23 nov 2018
by Sandy Tolan
Since the 2014 war, Mousa Hillah, known to neighbours and family as Abu Ali, has had far bigger worries, which are etched deeply into the exhausted face of the 48-year-old grandfather.
Dodging shell fire from Israeli tanks, he fled with his family from the destruction of his Shuja’eyya neighbourhood, flattened by Israel in an attack so devastating – 7,000 shells in barely an hour – that it astonished even US military officials. (“Holy bejeezus!” one retired general exclaimed.)
The family took refuge for months in an in-law’s house near the sea, along with 50 other people. When they returned, Abu Ali found his home – the one he had built after 30 years of working construction in Israel – utterly destroyed.
Brick by board, he rebuilt it, adorning his front entrance, in a dose of biting irony, with repurposed tank shells.
Facts
UN: more than 95% of Gaza water is undrinkable.
Israeli occupation prevents entry of digging equipment to Gaza so that Gazans cannot dig deep to get clean water.
Salinity has been sharply increasing since the start of Israeli punitive measures on Gaza.And now, as he sits in the filtered morning light beneath a lattice of grape leaves, he worries less about potable water than the Israeli drone buzzing overhead – often the harbinger of another attack.
God forbid if the military on either side, Israel or Egypt, starts shooting people approaching the fence, desperate for clean water.
Gidon Bromberg, director of Ecopeace Middle East in Tel Aviv, said: “I want to sleep well,” Abu Ali says, as his family takes refuge inside the rebuilt house. “I don’t feel safe in my home.”
So the brackish, undrinkable water that sputters from his tap, or the sweet water with possible faecal contamination in his rooftop tank: these are issues Abu Ali files under the category of extreme nuisance.
This very morning, for example, the electricity came on only from 6:30 to 8:30.
It shut off before the water delivery truck arrived – “too late to pump the water to the roof,” Abu Ali complains.
A shortage of drinking water is a major concern, but clearly, worrying about the buzzing drone takes priority.
Gaza’s water catastrophe
Yet if the Gaza Strip truly becomes “uninhabitable” by 2020, as the UN and humanitarian groups warn, it will be largely because of the utter collapse of the system for delivering safe drinking water and properly disposing of disease-causing sewage.
Because of Gaza’s water and sewage catastrophe, medical experts are now seeing sharp increases in waterborne and foodborne diseases, including gastroenteritis, severe diarrhoea, salmonella, typhoid fever, an “alarming magnitude” of stunting in young children, and even something called “blue baby syndrome.”
Independent, peer-reviewed medical studies also document an alarming rise in anaemia and infant mortality. And doctors in Gaza’s hospitals now report increased cases of paediatric cancer.
For years these torments seemed sealed off from the outside world by layers of fences, locked gates, patrolling Israeli drones and warplanes, and international disdain and indifference.
Now, finally, from Washington to European capitals, and even to the Israeli security infrastructure in Tel Aviv, alarm bells are going off, warning that something must be done to prevent the water catastrophe in Gaza from spinning out of control.
“If you really want to change the lives of people, you have to solve the water issue first,” says Adnan Abu Hasna, Gaza spokesperson for the UN Palestinian refugee agency, UNRWA.
How did the water crisis begin?
The crisis essentially began with the creation of Israel in 1948, when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were driven from their towns and villages and the population of Gaza quadrupled in a matter of weeks.
Now, three-quarters of Gaza’s two million people are refugees. Their descendants put immense pressure on Gaza’s aquifer, drawing it down so far that seawater is flowing in.
What is increasing the pressure on the aquifer are the billions of gallons pumped by Gaza’s now debilitated citrus industry, and the billions more by Gaza’s Israeli settlers, who helped drain a sweet pocket of Gaza water before Israel removed them in 2005.
Now, barely three percent of Gaza’s drinking water wells are fit for human consumption.
The aquifer is badly contaminated with disease-causing nitrates from pesticide use, and from sewage which flows freely as Gaza’s sewage plant is shut down for lack of electricity.
And the desalinated drinking water used by two-thirds of Gazans, according to tests by the Palestinian Water Authority, is prone to faecal contamination, causing more disease and making it a severe risk for Gaza’s children.
Israel’s bombing of water delivery infrastructure – including wells, water towers and pipelines, and sewage plants – in the 2014 war, made matters much worse.
A comprehensive peace deal, in theory, could have eliminated the challenges by connecting Gaza to the West Bank, where the vast Mountain Aquifer is big enough to drown Gaza’s water crisis.
As it is, there is no peace. The two territories are splintered, and Israel has effective control over all of the water – from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean.
As a health epidemic looms, experts, politicians, humanitarian officials and ordinary Gazans are left to debate the best way out of Gaza’s water catastrophe.
‘Stolen by the Israelis’
“We have 15 percent of our water resources, and the rest is stolen by the Israelis,” says Mazen Al Banna, deputy minister for the Hamas government’s water authority.
As he speaks, the wail of an ambulance and a slow mournful dirge pass by the minister’s Gaza City office – a memorial for three Gazans killed in Israeli air attacks the previous day.
Decades ago, Israel captured the Jordan River, directing much of its flow into Israel’s National Water Carrier.
Equally important, it controls the Mountain Aquifer, exercising its power under the Oslo accords to prohibit Palestinians from drilling wells – even though the aquifer lies almost entirely beneath the West Bank.
