Here's something grotesque.
Last week the physician Mustafa Barghouti visited New York and talked about the inequity in water usage in Israel/Palestine on public radio:
"We the Palestinians of the West Bank can only use up to 50 cubic
meters of water per capita per year, while an illegal settler can use
2400, 48 times more than us. That is not sustainable. Because it is inhuman."
Hard to argue with that. But host Brian Lehrer, typically, didn't really respond. (He tends to espouse the Zionist narrative; he'd had on Morton Klein of the ZOA as balance. Oh my.)
Now what do you know, that same day, a charity dedicated to clean water in developing nations was holding a worldwide festival to bring attention to its issue and help bring clean water to Africa. And–I bet you know where this is going– one of its worldwide water festivals was in Israel.
"I'm twittering over water in Jerusalem," wrote Karin Kloosterman.
Despite our own drought
issues, and lack of rain this year, Israelis are tweeting and
retweeting all about the cause to support water in Africa: Jerusalem's Twestival is unique in that beyond money for this charity, it will also be promoting worldwide awareness highlighting Israel's contributions in cleantech, writes Yannai, from the Jewish Climate Initiative…
The grotesquerie here is what it always is. Israel is obsessed with its international image, and manages to promote itself in any semi-hip forum it can get into, often by promoting its high-tech desalination projects– Jewish innovation, making "the desert bloom."
And meanwhile it rubbishes those same values in its treatment of the minority population under its boot. That's why I'm for boycott and divestment, to help end this process of image laundering and general sanctimony from a state that maintains "inhuman" policies, discriminating on an ethnic/religious basis.
(Phil Weiss)
the wheels are coming off the wagon…..i will be glad to see the reeducation of american jews….in so many ways they are some of the misinformed and psychologically used and abused of all americans.
mazel tov on your upcoming liberation!!!
reeducation is good…just repeat it reeducation is good…and dont believe what your leaders tell you at face value.
so now we know that the federal reserve has sunk americans pensions and savings by debauchery of the dollar…and now we need to relearn history.
Here's some education. The Palestinian population continues to expand yet no one is dying of thirst. So how much water is 50 cubic meters?
I'll do the math for you. It comes to about 35 gallons per day. That equals 1 load of laundry, 1 sink of dishes, 1 shower, brushing your teeth 2 times, flushing the toilet twice, washing your face and hands twice, and drinking 15 glasses of water.
So you're upset beacause an Israeli, a Jewish Israeli since those are the only kind you hate, has a swimming pool, and your typical Palestinian family doesn't. Tough shit.
Chris, the water isn't distrubuted in an equal manner – in winter when the wells are full, there is plenty of water.
In the summer, the Israelis frequently cut the water supply to Palestinian villages altogether. So for example, in Bil'in during the summer months, the village has water for one day per week.
This is of course, just when the water is needed for agriculture.
In the past, Palestinians seldom had trouble with the water supply, as they have lived in the region for centuries and used to planning for the summer drought.
Israelis are frequently new to region, and tend to have the same water use culture as they did in Europe, North America or Russia. Hence Bil'in's water problems started when illegal Israeli settlements were established near the village, and sank wells into the aquifers that run all along the West Bank.
Some people say that one of the reasons Israel hangs on to the West Bank is because of it's abundent water resources. So when Israel is forced to leave the West Bank, it really will be tough shit when the toilets in Tel Aviv run dry.
Creating financial booms and busts (especially in the tech sector) is a particularly easy way to reap profits and wage the sort of ethnonational financial warfare that Jabotinsky outlined in his writings. (See qunfuz: Misha'al (and Clegg).)
Chris,
flushing the toilet twice
Ah yes, this is what it comes down to — how many times per day an occupied people may flush the toilet.
Chris — what gives you the right to set such a quota? Did god whisper this number in your ear? Did some rabbi spy it in his breakfast cereal one morning? Please, do tell.
Aren't the Israelis developing desalination technology?
Maybe if the Pals straighten out their political priorities they can benefit from this.
Or maybe Qatar could send over their engineers.
I think the presentation of water usage is apples to oranges as well.
It likely is disparate, but NOWHERE near the caricature presented.
