WHO's Palestinian statistics: what's Israel got to do with it?

We are writing to express our serious concerns and surprise over some of the statements and quotations offered in Richard Horton's Offline1 about WHO's decision not to publish health statistics for the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in their World Health Statistics 2022.2 In fact, we entirely agree with Horton's central point about the need to publish accurate health statistics from all jurisdictions. We, too, cannot understand why Palestinian health data were not included, especially as Palestine is a member of the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office group.