RNS phow/Richard Npy. ,
An agricultural
researcher breaks up
the pars bed ground
of the Negev. One of
the feu, water sources
in the desert is
winter v,r( mno
Parched Israel digs for solutions
to severe water shortage problem.
AVI MACHLIS
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
A
Jerusalem
nother long, hot summer in Israel has
squeezed the country's scarce water supplies
past their limits.
After three years of drought, Israeli water
authorities have watched this summer in trepidation as
the country's three main water sources — the Sea of
Galilee, the coastal aquifer and mountain aquifer —
have been rapidly sucked below danger levels.
With no alternative solutions in place, there was lit-
tle they could do except to launch a big public cam-
paign, showing Israelis how every extra toilet flush
drains the Sea of Galilee, which has now dropped five
inches below the official danger point of 700 feet
below sea level.
Yet they know that the impact of publicity on water
consumption habits is only a partial remedy, and solid
solutions are needed to provide a long-term answer to
an ongoing problem.
So last month, the government pushed through a
long-awaited comprehensive plan for a series of solu-
tions, ranging from desalinization to importing water
from nearby countries such as Turkey to recycling
more sewage for agriculture and industry.
Mercy Of Heaven
But it will still take time for these projects to
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2000
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come to life. Even if the plan is pushed through
quickly, the first desalinization plant will probably
not come on line for more than two years. In the
interim, rain is of the essence.
"If in the coming winter we will have an aver-
age rainfall or a dry year, we will be forced to cut
the quotas of water for agriculture," said Shimon
Tal, Israel's water commissioner.
"A rainy winter will allow us to get through the
next year or two," he added. "However, over the
next two years we are dependent on the mercy of
heaven."
Those heavens have been far from merciful over
the past decade. Even though rainfall was average
in Israel last winter, the last three years have been
very dry overall.
Over the past decade, there has only been one
extremely rainy winter, in 1992. At the same time,
1 million immigrants came to Israel from former
Soviet Union countries, adding additional strain
on meager resources.
As part of a peace deal with Jordan, Israel
agreed to transfer 55 million cubic meters of
water a year to its eastern neighbor, and water is
on the agenda of the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks
as well.
Meanwhile, as Israel's standard of living has
steadily climbed, water use has been steadily rising.
Although the signs of an imminent crisis were
clear, the government only decided to implement
solutions last month.
From Trees To Water
he American Jewish community provides
A help for Israel's water problems through the
Jewish National Fund, known in Israel as Keren
Kayemet UIsrael.
Most American Jews have long associated the
JNF with trees, dating back to the organization's
origins in 1903, when it used trees to stake out
Jewish-owned land in Ottoman-ruled Palestine.
JNF still spends more than a quarter of its
$200-plus million annual budget on afforestation,
planting some 2.5 million trees each year and
tending to the 220 million trees that already exist.
But the planting is down from 4 million new
trees a decade ago. JNF officials say water needs,
which get 23 percent of the budget, will soon sur-
pass trees as a spending priority. The rest of the
budget in Israel goes toward developing communi-
ties in the Negev Desert, developing tourist sites,
and Zionist and ecological education and research.
The group has constructed 100 reservoirs in
the past decade and is raising money to con-
struct another 100 in the coming years. JNF
soon will offer donors not only the opportunity
to plant a tree, but to link a donation to a reser-
voir or other water-related effort.
Following revelations four years ago that only
20 percent of the money JNF raised in America
was actually going to Israel, the organization has
restructured to cut its overhead here. According
to Russell Robinson, executive vice president of
the JNF's U.S. operations, 60 percent of the $33
million it is raising this year will go to Israel,
with the remainder staying in the United States
for Zionist education and fund-raising. ❑
— Jewish Telegraphic Agency