AL-BIREH, West Bank, 17 March 2003 — Gas masks are out of the reach of most Palestinians as a possible US-led war on Iraq approaches.

Yousef Al-Mimi, a pharmacist in the West Bank town of Al-Bireh, said yesterday he stocked up on chemical protection kits to sell in his shop but found few Palestinians able to afford the price — $100 for adults and $200 for children.

Citing a lack of funds, the Palestinian Authority did not buy masks for the 3.6 million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza in preparation for a scenario in which Iraqi missiles fired at Israel hit those areas instead.

Israel has been distributing gas masks to its population since the 1991 Gulf War, when 39 Iraqi Scud missiles slammed into the Zionist state.

Distribution has been increased in Israel in the run-up to possible conflict in the Gulf although Israeli officials say they believe missile attacks this time are highly unlikely.

“When I published ads (for the chemical protection kits) in the newspaper, I received phone calls from all over the West Bank and Gaza but when they found out the price, they did not knock at my door,” Mimi said.

He said he had sold gas masks, purchased from an Israeli company, to only 40 families.

Some 60,000 Palestinians are eligible to receive gas masks from Israel, which has been battling a Palestinian uprising for statehood.

They live in West Bank areas designated by interim peace deals in the 1990s as under total Israeli control.

Last month, Israel’s High Court dismissed a petition by a human rights group that Israel, which reoccupied Palestinian cities in June following suicide bombings, be ordered to give gas masks to all Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

Israel argued that the Palestinian Authority still maintains civic responsibilities in those areas, where Palestinians have held frequent pro-Iraqi demonstrations that included shouted calls for Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to “bomb Tel Aviv”.

“They (the Israelis) are occupying us so they must give us masks. I cannot afford to buy a mask even if I worked for a week,” said Sami Bazzar, a taxi driver from Ramallah.

“Even if I bought one, what about my wife and kids,” asked the 38-year-old father of four.

Rasmi Matareyya, a Ramallah physician, said Palestinians with chronic ailments have begun to buy extra medicine. “Patients with heart problems and other urgent diseases take two boxes of drugs instead of one. But there has been no major jump in buying habits because people don’t have extra money. They can hardly afford to eat first,” Matareyya said.

Palestinian unemployment has climbed to about 60 percent since the start of the revolt in September 2000.

“I am not afraid of Saddam’s missiles — and there is a big ‘if’ here, but I am worried that (Israeli Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon will again confine us to our homes once the war starts,” said Hadla Ammar, a Palestinian homemaker.