How the Gaza war has impacted the pace of Abraham Accords-style Arab-Israeli normalization

Analysis How the Gaza war has impacted the pace of Abraham Accords-style Arab-Israeli normalization
(L-R) Bahrain Foreign Minister Abdullatif Al-Zayani, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, US President Donald Trump, and UAE Foreign Minister Abdullah bin Zayed Al-Nahyan participate in the signing of the Abraham Accords at the White House in Washington, D.C., on September 15, 2020. (AFP)
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Updated 26 September 2024
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How the Gaza war has impacted the pace of Abraham Accords-style Arab-Israeli normalization

How the Gaza war has impacted the pace of Abraham Accords-style Arab-Israeli normalization
  • The 2020 accords normalized relations between Israel, the UAE, and Bahrain, marking a major step in the peace process
  • The Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack and the resulting war in Gaza paused the accords’ momentum, complicating future agreements

LONDON: It is exactly four years since Donald Trump stood on the South Lawn of the White House, flanked by a beaming Benjamin Netanyahu and the foreign ministers of Bahrain and the UAE, each holding a copy of the Abraham Accords Declaration.

The signing of the agreements on Sept. 15, 2020, a process driven by the Trump administration, appeared to be the most significant development in the Arab-Israeli peace process for years.




In the historic Abraham Accords, Bahrain and the UAE recognized Israel’s sovereignty and agreed to normalize diplomatic relations. (AFP/File)

Both Bahrain and the UAE recognized Israel’s sovereignty and agreed to normalize diplomatic relations — the only Arab states to have done so since Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994.

In so doing, as the one-page declaration signed by all four parties affirmed, they recognized “the importance of maintaining and strengthening peace in the Middle East … based on mutual understanding and coexistence,” and vowed to “seek to end radicalization and conflict and to provide all children a better future.”

A number of “firsts” followed. For the first time, it became possible to call direct to Israel from the UAE, and Emirati ships and planes began to dock and land in Israeli ports and airports. Various trade and business deals were made.




The Abraham Accords ushered in an era of understanding that saw the opening of Abu Dhabi’s Abrahamic Family House, which has been featured in TIME Magazine's annual list of the World’s Greatest Places. (WAM photo)

The region’s major player was missing from the White House photo op that day in 2020, but speculation that Saudi Arabia would soon follow suit and normalize relations with Israel was rife.

Three years later, in a groundbreaking and wide-ranging interview with Fox News, broadcast on Sept. 20, 2023, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman gave the biggest hint yet that such a historic breakthrough might be afoot.




Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman being interviewed by Bret Baier of Fox News in September 2023. (AN Archives)

“Every day we get closer,” the Saudi crown prince told Bret Baier of Fox News, adding Saudi Arabia could work with Israel, although he added that any such agreement, which would be “the biggest historical deal since the end of the Cold War,” would depend on positive outcomes for the Palestinians.

“If we have a breakthrough of reaching a deal that give the Palestinians their needs and make the region calm, we’re going to work with whoever is there,” he said.

Just over two weeks later, on Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas and its allies attacked Israel. All bets were off, and the Abraham Accords seemed doomed to go the way of every previous initiative in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process since the Madrid Conference of 1991.




People pay tribute near the coffins of some of the people killed in the October 7 deadly attack by Hamas militants from the Gaza Strip, during a funeral in Kfar Harif in southern Israel, on Oct. 25, 2023. (AFP)

But, say some commentators, despite the death and destruction of the past year, it would be wrong to write off the accords completely, and whether or not the process can be resuscitated could depend on which of the two main candidates in the coming US presidential election is handed the keys to the White House by the American electorate on Nov. 5.

“I’m not sure I would describe the accords as being on life support,” said Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Chatham House (the Royal Institute of International Affairs).

“They are actually weathering this very difficult storm of the Gaza war. That is certainly putting the leadership and the decision-making in the UAE and Bahrain under a microscope, and of course that poses difficult domestic dynamics for these leaders to navigate.