“And this is against international law,” says Al Banna. “I’m talking about Palestinian water rights. It is very important.”
Yet arguing for Palestinian water rights is akin to debating the right of return for Palestinian refugees. It may be inscribed in international law, but it remains a distant and faltering prospect within the current political reality.
Instead, Hamas ministers and everyone else in Gaza must contend with Israel’s ongoing economic siege, which has restricted the movement of basic goods, including medical supplies and crucial parts for water infrastructure.
“Occupation and siege are the primary impediments to the successful promotion of public health in the Gaza Strip,” declared a 2018 study in the Lancet, which cited “significant and deleterious effects to health care.”
According to a 2017 report by the Israeli human rights group B’tselem: “During the siege, the health system has further deteriorated due to the lack of medical equipment, medicines, and rescue vehicles, and because of the frequent, prolonged power blackouts.”
The Israeli siege sharply restricts the movement of people and materials to and from Gaza – including “dual use” materials it claims could serve both civilian and military purposes.
This is a direct reason why nearly half the population is unemployed, and an increasing number of Gazans – now more than three-quarters of the population – are dependent on humanitarian aid.
The blockade has also delayed the entry of vital water infrastructure – in some cases, for years at a time.
A proposed desalination plant for Gaza City, for example – one of a series of proposed plants – has been delayed since 2010 because of dual-use restrictions.
“Eight years,” says Yasmin Bashir, project coordinator for Gaza’s Coastal Municipal Water Utility. “We got the funding in 2012. This plant is supposed to serve the people who are suffering from bad quality, high salinity water.”
For years Bashir continued to submit “a long list” of material for Israeli approval, including pipes, pumps, and spare parts for the desalination plant.
“But because of the blockade and frequent closure, that delayed the material entry into Gaza.”
And that is just one project.
“We manage more than 25 projects nowadays,” Bashir added.
Now, even voices within Israel’s military and security infrastructure are sounding warnings.
According to a 2017 report by Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies, “severe limits on access and movement imposed by Israel and Egypt have hindered post-conflict repair and reconstruction.”
Israel’s long list of dual-use items, according to the report, “includes 23 essential items” needed for Gaza’s WASH sector (water, sewage and hygiene), “such as pumps, drilling equipment, and chemicals for water purification.”
Is desalination the solution?
A consensus is now emerging between the Palestinian Authority, the UN, international donors, and even, it appears, the Israeli army, to establish a network of large desalination and sewage plants.
This solution carries an, at least, 500 million euro price tag, and is years away from operation, at best – if it’s ever built.
“Of course Gaza needs this project,” says Rebhi al Sheikh, former deputy minister for the Ramallah-based Palestinian Water Authority.
Others criticise the large, expensive development solution as inappropriate technology for an impoverished population that would struggle to afford desalinated water.
“The fantastic plans,” says Ramallah-based German hydrologist Clemens Messerschmid, fail to account for the fact that “Gaza can’t afford it. You just start crying if you look at the GDP.”
He argues that outside contractors, including in Israel, would be the biggest beneficiaries of the desalination scheme.
Perhaps more to the point, says Messerschmid, the amount of water to be produced by the plant won’t ultimately meet Gaza’s needs.
“You don’t reach these quantities under realistic conditions in Gaza.”
Yet the desalination plan appears to be gaining momentum.
The PA’s concerns about Gaza’s water crisis are joined by humanitarian agencies, foreign governments, and even, it appears, an emergency response committee of the Israeli army.
In a Gaza Emergency Response document circulated to unnamed “Friends and Colleagues,” the Israeli army calls for “an immediate humanitarian response” to “enhance the energy supply” and “increase the access to potable water” in Gaza.
Despite the desalination push, a pilot plant in southern Gaza barely operates.
A midday visit in late summer revealed a quiet plant; birds were chirping in the rafters above the idle plant floor: no power.
“We don’t have more than four hours these days,” said plant manager Kamal Abu Moamar. “But we hope.”
He is waiting for his superiors, PA ministers to solve the problem. “But we don’t know how or when.”
Even if the plants are built, there’s no guarantee they would remain standing. Some officials question whether Israel would decide to bomb the desalination plants in the next Gaza war, just as it bombed Gaza’s power plant and other critical infrastructure in previous wars.
“Nobody can tell Israel that you are doing the wrong thing,” says Hamas’s Al Banna. “Israel is doing everything against international law but nobody can prevent Israel doing everything she wants to do.”
In the “Emergency Response” document, the Israel army endorses the Gaza desalination plan, but so far has offered no guarantees it wouldn’t target these plants in the next war.
Al Jazeera contacted an Israeli army spokesman a dozen times, but did not receive a response by time the of publishing.
So the question came to Gregor von Medeazza, a UNICEF water and sanitation expert working in Gaza: Under the circumstances, is investing hundreds of millions in donor funds wasn’t too big a risk?
“Any infrastructure is a risk” he said, “[But] what is the way forward?”
Beyond Gaza’s borders
Other risks abound, both with Gaza’s water and its sewage, which flows into the sea at a rate of 110 million litres a day.
These risks flow well beyond Gaza’s borders, flowing north in the currents.
