No new coronavirus cases were reported in the Palestinian Authority (PA) on Thursday, the PA “health minister”, Mai al-Kaila, said, according to the Wafa news agency. She said in a statement that the total number of cases remains at 548, including PA-assigned areas of Judea and Samaria, the Gaza Strip and eastern Jerusalem, which the PA includes in its tally of cases despite it being under Israeli sovereignty. The number of recoveries has reached 426, or 77.7 percent of the documented cases, said al-Kaila. Al-Kaila said 118 cases remain active, including 55 in eastern Jerusalem, six in the Gaza Strip and the rest in Judea and Samaria, mainly in the Hebron district with 24 cases, 17 in Jerusalem district villages under Palestinian Authority rule, and 13 in the Ramallah district. None of the patients is in intensive care, she added. PA cabinet leader Mohammad Shtayyeh last week announced a partial ease on the lockdown restrictions put in place to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus. That announcement came a day after PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas agreed to extend the state of emergency that was declared over the spread of coronavirus until June 5. Abbas initially announced a month-long state of emergency after the first seven cases of coronavirus were identified in Bethlehem. Since then, cases were identified in other PA-controlled cities as well.
