Group: Israel Hogging West Bank Water

Israel Is Depriving Palestinians in the West Bank of Their Fair Share, Amnesty International Says

(AP)  Amnesty International is accusing Israel of pumping disproportionate amounts of drinking water from an aquifer it controls in the West Bank, depriving local Palestinians of their fair share.

The London-based human rights group also said in a report to be released Tuesday, that Israel has blocked infrastructure projects that would improve existing water supplies to Palestinians - both in the West Bank and those living in the Gaza Strip.

"This scarcity has affected every walk of life for Palestinians," Amnesty's researcher on Israel, Donatella Rovera, told The Associated Press in an interview Monday, ahead of the report's release. "A greater amount of water has to be granted to them."

Israeli officials deny the accusations.

Water is a major point of contention between Israelis and Palestinians and is considered an issue that must be resolved before the two sides could make peace.

The issue is further compounded by the split in Palestinian territories, with the moderate Fatah movement governing the West Bank, while the militant Hamas rules the coastal Gaza Strip.

Israelis use more than four times the amount of water per person on average than do Palestinians, whose consumption falls far below the minimum amount recommended by the World Health Organization, the report said.

The report especially focuses on the so-called Mountain Aquifer in the West Bank. It says that Israel uses more than 80 percent of water drawn from the aquifer and while the Jewish state has other water sources, the aquifer is the West Bank's sole supply of water.

As a result, the 450,000 Israelis who live in the West Bank and east Jerusalem use more water than the 2.3 million Palestinian residents, Amnesty said. Israel captured both areas from Jordan in the 1967 war. The Palestinians claim them as part of a future state.

Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev called Amnesty's claims "completely ludicrous," and said Israel holds the legal right to the aquifer since it was the first to discover, develop and pump from it.

Regev said Israel pumps less water from the Mountain Aquifer today than it did in 1967, and Palestinian consumption of fresh water has actually tripled in that time.

He blamed the Palestinians for not investing in development in the West Bank and said they have failed even to drill wells that have already been approved.

Amnesty charged that Israel routinely denies Palestinians permits to launch desperately needed water sanitation and infrastructure projects in the West Bank.

Shaul Arlosoroff, a leading Israeli authority on water acquisition and use, said Israeli restrictions in the West Bank are meant to protect an already taxed aquifer from overpumping.

In the report, Amnesty also cited serious problems with water supply to the Gaza Strip.

Since Hamas seized control of the coastal territory in 2007, Gaza's long-standing problems with sewage and water sanitation facilities have deteriorated, Rovera said. During Israel's offensive in Gaza last year, water and sewage pipes suffered severe damage.

Rovera said the water situation in Gaza had reached a "crisis point," with 90 percent to 95 percent of the water supply contaminated and unfit for human consumption.

An Israeli blockade of Gaza has halted any repairs to the strip's overburdened sewage and water networks, preventing materials and equipment to repair the infrastructure from getting in, Rovera said.

[wyodutch]

I wonder.... Would Jesus approve of the moneychangers stealing water from the mouths of children?

[pickaguitar1]

Not news...everyone knows that israel is run by racist scum.

[antoniof123]

You want my opinion let's leave the whole middle east we get our oil from Canada so we really don't need them. Let them kill each other no more wellfare for any of them. They can starve or die for all I care.

[Iamthemango]

The key phrase is that Israel 'controls' the aquifer which means they are not obligated to give water rights to the Palestinians.

Why don't they ask Hamas for water? They have money to purchase rockets to lob into Israel, they ought to invest in Palestinian infrastructure.

That goes to show you that Hamas, Hezbollah and all the terrorist organizations are not interested in a Palestinian state, but in the destruction of Israel.

Let them die of thirst.

[wyodutch]

I really don't care if the Jews and Jihadists rip each others throats out. I just want their grimy hands out of the pocket of the American taxpayers.

[WrongIsWrong]

As if there was moral equivalence between killer and victim.

[WrongIsWrong]

Oh, the Nazi and Jihadi should be friends,
Oh, the Nazi and Jihadi should be friends,
One man likes to gas a cow,
The other dates ones anyhow,
But that's no reason why they cain't be friends.

(Lyrics cut from out-of-town tryouts of the musical "Okkklahoma").

[factsearcher]

This is a great unbiased article to read:

www.nytimes.com/2009/10/27/world/middleeast/27gaza.html?_r=1&ref=world

[factsearcher]

The title of this article is suggesting that Israel is forcefully stealing the palistinian water.
I guess the author does not know much history and is obviolusly one-sided.
Israel aquaducts and irrigation system is so advanced that other countries have copied it.
But the most important FACT is that as an accord, Israel and its population uses more water than the palistinians....but now the palis also want to fight it.... one more thing to fight.
The way I see it: If palistinians would agree to an honest cease fire and holt to violence- the walls would not exist between them.
There would be business trades and infrastructure agreements in place just like there is with Israel and Jordan, Egypt etc....
There would be normalcy for both population and progress.
Palistinians have chose from the beginning to fight it and to use violence for an arcaic cause: Destruction of the jews and more than that:
CLeansing of other religions....except radical muslims of course.