Gidon Bromberg, director of Ecopeace Middle East, based in Tel Aviv, said Gaza sewage led to the closure of Israeli beaches, and even at one point the shutdown of the desalination plant in Ashkelon, which supplies Israel with 15 percent of its drinking water.
Bromberg says Israelis cannot continue to ignore the humanitarian disaster in Gaza.
He called it “a ticking time bomb”, and warned of an outbreak of pandemic disease – a direct consequence of Gaza’s contaminated water.
If that happens, Bromberg says, Gazans could flock to the fence on Israel’s border – not “with stones or rockets,” but “with buckets”, demanding clean water.
“God forbid if the military on either side, Israel or Egypt, starts shooting people approaching the fence, desperate for clean water.”
~ Al Jazeera/Days of Palestine
This article is the second of a two-part series on Gaza’s water crisis. The first, which examines Gaza’s water and health catastrophe, has been previously published.
Since the 2014 war, Mousa Hillah, known to neighbours and family as Abu Ali, has had far bigger worries, which are etched deeply into the exhausted face of the 48-year-old grandfather.
Dodging shell fire from Israeli tanks, he fled with his family from the destruction of his Shuja’eyya neighbourhood, flattened by Israel in an attack so devastating – 7,000 shells in barely an hour – that it astonished even US military officials. (“Holy bejeezus!” one retired general exclaimed.)
The family took refuge for months in an in-law’s house near the sea, along with 50 other people. When they returned, Abu Ali found his home – the one he had built after 30 years of working construction in Israel – utterly destroyed.
Brick by board, he rebuilt it, adorning his front entrance, in a dose of biting irony, with repurposed tank shells.
Facts
UN: more than 95% of Gaza water is undrinkable.
Israeli occupation prevents entry of digging equipment to Gaza so that Gazans cannot dig deep to get clean water.
Salinity has been sharply increasing since the start of Israeli punitive measures on Gaza.And now, as he sits in the filtered morning light beneath a lattice of grape leaves, he worries less about potable water than the Israeli drone buzzing overhead – often the harbinger of another attack.
God forbid if the military on either side, Israel or Egypt, starts shooting people approaching the fence, desperate for clean water.
Gidon Bromberg, director of Ecopeace Middle East in Tel Aviv, said: “I want to sleep well,” Abu Ali says, as his family takes refuge inside the rebuilt house. “I don’t feel safe in my home.”
So the brackish, undrinkable water that sputters from his tap, or the sweet water with possible faecal contamination in his rooftop tank: these are issues Abu Ali files under the category of extreme nuisance.
This very morning, for example, the electricity came on only from 6:30 to 8:30.
It shut off before the water delivery truck arrived – “too late to pump the water to the roof,” Abu Ali complains.
A shortage of drinking water is a major concern, but clearly, worrying about the buzzing drone takes priority.
Gaza’s water catastrophe
Yet if the Gaza Strip truly becomes “uninhabitable” by 2020, as the UN and humanitarian groups warn, it will be largely because of the utter collapse of the system for delivering safe drinking water and properly disposing of disease-causing sewage.
Because of Gaza’s water and sewage catastrophe, medical experts are now seeing sharp increases in waterborne and foodborne diseases, including gastroenteritis, severe diarrhoea, salmonella, typhoid fever, an “alarming magnitude” of stunting in young children, and even something called “blue baby syndrome.”
Independent, peer-reviewed medical studies also document an alarming rise in anaemia and infant mortality. And doctors in Gaza’s hospitals now report increased cases of paediatric cancer.
For years these torments seemed sealed off from the outside world by layers of fences, locked gates, patrolling Israeli drones and warplanes, and international disdain and indifference.
Now, finally, from Washington to European capitals, and even to the Israeli security infrastructure in Tel Aviv, alarm bells are going off, warning that something must be done to prevent the water catastrophe in Gaza from spinning out of control.
“If you really want to change the lives of people, you have to solve the water issue first,” says Adnan Abu Hasna, Gaza spokesperson for the UN Palestinian refugee agency, UNRWA.
How did the water crisis begin?
The crisis essentially began with the creation of Israel in 1948, when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were driven from their towns and villages and the population of Gaza quadrupled in a matter of weeks.
Now, three-quarters of Gaza’s two million people are refugees. Their descendants put immense pressure on Gaza’s aquifer, drawing it down so far that seawater is flowing in.
What is increasing the pressure on the aquifer are the billions of gallons pumped by Gaza’s now debilitated citrus industry, and the billions more by Gaza’s Israeli settlers, who helped drain a sweet pocket of Gaza water before Israel removed them in 2005.
Now, barely three percent of Gaza’s drinking water wells are fit for human consumption.
The aquifer is badly contaminated with disease-causing nitrates from pesticide use, and from sewage which flows freely as Gaza’s sewage plant is shut down for lack of electricity.
And the desalinated drinking water used by two-thirds of Gazans, according to tests by the Palestinian Water Authority, is prone to faecal contamination, causing more disease and making it a severe risk for Gaza’s children.
Israel’s bombing of water delivery infrastructure – including wells, water towers and pipelines, and sewage plants – in the 2014 war, made matters much worse.
A comprehensive peace deal, in theory, could have eliminated the challenges by connecting Gaza to the West Bank, where the vast Mountain Aquifer is big enough to drown Gaza’s water crisis.
