How Gaza's electricity crisis is becoming Israel's water catastrophe

[Little Tich]

Source: Al-Monitor

The electricity crisis in the Gaza Strip is no longer just the problem of the 1.8 million Palestinians who live there or of the Hamas regime. The chronic power deficit is creating environmental repercussions that threaten Israel’s water reservoirs, sewage system and environmental quality. In May, Gaza’s sewage system collapsed, and raw sewage reached the water reservoir of the Hof Ashkelon Regional Council. Gaza’s sewage plants have ceased functioning due to the lack of electricity, and left wastewater flows into Israel untreated.

“Without electricity, water cannot be produced and wastewater cannot be treated,” said Eilon Adar, a hydrologist and the former director of Ben-Gurion University’s Zuckerberg Institute for Water Research, Department of Environmental Hydrology and Microbiology in Beersheba. “An aquifer knows no borders. Water does not stop at a border. At the moment the damage is negligible, but Gaza is now dumping its untreated wastewater near the Beit Lahia wastewater treatment plant. This site, founded a number of years ago with Israel’s agreement, is only about 200 meters [660 feet] from Israel’s border and the [effluent] ‘lake’ seeps into the coastal aquifer.”

According to Adar, when Gaza's wastewater treatment plant does not function, Israel stands to suffer as well. The ramifications of this can already be seen.

“Gaza sends wastewater to the area of the nonfunctional treatment plant, causing the water level to rise. A virtual mountain of underground water has been created that will flow to the only place in Gaza that still has drinkable water. That water will become contaminated and then disaster will hit. Once [contaminated] water permeates potable water, it will be almost impossible to fix the situation.”

Read more: http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/08/gaza-stip-electricity-crisis-water-pollution-aquifer-shore.html

[Larkspur]

1. Wastewater, not Iran's nuclear program, poses more a danger to Israel than nuclear bombs

Who'd a thought of that?

[GeoWilliam750]

2. Given how extremely plentiful water is in Gaza and the OC, it shouldn't be a problem

At least according to the post below, aren't there supposed to be a number of Olympic sized swimming pools in the occupied territories?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1134131768

Mind you the first two pools listed in the article are citations from 6 and 9 years ago, and one at a "resort" in Bethlehem. A quick search of the web, has not resulted in any update on these first two pools, and whether they still operate - both seem to be drawn from a single - very old - citation. However, I do not read Arabic, so cannot search in the original language for more recent information.

[Little Tich]

3. I sincerely doubt that there are any olympic sized swimming pools left in Gaza.

Besides, you would need stuff like chlorine, clean water and electricity to have it working - things that are in short supply in Gaza.

Don't believe everything you read from Tablet Mag, though - there was an article in Jerusalem Post (http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/The-hunt-for-an-Olympic-sized-pool-in-the-West-Bank-463772) about the size of the biggest pools in the West Bank, and they only found half-Olympic-sized pools. I don't really know if a swimmer is hampered by having to train in a smaller pool, or if it's even one of the bigger obstacles for a Palestinian Olympic swimmer, so I have nothing to add to that particular discussion.

The real issue is that there's an environmental disaster in the making here, and Israel isn't doing anything to fix it.

[Israeli]

7. Swimming pools !!!

Thirst and narrative

http://adam-keller2.blogspot.co.il/2016/08/thirst-and-narrative_12.html

+

http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/events/1464389870

[Little Tich]

8. That certainly puts things in perspective... n/t

[6chars]

4. Maybe the Palestinians will work cooperatively with Israel

to solve regional problems like this one!

[Igel]

5. Not exactly a winning piece of reporting.

Basically it says that in war, infrastructure shouldn't be touched. That fuel should be free. That, sadly, after the EU found that funds were being diverted it stopped paying for Gazan oil--in other words, as relief agencies are finding out, the leaders of Hamas insist that their "services" be funded first, ideological, religious, and corruption-based, before worrying about the populace.

Then again, as the article says, it's a pity that they even have a power plant, because otherwise Israel would be somehow obligated to give them free electricity. Hell, even Egypt doesn't trust Hamas, it's cash-and-carry.

One has to wonder: If the average household gets 7 hours electricity a day, how much of a reduction would powering the waste treatment facility 24/7 cause? Would it be worth cutting electricity to 6.45 hours/day in exchange for preserving what is also the Gazan facility?

Of course, the problem predates the current crisis by a decade, and isn't only due to human sewage. The coastal aquifers being infiltrated by excess pumping from that aquifer. Excess agricultural "fertilizer" is also a problem. Basically, "genocide" has caused a population explosion, which across the Arab world produced a surfeit of young adult men that triggered the Arab Spring. In Gaza, however, xenophobia and jingoism let Hamas both strengthen its position and increase resentment against the outsider.

When Israel did provide (even more) electricity, it was resented. It was to keep Gaza reliant, to bribe the Gazan population, to protect itself. An odd case of "damn you for providing electricity" coupled with "it's your duty to provide us with electricity." Gaza is apparently fenced in by one of the easternmost branches of "de Nile."

[Little Tich]

6. Seems like you didn't think that one through...

If the source of the problem with Gaza's sewage is the same as your proposed solution - which is essentially doing nothing, then the result (environmental disaster) would be the same regardless of what form of doing nothing was undertaken or not...

[shira]

9. It's shabby reporting. Hamas has no interest in solving the problem.

So long as they do nothing, Gazan suffering will be blamed on Israel. Palestinians in Gaza are nothing but political pawns. Israel will take the heat for Hamas doing nothing.

Win-Win for Hamas.

Everyone knows that except the author of this piece.