“But at the same time, they remain committed to the Abraham Accords and haven’t shown any willingness to walk back from them or to break diplomatic ties. They in fact are arguing that by having diplomatic ties with Israel, they have a better avenue to support Palestinians and work behind the scenes with the Israelis.”




​This picture taken on March 28, 2024 from Israel's southern border with the Gaza Strip shows buildings which have been destroyed by Israeli strikes, amid the ongoing battles between Israeli forces and Hamas militants since the October 7 attack on southern Israel. (AFP)

As for the Israelis, “normalization with Saudi Arabia is not on the cards for now, partly because obviously the Israeli leadership has different priorities right now, and after Oct. 7, the price of normalization became higher.

“And I think the Israeli leadership is calculating that if they wait this out — and perhaps over-anticipating that the Saudis will still be there, which could be a miscalculation — the price that they have to pay for normalization will go down again.

“I think that they’re assuming that the conditions in the region might change, or perhaps if the outcome of the US election leads to a Trump victory, that might alter what they need to do, what commitments they need to make toward the Palestinians that would satisfy the Saudis.”

INNUMBERS

18% Decline in Israel’s overall trade with outside world since eruption of Gaza war in October 2023.

4% Decline in trade between Israel and 7 Arab countries that have normalized ties with it during the same period.

14% Drop in Israel-UAE trade in the last quarter of 2023 following the conflict.

(Source: Abraham Accords Peace Institute)

But for Brian Katulis, senior fellow for US foreign policy at the Middle East Institute in Washington, “it’s a coin toss” whether a Trump or Kamala Harris administration would be most likely to reinvigorate the Abraham Accords.

“As we saw in the candidates’ debate on Tuesday evening, these issues don’t really matter to either of the leaders or the political discourse in America right now,” he said.

“These questions, of the Abraham Accords, of Israel-Palestine or of Iran, don’t really drive the political and policy debate in a major way compared to US domestic issues — immigration, abortion, who we are as a country, inflation.

“When it comes to foreign policy issues, China is much more relevant as a political question.”




Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and his Democratic rival Kamala Harris participate in a debate in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on September 10, 2024. (AFP)

Although, as the father of the Abraham Accords, Trump might be assumed to be keen to re-engage with an initiative he once saw as a foundation stone of his legacy — in January, a Republican lawmaker nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize — “he’s just so erratic as a leader, and I don’t know that he’ll be focused on it,” Katulis said.

“Harris may actually put more time and thought into it. In the debate, she was the only candidate who talked about a two-state solution, and that’s music to the ears of anyone in places like Saudi Arabia, which have been calling for a state of Palestine forever.”

But Saudi Arabia is unlikely to shift far from the position it took in 2002, when it was the author of the Arab Peace Initiative, which was adopted by the Council of Arab States.

This offered Israel peace and normalization of relations with all 22 Arab states, in exchange for “full Israeli withdrawal from all the Arab territories occupied since June 1967, in implementation of Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338, reaffirmed by the Madrid Conference of 1991 and the land-for-peace principle, and Israel’s acceptance of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.”

Merissa Khurma, program director of the Middle East Program at the Wilson Center, said: “And of course, the Abraham Accords agreements completely flipped that formula because they offered normalization first.




Israel's revenge attacks against Palestinians in Gaza has not spared houses of worship, making efforts at restoring peace more difficult. (AFP)

“The premise they presented was that it was through these channels of communication that have now been established that we can try to address the thorny issues in the Palestinian-Israeli arena.

“But we all know that the reality on the ground was very different, that settlements and outposts have expanded and with the emergence of the most right-wing government in Israel’s history, all of that has been accelerated.

“I’ve spoken to officials and thought leaders in the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco, and there’s consensus that the Abraham Accords are, at best, on pause. Someone even said the accords are in a coma and they will need to be resuscitated after the war ends in Gaza.”

Harris, Joe Biden’s vice president, is likely to follow in his administration’s footsteps to some extent when it comes to the Abraham Accords.

“The Biden administration was a bit slow to embrace the model of the accords when they came into office, really, because, you know, they saw it as Trump’s legacy, and they were very partisan in their approach,” said Vakil.