As it is, there is no peace. The two territories are splintered, and Israel has effective control over all of the water – from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean.
As a health epidemic looms, experts, politicians, humanitarian officials and ordinary Gazans are left to debate the best way out of Gaza’s water catastrophe.
‘Stolen by the Israelis’
“We have 15 percent of our water resources, and the rest is stolen by the Israelis,” says Mazen Al Banna, deputy minister for the Hamas government’s water authority.
As he speaks, the wail of an ambulance and a slow mournful dirge pass by the minister’s Gaza City office – a memorial for three Gazans killed in Israeli air attacks the previous day.
Decades ago, Israel captured the Jordan River, directing much of its flow into Israel’s National Water Carrier.
Equally important, it controls the Mountain Aquifer, exercising its power under the Oslo accords to prohibit Palestinians from drilling wells – even though the aquifer lies almost entirely beneath the West Bank.
“And this is against international law,” says Al Banna. “I’m talking about Palestinian water rights. It is very important.”
Yet arguing for Palestinian water rights is akin to debating the right of return for Palestinian refugees. It may be inscribed in international law, but it remains a distant and faltering prospect within the current political reality.
Instead, Hamas ministers and everyone else in Gaza must contend with Israel’s ongoing economic siege, which has restricted the movement of basic goods, including medical supplies and crucial parts for water infrastructure.
“Occupation and siege are the primary impediments to the successful promotion of public health in the Gaza Strip,” declared a 2018 study in the Lancet, which cited “significant and deleterious effects to health care.”
According to a 2017 report by the Israeli human rights group B’tselem: “During the siege, the health system has further deteriorated due to the lack of medical equipment, medicines, and rescue vehicles, and because of the frequent, prolonged power blackouts.”
The Israeli siege sharply restricts the movement of people and materials to and from Gaza – including “dual use” materials it claims could serve both civilian and military purposes.
This is a direct reason why nearly half the population is unemployed, and an increasing number of Gazans – now more than three-quarters of the population – are dependent on humanitarian aid.
The blockade has also delayed the entry of vital water infrastructure – in some cases, for years at a time.
A proposed desalination plant for Gaza City, for example – one of a series of proposed plants – has been delayed since 2010 because of dual-use restrictions.
“Eight years,” says Yasmin Bashir, project coordinator for Gaza’s Coastal Municipal Water Utility. “We got the funding in 2012. This plant is supposed to serve the people who are suffering from bad quality, high salinity water.”
For years Bashir continued to submit “a long list” of material for Israeli approval, including pipes, pumps, and spare parts for the desalination plant.
“But because of the blockade and frequent closure, that delayed the material entry into Gaza.”
And that is just one project.
“We manage more than 25 projects nowadays,” Bashir added.
Now, even voices within Israel’s military and security infrastructure are sounding warnings.
According to a 2017 report by Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies, “severe limits on access and movement imposed by Israel and Egypt have hindered post-conflict repair and reconstruction.”
Israel’s long list of dual-use items, according to the report, “includes 23 essential items” needed for Gaza’s WASH sector (water, sewage and hygiene), “such as pumps, drilling equipment, and chemicals for water purification.”
Is desalination the solution?
A consensus is now emerging between the Palestinian Authority, the UN, international donors, and even, it appears, the Israeli army, to establish a network of large desalination and sewage plants.
This solution carries an, at least, 500 million euro price tag, and is years away from operation, at best – if it’s ever built.
“Of course Gaza needs this project,” says Rebhi al Sheikh, former deputy minister for the Ramallah-based Palestinian Water Authority.
Others criticise the large, expensive development solution as inappropriate technology for an impoverished population that would struggle to afford desalinated water.
“The fantastic plans,” says Ramallah-based German hydrologist Clemens Messerschmid, fail to account for the fact that “Gaza can’t afford it. You just start crying if you look at the GDP.”
He argues that outside contractors, including in Israel, would be the biggest beneficiaries of the desalination scheme.
Perhaps more to the point, says Messerschmid, the amount of water to be produced by the plant won’t ultimately meet Gaza’s needs.
“You don’t reach these quantities under realistic conditions in Gaza.”
Yet the desalination plan appears to be gaining momentum.
The PA’s concerns about Gaza’s water crisis are joined by humanitarian agencies, foreign governments, and even, it appears, an emergency response committee of the Israeli army.
In a Gaza Emergency Response document circulated to unnamed “Friends and Colleagues,” the Israeli army calls for “an immediate humanitarian response” to “enhance the energy supply” and “increase the access to potable water” in Gaza.
Despite the desalination push, a pilot plant in southern Gaza barely operates.
A midday visit in late summer revealed a quiet plant; birds were chirping in the rafters above the idle plant floor: no power.
“We don’t have more than four hours these days,” said plant manager Kamal Abu Moamar. “But we hope.”
He is waiting for his superiors, PA ministers to solve the problem. “But we don’t know how or when.”
Even if the plants are built, there’s no guarantee they would remain standing. Some officials question whether Israel would decide to bomb the desalination plants in the next Gaza war, just as it bombed Gaza’s power plant and other critical infrastructure in previous wars.
“Nobody can tell Israel that you are doing the wrong thing,” says Hamas’s Al Banna. “Israel is doing everything against international law but nobody can prevent Israel doing everything she wants to do.”
