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The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
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The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
Ruchama Marton and Hadas Ziv. Physicians for Human Rights Israel, 30 Levanda Street, Tel Aviv, Israel, 03-687-3718, mail@phr.org.il
Following 26 years of occupation, the Oslo agreements were signed between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) in 1993. The responsibility for health and education was transferred to the PA on May 1994. The right to health of the Palestinians in the Occupied territories (OT) was severely neglected by Israeli authorities. With the transfer of responsibility, Israel’s legacy of neglect was not accounted for, and the health system was transferred with poor infrastructure with no respect for continuity of patients’ rights. The paper will attempt to present PHRI struggle for the right to health in the OT in face of the new political reality. Both Israel and the PA chose to overlook social rights in general, and the right to health in particular. Israel was unwilling to recognize its responsibility and pay financially, and the PA was striving for signs of sovereignty. PHRI struggle was therefore modified from the comprehensive world view that demanded Israel to be accountable to demanding it to avoid hindering the independent functioning of the PA health system. By accepting the political restriction of its struggle PHR took upon itself the feminine role of “taking care” (responsibility), leaving the decision making (power) in the hand of the Israeli security apparatus. The paper will check the ways in which such decision endangered PHRI subversive potential, and its gradual reappearance since September 2000.
Learning Objectives:
Keywords: Human Rights, War
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.