The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories (B’Tselem), reported that Israel is heavily exploiting water resources in the Jordan Valley despite the fact that most of the water resources belong jointly to the Palestinians and Israel.Yet, Israel took over most of the wells drawing 32 million m3 from the area every year and is allocating most of this water to 37 Israeli settlements built by Israel in the area. The settlements are mainly agricultural with less than 10.000 settlers living in them. They are granted 45 million m3 every year.
This means that the 10.000 settlers are using nearly %33 of the amount of water allocated to all of the 2.5 Million Palestinians in the West Bank.
B’Tselem added that 80.000 Palestinians live in the Jordan Valley but only draw 31 million m3 a year.
The excessive pumping of Palestinian wells to provide more water to settlements and their swimming pools and gardens, had dried Palestinian wells in the northern Jordan Valley villages of Bardalah and Cardalah.
B’Tselem further stated that as Israel continues to prevent the Palestinians for accessing most of the lands in the area, they became totally isolated, while Bedouins in the areas are not connected to a water grid, and each Palestinian must make do with only 20 liters of water a day.
The World Health Organization (WHO) defined these amounts as barely sufficient for humanitarian-disaster areas.
B’Tselem added that Israeli settlers who live nearby have steady water supplies that is more than 20 times greater than what the Palestinians receive.
It further concluded that such violations contradict with the International Law as it clearly forbids an occupying power from exploiting, for its own need, the resources of lands it occupies.