In the “Emergency Response” document, the Israel army endorses the Gaza desalination plan, but so far has offered no guarantees it wouldn’t target these plants in the next war.
Al Jazeera contacted an Israeli army spokesman a dozen times, but did not receive a response by time the of publishing.
So the question came to Gregor von Medeazza, a UNICEF water and sanitation expert working in Gaza: Under the circumstances, is investing hundreds of millions in donor funds wasn’t too big a risk?
“Any infrastructure is a risk” he said, “[But] what is the way forward?”
Beyond Gaza’s borders
Other risks abound, both with Gaza’s water and its sewage, which flows into the sea at a rate of 110 million litres a day.
These risks flow well beyond Gaza’s borders, flowing north in the currents.
Gidon Bromberg, director of Ecopeace Middle East, based in Tel Aviv, said Gaza sewage led to the closure of Israeli beaches, and even at one point the shutdown of the desalination plant in Ashkelon, which supplies Israel with 15 percent of its drinking water.
Bromberg says Israelis cannot continue to ignore the humanitarian disaster in Gaza.
He called it “a ticking time bomb”, and warned of an outbreak of pandemic disease – a direct consequence of Gaza’s contaminated water.
If that happens, Bromberg says, Gazans could flock to the fence on Israel’s border – not “with stones or rockets,” but “with buckets”, demanding clean water.
“God forbid if the military on either side, Israel or Egypt, starts shooting people approaching the fence, desperate for clean water.”
~ Al Jazeera/Days of Palestine
This article is the second of a two-part series on Gaza’s water crisis. The first, which examines Gaza’s water and health catastrophe, has been previously published.
2 nov 2018
Palestinian farmers in Salfit villages and towns have complained that Israeli settlements, especially Ariel settlement, keep polluting their olive groves with wastewater.
Farmers told a reporter for the Palestinian Information Center (PIC) that Ariel, the second largest settlement in the occupied West Bank, was pouring sewage into the valleys of Salfit city and the towns of Hares, Kifl Hares, Bruqin and Kafr ad-Dik as well as the tourist areas of Wad al-Mutawi and Wad al-Fawwar.
The sewage coming from this settlement, in particular, is polluting the soil in those areas, especially through getting mixed with either rainwater or spring water in Wad al-Mutawi.
The settlement of Ariel has been pumping its sewage directly into nearby Palestinian areas for years, creating a dangerous and unhealthy situation for local residents and contaminating groundwater and crops.
Farmers told a reporter for the Palestinian Information Center (PIC) that Ariel, the second largest settlement in the occupied West Bank, was pouring sewage into the valleys of Salfit city and the towns of Hares, Kifl Hares, Bruqin and Kafr ad-Dik as well as the tourist areas of Wad al-Mutawi and Wad al-Fawwar.
The sewage coming from this settlement, in particular, is polluting the soil in those areas, especially through getting mixed with either rainwater or spring water in Wad al-Mutawi.
The settlement of Ariel has been pumping its sewage directly into nearby Palestinian areas for years, creating a dangerous and unhealthy situation for local residents and contaminating groundwater and crops.
1 nov 2018
Israeli settlers from the illegal Sha’are Tikva settlement, on Thursday, dumped their sewage onto school property in the northern West Bank village of Azzun Atma, southeast of Qalqilia, said Alaa Marabeh, principal of Azzun Beit Amin Secondary School.
He said, according to WAFA, that the sewage flooded the school courtyard and playground, resulting in a repulsive smell inside the school, stressing that this is the second time in two months settlers dump their sewage on the village school.
He said it usually takes over 10 days for sewage water to dry, causing health hazards for students and the community at large.
Jewish-Israeli settler harassment of Palestinian villages is a regular occurrence and faces hardly any rebuke from Israeli authorities.
He said, according to WAFA, that the sewage flooded the school courtyard and playground, resulting in a repulsive smell inside the school, stressing that this is the second time in two months settlers dump their sewage on the village school.
He said it usually takes over 10 days for sewage water to dry, causing health hazards for students and the community at large.
Jewish-Israeli settler harassment of Palestinian villages is a regular occurrence and faces hardly any rebuke from Israeli authorities.
16 oct 2018
Israeli settlers stormed the Bedouin village of Khan al-Ahmar, east of Jerusalem, on Monday, and flooded the area with wastewater for a second time.
Locals said that Israeli settlers from the nearby illegal Israeli settlement of Kfar Adummim, stormed the village and flooded Khan al-Ahmar with wastewater, causing serious environmental and health hazard for residents.
Ma’an sources added that the wastewater from the Kfar Adummim settlement flooded large areas of the village, as Israeli settlers attempted to assist the Israeli government in forcing the residents to leave the area.
This is not the first time Israeli settlers flooded the village with wastewater, causing serious damage to land and property.
Khan al-Ahmar is in danger of being demolished by Israeli forces at any moment, which would displace 181 people, half of whom are children.
Critics and human rights organizations argue that the demolition is part of an Israeli plan to expand the nearby illegal Israeli settlement of Kfar Adummim, and to create a region of contiguous Israeli control from Jerusalem almost to the Dead Sea, which would make a contiguous Palestinian state impossible.
Israel has been constantly trying to uproot Bedouin communities from the area to east of Jerusalem, to allow settlement expansion in the area, which would later turn the entire eastern part of the West Bank into a settlement zone.
