Gaza: underground water supply faces dangerous salinity crisis

The Gaza Strip’s underground water supply is facing a massive crisis from rising salinity levels and pollution, Anadolu has reported. The problem has arisen largely from overuse.

“There is a continuous, high rate fall in the underground water level in most areas of the Gaza Strip,” Mazen Al-Banna from the Water and Environmental Quality Authority told reporters ahead of World Water Day. The day is marked on 22 March and is an opportunity to advocate for the sustainable management of freshwater sources.

Al-Banna, who heads the Planning and Awareness Unit at the Water Authority, said that Gaza’s sole coastal aquifer fulfils more than 90 per cent of the water needs of the territory’s residents. He warned that the salinity level in wells across the Gaza Strip has doubled to levels that exceed international standards for drinking water. A staggering 98 per cent of water from Gaza’s wells is now unfit for human consumption.

The official also blamed sewage intrusion in Gaza’s underground water reservoir due to poor infrastructure, which pollutes the water available for drinking.

Gaza faces water crisis amid groundwater decline: Official

“The occupying state of Israel is fully responsible for the water crisis in the Gaza Strip and for the depletion of its groundwater,” insisted the water official. “It prevents the natural lateral flow of water along the eastern borders through its wells and prevents the flow of surface water during the rainy season through the various valleys in the territory.”

He said that the Israeli blockade of Gaza since 2006 makes it impossible to import materials needed to implement water and sewage projects and for effective water treatment. In closing, Al-Banna called upon the international community to put pressure on Israel to lift the siege.