Israel, the Palestinians and the water issue
Palestine-Israel, Economics, 7/9/2001

News reports stated that the policy pursued by Israel concerning the issue of waters prohibits the Palestinians from their due shares of waters. A matter which pushed them ( the Palestinians ) to use polluted waters while the Israelis get the biggest share of fresh waters of which great part go to the Swimming pools in the Israeli settlements.

The news reports stressed that the Palestinians assert that the injustice in water distribution affect the growth operations in their areas.

They added that the imbalance has been increasing daily noting that in the West Bank the Palestinians are obliged to go into very far areas in search of waters while the Israeli youngmen just few meters apart enjoy swimming pools filled with waters in the settlements in the heart of their lands.

In Gaza, thousands of Israeli settlers enjoy the abundant waters pumped to them while more than one million Palestinians suffer water shortage and are obliged to pump each drop of underground water, polluted by the salty sea waters and the sewage waters.

Due to the reliance of the Palestinian economy on food agriculture, the future seems gloomy.

The reports indicated that the Palestinians started to build stations for desalinating sea water, while Israel which owns the potentials to desalinate water of the sea wants the naturally fresh water, noting that with the increased number of the Israeli population and settlers the problem will be deteriorating.

They indicated that Israel has pumped the waters of the Tiberies to such an extent that the water level has been decreased notable and salts started to threaten its fresh waters. They explained that mud has started to form small islands that deform the surface of the lake because of Israel's pumping of the said lake's waters to the Negev desert through channels built under the ground.

The reports added that usually some 100 million gallons ( 380 billion liters of waters) are brought from the Lake but this amount has been reduced by more than three quarters because of the decrease at the water level of the lake and the possibility of a leakage in the salty waters.

Previous Stories:
  Israel seeks economic talks with the Palestinians   (4/26/2001)
  Israeli airliner suspends flights   (4/25/2001)
  Palestinian economy losses $ 2 billion because of the Israeli siege   (4/9/2001)

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