Although international humanitarian law prohibits the demolition of the village and illegal confiscation of private property, Israeli forces continue their planned expansion by forcing evictions and violating basic human rights of the people.
Israel is attempting to displace the residents of Khan al-Ahmar from the area, in order to complete their illegal settlement project labeled as E1.
The Israeli government set up the contentious “E1 corridor” to link annexed occupied East Jerusalem with the enormous illegal Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, by confiscating 12,000 dunams (2,965 acres) of Palestinian-owned lands from occupied East Jerusalem to the Dead Sea.
Israeli authorities plan to build thousands of homes for Jewish-only settlements in E1, which would effectively divide the West Bank and make the creation of a contiguous Palestinian state — as envisaged by the two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict — almost impossible.
Locals said that Israeli settlers from the nearby illegal Israeli settlement of Kfar Adummim, stormed the village and flooded Khan al-Ahmar with wastewater, causing serious environmental and health hazard for residents.
Ma’an sources added that the wastewater from the Kfar Adummim settlement flooded large areas of the village, as Israeli settlers attempted to assist the Israeli government in forcing the residents to leave the area.
This is not the first time Israeli settlers flooded the village with wastewater, causing serious damage to land and property.
Khan al-Ahmar is in danger of being demolished by Israeli forces at any moment, which would displace 181 people, half of whom are children.
Critics and human rights organizations argue that the demolition is part of an Israeli plan to expand the nearby illegal Israeli settlement of Kfar Adummim, and to create a region of contiguous Israeli control from Jerusalem almost to the Dead Sea, which would make a contiguous Palestinian state impossible.
Israel has been constantly trying to uproot Bedouin communities from the area to east of Jerusalem, to allow settlement expansion in the area, which would later turn the entire eastern part of the West Bank into a settlement zone.
Although international humanitarian law prohibits the demolition of the village and illegal confiscation of private property, Israeli forces continue their planned expansion by forcing evictions and violating basic human rights of the people.
Israel is attempting to displace the residents of Khan al-Ahmar from the area, in order to complete their illegal settlement project labeled as E1.
The Israeli government set up the contentious “E1 corridor” to link annexed occupied East Jerusalem with the enormous illegal Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, by confiscating 12,000 dunams (2,965 acres) of Palestinian-owned lands from occupied East Jerusalem to the Dead Sea.
Israeli authorities plan to build thousands of homes for Jewish-only settlements in E1, which would effectively divide the West Bank and make the creation of a contiguous Palestinian state — as envisaged by the two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict — almost impossible.
2 oct 2018
Illegal Israeli colonialist settlers flooded the al-Khan al-Ahmar Bedouin Palestinian community with Sewage water, in an attempt to force the inhabitants to leave their Dwellings, just as the ultimatum set by the Israeli court for their displacement went into effect, Monday.
Abdullah Abu Rahma, a senior nonviolent activist and the head of Save al-Khan al-Ahmar Campaign, said both the Israeli soldiers and the colonialist settlers are constantly increasing the suffering of the Palestinians, and continuously violating their rights, even their very existence, in order to remove and displace them.
Abu Rahma said the assailants, from Kfar Adumim illegal colony, flooded the community with Sewage water, in yet another means of assaults and violations against nearly 200 Palestinians, including children.
“Both the settlers and the soldiers are partaking in these violations and war on the inhabitants of a-Khan al-Ahmar,” he said, “But the violations, and isolation of the community, will not only increase the steadfastness and determination of the villagers.”
He also called for increasing the support and solidarity with the Bedouin community, to foil the illegal Israeli plans of displacement, and replacing the Palestinians with illegal colonialist settlers.
|Hanna: “Israel Is Practicing Ethnic Cleansing In Al-Khan Al-Ahmar”|
Eid Abu Dahouk, the mayor of al-Khan al-Ahmar, said that “by flooding the community with sewage, the colonialist settlers are engaging in a new form of war against the inhabitants.
He warned of the grave consequences, and health risks resulting from this serious violation against al-Khan al-Ahmar, especially the children, in addition to the livestock, the only source of livelihood of the families.
The Palestinians, along with international peace activists, are ongoing with their nonviolent protests in al-Khan al-Ahmar, despite the constant assaults, violations and threats of forceful eviction.
|P.A. To Head To ICC Over Al-Khan Al-Ahmar Demolition|
On September 5th, the Israeli supreme court denied an appeal against the demolition of the Palestinian community, and ordered its removal and displacement.
The first ruling by the court was made in May of this year, when it granted the military a green light for demolishing it.
There are approximately 200 Palestinians living in al-Khan al-Ahmar, %53 of them are children, and %95 of the population are refugees officially registered by the UNRWA. The community has one school providing education to 170 children.
It is worth mentioning that al-Khan al-Ahmar is surrounded by several illegal Israeli colonies, while Israel wants to remove it as part of its E1 colonialist project, which aims at surrounding occupied Jerusalem with a chain of Jewish-only colonies, and blocking the geographical contiguity of the occupied West Bank, and completely isolating the Palestinians from Jerusalem
Abdullah Abu Rahma, a senior nonviolent activist and the head of Save al-Khan al-Ahmar Campaign, said both the Israeli soldiers and the colonialist settlers are constantly increasing the suffering of the Palestinians, and continuously violating their rights, even their very existence, in order to remove and displace them.
