German European Parliament President Martin Schulz caused an uproar during his address to the Knesset today because of remarks he made about conditions in occupied Palestine.
It appears some Israeli MKs are unaware of the gross discrepancies between water allocations in the areas under their purview. Haaretz reports EU President Schulz was accused of “blatant” and “lying propaganda“, “selective hearing” as well as incitement “against Jews” during a session in the Knesset today when he repeated a question from a Palestinian youth alluding water usage in Israel was several times that of occupied Palestine and questioned if it was true:
“A Palestinian youth asked me why an Israeli can use 70 cubic liters of water and a Palestinian just 17,” he said. “I haven’t checked the data. I’m asking you if this is correct.”
This claim came as a surprise and shock to some members of the Knesset! Indignant, Habayit Hayehudi [Jewish Home] party leader Naftali Bennet demanded an apology and walked out with his party’s MKs in tow.
MK Moti Yogev (Habayit Hayehudi) called to Schulz: “Shame on you, you support someone who is inciting against Jews.”
“The comments made in the Knesset are very serious,” said party chairman Naftali Bennett. “Habayit Hayehudi demands an apology from the president of the European Parliament, who said two lies in his speech, which Palestinians fed him. Silence in the face of lying propaganda grants legitimacy to activities against Israeli citizens.”
MK Itzik Shmuli of Labor has filed a complaint to the Knesset’s ethics committee, saying the walkout was “in contempt of the Knesset.” Meretz leader Zahava Gal-On said she objected to the damage done to the Knesset as an institution.
Culture and Sports Minister Limor Livnat, of Likud, supported the walkout.
“Give him all due respect, but the president of the [European] Parliament stands here and says a blatant lie as though Israelis have the right to use 70 cubic liters of water and the Palestinians 17 cubic liters,” she said.
Netanyahu accused the EU President of “selective hearing”. German press website DW reported Bennett immediately took to his Facebook page:
“I will not tolerate duplicitous propaganda against Israel in the Knesset … and especially not in German.”
And Likud MK Moshe Feiglin also took to facebook expressing his refusal to attend the speech altogether stating it was “inappropriate” to give a speech in German at the Knesset because:
“the language used when our parents were thrust into the railway wagons and in the crematoria.”
More from DW:
In his speech, Schulz also said “the Palestinians have the right to self-determination and equality,” and that they want to “live in peace and have unlimited freedom of movement,” which he said they are denied in Gaza.
Shortly before his Knesset speech, Schulz had complained of sensitivity in Israel against criticism from Europe. “Mutual criticism is quite normal in a democracy,” he told Israeli journalists. “The EU stands by its special relationship with Israel, but that does not mean that it has to agree with every decision of the Israeli government,” stressed Schulz.
We recommend “Everyday Nakba” (7:36!) an award winning documentary about water, filmed and directed by Mohammad al-Azza. Set in Aida refugee camp , West Bank Palestine:
This has the potential of being a WATERSHED
Can the water experts please support/provide Schultz the facts (including GAZA which gets sewage to drink) and DESTROY Netanyahu over this?
Coming on the heels of Scarlett Sodastream? – this is just too much – the clear parallels are dripping all over this
Losing it, the bots. For so long they controlled the narrative. Their 2 conflicting narratives, No truth. Now truth in the Knesset and they can’t take it.
A bit of urdu
Mir, these wilds of today
Were bustling towns yesterday
Mir Taqi Mir
The notion that Zionism controls its own destiny is so deluded.
Great piece. You night also note that the second “lie” Schulz told is that Israel is blockading Gaza.
I find this event very telling. I’ve long since come to accept that the Occupation is in fact very popular in Israel (certainly more popular than peace), which is why it continues so long and why no serious Israeli peace movement develops. But I hadn’t quiet realized the extent to which Israelis block out every sight and sound of the Occupation, and honestly convince themselves it isn’t going on.
No politician is going to stand in the Knesset and quote stats he heard from ‘a Palestinian boy’.
This was very deliberate. Shultz knew his facts, but decided to play the ‘you tell me’ game.
He won hands down. Nicely played Mr Shultz.
NOTE—where the article says “shared water resources” refers to the aquifilter on Palestine property in the occupied West Bank. As typical of Israel they ‘occupied’ the water like they do everything else.
Israelis get four-fifths of scarce West Bank water, says World Bank
Palestinians losing out in access to vital shared aquifer in the occupied territories
Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem
theguardian.com, Wednesday 27 May 2009 13.05 EDT
A deepening drought in the Middle East is aggravating a dispute over water resources after the World Bank found that Israel is taking four times as much water as the Palestinians from a vital shared aquifer.
The region faces a fifth consecutive year of drought this summer, but the World Bank report found huge disparities in water use between Israelis and Palestinians, although both share the mountain aquifer that runs the length of the occupied West Bank. Palestinians have access to only a fifth of the water supply, while Israel, which controls the area, takes the rest, the bank said.