[wyodutch]

As Harry Truman observed...
.
"The Jews, I find are very, very SELFISH. They care not how many Estonians, Latvians, Finns, Poles, Yugoslavs, or Greeks get murdered or mistreated as Displaced Persons as long as the Jews get special treatment... Yet when they have power, physical, financial or political, neither Hitler or Stalin has anything on them for cruelty or mistreatment to the underdog."

[WrongIsWrong]

The Aryans, I find, are moronic scum, and their mothers are slatternly, bovine, maladjusted and inbred...

[factsearcher]

Ok Let me get this clear:
UN passed british mandate resolution for jewish and arab/muslim states to live side by side in peace.
Arab CHOSE to fight it and go to war against it.
They have both been in wars since then.
Israel CHOSE to live with the times and better their people by building infrastructures: water, schools, farming, business and a socio-democracy which is inclusive of arabs in their parliament.
Palistinians CHOSE continue go to war instead of building and creating.
Israel has tried thru the years to make peace with palistinians...remember when Israel was willing to give 98% of land in exchange for peace and Arafat rejected it?
Palistinians are using the martyr cause as the reason for their misfortune. Peace is not in their interests since that would mean being self sufficient and acutally better themselves.
Israel has CHOSEN to continue to try to make peace. Has made peace with Jordan and Egypt...which ironicaly that is what palistinians origins: they are part jordanians and part egyptians.
Palistinians have CHOSEN to continue fighting to have jewish state side by side.
Fast forward: Israel has built and created an incredible aquaduct system and irrigation which they now HAVE to share with palistinians... interesting right?
The middle east has to leave the old battles and realize we are in an era of TOLERANCE not extremism...which is why terrorism exist.

[nextgenman09]

Ah, the Jewraeli Welfare Leeches are at it again. Its bad enough that these Illegal Immigrants for Post WWII Europe live free and easy off $3 Billion a year in US Taxpayer Welfare, now they're back to thieving too.

[U_S_Drug_Addict]

http://worldfacts.us/Israel.htm

[WrongIsWrong]

Drug addict for a reason, no doubt.

[U_S_Drug_Addict]

when all else fails, pick a photo of crospy critters for some sympathy

[WrongIsWrong]

Yeah, tell us all about when all else fails.

[nextgenman09]

Ah, the Jewraeli Welfare Leeches are at it again. Its bad enough that these Illegal Immigrants for Post WWII Europe live free and easy off $3 Billion a year in US Taxpayer Welfare, now they're back to thieving too.

[WrongIsWrong]

Here's a little song, and you can sing-along...

Now Fatherland, Fatherland, show us the sign
Your children have waited to see
The morning will come
When the world is mine
Tomorrow belongs to me

Sehr gut, mein herr!

[babooph]

That "special relationship" with Israel that the US propaganda system keeps selling is a HOST PARASITE relationship-I myself prefer to rid myself of parasites,but I am not a Christian so....

[WrongIsWrong]

Take it like a man.

[askagain]

with spelling corrections

What an irony. Israel should provide more water to an enemy committed to destroying Israel. Israel should provide more food to an enemy committed to destroying Israel. Israel should provide more medicine to an enemy committed to destroying Israel. The Palestinians invest in guns, ammunition, bombs, hand grenades, and more guns at the expense of their people. Other countries build schools, hospitals, hotels, resorts, roads, and homes. The Palestinians just buy more weapons to wage war.

[askagain]

What an irony. Israel should provide more water to an enmemy committed to destroying Israel. Israel should provide more food to an enmemy committed to destroying Israel. Israel should provide more medicine to an enmemy committed to destroying Israel. The Palestinians invest in guns, ammunition, bombs, hand grenades, and more guns at the expense of their people. Other countries build schools, hospitals, hotels, resorts, roads, and homes. The Palestinians just buy more weapons to wage war.

[tmittelstaed]

Israel is deliberately doing this to limit Palestinian population growth, that is one of Israel's main concerns these days.

[EXHAMGRAD]

There will never be peace until JORDAN becomes the honest homeland of the Palestinean People- living on real territory side by side in PEACE with all nations of the area .


Why IS there A KING and a so called Royal FAMILY on land that is historically without a king ??

When will the world ask, how come ?

Most of the people in JORDAN are Palestinean and have been silenced by the govt that refuses them their HISTORICAL RIgHTS ! Look up the history. I am not kidding. Arafat fought "Black September" and was nearly killed by the JORDANian ARMY !

[salibason]

That greed is just a small part of the daily routine of the Israelies in every day life.Wonder why they cant grasp peace.

[ejlorge]

earth5661,

It would be hilarious if it weren't so tragic that Zionists both use the
the Mein Kamf playbook while at the same time reminding everyone (ad nauseam) how they were the victims of such a philosophy.

[rebeccaelizabethdalton]

This is news? Israel's be doing this for half a century. Israelis water their plants and fill their pools with Palestinian water.

[U_S_Drug_Addict]

and thanks for proving that paid trolls are in abundance.

[WrongIsWrong]

Just look in the mirror. And then spit.

[wyodutch]

Careful of what you say, Rebecca... the Israel-First crowd has crawled out from under the rocks.

[WrongIsWrong]

Take care, Schickelgruber. Maybe Demjanjuk needs some company.