It may or may not be true that the ongoing war in Iraq is about oil;
the jury, it seems, is still out. But oil certainly played some role in
the conflict, if only as a voice in President Bush’s darkest
subconscious, reminding him of the grease upon which his economic
machine depends. America needs the black gold if it is to survive.
Let’s say it’s true. Let’s say that behind all the political hyperbole,
and the heart-tugging speeches in which America and Britain claimed the
moral high ground in the “war on terrorism,” the simpler explanation is
that decayed plant life, vast subterranean pools of it, has become the
principal commodity of our time. It shouldn’t surprise us. Control of
natural resources has long played a key role in war. Saddam Hussein
invaded Kuwait in 1991 in order to gain control of its oil reserves.
Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor in an attempt to gain
control over critical oil supplies in the Dutch East Indies and Malaya.
Of all the resources we need as a species, water is the most important
- it is, quite simply, the foundation of all life. While oil is
essential for combustion engines and electricity generations, there are
alternatives, albeit more expensive ones. For water, on the other hand,
there are no alternatives. We cannot drink or irrigate our crops with
anything else. And because many of the world’s rivers and underground
aquifers cross political boundaries, water is also one of the most
likely causes of conflict.
During a recent visit to Lebanon, it was suggested to me that the war
in the Middle East is, among other things, a war for water. For most
people, the Middle East is divided primarily along religious and ethnic
lines. But if we look beneath the surface, a number of other issues
play a strong part, not the least of which is the control of vital
water sources in a region totally dependent on agriculture. The
occupied territories are mainly valuable for the water they contain.“If
you stand on the southern border of Lebanon,” says Caroll, an ecotour
guide working out of Beirut, “you’ll be struck by the fact that our
side is dry and arid, while the Israeli side is green, lush, and
well-irrigated. There are orchards, lawns, even swimming pools. And yet
you are talking about a matter of a few feet in distance between our
countries.”
Clean water should be a basic human right. Yet by 2025, the UN predicts
that nearly half the world’s population will experience critical water
shortages. And the Middle East, an already volatile region, has the
lowest per capita water supply in the world. North Africa and the
Middle East account for 6.3 percent of the world’s population, but have
just 1.4 percent of the world’s renewable fresh water. This year,
Professor Boutros Boutros-Ghali, former Secretary General of the United
Nations, reiterated the concern he first voiced in 1985: “The next war
in the Middle East will be fought over water, not politics.”
Last year, tensions flared when Lebanon announced its intention to
install a pump at the Wazzani Springs. The Springs run into the Hasbani
River, which flows through Israel on its way to the Sea of Galilee; en
route it feeds the fish farms of four kibbutzes. The sudden extra
demand for water by the Lebanese in this area is not just because there
has been less rainfall in the last few years. Since the Israeli retreat
from the area in 2000, the Lebanese have been rebuilding villages that
existed there before the conflict. People are returning home.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon wasted no time in threatening swift
military action if the pumping did not cease, accusing the Lebanese of
“stealing” Israeli water supplies. The facts of the matter, however,
are not so clear. The springs are fed by the Jordan River system, which
is an international watershed. The Johnston Agreement of 1955 was drawn
up for the specific purpose of allocating water rights to all four
countries that feed off the Jordan system - Jordan, Israel, Lebanon,
and Syria. Israel was granted the largest portion of the water. The
Lebanese were granted 35 million cubic meters (mcm) per year. Due to
the hostilities of the last few decades, they have taken barely more
than 7 mcm per year. The new pump would have brought the total to 10-15
mcm.
The dispute took place during the buildup to war in Iraq, and George W.
Bush was anxious to retain what little Arab support he had. American
peacekeepers hurried to the scene where they cautioned both the
Lebanese and the Israelis to use “restraint.” But for the Lebanese,
that restraint meant not supplying running water to a region
desperately in need. Many villages are supplied with drinking and
irrigation water by a single weekly truck.
The Israelis ask why the Lebanese don’t pump from the Litani, a much
larger river, whose waters flow into the Mediterranean north of the
frontier. But the Litani’s water is heavily polluted and unfit for
drinking. Building a water treatment plant would be a costly,
time-consuming procedure. Why should they, say the Lebanese, when they
have a right to use the Wazzani?
So the construction continued, with each side making bolder and more
belligerent threats. Israel began a nightly regimen of amplified wolf
cries across the wire in order to upset pipeline workers. Apache
gunships hovered just across the border.
On November 3, 2002, shortly after the pumping station started
operation, Israeli jets made menacing passes overhead. The Shiite
militant group Hezbollah sent armed men to protect pumping station
workers. Asked by the Jerusalem Post whether the project would be
considered a provocation for war by Israel, Prime Minister Sharon
responded: “Israel will not allow the Hasbani to be diverted. I want to
be very clear on this. And we are ready to deal with this issue.”
Hezbollah responded to Sharon’s threats with some of their own.
Executive Committee member Hashem Safiedin said: “If they even think
about using force to stop the Lebanese exploiting the waters of the
Wazzani, we will cut their hands off.”
The Lebanese are still pumping, though they have agreed to limit their
take to drinking water, and not use the larger amounts required for
badly needed irrigation.
The latest development - spurred, no doubt, by the Bush
administration’s keenness to prevent any additional conflicts in the
Middle East while it grapples with the situation in Iraq - is that the
US has offered $500 million in aid to Lebanon, which would be used to
build a water distribution facility in the South. The only catch is
that Lebanon must first disarm the Hezbollah. Clearly, that is unlikely
to happen.
Whatever happens in this difficult situation, it is unlikely to be
resolved in the near future and without sizeable concessions by both
sides. Of paramount importance, though, is that the world’s leaders
heed these events as signifying a global problem. The World Water
Development Report published this year suggests that our global water
supply will drop by an average of a third per person over the next 20
years. Their optimum estimate for the situation in 2025 is that two
billion people, throughout 48 countries, will face major water
scarcity. It could, however, be as many as seven billion if major
change is not implemented immediately.
“Water consumption has almost doubled in the last 50 years,” says the
report. “A child born in the developed world consumes 30 to 50 times
the water resources of one in the developing world. Meanwhile water
quality continues to worsen… Every day, 6,000 people, mostly children
under the age of five, die from diarrhoeal diseases.” The future, for
many parts of the world, looks bleak.
Freelance writer Piers Moore Ede is a frequent contributor to Earth Island Journal. He lives in London.
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