Among Israeli Jews, there is disparity as well, and probably in the same numeric range.
Wow
According to Chris , Palestinians can only go to the bathroom twice a day, disregarding that the average human goes to the toilet 6 to 8 times(1.5 gallons per flush) a day just to urinate not including defecation.He also forgot the daily shower which alone spends 7 gallons on average.
and just for the record 50 cubic meters results in 30 gallons per day, from which 19 are spent just urinating and showering…
So now Palestinians have an amazing 11 extra gallons to spend on everything else, including cooking which you didn't count…
According to a recent report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies “Much of Israel’s water, moreover, is located in politically fraught territory: one third is of it is in the Golan Heights and another third is in the mountain aquifer that underlies the West Bank”
p. 62 link to csis.org
So, is it any wonder that Israel is incapable of making peace with Syria or the Palestinians?
Phil, you are right on many points, including the one about how 'pro-Israel' internet propagandists are using blogs like TreeHugger as PR tool to project a positive image for Israel.
Many other TreeHugger posts related to Israel are sometimes oblivious to its discriminatory policy towards Israeli Arabs and Palestinians when it comes to resource deistribution and their exclusion as beneficiaries of Israel's new transportation projects.
One of the posts advertises an ecological farming apprenticeship that takes place in Modi'in, a veritable settlement-city, a fact which the post completely ignores.
This 50 cubic meters of water must also be shared with lifestock and agriculture. Take 145 litres of water a day and after using it for bathing and cooking and sewage, take what is left and give it to livestock. What is left must water your crops in the desert: if you don't water your crops you starve.
Palestinians are not allowed to sink their own wells. They must purchase the water from Israeli Authorities.
According to BT'selem, many settler communities repeatedly damage the pipes in the villages below, and then sell the water at the vastly inflated prices to the natives. It is a nice money spinner.
Eva, Nothing in the original post states anything about livestock, nor that thier water comes from the 50 cubic feet. But make up any type of bullshit you'd like. That is quickly becoming your specialty here.
Kodder, Don't lie. The shower was included. Please state the page where you got the average number of times a person uses the toilet, including all those between the ages of 0 and 1, which figures into the 50 meter figure. As you are giving 1.5 gallons per, that ups it to 4 times a day. And 50 meters is 35 gallons per day. You stole 17% via shoddy math or do you have a compulsion to lie?
Sam, What quota? The question was whether or not someone could exist on 50 CuMtrs of water a year. Obviously, the answer is yes and the author is merely whining. A specialty of Philip Weiss.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=50+cubic+meters+in+gallons&btnG=Google+Search&meta=
divide that by 365 you get: 30.1327… gallons
0 to 1 gets offset by old men who have to go every 30 mins.
you can google it as well.
just a question, how many time you pee a day? just twice? if yes go check a doctor.
a person usually pees every 2 to 3 hours while awake.
and you know what's the problem in this comment, is that I am actually debating with a racist guy on how many times Palestinians should be allowed to pee everyday…
@kodder
Your search comes up with the number of imperial gallons (~1.2 gallons), most measurements in gallons are in actual gallons, not imperial gallons.
So your numbers are off by 20%.
it doesn't matter.
what matters is, the guy was actually crazy enough to count how many times Palestinians should be peeing.
also not forgetting other use of water. just look at the comment written by Eva.
50 cubic meter is NOTHING.
I agree with Richard Witty…to argue this without taking into consideration that Israel frequently faces drought is disingenuous (as are most of the anti-Israel arguments here).
You are constantly misrepresenting the truth and then wonder why no one believes in your cause.
In any case, it's been argued that a lot of the antagonism between Arabs and Israelis would disappear 100% if the water problem were solved. And maybe it is that simple. I find it hard to believe that hostility could melt away just like that…but it's worth considering.
What the ambulance chasers and other assorted riffraff would do then is anybody's guess. Maybe fight for the impoverished and forgotten in Appalachia?
Thank you, Suzanne.
For Kodder's information, 50 cubic meters of water is a significant amount. I do not use 50 cubic meters a year.
