PA daily revives libel that former Israeli MP admited that medical experiments were carried out on Palestinian prisoners

Headline: "As if the prisoners need the Coronavirus"

"At the end of the 1990s, Chairman of the [Israeli] Parliamentary Science Committee Dalia Itzik admitted that more than 1,100 medical experiments were carried out on prisoners through contracts with Israeli drug companies to actually test the drugs and their consequences and reactions on the body in order to know if a certain drug has side effects. This admission proves that the prisoners constitute guinea pigs for Israel."

This is not the first time the PA has claimed that former Speaker of Israeli Parliament and MP asserted that Israel conducts medical experiments on Palestinian prisoners. Reporting on this libel in 2008, PMW checked with then Israeli Parliament Speaker Dalia Itzik and the Ministry of Health. The following are their responses:

Office of Israeli Parliament Speaker Dalia Itzik: "[Israeli Parliament] Knesset Speaker Itzik never made the statements attributed to her. Speaker Itzik is certain that incidents of this kind do not occur in Israel; this is not how Israel conducts itself." [2007]

Ministry of Health: "Clinical testing on prisoners in prison was never approved, never performed, and is most certainly not taking place at present." [2007]