Water Wars

By jueri on July 23, 2006 11:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Just a cut and paste here.

Water Wars: Drought, Flood, Folly and the Politics of Thirst Diane Rainses Ward
Lurking in the background of the last great wars over oil is a likely
series of battles over a resource without which we literally cannot live:
water.

That is why corporations have already begin working toward the privatization
of water rights and the distribution of water throughout the globe. It is a
relatively quiet profit-making encroachment on our most basic free
commodity -- at least up until now.

Water Wars sets the stage for the developing political and real wars over
something we always believed to be a free, elemental resource. In short,
it's an extremely fascinating and well-written primer into how historically
we have gotten to this point. It focuses on specific issues and initiatives
relating to water -- and reveals their impact on the global problem.

Along the way, Diane Raines Ward, the author, provides us with historical
background on the role of water in the development of civilization. After
all, it's the ultimate resource we take for granted and is inextricably
intertwined with life itself.

Yet, after reading this book, you will never take water for granted again.

Consider some of these facts:

"Six thousand children die daily from water-related maladies."

"In Onitsha, Nigeria, poorer householders spend almost twenty percent of
their income on water."

"1.4 billion people, almost twenty percent of those living on the planet,
don't have access to an adequate supply of clean water."

Currently, "a third of all countries suffer water stress."

"In Bombay, local mafias chain water taps and charge residents by the
bucket."

Our fear is that it won't be long before water distribution becomes a
private, not a public, utility. Imagine Exxon/Mobil in charge of our water
supplies. Trust us, they are already thinking about it. Water is the new oil
to big business, because oil is running out.

In "Water Wars: Drought, Flood, Folly, and the Politics of Thirst," Diane
Raines Ward makes a compassionate, detailed and compelling argument that we
need to adopt an international strategic approach to water use, because
demand is outstripping supply.

It's a plea we should heed, ignoring it at our peril. She leaves it to
another author to explore the corporate plans to turn water into a
profitable commodity (although bottled water already does that on a
small-scale), but she persuasviely sets the stage.

We may be reaching the tipping point where water will no longer be free, and
the poor may literally die of thirst on a regular basis.

Diane Raines Ward warns us.

We should be listening.

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Also info on water in the ME

HISTORY OF CONFLICT

The allocation of the Jordan's headwaters began to be taken seriously in the
1930s when increased Jewish immigration into Palestine created a need for
sustained water management for agricultural development and drinking. Five
separate plans for managing the Jordan's waters were proposed between 1939
and 1953 alone. Lebanon initially based its right to draw water from the
Hasbani on a 1920 treaty between Britain and France covering aspects of
their mandates over Syria (including Lebanon) and Palestine. Article 8 of
the treaty permitted Palestine to make use as it saw fit of the Jordan's
headwaters passing through its territory "after satisfaction of the needs of
the territories under the French mandate ." The Lebanese argued that Article
8 allows Lebanon unrestricted use of water from the Hasbani; Israel is
entitled to whatever is left.

The most comprehensive arrangement on sharing the waters of the Jordan was
the 1953 Main Plan, more commonly known after Eric Johnston, an American
ambassador who negotiated the agreement during four trips to the region
between 1953 and 1955. Johnston persuaded Lebanon, Syria and Jordan to
permit Israel to channel some of the Jordan's waters to the Negev Desert in
the south, technically an illegal out-of-basin transfer. Israel agreed to
drop its demand that the Litani river -- which flows wholly in Lebanon --
should be incorporated into a final water sharing agreement. In the final
arrangement, Lebanon was granted 35 million cubic meters (mcm) a year to
irrigate 8,700 acres in the district of Hasbaya. Syria gained 132 mcm and
Jordan 480 mcm. Israel won 400 mcm, or 40 percent of the total, which,
according to Johnston, represented a "radical concession by the Arabs."

