The water shared by Israelis and Palestinians could one day help to quench a thirst for peace, Duke scientists announced recently.
While negotiations remain stalled between the governments of Israel and the Palestinian National Authority over regional and political resources in the Gaza Strip, University professors believe collaborative efforts to remedy the region's water crisis could help move talks forward.
"Right now there is a lull in peace negotiations," said Erika Weinthal, associate professor of environmental policy at the Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences. "But water is essential for the economies of both regions."
Weinthal, who studies the role of the environment in the processes of state-building and peacemaking, said collaborations for countering the water crisis could play a key role in easing tensions, perhaps one day helping to sustain peaceful relations.
Israel and the PNA share water resources in both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. The shared aquifer in the Gaza Strip is the sole freshwater source for agricultural and domestic use.
Increased pumping of water resources in the region-which has a population of about 1.4 million-has led to rising pollution in fresh groundwater, said Avner Vengosh, a geochemist and associate professor of earth and ocean sciences at the Nicholas School and Weinthal's husband.
To make matters worse, increased natural flow of water from Israel to the Gaza Strip has also resulted in salinization of the shared aquifer, said Vengosh, who has traced sources of salinity and harmful contaminants using chemical and radioactive detectors.
One challenge researchers have noted is that the use of dams to control water flow would worsen the problem, increasing the inflow of salinized water to the shared water source, Vengosh said.
"There exists no major dispute among the scientific community about what needs to be done," he explained, adding that as an environmentalist he tries to remain objective about political disputes.
Research by Vengosh and other scientists from the PNA and France confirmed the existing notion that the water crisis would be best remedied by joint efforts of desalinization to prevent the flow of naturally occurring salinized water from Israel to the Gaza Strip, according to findings published by Vengosh in the Journal of Ground Water.
"The truth is that resolving this crisis will require cooperation with Israel [from the PNA], not further separation from it," Weinthal said. "The complexity of the situation deems joint-management plans to treat water and control water flow interactions the best solution."
Weinthal, who has been published extensively for her studies on environment and the process of state-building, said regional water resources served as a key component in the prevention of interstate conflict during the formation of the newly independent states of Central Asia after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.
International organizations encouraged and funded collaborations to allocate transboundary water resources among newly formed states, she said. Although some Central Asian states possessed more resources-just as Israelis have better access to water resources than residents of the Gaza Strip-states found that working together best served their interests.
"Today, there's very little emphasis on the environment at the political level [among Israel and the PNA]," Weinthal said.
Collaborations proposed by Vengosh and other scientists would counter a general trend of separatism spurred by the Oslo Agreements of 1993, when the governments of the PNA and Israel committed to a two-state solution in an attempt to settle regional conflicts.
Weinthal said international organizations could serve as a key third party in solving the water crisis-making the proposed solution a win-win situation.
"Not only would both regions receive water resources, but also international credibility and international aid [if the environment became a political focus] with the proposed collaborations," she said.
Weinthal hopes that the economic value of environmental changes-including improved access to water for agriculture-will one day influence peace among Palestinians and Israelis.
"Water is a source of tension," she said. "But it often serves to bring people together."
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