By: IBRAHIM Jaafar
The Palestinian Authority (PA) Ministry of Labour had warned that Palestinians caught smuggling in workers from Israel into the occupied West Bank will be held legally accountable.
Several Palestinians who were caught attempting to smuggle workers from Israel in their vehicles were arrested by the PA security forces over the past few days, Jerusalem post recorded.
For weeks, Palestinian officials have issued warnings that workers travelling back and forth between Israel, its settlements and their homes could fuel a larger outbreak of COVID-19.
“Some workers are trying to avoid being tested for the virus or forced into isolation, and this is a big problem,” PA governor of Nablus Ibrahim Ramadan said. “They are endangering their lives and those of their families.”
The PA fears that some of the workers may have contracted the disease during their stay in Israel, and it will therefore isolate or quarantine workers returning from Israel for 14 days, and has set aside some hotels and other locations as quarantine sites, Haaretz reported.
The PA said all workers who return from Israel will be forced to take an initial health test by the Palestinian security services and medical staff waiting for them at the Israeli checkpoints, and if there are early symptoms they will be sent for a coronavirus test.
With the number of people infected in the occupied West Bank steadily increasing past 240, and the Coronavirus continues to ravage almost every nation on earth, Arab countries remain unable, or unwilling, to formulate a collective strategy or economic stimulus plans to help the poorest and most vulnerable. Thus the good measure had been set and Palestinian need to respect the order for there collective safety.