The right to health in Palestine is threatened by Israel's reprisals on civil society organisations

By Farah Caïdi / GICJ

30% of the health services are provided by different Civil Society Organisations (CSO) in Palestine. Along with the shortage in health services provided by the Palestinian Authority, the latter cannot provide those services in the Area C of the West Bank. In this context, Health Work Committees - Palestine لجان العمل الصحي is one of the main organisations ensuring that children, women, and men have access to the medical care they need. This is what Ali Hassouneh, the acting general manager, shared with the Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory on this 3rd day of public hearings.

The organisation implemented the first centre for early breast cancer detection, a unique program in the area. It has a mobile clinic enabling them to examine women in the most marginalised areas.

However, because of the designation of the organisation as unlawful, the regular arrests of its employees by the Israel military and the pressure exerted on donors by NGO monitor (an Israeli right-wing NGO), the organisation's activities greatly suffered. The donor organisations went from 40 to only 5. Thus, they were forced to hand out the ownership of the centre for early breast cancer detection to another organisation and to stop many services, including health services in more than 85 schools.

Geneva International Centre for Justice (GICJ) reiterates once again its support to the Palestinian civil society, and particularly to the human rights organisations victims of Israeli reprisals. These organisations are threatened because of their long-standing work within Palestinian society, but also because of their presence at the international scale. Many of them received donations from a number of countries and are actively working with the UN mechanisms, denouncing Israel violations.