A health worker removes a box of the Sputnik V vaccine from cold storage at a Covid-19 vaccination center at Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow, Russia, on Friday, Feb. 19, 2021. With Sputnik V winning international recognition earlier this month, overcoming early skepticism, Russia is pitching it to the EU as the bloc struggles with its vaccine rollout. Photographer: Andrey Rudakov/Bloomberg According to the report, the vaccine purchase was stipulated in a secret clause in a Russian-brokered deal to return an Israeli woman who crossed the border into Syria. In exchange, Israel agreed to return two shepherds who crossed from Syria into Israeli territory, and pardoned a Druze woman from the Israeli-held section of the Golan Heights who had been sentenced to community service. The Ynet website said she was convicted of monitoring and photographing Israeli soldiers along the frontier.
Syria’s state-run SANA news agency denied the report of the vaccine clause, saying it was a lie meant to improve Israel’s image.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said only that Israel didn’t give the Syrians any vaccine from its own inventory, Ynet said. He didn’t comment directly on whether Israel bought Russian-made vaccines for Syria.
Read more: Feb. 18, Israel Returns Two Shepherds to Syria as Prisoner Swap Reported