"According to the World Health Organization, the per capita minimal amount of water needed for household and urban needs is one hundred liters a day. Due to the chronic water shortage, water consumption in the northern West Bank has dropped to one-third this amount. In Tubas, per capita consumption is 30 liters; in Jenin, it is 38 liters. In Nablus and the Southern Hebron Hills, the figure is slightly higher than 50 liters a day.
Average per capita consumption throughout the West Bank is 66 liters, two-thirds of the minimal amount needed according to the WHO. These figures include water for livestock, meaning that the water consumed for personal use is even less."
http://climateandcapitalism.com/?p=507 (Quoting a B'Tselem report.)
It's funny how many want to downplay the disparity. "I do not use 50 cubic meteres a year." Good for you. Because you don't doesn't mean that the Palestinians aren't entitled to more. Reminds me of that stupid Rumsfeld quote about prisoners in Guatanamo about him standing for 23 hours a day or something.
Way to justify the unjustifiable. PS If there are disparities in other nations, then question that too. Maybe it's a matter of discrimmination according to law like Israel.
The amount arrived at is an average amount per person per year, and includes all the usage of entire population, livestock, industry and agriculture included.
Just because the extra information on the topic is not included in the specific article, does not mean that it does not exist. Water apartheid, the difference in water allocation between occupied population and Israeli settlers is one of the main injustices of the occupation.Lack of water is chronic and pernicious. It chokes the self-sufficiency of food production in Occupied Territories and results in captive market for Israeli produce.
90% of Palestinian farms rely on rainwater only. 50% of Israeli farms are fully irrigated. Israel consumes the vast majority of the water from the Jordan River despite only 3% of the river falling within its pre-1967 borders.
Israel now diverts one quarter of its total water consumption through its National Water Carrier from the Jordan River, whereas Palestinians have no access to it whatsoever due to Israeli closures.
This in New Scientist in 2004:
Israel has drawn up a secret plan for a giant desalination plant to supply drinking water to the Palestinian territory on the West Bank. It hopes the project will diminish pressure for it to grant any future Palestinian state greater access to the region's scarce supplies of fresh water.
Under an agreement signed a decade ago as part of the Oslo accord, four-fifths of the West Bank's water is allocated to Israel, though the aquifers that supply it are largely replenished by water falling onto Palestinian territory.
The new plans call for seawater to be desalinated at Caesaria on the Mediterranean coast, and then pumped into the West Bank, where a network of pipes will deliver it to large towns and many of the 250 villages that currently rely on local springs and small wells for their water.
Israel, which WANTS THE US to fund the project, would GUARANTEE SAFE PASSAGE of the water across its territory in return for an agreement that Israel can continue to take the lion's share of the waters of the West Bank. These mainly comprise underground reserves such as the western aquifer, the region's largest, cleanest and most reliable water source.
For Israelis, agreement on the future joint management of this aquifer is a prerequisite for granting Palestine statehood."
Excerpts:
"On 17 June 1967, Military Order 92 was issued. It covered the following:
a-All water resources in Gaza and the West Bank are considered government property;
b-All permits for artesian wells are cancelled;
c-All information or data regarding water resources is strictly classified…
‘Amira Hess [sic], an Israeli journalist wrote: “ Since the June War of 1967, Israel has total control over Palestinian water resources. Israeli governments have prohibited the digging of wells and restricted irrigation to its pre-1967 levels, thus, keeping Palestinian crops dependent on rainwater. The fact is we can not accuse the settlers, for all Israeli governments from that of Levi Ashqol in 1967 to that of Yitzhaq Rabin in 1992, have adopted policies of devastation designed to dry-up Palestinian cities and villages”…
Period
Hebron, a Palestinian City with a population of 140,000
Kharsina and Qiryat Arba’a, with a population of 5500 Israelis
December 1997
317,952** [Hebron]
65,120** [Kharsina and Qiryat Arba'a]
February 1997
254,660
45,100
February 1998
221,512
55,200
July 1997
210,320
98,530
July 1998
190,220
111,113
18 Aug-19Sep. 1998
184,976
99,320
Consumption per person, July 1997
58 liters
345 liters
Consumption per person, July 1998
30-40 liters
350 liters [cubic metres]"
http://dair-ga.tripod.com/water.htm
Eva–I just looked up that article from New Scientist…and frankly it would've been nice if they included commentary and confirmation from both Israel and the US about why Israel would be getting so much water from the project.
