Sinjil, a village tucked between the sleepy hills on the outskirts of Ramallah in the West Bank with a population of about 6000.

Soon after the coronavirus outbreak began, the villagers formed committees to manage the deadly threat.

The entrances to Sinjil were immediately shuttered and restricted access to outsiders. Recreational facilities were ordered to close with grocery stores opened for limited working hours.

Mayor Dr Moataz Tawafsha, who heads the Emergency Committee, has formed five committees to deal with the coronavirus. The Emergency Committee leads and manages and was responsible to create the panels to meet the community’s immediate needs.

One of the group handles security led by a group of young volunteers, who protect the town and implement the decisions and instructions received from the Palestinian government regarding closures. The group also plays a role in protecting the entrances to the town and the curfew.

The Food Security Committee collects products from the local stores and organises the stock for distribution.

On March 5, the Palestinian Authority declared a state of emergency, after the West Bank’s first coronavirus case was reported. A month later the order was renewed, and a strict curfew was imposed putting a great financial burden on the residents of the village.

The villagers immediately launched a charitable initiative on its Facebook page under the title “Think of Others” calling on the town’s businesspeople to make financial contributions and to donate in-kind.

With 300 residents working in Israel and another similar amount of people working outside the village throughout the West Bank. PA Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh has repeatedly called on Palestinians working in Israel to return home.

Sinjil’s Statistics Committee was formed to ensure that all who entered the village were screened for COVID-19

At the outset of the crisis, many rumours and fake news created fear and confusion among the residence which led to officials forming a Media Committee to educate people and to keep them abreast of the latest news of the pandemic.

Wearing masks, volunteers from the Security Committee man roadblocks at the entrances to the village, sanitizing every car that enters and making themselves a barrier between their families and potential carriers of the virus.

Since the initiative began in early March, a large room at the municipality has been filled with cases of cooking oil, rice, flour, and sugar. The Head of the Committee consulted with the villagers on how and when to distribute the food packages.

The coronavirus has affected almost everyone in the village, including the families of the hundreds of workers who lost their jobs, who used to give and are now on the receiving end.

With Ramadan just a few days away, more than 600 food packages have been prepared containing the basic stables as well as meat. Each package costs $70 to prepare. In addition to contributing food and money, some have offered their homes to be used as quarantine sites.

Some have paid the electric and medical bills of those struggling and some home-owners have offered tenants to defer rent payments. Other donors have asked that their money be allocated to supplying children with items such as milk, diapers, and toys.

By Annisa Essack