“But they did come around, and they did begin to embrace this idea of integration through normalization. The reality, though — and this is what we’ve seen born out since Oct. 7 — is that without providing a mechanism and commitment to restart a peace process, and one that allows Palestinians to have self-determination, the accords, on their own, cannot deliver Israel’s security or provide the region with that integration, that economic and security integration that they’re seeking.”




Israel's relentless revenge attacks that has killed  more than 40,000 Palestinians in Gaza to date has only served to derail attempts at restoring peace in the region. (AFP)/File)

A reboot of the agreements in the wake of the cessation of the current hostilities would be an opportunity — if not a precondition — to reconfigure them and put Palestinian demands at the top of the agenda.

“The Abraham Accords was a well-intentioned initiative led by countries in the region that wanted to prioritize their national security and economic interests,” Merissa Khurma said.

“No one can say taking the path of peace is a bad idea. But the heavy criticism from the region and the Arab public in general, which you can see in the polling from 2021 until today, is that in doing so they basically sidelined the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and flipped the formula that was the essence of the Arab Peace Initiative led by Saudi Arabia in 2002.”


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To move forward successfully, said Katulis, whoever becomes America’s next president must “prioritize Palestine and make it a big item on the agenda.”

To do this, they should “go back to good old-fashioned collective diplomacy and form a regional coalition with a new international framework to create the state of Palestine. It’s ripe for the picking, and I would lean into it.”

Katulis added: “I would advise either President Trump or Harris to work by, with and through all of these countries, from Saudi Arabia to Morocco and others, those that have accords and those that want to. I would spend at least six months assembling everything that people have argued since the war started, and what they’d be willing to do, and what they’d be willing to invest, and present to Israel, the Israeli public and its politicians an offer — a state of Palestine that is going to be good for your security and will also insulate you from the threats presented by Iran.




Palestinian demonstrators sit before Israeli border guards in Beit Jala, occupied West Bank on September 3, 2024 in solidarity with a Palestinian family whose land was taken over by armed Israeli settlers planning to build a new outpost, aggravating animosities. (AFP)

“It is important to think practical, to think realistic, and realistic is that the next US president is not going to actually attend to a lot of these issues, so we’ve got to work with and through people diplomatically.

“Use that new energy in the UAE and Saudi Arabia and other places, use the resources they have to actually do some good, and that good should have as its endpoint making an offer to say, this is a state of Palestine which will coexist with Israel.”

That new energy, said Khurma, was evident at the 33rd summit of the Arab League in Bahrain in May.

In the joint declaration issued afterward, the league reiterated “our unwavering position and our call for a just and comprehensive peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine, as well as our support for the call of His Excellency President Mahmoud Abbas, President of the State of Palestine, for an international peace conference to be convened and for irreversible steps to be taken to implement the two-state solution, in accordance with the Arab Peace Initiative and authoritative international resolutions, with a view to establishing an independent and sovereign Palestinian State, with East Jerusalem as its capital, on the basis of the lines of 4 June 1967.”




Palestinian Authority's President Mahmud Abbas holds a placard showing maps of historical Palestine as he meets by video conference with representatives of Palestinian factions gathered at the Palestinian embassy in Beirut on September 3, 2020,. (POOL/AFP)

For whoever becomes the next president of the US, this initiative could be the vital missing component needed to jumpstart the Abraham Accords.

“When they met in Bahrain, the Arab countries revived the Arab Peace Initiative and took it a step further,” Khurma said.

“In the US media, there was very little coverage, but the declaration is very important because it shows that even in the midst of this horrific war, these countries are still willing to revive the Arab Peace Initiative, a peace plan with Israel, and to extend a hand to normalize with Israel, but of course, without leaving the Palestinians behind.”
 

