Last week, EU Commissioner Johannes Hahn visited Gaza’s EU-funded seawater desalination plant. Mr. Hahn, responsible for European Neighbourhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations, spoke directly to the dire need for the plant in Palestine: “Water and natural resources have been significantly damaged after the continuous years of closure and conflicts in Gaza. As a consequence, nearly 95% of water in Gaza is considered unfit for human consumption. Therefore we are supporting this plant that will provide clean fresh water for 150,000 Palestinians.”^[1] 

In the Israel-Palestine conflict, the contest over water is “only second to land.”^[2]  The Centre for Economic and Social Rights (CESR) reports that “Israeli confiscation and control of Palestinian water resources…violates Palestinians’ human right to safe, accessible, and adequate drinking water.”^[3]  Israel controls the majority of the two water systems it shares with Palestine—including the entire Jordan River basin; more than 80% of underground water from the Western (Mountain) aquifer; and 85% of groundwater resources available in the West Bank.  The Israeli population is 8 million and the Palestinian population is 4.4 million; although each Israeli uses an average of 600 litres of water each day, and each Palestinian uses less than the minimum daily standard of 100 litres recommended by the World Health Organization.^[4] 

This water scarcity is evident in Gazans’ overreliance on groundwater.  Separate studies from 2011 and 2012 reveal that continued misuse of Gaza’s sole aquifer will cause its eventual destruction. According to a 2012 United Nations report, the aquifer may become unusable by the end of this year, “with damages becoming irreversible by 2020.”^[5]

^{Sabah Abu Ghanim in Gaza City’s Tanya Habjouqa/Panos Pictures in The Guardian[6]}

The new EU-funded desalination plant will help alleviate this water scarcity.  As of now, the first phase of the plant is nearly complete; once the plant begins operations, it will produce 6,000 cubic metres of drinking water each day and provide more than 75,000 Palestinians with safe drinking water (35,000 people in Khan Younis and 40,000 people in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip). The EU has invested EUR 10 million during this phase, and Commissioner Hahn announced that the EU will invest an additional EUR 10 million for the second phase of the plant, which will double the plant’s current capacity to produce a total of 12,000 cubic metres of water per day (within 36 months).^[7]  The Palestinian Water Authority (PWA) and Gaza’s Coastal Municipalities Water Utilities have assisted the construction of the plant, to help ensure the delivery of safe drinking water to Gaza’s population of 1.8 million people—including nearly one million children.

June Kunugi, UNICEF Special Representative for the State of Palestine, thanked the European Union for its support, and hailed the “near-completion of the first phase of this ambitious project” as “a symbol of hope and positive change in Gaza.”^[8]