Abu Rahma said the assailants, from Kfar Adumim illegal colony, flooded the community with Sewage water, in yet another means of assaults and violations against nearly 200 Palestinians, including children.
“Both the settlers and the soldiers are partaking in these violations and war on the inhabitants of a-Khan al-Ahmar,” he said, “But the violations, and isolation of the community, will not only increase the steadfastness and determination of the villagers.”
He also called for increasing the support and solidarity with the Bedouin community, to foil the illegal Israeli plans of displacement, and replacing the Palestinians with illegal colonialist settlers.
|Hanna: “Israel Is Practicing Ethnic Cleansing In Al-Khan Al-Ahmar”|
Eid Abu Dahouk, the mayor of al-Khan al-Ahmar, said that “by flooding the community with sewage, the colonialist settlers are engaging in a new form of war against the inhabitants.
He warned of the grave consequences, and health risks resulting from this serious violation against al-Khan al-Ahmar, especially the children, in addition to the livestock, the only source of livelihood of the families.
The Palestinians, along with international peace activists, are ongoing with their nonviolent protests in al-Khan al-Ahmar, despite the constant assaults, violations and threats of forceful eviction.
|P.A. To Head To ICC Over Al-Khan Al-Ahmar Demolition|
On September 5th, the Israeli supreme court denied an appeal against the demolition of the Palestinian community, and ordered its removal and displacement.
The first ruling by the court was made in May of this year, when it granted the military a green light for demolishing it.
There are approximately 200 Palestinians living in al-Khan al-Ahmar, %53 of them are children, and %95 of the population are refugees officially registered by the UNRWA. The community has one school providing education to 170 children.
It is worth mentioning that al-Khan al-Ahmar is surrounded by several illegal Israeli colonies, while Israel wants to remove it as part of its E1 colonialist project, which aims at surrounding occupied Jerusalem with a chain of Jewish-only colonies, and blocking the geographical contiguity of the occupied West Bank, and completely isolating the Palestinians from Jerusalem
20 sept 2018
Ecologists and farmers have sounded alarm bells over the acute damage wrought by Israel’s sewage disposal pouring into Palestinian olive groves in Salfit.
Reporting from the scene, eye-witnesses said Palestinian cultivated lands have been terribly tainted by sewage waste spilling from the Israeli Baduel settlement, built on Palestinian lands in Salfit.
Researcher Khaled Maali warned of the tragic fallouts of sewage waste, mingled with industrial chemicals, which has been pouring into Palestinian springs and streams from 25 Israeli settlements and industrial zones.
Salfit, home to natural masterpieces and prolific agricultural output, has been turned into a source of epidemics, infectious diseases, insects, rodents, pigs, and stench due to Israel’s untreated sewage disposal and frenzied settlement activity.
Reporting from the scene, eye-witnesses said Palestinian cultivated lands have been terribly tainted by sewage waste spilling from the Israeli Baduel settlement, built on Palestinian lands in Salfit.
Researcher Khaled Maali warned of the tragic fallouts of sewage waste, mingled with industrial chemicals, which has been pouring into Palestinian springs and streams from 25 Israeli settlements and industrial zones.
Salfit, home to natural masterpieces and prolific agricultural output, has been turned into a source of epidemics, infectious diseases, insects, rodents, pigs, and stench due to Israel’s untreated sewage disposal and frenzied settlement activity.
7 sept 2018
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) on Friday afternoon demolished a Palestinian waste recycling plant in Awarta town, south of Nablus city in the West Bank.
Local sources told the PIC reporter that an Israeli bulldozer entered the town and started the demolition under the protection of IOF soldiers.
The sources said that the IOF later closed the entrance leading to the demolished waste recycling plant and imposed tightened security measures preventing Palestinian citizens from approaching the farmlands adjacent to the site.
Local sources told the PIC reporter that an Israeli bulldozer entered the town and started the demolition under the protection of IOF soldiers.
The sources said that the IOF later closed the entrance leading to the demolished waste recycling plant and imposed tightened security measures preventing Palestinian citizens from approaching the farmlands adjacent to the site.
5 sept 2018
Jerusalem, 5 September 2018: The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA): This week, final stocks of emergency fuel will be delivered to critical facilities in the Gaza Strip, through the United Nations-Assisted Emergency Fuel Program.
The Humanitarian Coordinator, Jamie McGoldrick, has written to the donor community requesting immediate support for the program, which provides life-saving emergency fuel to operate standby emergency power generators at critical health centers, and water and sanitation facilities in the Gaza Strip. Funds donated thus far in 2018 have been depleted.
Life-saving services in Gaza currently depend on the UN’s delivery of emergency fuel, due to an energy crisis that leaves the two million Palestinian residents of Gaza, over half of whom are children, with only 4-5 hours of electricity from the grid per day. Based on the current electricity deficit in Gaza, a minimum of $4.5 million is required to sustain these essential services until the end of the year.
“If new funds are not received immediately, we will be facing a potentially catastrophic breakdown in essential service delivery,” said Mr. McGoldrick.
“Services provided at hospitals, clinics, as well as sewage treatment, water and sanitation facilities will cease. Some hospitals are already within a week of closing.
