Even before its official founding in 1948, the Israeli elite has been systematically planning the debellatio of the Palestinian population from the territories it considers its own based on claims of historical and divine right. This is pursued on different levels and following different logics, ranging from illegal settlement building and repeated territorial incursions, to the control of essential resources, Palestinian employment, and political development. This is being deliberately pursued under the eyes of a helpless international community, preventing the realization of the so-called “two-state solution.” A solution, the only one ever approved by the UN, that is already, on closer inspection, overly permissive towards Israel, which since its origins has been guilty of serious human rights violations against the Palestinian population.
This article aims to investigate how Israel has exploited Palestinian water resources to advance its project of subjugation. In fact, since the beginning of its history, Israel has fought to defend the “blue gold”, which is so fundamental to the development of the Jewish state that it has justified massive infrastructure projects, aimed at “making the desert bloom”, and armed interventions in Palestine and neighboring countries in order to protect its water supply.
The territorial distribution of resources
There are three water sources involved in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, only one of which is under fragile Palestinian control.
The first is the Jordan Basin, which supplies also Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan, and is exploited by Israel through the National Water Carrier, an impressive system built between 1948 and 1964. In 1967 Israel’s appropriation of the Golan Heights eliminated the threat posed by a Syrian plan, backed by Nasser, to divert the waters of the two rivers Hasbani and Banias, tributaries of the Jordan, which would have reduced the water available to Israel.
The second is the Mountain Aquifer, which extends for 130 km beneath the West Bank. Before Israel took military control in 1967 it irrigated 25 percent of Palestinian farmland, while today it supplies barely 5 percent. In 1982, the entire water infrastructure present in the West Bank, was handed over by the Jewish State to the Israeli water company Mekorot for the symbolic price of one shekel (US$0.29). This permanently integrated it into Israel’s water system, channeling it to meet Israeli needs (currently half of the drinking water available to Israel comes from the Mountain Aquifer). The third and final source lies in the Gaza Strip: a shallow coastal aquifer. Over the years, it has been overdrawn by Palestinian authorities in an effort to meet the demands of a dense and growing population, with withdrawals reaching three times its natural recharge rate.
The Origins and Pursuit of Appropriation in the West Bank
Since the conclusion of the 1993 Oslo Accords, later confirmed and supplemented by the 1995 Taba (or Oslo II) Accords, the distribution of water resources in Palestine has been heavily skewed in Israel’s favor: 80 percent of the water under Israeli control, 20 percent nominally under Palestinian control, via the Palestinian Water Authority (PWA).
The problem with these agreements lies not only in their initial unfairness but also in their implementation. In fact, the responsibility for water distribution in the Palestinian territories has been entrusted to the Israeli Mekorot, which manages at the same time the supply of Israeli settlements and Palestinian villages, deliberately creating stark disparities: settlers enjoy an average of 247 liters per person per day, while Palestinians receive just 82 liters in urban areas and as little as 20 liters in rural areas. These figures show that Palestinians have long been forced to live far below the minimum standard for a decent life, which according to the WHO is 100 liters of water per day per capita.
This bleak picture is worsened by two factors. First, the lack of running water, which forces 92 percent of Palestinian households in the West Bank to rely on private cisterns and tankers to collect rainwater. Second, the abuses of the Israeli administration and army. The former is responsible, in fact, for the constant rejection of Palestinian requests for the construction of new water infrastructure, while the latter actively demolishes the few remaining Palestinian facilities and improvised cisterns or tankers, set up out of necessity in villages only to be dismantled on the grounds that they lacked Israeli permits.
Political and humanitarian blackmail in Gaza
In Gaza, the situation is, if anything, even more dire than in the West Bank: for the past 30 years, over 95 percent of water from the coastal aquifer has been undrinkable, forcing Palestinian authorities to buy large quantities of water from Mekorot.
Several factors have contributed to the worsening of water security conditions in the Strip. First, there is the overexploitation of the aquifer beneath the Strip: to address this, three seawater desalination plants were built in the north, center, and south of the Strip. According to UNICEF, however, they meet the needs of only 7 percent of the population. Second, sewage systems and treatment plants have collapsed: they are badly damaged and often unable to function due to power shortages, causing contaminated water to seep into the aquifer or into the sea. Finally, the Israeli military actions perpetrated against the Strip over the decades, which have destroyed, according to Oxfam, 70 percent of wells and all treatment plants. They have also blocked the import of goods arbitrarily classified by Israel as “dual use”, i.e. for possible military use, which include about 70 percent of the WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) components and equipment needed to build or repair water and sewage facilities. Currently, Gaza’s water supply situation, like so many other aspects of life there, is unlivable: the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics reports that water availability is just 3–5 liters per person per day, far below the WHO’s emergency survival minimum of 15 liters. This chronic shortage of water has caused a 25 percent rise in preventable diseases, driven by poor hygiene conditions and contaminated water. Private speculators have seized on this crisis, selling the scarce water from desalination plants at prices up to 30 times higher than the defunct public network, without guaranteeing hygiene and in effect slowly poisoning people with unsafe substances and unsanitized trucks.
The Consequences of Water Grabbing and International Condemnations
Israel has faced countless international condemnations from NGOs and international courts, accused of inflicting relentless suffering on a population already brought to its knees. In 2024, an Oxfam report accused Israel of using water as a weapon of war, strategically reducing the flow of water supplies to Gaza and the West Bank, imposing a “chronic deprivation of safe water” to enforce political blackmail and pursue a ruthless strategy of subjugation.
The consequences of Israel’s continued violation of humanitarian law are catastrophic in every level. Not only are civilians deprived of a dignified life, but the formation of a stable Palestinian government is also obstructed, undermining any possibility of self-sufficiency and thus of building a relationship of trust between citizens and government in Palestine. Israel holds Palestinian lives in its hands, blackmailing them through an international system that has recklessly handed it control over everything Palestine would need to stand on its own with dignity.
There can be no talk of fair negotiations, of a two-state solution, of wrong or right, as long as people continue to die for water.
References
https://www.geopolitica.info/il-ruolo-dellacqua-nel-conflitto-israelo-palestinese/
https://www.limesonline.com/limesplus/israele-la-battaglia-dell-acqua-14654979/
https://www.orizzontipolitici.it/senza-acqua-senza-diritti-la-palestina-e-il-water-grabbing/
https://peacepalacelibrary.nl/research-guide/water
https://www.lifegate.it/modello-israele-acqua#:~:text=Fu however, the war of,the current 5 percent”