Water Case study: Israel Flashcards
About?
Israel has 2 main sources of water, the river Jordan and its tributaries and 2 aquifers.-the West Bank Aquifer where Israel share 80% of the water and Palestine have 20% of water and the other is the Crytal Plain Aquifer
What about aquifer
The Crystal plain Aquifer contributes to Israel’s commercial drip irrigation, Israel has depleted the aquifer to below sea level and mismanagement has caused the aquifer to become contaminated by nitrates, salt and seawater. 20% of the water in the CPA cannot be used, the damage is irreversible
Conflicts
Israel has been involved in numerous conflicts to ensure that water pathways are kept clear examples of this are in 1967 there was a 6 day war over water supply due to Israel responding to Syria attempting to divert the supplies of their water.-resulted in Israel gaining West Bank from Jordan, Golan Heights from Syria and the Gaza strip from Egypt. Syria now want a larger share of the water so want boarders to be reinstated to before 1967 war.
Treaty
1994 Israel-Jordan peace treaty, Israel led negotiations over the sustainable use of the Yarmouk river and this was successful and settled relations between the 2.
How to imprve water security
Israel have done numerous things to improve their water security, Israel set up the National Water Carrier system in 1959, involved drip fed irrigation to the neger desert settlements, began to charge the “true cost” of water, began to recycle sewage water for agriculture usage(65% of crops grown using this) and the “Desalinisation master plan” Israel intend to produce 25% of all their water supply from desalinisation by 2020 (currently a plant in Ashkelton).