 


Lebanon aid convoy driver injured after Israeli strike

Lebanon aid convoy driver injured after Israeli strike
Updated 58 min 10 sec ago
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Lebanon aid convoy driver injured after Israeli strike

Lebanon aid convoy driver injured after Israeli strike
  • Minister of Public Works and Transport Ali Hamieh told AFP that the convoy was carrying “humanitarian aid from the Lebanese government

Beirut: An Israeli strike hit an east Lebanon town as an aid convoy drove through it Tuesday, injuring one of its drivers, a governor and the state news agency said.
The governor of Baalbek, Bachir Khodr, on X reported “an Israeli strike very close to an aid convoy as it drove through the town of Ain” on its way to Ras Baalbek.
He posted a picture from the back window of the car he was in, showing a huge column of smoke billowing up into the sky dozens of meters (yards) behind it.
“The driver of the truck driving directly behind us was injured,” he added.
Israeli strikes hit Ain during “the passage of a convoy consisting of three trucks” heading toward the town of Ras Baalbek, said the National News Agency (NNA).
“One of the aid trucks heading to Ras Baalbek was damaged as a result of the blowback of the strike in Ain, which led to the injury of the truck driver.”
Minister of Public Works and Transport Ali Hamieh told AFP that the convoy was carrying “humanitarian aid from the Lebanese government.”
It “was traveling to the area accompanied by the Lebanese Red Cross with agreement from the United Nations,” he said.
The convoy was made up of five trucks, and carried aid from several countries including the United Arab Emirates and Turkiye.
Two had previously unloaded goods in Baalbek, NNA said.
Almost a year of cross-border fire, Israel on September 23 increased its strikes against Lebanese militant group Hezbollah in south and east Lebanon, as well as the capital’s southern suburbs.
The escalation has killed more than 1,300 people, according to an AFP tally of official figures.


‘Extremely valuable’ secret tomb uncovered in Jordan’s Petra

‘Extremely valuable’ secret tomb uncovered in Jordan’s Petra
Updated 14 October 2024
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‘Extremely valuable’ secret tomb uncovered in Jordan’s Petra

‘Extremely valuable’ secret tomb uncovered in Jordan’s Petra
  • 12 skeletons, hundreds of artifacts recovered as lead archaeologist hails ‘rare’ find
  • Discovery may offer new clues about ancient Arab society

LONDON: Archaeologists have uncovered human remains and hundreds of artifacts in a hidden tomb in Petra, Jordan, The Times reported.

The discovery of the 2,000-year-old underground site could help researchers solve long-running questions over the origins of the ancient city and those who built it.

Located underneath Petra’s Treasury, the tomb contained 12 well-preserved skeletons and hundreds of bronze, iron and ceramic artifacts.

The joint US-Jordanian archaeological team that made the discovery worked underneath the famous edifice, which has been featured in films including “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.”

Based on the central location of the tomb within the UNESCO World Heritage Site, it is believed to have been commissioned by inhabitants of prominent social standing.

Hundreds more items are expected to be recovered as excavation continues, according to lead archaeologist Dr. Pearce Paul Creasman, executive director of the American Center of Research.

Petra’s Treasury was named as such because of an early theory that it held the treasure of a pharaoh, but most researchers today believe that it was a tomb built by Nabataean King Aretas IV, who ruled from about 9 B.C. to 40 A.D.

This has been supported by the latest discovery, as archaeologists believe the uncovered tomb predates the Treasury.

Creasman said his team dated the hidden tomb to the first century B.C. using luminescence dating, which tracks the last exposure of mineral grains to sunlight. The archaeologists first discovered the tomb using ground-penetrating radar.

The recovery of its contents is a rare event. Many other tombs have been discovered across Petra over the years but most were empty, having been used multiple times throughout the centuries.

“It is rare to find a tomb with human remains in Petra,” Creasman said. “So, when you do find one, that becomes extremely valuable.”

The first historical record of the Nabataean civilization was in 312 B.C. They had repelled an invasion launched by Antigonus, the former general and successor of Alexander the Great who inherited large parts of the Macedonian Empire.

“They just appear in the historical record and then it goes over a hundred years before we read about them in text again, by which time they have this fully fledged society and Petra is being built in the sense that we know it today,” Creasman said.

Little is known of early Nabataean society, though ancient recordings suggest that the civilization was remarkably egalitarian, as there is little difference between noble and common Nabataean tombs.

