Palestinians - and B'Tselem - exploiting coronavirus to demonize Israel, claim Israel destroyed a fake "clinic"

B'Tselem published yesterday:

During the Coronavirus crisis, Israel confiscates tents designated for clinic in the Northern West Bank

This morning, Thursday, 26 March 2020, at around 7:30 am, officials from Israel’s Civil Administration in the West Bank arrived with a military jeep escort, a bulldozer and two flatbed trucks with cranes at the Palestinian community of Khirbet Ibziq in the northern Jordan Valley. They confiscated poles and sheeting that were meant to form eight tents, two for a field clinic, and four for emergency housing for residents evacuated from their homes, and two as makeshift mosques. The force also confiscated a tin shack in place for more than two years, as well as a power generator and sacks of sand and cement. Four pallets of cinder blocks intended for the tent floors were taken away and four others demolished.

As the whole world battles an unprecedented and paralyzing healthcare crisis, Israel’s military is devoting time and resources to harassing the most vulnerable Palestinian communities in the West Bank, that Israel has attempted to drive out of the area for decades. Shutting down a first-aid community initiative during a health crisis is an especially cruel example of the regular abuse inflicted on these communities, and it goes against basic human and humanitarian principles during an emergency. Unlike Israel’s policies, this pandemic does not discriminate based on nationality, ethnicity or religion. It is high time the government and military acknowledged that now, of all times, Israel is responsible for the health and wellbeing of the five million Palestinians who live under its control in the Occupied Territories.

What really happened?

The Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) slammed the Human Rights NGO B'Tselem for alleging that the IDF demolished a coronavirus treatment center built by Palestinians in the Jordan Valley.

“We are sorry to see a Human Rights NGO choosing to exploit a global crisis to spread fake news,” the COGAT press statement said.

COGAT claims that the demolished structure was a guarding post built illegally and without permits by a resident of Bardala, which is northeast of Nablus.

Neither the Palestinian Authority (PA) nor International Health groups requested to build a treatment center for COVID-19 patients, according to COGAT's claims. 

COGAT is coordinating the delivery of thousands of masks and COVID-19 test kits donated by the World Health Organization to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, despite the blockade still enforced there. The aid is also provided to the West Bank, which is under the control of the PA.  

Khirbet Ibziq is in Area C where Israeli permits are required to build - under international law. (If Israel is considered the belligerent occupier, then Israel is required to administer building permits. If Israel claims the territory then it still is required to administer building permits.) Residents in the area of Khirbet Ibziq have a history of illegal building, which B'Tselem documents. This time they pretended that a couple of the tents were for a coronavirus clinic, even though no one even told the Palestinian Authority about this, let alone Israel.

It was a basic land grab - one made even more immoral because it was specifically done during this crisis. It was a lie from the start to make Israel look like monsters for confiscating the materials - way before they were even erected.

B'Tselem knows this and they play along with the fiction, because to them the moral imperative of demonizing Israel is far higher than little things like telling the truth.

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