The Water Crisis in Palestinian Villages Without a Water Network
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1 B’Tselem, Thirsty for a Solution - The Water Crisis in the Occupied Territories and its Resolution in the Final-Status Agreement, Position Paper, July 2000. 2 This report does not deal with the Gaza Strip because almost every town and village there is connected to a water network. In addition, Israel has much less control over the water sector in the Gaza Strip than in the West Bank. 3 For details on the physical and geographic characteristics of the Mountain Aquifer and its precise division between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, see Thirsty for a Solution, pp. 28-30. 4 At the beginning of the occupation, Israel declared the strip of land along the Lower Jordan River as a closed military area, and thereby prevented Palestinian access to the river. However, access to the river would not have benefited the Palestinians because Israel extracts water from the Sea of Galilee and the Yarmuh River before the water reaches the Lower Jordan. As a result, very little water flows into the Lower Jordan River. 5 See Thirsty for a Solution, pp. 53-57. 6 See the agency’s Web site: http://www.usaid.wbg.org/water.html. 7 For an updated summary of this contention, see Zvi Eckstein, “Is the Water and Agriculture Sector in Danger,” Water and Irrigation (in Hebrew), Issue 404, June 2001, pp. 30-33. 9 Ibid. 10 Ibid. 11 Ha’aretz, 5 October 2000. 12 In early 2001, the Water Commissioner’s Office cancelled Savyon’s water allocation for agricultural use. See State Comptroller, Annual Report 51B, footnote 8. 13 All the water-related matters of the Oslo II Agreement are found in article 40 of the Annex on Civil Affairs (Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, Washington, D.C., 28 September 1995). 14 The source of the basic information is the lists provided to B’Tselem by the official in charge of water matters, on behalf of the Palestinian Ministry for Local Government, in each of the West Bank districts. B’Tselem cross-checked the data from these lists with information from other sources, among them checks made by B’Tselem fieldworkers, data from the Palestinian Water Authority, and information provided by the Palestinian Hydrology Group. For a complete list of the communities and the number of residents living in each, see the appendix. 15 Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, Israel Statistical Monthly, May 2001. 16 Palestinian Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation, Regional Plan for the West Bank Governates: Water and Wastewater Existing Situation (PNA, Ramallah, 1998), chap. 2.2.3. 17 According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, in the first quarter of 2001, the median income of a household in the Occupied Territories fell by forty-eight percent, unemployment increased from eleven percent before the intifada to thirty-eight percent, and the percentage of families living in poverty increased to sixty-four percent, compared to twenty-one percent before the intifada. Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Impact of the Israeli Measures on the Economic Conditions of Palestine Households, April 2001. 18 Regarding restrictions on the freedom of movement during the intifada, see B’Tselem, Civilians Under Siege: Restrictions on Freedom of Movement as Collective Punishment, January 2001; B’Tselem, No Way Out: Medical Implications of Israel’s Siege Policy, June 2001. 19 For a discussion on these activities since the outbreak of the current intifada, see B’Tselem, Tacit Consent: Israeli Law Enforcement on Settlers in the Occupied Territories, March 2001. 20 The testimony was given to Suha Ziyad on 14 July 2001. 21 Ana Bellisari, “Public Health and the Water Crisis in the Occupied Territories,” Journal of Palestine Studies, vol. 23(2), 1994, pp. 52-63. 22 World Bank, Developing the Occupied Territories: An Investment in Peace (Washington, D.C., 1993), vol. 3; Arie Arnon, Israel Luski, Avia Spivak, and Jimmy Weinblatt, The Palestinian Economy – Between Imposed Integration and Voluntary Separation (Brill, New York, 1997), pp. 30-34. 23 Taher Nassereddin, “Legal and Administrative Responsibility of Domestic Water Supply to the Palestinians,” in Feitelson and Haddad (eds.), Joint Management of Shared Aquifers, the Fourth Workshop (PCG and Truman Institute, Jerusalem, 1997), pp. 117-126. 24 The villages: Burin, Madmeh, ‘Asira al Qibliya, Tell, ‘Iraq Burin, Sarra, and ‘Urif. Although these villages are located in Area B, some of the main conduits are planned for Area C, making Civil Administration approval necessary. 25 The villages: Zububa, Rummana, ‘Arabbuna, Silat al-Harithiya, ‘Anin, al-Yamun, Kafr Dan, al-Hashimiya, al-‘Araqa, and Kafr Qud. 26 The head of the Jenin Water Department, Wadah al-Labdi, provided this information to B’Tselem in a letter of 5 May 2001. 28 The testimony was given to Musa Hashhash on 30 June 2001. 29 The testimony was given to Musa Hashhash on 26 June 2001. 30 The testimony was given to Musa Hashhash on 30 June 2001. 31 The testimony was given to Musa Hashhash on 24 June 2001 32 The testimony was given to Hashem Abu Hassan on 27 June 2001. 33 The testimony was given to Hashem Abu Hassan on 11 June 2001. 34 This principle is deemed international customary law applying to all states, and is formulated in the UN Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses, 21 May 1997. For a discussion on implementation of this principle, see Thirsty for a Solution, chap. 6. 35 For a discussion on the right to water under international law, see Thirsty for a Solution, chap. 1. 36 Regarding the equitable division of shared water sources, see Thirsty for a Solution, chap. 6. 
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