The most vulnerable people of Gaza, who rely on public services and have limited income sources, will be the most negatively affected.”
Hospitals in the Gaza Strip only have enough fuel to support service provision just over two weeks, in total, with some facilities at greater risk: Al Aqsa Hospital in the Middle Area of the Gaza Strip, for example, only has enough emergency fuel to sustain services for just under a week, putting the lives of over 500 vulnerable patients at risk each day.
These include patients being treated in intensive care; new-born babies in neonatal units; patients requiring emergency surgery; dialysis patients treated for kidney failure; and those needing emergency care.
More than 4,800 patients in Gaza daily require access to lifesaving or life-sustaining health care that requires a constant supply of electricity. Of these, at least 300 are connected to life-saving medical machines such as ventilators, dialysis machines, incubators and anesthetic machines, where disruption or electricity cut-out puts patients at immediate risk of brain damage or death.
Without fuel, some 300,000 people will potentially be affected by serious public health concerns as sewage could overflow onto streets. Overall, water and wastewater services are dropping to less than 20 per cent of capacity and water availability is dropping below 50 litres per capita per day, less than half of the minimum requirement according to WHO. Additionally, some essential infrastructure risks significant damage due to lack of fuel to operate key parts, with potential loss of donor investments as a result.
“The situation in Gaza is desperate. Over a decade of blockade and unresolved internal political divisions have stripped people of their rights and left over two-thirds of the population dependent on humanitarian aid,” said Mr. McGoldrick. “We can prevent a further slide into catastrophe by ensuring that essential services continue, but we need the international community to step up immediately with support to do so.”
END
For more information, please contact Mr. Ofir Feuerstein, +972 (0) 54 33 11 836, feuerstein@un.org
The Humanitarian Coordinator, Jamie McGoldrick, has written to the donor community requesting immediate support for the program, which provides life-saving emergency fuel to operate standby emergency power generators at critical health centers, and water and sanitation facilities in the Gaza Strip. Funds donated thus far in 2018 have been depleted.
Life-saving services in Gaza currently depend on the UN’s delivery of emergency fuel, due to an energy crisis that leaves the two million Palestinian residents of Gaza, over half of whom are children, with only 4-5 hours of electricity from the grid per day. Based on the current electricity deficit in Gaza, a minimum of $4.5 million is required to sustain these essential services until the end of the year.
“If new funds are not received immediately, we will be facing a potentially catastrophic breakdown in essential service delivery,” said Mr. McGoldrick.
“Services provided at hospitals, clinics, as well as sewage treatment, water and sanitation facilities will cease. Some hospitals are already within a week of closing.
The most vulnerable people of Gaza, who rely on public services and have limited income sources, will be the most negatively affected.”
Hospitals in the Gaza Strip only have enough fuel to support service provision just over two weeks, in total, with some facilities at greater risk: Al Aqsa Hospital in the Middle Area of the Gaza Strip, for example, only has enough emergency fuel to sustain services for just under a week, putting the lives of over 500 vulnerable patients at risk each day.
These include patients being treated in intensive care; new-born babies in neonatal units; patients requiring emergency surgery; dialysis patients treated for kidney failure; and those needing emergency care.
More than 4,800 patients in Gaza daily require access to lifesaving or life-sustaining health care that requires a constant supply of electricity. Of these, at least 300 are connected to life-saving medical machines such as ventilators, dialysis machines, incubators and anesthetic machines, where disruption or electricity cut-out puts patients at immediate risk of brain damage or death.
Without fuel, some 300,000 people will potentially be affected by serious public health concerns as sewage could overflow onto streets. Overall, water and wastewater services are dropping to less than 20 per cent of capacity and water availability is dropping below 50 litres per capita per day, less than half of the minimum requirement according to WHO. Additionally, some essential infrastructure risks significant damage due to lack of fuel to operate key parts, with potential loss of donor investments as a result.
“The situation in Gaza is desperate. Over a decade of blockade and unresolved internal political divisions have stripped people of their rights and left over two-thirds of the population dependent on humanitarian aid,” said Mr. McGoldrick. “We can prevent a further slide into catastrophe by ensuring that essential services continue, but we need the international community to step up immediately with support to do so.”
END
For more information, please contact Mr. Ofir Feuerstein, +972 (0) 54 33 11 836, feuerstein@un.org
11 aug 2018
Palestinian farmers have complained that sewage coming from Ariel settlement is polluting the atmosphere and the natural park in western Salfit.
According to local farmers on Saturday morning, wastewater is being channeled from Ariel settlement to the area and park of Wadi al-Matwi and Ghanates in western Salfit.
The wastewater has also reached the town of Kafr ad-Dik in Salfit, the farmers reported.
The settlement of Ariel has been pumping its sewage directly into nearby Palestinian areas for years, creating a dangerous and unhealthy situation for local residents and contaminating groundwater and crops.
According to local farmers on Saturday morning, wastewater is being channeled from Ariel settlement to the area and park of Wadi al-Matwi and Ghanates in western Salfit.
The wastewater has also reached the town of Kafr ad-Dik in Salfit, the farmers reported.
The settlement of Ariel has been pumping its sewage directly into nearby Palestinian areas for years, creating a dangerous and unhealthy situation for local residents and contaminating groundwater and crops.
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