Israelis use 240 cubic metres of water a person each year, against 75 cubic metres for West Bank Palestinians and 125 for Gazans, the bank said. Increasingly, West Bank Palestinians must rely on water bought from the Israeli national water company, Mekorot.
In some areas of the West Bank, Palestinians are surviving on as little as 10 to 15 litres a person each day, which is at or below humanitarian disaster response levels recommended to avoid epidemics. In Gaza, where Palestinians rely on an aquifer that has become increasingly saline and polluted, the situation is worse. Only 5%-10% of the available water is clean enough to drink.
The World Bank report, published last month, provoked sharp criticism from Israel, which disputed the figures and the scale of the problem on the Palestinian side. But others have welcomed the study and its findings.
Gidon Bromberg, the Israeli head of Friends of the Earth Middle East, said there was a clear failure to meet basic water needs for both Israelis and Palestinians, and that Israelis were taking “the lion’s share”.
“The bottom line is there is a severe water crisis out there, predominantly on the Palestinian side, and it will be felt even worse this coming summer,” Bromberg said at a conference on the issue in Jerusalem.
He said the Joint Water Committee, established in 1995 with Israelis and Palestinians as an interim measure under the Oslo peace accords, had failed to produce results and needed reform.
The World Bank report said the hopes that the Oslo accords might bring water resources for a viable Palestinian state and improve the life of Palestinians had “only very partially been realised”.
It said failings in water resource and management and chronic underinvestment were to blame. In Gaza, the continued Israeli economic blockade played a key role in preventing maintenance and construction of sewage and water projects. In the West Bank, Israeli military controls over the Palestinians were a factor, with Palestinians still waiting for approval on 143 water projects.
“We consider that the efficiency of our aid in the current situation is compromised,” said Pier Mantovani, a Middle East water specialist for the World Bank, which is an important source of aid for the Palestinians.
Most went on short-term emergency projects with limited long-term strategic value. It was a “piecemeal, ad hoc” approach, he said.
Yossi Dreisen, a former official and now adviser at the Israeli water authority, disputed the Bank’s findings and said many remarks in the report were “not correct”. He produced figures suggesting Israeli water consumption per person had fallen since 1967, when Israel captured and occupied the West Bank, while Palestinian consumption had risen.
Israel argues that the water problem should be solved by finding new sources, through desalination and water treatment.
“There is not enough water in this area,” said Dreisen. “Something must be done. The solution where one is giving water to the other is not acceptable to us.”
However, Fuad Bateh, an adviser to the Palestinian water authority, said Israel continued to have obligations under international law as the occupying power and should allow Palestinians water resources through an “equitable and reasonable allocation in accordance with international law”.
He accepted that there was a lack of institutional development and capacity on the Palestinian side, but he said the Palestinians were caught in an unequal, asymmetric dispute. Palestinians had not been allowed to develop any new production wells in the West Bank since the 1967 war.
“Palestinians have no say in the Israeli development of these shared, trans-boundary, water resources,” he said. “It is a situation in which Israel has a de facto veto over Palestinian water development.”
Been reported for years and years and years and years…
Report of Restrictions on Palestinian Water … – World Bankweb.worldbank.org › … › News & EventsCached
SimilarWorld BankLoading…Jerusalem, April 20, 2009 — The World Bank published a report today entitled Assessment of Restrictions on Palestinian Water Sector Development. The report …Assessment of restrictions on Palestinian water sector developmentdocuments.worldbank.org/…/west-bank-gaza-assessment-restrictions-pale…Cached
SimilarApr 1, 2009 – The World Bank … Documents & Reports … and create awareness of the factors restricting Palestinian water sector development as well as of …Israel stifles Palestinian growth, says World Bank – Middle East …www.independent.co.uk › … › World › Middle EastCachedThe IndependentLoading…Oct 8, 2013 – The report added that Palestinian agriculture is stymied by Israeli restrictions on accessing land and on water use and would undergo a major …World Report 2013: Israel/Palestine | Human Rights Watchwww.hrw.org/world-report/2013/…/israel-palesti…Cached
SimilarHuman Rights WatchLoading…… against Palestinians close to Israel’s border with Gaza deprived them of access to 35 percent of Gaza’s farmland and 85 percent of its fishing waters. As part of …Palestine: World Bank reports assesses restrictions on water …washmena.wordpress.com/…/palestine-world-bank-reports-assesses-restri…Cached
SimilarApr 22, 2009 – A World Bank report blames Palestinian mismanagement and Israeli restrictions for severe water shortages in Palestinian areas. Palestinians …Restrictions on Palestinian Water Sector Development – World Bank …unispal.un.org/…/DDCB9FC89A11D8108525759E005…Cached
SimilarUnited NationsLoading…Apr 20, 2009 – Report No. 47657-GZ WEST BANK AND GAZA ASSESSMENT OF RESTRICTIONS ON PALESTINIAN WATER SECTOR DEVELOPMENT