The discovery of the Petra tomb may offer new clues about the ancient Arab society, including diet and nutrition, Creasman said.

“This is going to help us learn more about a shared, regional past,” he added. “The Nabateans were a multicultural trading society who only worked because they united as a people. I hope they might be able to teach us something today.”


Israeli army says intercepts two drones approaching from Syria

Israeli army says intercepts two drones approaching from Syria
Updated 14 October 2024
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Israeli army says intercepts two drones approaching from Syria

Israeli army says intercepts two drones approaching from Syria
  • Israel is fighting a war on two fronts, one on its northern border with Lebanon, the other with Hamas in Gaza, while also facing attacks from Iran-backed militants in Syria, Iraq and Yemen

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said it intercepted two drones approaching from Syria on Monday, a day after a drone attack by Lebanon’s Hezbollah on a base killed four soldiers.
“A short while ago, two UAVs that approached Israeli territory from Syria were successfully intercepted by the IAF (air force). The UAVs were intercepted before crossing into Israeli territory,” the military said in a statement.
Israel is fighting a war on two fronts, one on its northern border with Lebanon, the other with Hamas in Gaza, while also facing attacks from Iran-backed militants in Syria, Iraq and Yemen.
Hezbollah has historically relied on its ally Syria to transport arms and other equipment from its main backer Iran.
Israeli authorities rarely comment publicly about individual strikes or operations involving Syria, but have repeatedly said they will not allow Iran to expand its sway over the region.
Last week, the Israeli army said its forces killed a Hezbollah figure inside Syria, Adham Jahout, who was described as an intermediary who “relayed information from Syrian regime sources to the Hezbollah.”
Iran and Hezbollah have been among the Syrian government’s most important allies in the country’s more than decade-old civil war.
On October 30, an Israeli air strike hit a road linking Syria and Lebanon as Israel tried to cut off supply routes of Hezbollah, according to a Syrian war monitor.
That strike came less than a week after Israeli jets struck the main Lebanon-Syria border crossing of Masnaa in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley, cutting off the road to traffic.
A deadly strike blamed on Israel on April 1 against Iran’s diplomatic mission in Damascus levelled the embassy’s consular annex, killing seven Revolutionary Guard members, including two generals.
Nearly two weeks later, Iran launched a wave of missiles and drones at Israel, Tehran’s first-ever direct assault on Israeli territory since the establishment of its Islamic republic in 1979.


Hezbollah targets Israeli naval base after deadly drone strike

Hezbollah targets Israeli naval base after deadly drone strike
Updated 14 October 2024
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Hezbollah targets Israeli naval base after deadly drone strike

Hezbollah targets Israeli naval base after deadly drone strike
  • The group said its fighters launched rockets at a naval base near Haifa