Perhaps too radical, as the plan was never ratified by the governments of
the four countries. Instead, Israel embarked in 1959 on a unilateral scheme
to channel water from the Jordan to the Negev. In response, the Arab League
decided to implement a ten year-old plan to divert the Jordan's headwaters,
including the Hasbani, away from Israel. The Arab diversion project began in
1965. Israel bombed the works, setting in motion a chain of cross-border
skirmishes that culminated two years later in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

Israel destroyed Lebanon's original pumping station and eight-inch pipe
located beside the Wazzani springs during the 1967 war, denying Lebanon the
use of the spring water for 34 years. In 1978, Israel invaded Lebanon,
securing a strip of territory along the border which included the Wazzani
springs. In the early 1980s, Israel attempted to annex a corner of southeast
Lebanon east of the Israeli town of Metulla which would have included the
Wazzani. The scheme was dropped after objections from Saad Haddad, commander
of the Israeli-allied Army of Free Lebanon. However, the Israelis were able
to make use of the Wazzani by pumping drinking water from the springs via a
four-inch pipe to supply Ghajar, a village populated by Syrian Alawites
which was occupied by Israel in 1967 and is located on the east bank of the
Hasbani.

OF PUMPS AND PIPES

Following the Israeli withdrawal in May 2000, the Lebanese government began
assessing the water needs of the area. In March 2001, the state-run Council
of the South installed a pump and four-inch pipe beside the Wazzani springs
to supply drinking water to several impoverished villages in the immediate
vicinity. Israel's reaction was out of proportion to the scale of the
scheme.

Uri Saguy, head of the Israeli Mekorot water company and former head of
Israeli military intelligence, warned of a "war or forceful confrontation"
if understandings were not reached on water allocation. For two weeks, the
specter of a Middle East water war was invoked in the Lebanese and Israeli
media. The fuss only died down when United Nations peacekeepers in south
Lebanon pointed out that the pipe was only four inches in diameter, and that
the Israeli authorities had been informed of the project several weeks in
advance.

http://www.merip.org/mero/mero093002.html

I. CASE BACKGROUND

1. Abstract
In the Middle East, the supply of water is much less than its demand,
thereby resulting in conflict over it. This is true for Israel and Lebanon,
where there have been struggles, although not always armed, for the waters
of the Litani River. At this point, Israel occupies southern Lebanon. Part
of the Litani is located in this region. There are conflicting reports and
conclusions over whether or not Israel is using the Litani. There is also a
verbal struggle over which country needs the Litani more, could make best
use of it, and who, therefore, should develop their use of the Litani.
Although there is not an armed struggle over it now, it has been involved in
armed struggles in the past (in the 1967 war, and in 1982) and it is
conceivable that in the future the struggles over it may become armed.

2. Description
The themes of this section are the environment and the Litani River,
conflict over this, and the solution.

A. Environment
Some "8% of the world's freshwater supplies are used for . We need adequate
supplies of water to feed ourselves. Agriculture accounts for some 63
percent of the world's use of freshwater."(1) No where is the need for water
more evident than where water is scarce, as in the Middle East. In fact,
there has been an armed conflict over water, in particular, the Litani
River, between Lebanon and Israel.

The entire basin of the Litani River is located within the borders of
Lebanon. The river rises in the central part of the northern Biqa'a Valley,
a short distance west of Baalbek and flows between the Lebanon mountain to
the west and the anti-Lebanon mountains to the east, running south and
southwestardly at its own pace. The river enters a gorge at Qarun, flows
through it about 30 kilometers and, near Nabatiya and the Beaufort Castle,
abruptly turns right (to the west), to break through the mountain range to
the right, and continues to flow through the hilly terrain of the al-Amal
region. North of Tyre, it empties into the Mediterranean.

The Litani River flows not far from Israel. The nearest part of the Litani
to Israel is where the river turns by Nabatiya, four kilometers from
Israel's border. The river's proximity to Israel may make it even more
tempting for Israel to exploit. The Litani River is 170 kilometers long,
with a basin of 2,290 square kilometers. A narrow ridge about 5 kilometers
wide separates the Litani from the Hasbani River, a tributary of the Jordan
River.