How Gaza's electricity crisis is becoming Israel's water catastrophe
The inability to treat wastewater in the Gaza Strip because of a lack of electricity is threatening to contaminate the water supplies of Gaza as well as Israel unless immediately addressed.
The electricity crisis in the Gaza Strip is no longer just the problem of the 1.8 million Palestinians who live there or of the Hamas regime. The chronic power deficit is creating environmental repercussions that threaten Israel’s water reservoirs, sewage system and environmental quality. In May, Gaza’s sewage system collapsed, and raw sewage reached the water reservoir of the Hof Ashkelon Regional Council. Gaza’s sewage plants have ceased functioning due to the lack of electricity, and left wastewater flows into Israel untreated.
“Without electricity, water cannot be produced and wastewater cannot be treated,” said Eilon Adar, a hydrologist and the former director of Ben-Gurion University’s Zuckerberg Institute for Water Research, Department of Environmental Hydrology and Microbiology in Beersheba. “An aquifer knows no borders. Water does not stop at a border. At the moment the damage is negligible, but Gaza is now dumping its untreated wastewater near the Beit Lahia wastewater treatment plant. This site, founded a number of years ago with Israel’s agreement, is only about 200 meters [660 feet] from Israel’s border and the [effluent] ‘lake’ seeps into the coastal aquifer.”
According to Adar, when Gaza's wastewater treatment plant does not function, Israel stands to suffer as well. The ramifications of this can already be seen.
“Gaza sends wastewater to the area of the nonfunctional treatment plant, causing the water level to rise. A virtual mountain of underground water has been created that will flow to the only place in Gaza that still has drinkable water. That water will become contaminated and then disaster will hit. Once [contaminated] water permeates potable water, it will be almost impossible to fix the situation.”