How does one do investigative reporting without pushing for an answer to that burning question????
"Average per capita consumption throughout the West Bank is 66 liters"
But Philip Weiss posted that it was 50 cubic meters a year, which comes to 35 gallons a day, which is about 122 liters a day.
So whi is bullshitting who?
Are you claiming that Philip Weiss is a lying sack of shit?
How dare you!!!
The question was whether or not someone could exist on 50 CuMtrs of water a year. Obviously, the answer is yes and the author is merely whining.
Note the word exist. That's where these folks set the bar.
I suppose, according to your math, one could exist on 50m^3/day, so long as one one limited to peeing but twice per day.
Oh, to live in your kingdom, Mr. Berel.
Sam, you just can't stop lying, can you?
Is it pathological?
Can't stand the fact that you lost this debate?
Chris—lying seems to be an art form on this blog. Wonder which liars training camp they attended…
Onlookers, please compare the comments of each person above. Do you see a pattern from the likes of Suzanne and Chris Berel? They can't see the forest due to there carefully selected minor trees. Like Nazi Germans back in the day, they would quibble that a dead jew was not the result of a gas chamber, or the result of disease or being worked to death, denied basics; they'd say a frail, bug-ridden jew had nobody but his or her self to blame because
the jew died due to the fact he neglected his food and bar of soap. Besides, they'd say, "War has its costs, we what we could for them under the circumstances."
A feeble cry from one of Mondo's David Duke/Islamic facist regulars as Mondoweiss hits the public spotlight. Trying to deflect attention from genocidal talk of destroying Israel, destroying America, arming Iran etc.
Your biggest flaw is that you earnestly believe Americans are dumb. Keep on keeping on, idiots.
@ Eva Smagacz | February 17, 2009 at 07:06 PM
That's almost funny. Palestinians would have the water under their feet literally sucked out from underneath them by remote Israeli wells, and the Israeli government would be able to cut off all Palestinian water piped across Israel at will. This is part and parcel of why it is nonsense to claim that Israel has ever been interested in a just peace.
@ Suzanne
The truth hurts so you resort to name calling: "Mondo's David Duke/Islamic facist regulars"
Typical Zionist propaganda, worthy of a NAZI yellow sheet. Same diversionary tactics. Americans concerned about America's survival and reputation are coming to the internet because the truth
is blocked out by TV and the mainstream print media. Americans eventually wake up despite the
muzzle on whistleblowers. Proof is, Americans finally realized the intelligence reports supporting
the attack on Iraq were cherry-picked and stacked, the mountain of intelligence telling us the Bush neocons and go-along media were fakers all along–was ignored. Now Americans have to wake up to the fact that supporting Israel right or wrong is sending us to the ash bin of history fast.
Israel gave them the greenhouses in Gaza. They destroyed them.
link to gatewaypundit.blogspot.com
/>
They destroy everything. They never build anything. They are like the walking dead.
Israel wants peace, but they don't. It's that simple.
link to edmundstanding.blogspot.com
This blog is just "carrying their water" by spreading their blood-libels. Get some facts.
link to cdn-friends-icej.ca
/>
"4. Israel Supplies Water to the Palestinians, Jordan, and Lebanon
Contrary to charges that Israel uses Arab water, the reality is the reverse: Israel has supplied, from its own sources, large amounts of water to Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, to the Kingdom of Jordan, and to a number of villages in South Lebanon.
Meanwhile, Jordan has not supplied the West Bank with any water since 1967, despite its obligation, under international legal guidelines, to supply 70-150 MCM annually."
Read the whole thing, and get some facts instead of terrorist Barghouti's lies.
It is the "Palestinians" who aligned themselves with Hitler, AND the Holocaust.
link to worldfuturefund.org
/>
And you compare Israel to Nazis?
link to sullivan-county.com
Everything you know is wrong. You can fix that, but only if you really want to.