The Palestinian Authority (PA) on Wednesday said it will receive over 60,000 coronavirus vaccine doses within the next 48 hours, the first shipment provided by the World Health Organization's (WHO) COVAX initiative aimed at guaranteeing fair and equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines for every country.

That's only enough doses to vaccinate 31,000 people out of a population of nearly five million Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza. 

Israel, which has faced criticism for not sharing more of its supplies with the Palestinians, has already vaccinated five million people – more than half of its population – and has largely reopened its economy.

Palestinian Health Ministry spokesman Kamal al-Shakhra said authorities would receive 38,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine and 24,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine. The AstraZeneca vaccines will be kept in storage until the WHO reviews recent safety concerns.

An Israeli security official confirmed the shipment, which arrived at Israel's Ben Gurion International Airport, and said about a third of the vaccines would be sent to Gaza later on Wednesday. 

The official spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations. These are the first doses to arrive through the WHO's COVAX initiative, a global humanitarian partnership that has been slow to get off the ground, facing shortages of cash and supplies as rich countries have galloped ahead with their vaccination campaigns. 

Those global inequities have been on vivid display in Israel, which boasts one of the world's fastest vaccination campaigns, and the Palestinian territories, which have yet to receive enough vaccines to cover medical workers, let alone the elderly or those with chronic illness.

Until now, the PA had received 2,000 doses from Israel and acquired another 10,000 doses of the Russian-made Sputnik V vaccine. 

Authorities in the Gaza Strip, which is ruled by the Islamic militant group Hamas, have received 60,000 doses in shipments organized by Mohammed Dahlan, a political rival of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas based in the United Arab Emirates.