BEIRUT: Hezbollah said it targeted an Israeli naval base on Monday, a day after a drone strike killed four soldiers in the deadliest attack on Israel since the war in Lebanon began.
The group said its fighters launched rockets at a naval base near Haifa in northern Israel, calling it a tribute to its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
The Israeli military said on Monday it had intercepted another launch aimed at a training camp at Binyamina, also near Haifa, a day after four soldiers were killed and dozens more wounded in a Hezbollah drone strike.
On Monday, Israeli army chief Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi visited the Golani Brigade’s training camp in Binyamina, and told soldiers: “We are at war, and an attack on a training base on the home front is difficult and the results are painful.”
Israeli volunteer rescue service United Hatzalah said its teams in Binyamina assisted more than 60 people with mild to critical injuries.
Israel and Hezbollah have been at war since Israel intensified its strikes on Lebanon on September 23 and sent ground troops across the border a week later.
Israel has vowed to secure its northern border to allow tens of thousands of people displaced by nearly a year of Hezbollah rocket fire launched. Hezbollah says the rocket fire is in solidarity with its Palestinian ally, Hamas.
The war, which saw an expansion in fighting and air strikes around Lebanon at the weekend, has killed more than 1,300 people, according to an AFP tally of Lebanese health ministry figures.
On Sunday, Hezbollah threatened more attacks if Israel’s continues its offensive in Lebanon, warning Israel what it saw was “nothing compared to what awaits it if it decides to continue its aggression.”
Escalating violence
In Lebanon, Israel has expanded its air strikes mainly on Hezbollah strongholds, while its troops in south Lebanon have engaged in fierce fighting.
Hezbollah said it shelled Israeli troops inside a southern Lebanese village Monday, after saying it targeted soldiers elsewhere along the border.
Lebanon’s official National News Agency reported Sunday that Israeli forces had escalated air strikes on southern Lebanon, pounding border villages.
Lebanon’s health ministry said Israel’s strikes on Saturday killed 51 people, including 16 in Maaysra, a Shiite Muslim village in a Christian-majority area north of Beirut.
In Nabatiyeh, in the south, residents spoke of their shock and grief after its marketplace was hit on Saturday.
“I’m staying here and I will not leave... Nabatiyeh is our mother. It’s heartbreaking to see people’s livelihoods gone,” said Tarek Sadaka, barely holding back tears.
Others have fled the city, with more than one million Lebanese leaving areas that morphed into war zones within weeks.
A UN peacekeeping force deployed in Lebanon since Israel’s 1978 invasion has been thrust onto the front lines of the latest war, with Israel repeatedly calling on it to abandon their positions.
On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on them to withdraw for their own safety and said their presence had “the effect of providing Hezbollah terrorists with human shields.”
Five United Nations peacekeepers were injured in a series of incidents last week, with the latest seeing the UN force accuse Israeli troops of breaking through a gate and entering one of their positions.
The Israeli military later said a tank “backed several meters into a UNIFIL post” while “under fire” and attempting to evacuate injured soldiers.
UN chief Antonio Guterres said “attacks” against peacekeepers “may constitute a war crime.”
Three Lebanese soldiers were wounded on Sunday, the country’s army said, when Israeli forces fired on military vehicles in south Lebanon.
War on Gaza
The war in Lebanon erupted nearly a year after Hamas staged the deadliest-ever attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, sparking the conflict in Gaza.
The attack resulted in the deaths of 1,206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli figures.
The number includes hostages killed in captivity.
The war in Gaza has killed, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, 42,289 people, the majority civilians. The UN has described the figures as reliable.
Gaza’s civil defense agency said Israeli shelling late Sunday on a school used as a shelter for displaced people had killed 15 people. The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports.
“The Al-Mufti school was bombarded with a large volley of Israeli artillery, resulting in an initial death toll of 15 martyrs, including children, women and entire families, and 50 wounded,” said its spokesman, Mahmud Bassal.
Regional tensions
With the wars in Lebanon and Gaza showing no sign of abating, fears of an all-out regional conflict have seen Iran, which backs Hezbollah and Hamas, engage in diplomatic efforts with allies and other powers.
Israel has vowed to retaliate against Iran’s missile strike of October 1, prompting a pledge from Tehran’s side that it would hit back if it is hit.
Iran has, for decades, financed and trained militant groups in Lebanon, the Palestinian territories and beyond, but it has yet to enter into direct conflict with its arch enemy, Israel.
On Sunday, Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian spoke with his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, to seek support for a Gaza and Lebanon ceasefire, according to the Iranian presidential website.
According to Macron’s office, the French leader appealed to Iran to support “a general de-escalation” in Lebanon and Gaza.
The Pentagon said it would deploy a high-altitude anti-missile system and its US military crew to Israel to help the ally protect itself from potential Iranian attack.


Second phase of polio vaccination campaign begins in Gaza, WHO says

Second phase of polio vaccination campaign begins in Gaza, WHO says
Updated 14 October 2024
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Second phase of polio vaccination campaign begins in Gaza, WHO says

Second phase of polio vaccination campaign begins in Gaza, WHO says
  • Aid groups carried out a first round of vaccinations last month

GENEVA: The World Health Organization said on X on Monday that the second phase of a polio vaccination campaign had started in central Gaza.
Aid groups carried out a first round of vaccinations last month, after a baby was partially paralyzed by the type 2 polio virus in August, in the first such case in the territory in 25 years.