Water thieves
Britain has decided to
help the Israeli regime steal water from Palestinians, while even the Israeli press
describes the act as a ‘water occupation.’
British Water, which
represents the UK water industry supply chain, signed an agreement with Israel
in December which received no media coverage. The agreement was not even
published on British Water’s website. However, the Israeli regime’s embassy in
London proudly reported the agreement.
This comes as Israel’s
400-mile apartheid wall illegally encloses key water supplies. The
International Court of Justice at The Hague ruled the apartheid wall is
‘contrary to international law’ and that “all States are under an obligation
not to recognize the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the
wall and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created
by such construction.”
Israel’s apartheid wall
is not even built along the so-called Green Line which itself is not a legal
and official border. It bites deep into the occupied Palestinian West Bank and
its construction is aimed at stealing Palestinians’ water and selling them
their own water at an inflated price.
Palestinians have no
access to the Jordan River because of the Israeli regime’s closures. Moreover,
during the Gaza Massacre in 2008, Israel destroyed more than 30 kilometers of
water networks and 11 water wells in a ‘deliberate and systematic’ manner, as
described by a UN Fact Finding Mission.
Despite the establishment
of a Joint Water Committee, which was set up to secure water supply to
Palestinians, Israel was given veto power.
This way, Palestinians
are forced to buy their own water, which is extracted from wells within their
own land.
Although between 100 and
150 liters of water per day are necessary to meet health needs, an individual
in marginalized Palestinian communities in the Occupied West Bank live on less
than 20 liters of water a day. This comes as an average Israeli consumes 280
liters of Palestinians’ water each day.
Britain’s complicity with
Israel in robbing the Palestinians of their water comes as even the Israeli
newspaper Haaretz admitted that “some 450,000 [illegal] Israeli settlers
on the [Occupied] West Bank use more water than the 2.3 million Palestinians
that live there.”
The newspaper even
considered the situation as a ‘water occupation’ that the Israeli regime has
launched against the Palestinian people.
Given the bigger picture
of the establishment of the Zionist state which would not be possible without
Arthur Balfour, Britain’s foreign secretary from 1916 to 1919, and the UK Trade
and Investment Department’s commitment to benefit Israel such acts on the part
of Britain are not unexpected.
Said Balfour in his
Balfour Declaration back in 1917:
“In Palestine we do not propose even to go through the form of consulting the wishes of the present inhabitants of the country. The four powers are committed to Zionism and Zionism, be it right or wrong, good or bad, is rooted in age-long tradition, in present needs, in future hopes, of far profounder import than the desires and prejudices of the 700,000 Arabs who now occupy that land.”
Balfour’s comments were
made as Britain had promised “the 700,000 Arabs” that had “occupied the land”
independence in return for their assistance in defeating the Ottoman-German
Alliance in World War I.
However, after “Turks
were smitten,” as described by Stephen Ostrander, the British government gave
no thought to its promise as it surrendered Palestine for the establishment of
a Zionist state.
Related articles
Stealing Palestine’s resources is illegal, despite
Israeli court ruling (alethonews.wordpress.com)
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