The water is running out in Gaza: Humanitarian catastrophe looms as territory’s only aquifer fails

Reuters reports: The Gaza Strip, a tiny wedge of land jammed between Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean sea, is heading inexorably into a water crisis that the United Nations says could make the Palestinian enclave uninhabitable in just a few years.

With 90 to 95 per cent of the territory’s only aquifer contaminated by sewage, chemicals and seawater, neighbourhood desalination facilities and their public taps are a lifesaver for some of Gaza’s 1.6 million residents. But these small-scale projects provide water for only about 20 per cent of the population, forcing many more residents in the impoverished territory to buy bottled water at a premium. The UN estimates that more than 80 per cent of Gazans buy their drinking water. “Families are paying as much as a third of their household income for water,” said June Kunugi, a special representative of the UN children’s fund Unicef.

The Gaza Strip, governed by the Islamist group Hamas and in a permanent state of tension with Israel, is not the only place in the Middle East facing water woes. A Nasa study of satellite data released this year showed that between 2003 and 2009 the region lost 144 cubic kilometres of stored freshwater – equivalent to the amount in the Dead Sea – making a bad situation much worse. [Continue reading…]

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One thought on “The water is running out in Gaza: Humanitarian catastrophe looms as territory’s only aquifer fails

  1. Norman

    Reading the whole story posted here & the Independent, really shows how stupid humankind is towards each other. It also shows how callus the Israeli leadership is towards the inhabitants of Gaza. I wonder, if the so called chosen ones will be the recipient of their Gods wraith, destructive that is?

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