After months of delays, the Palestinian Authority (PA) began its public coronavirus vaccination campaign this week, albeit to a very slow start.

The latest: 247,641 Palestinians tested positive for COVID-19; 221,221 recoveries; and 2,629 deathsOf those who…

“We are turning people away, very sick people, because we have nowhere to put them,” a nurse who asked to remain anonymous told Mondoweiss. “At this point it’s like we were waiting for people to die just so that someone else can take their bed or their ventilator.”

Medical professionals in Gaza are finally starting to get vaccinated against COVID-19. Dr. Mohammed Abdelmanem, a 47-year-old pulmonologist, will be among the first wave to receive a vaccine this week. He says he’s looking forward to finally not being afraid.

Cases of COVID-19 continue to rise in the West Bank and Gaza as Palestinians experience a third wave, overwhelming hospitals and filling ICU’s to their maximum capacity.

Palestinian-Americans were turned back from an Israeli vaccination clinic at a checkpoint outside Ramallah because they held Palestinian ID cards, and the U.S. Embassy won’t help them. “It would be different if all U.S. citizens here were being treated the same,” Wafaa Jallaq tells Mondoweiss. “But when Israel, or being Israeli, is basically the distinction between who gets vaccinated and who doesn’t, that’s when it becomes frustrating. The U.S. has let go of its responsibility towards its citizens in the West Bank.”

Over the last week the West Bank continues to experience a “significant surge” in a third COVID-19 wave, according to the World Health Organization with some areas doubling the number of active cases in the last seven days.

This week will mark the one year anniversary since the first cases of the coronavirus were reported in Palestine, and a state of emergency was declared in the occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem, where Palestine’s COVID-19 outbreak began. One year later Palestine’s COVID-19 nightmare seems to only be getting worse. Cases are surging in the West Bank, causing health officials to declare a third wave of the virus, as many hospitals across the territory reach maximum capacity.

The JVP Health Advisory Council calls on Israel to assume its responsibility to distribute vaccines to Palestinians in the occupied territory: “As health workers, it would be a violation of our professional ethics to stand by in silence as this form of discrimination occurs.”

Palestinians wait for travel permits to enter into Egypt through the Rafah border crossing, in…