H.A. Amery and A.A. Kubursi
Introduction
Water, Conflict, and Development: The Litani in Context
Israel's High Water Consumption: An Analysis
Alternative Water Sources
"Sharing" the Litani River?
Selected Sources
Water is a scarce commodity in Lebanon, especially in the provinces
of the Biqa` and the South which are almost solely dependent on
the Litani River and its tributaries. These provinces, Lebanon's
largest, share a number of common attributes. They are the country's
most rural provinces and its principal agricultural regions. They
are also the least-developed and most impoverished of the provinces,
and in them are found the largest concentrations of Lebanon's
Shi`a population. In many ways also, these provinces fell outside
the political and economic mainstream of the First Republic.
Indeed, the Lebanon of the First Republic that emerged after 1943
was basically as confessional society/economy which grew as a
natural outcome of the extensive intersection of interests between
Maronite bureaucrats and Sunni trading families. The former group
was primarily interested in developing and securing a stable source
of public finance which, in the context of the prevailing conditions
and structure of the Lebanese economy, could only be based on
custom duties on foreign imports. Much of this activity was controlled
primarily by a handful of very powerful Sunni trading families
in the coastal cities of Beirut, Tripoli, and Sidon. These traders
saw their interests best served by a government restricting itself
to building an efficient social infrastructure and maintaining
a policy environment favorable to free trade.
This intersection of interests manifested itself politically in
the National Pact. It also manifested itself, perhaps in a less
obvious way but no less significantly, in an implicit economic
social contract that supplemented the political accord. The terms
of this implicit economic contract called for the public sector
to invest heavily in building an extensive infrastructure of trade
routes, ports, airports warehouses, and communication networks,
and to restrict its activity in promoting competing commodity-producing
sectors (agriculture and manufacturing) or regions which could
undermine the dominance and the free flow of imports. It also
called for a pro-free trade, pro-business policy environment with
minimal government interference, including no income or profit
taxes, bank secrecy laws, and a free foreign exchange market.
Other sects and regions were virtually cut out of this framework
and the prosperity it engendered.
Lebanon's current economic predicament is rooted in the unmanaged
mercurial successes experienced between the 1950s and the mid-1970s;
and in a less obvious way, in the confessional structure of the
society and economy. The civil war brought in its wake a massive
destruction of infrastructure and productive capital and resulted
in great human loss and displacement of populations. It also brought
the end to the implicit social contract of 1943.
The Lebanese today face the challenge not only of reconstructing their economy, but also of reconstituting their society and polity. There is a need for a new social contract. This paper assumes that such a contract must call for a more balanced economy in which commodity-producing sectors would moderate the lopsided, services-biased production structure of the First Republic, and in which the disenfranchised regions and sects in Lebanon would be represented more equitably
within the system and co-opted into the mainstream of society
and the economy. This is, perhaps, a tall order for a society
and economy still reeling from the impact of civil war and occupation.
There is no alternative, however, to a careful reassessment of
Lebanon's emerging comparative advantage, and the exploitation
of its human and natural resources.
Resources are meager at best and the international and Arab environments
are not conducive at present for massive aid to Lebanon. The Lebanese
will have to make do on their own. This paper argues that, within
this perspective, agriculture and industry will likely play new
and revitalizing roles in the south, the northeast, and other
underdeveloped regions, if they become the focus of the development
effort. The development of the Litani River basin will figure
highly in this strategy. Equally important, however, is the fact
that development of the Litani basin might very well be a necessary
action to thwart Israeli designs over this entirely Lebanese water
system.
Water, Conflict, and Development: The Litani in Context
Water is a natural resource that is usually non-tradable and has
no market value. For geo-climatic reasons, water is a scarce resource
in most Middle Eastern countries. This problem is most acute in
the rapidly developing state of Israel. Israel obtains over one
third of its water supply from the occupied West Bank and Gaza
Strip. Due to its scarcity and strong association with economic
development, the question of water takes on a whole new dimension
in the hostile political environment of the Middle East. It has
been argued that Israel was in part motivated by its lack of resources,
especially water, when it initiated the 1967 War (Stauffer, 1985;
Naff and Matson 1984). Since then, Israel has become dependent
on the West Bank's water resources, and its occupation of southern
Lebanon up to the western bend of the Litani River is raising
questions and charges similar to those raised 25 years ago when
Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Israel's High Water Consumption: An Analysis
There is a general consensus among hydrologists and water planners
in Israel that the country is currently developing all of its
replenishable water stock. Indeed, the gap between water supply
and demand is widening. It is therefore imperative to analyze
the factors which led to this situation. This is done by looking
first at demographic and cultural factors, and then at the ideological
factors which influence water consumption and planning in the
state of Israel.
1. Demography and Culture
The majority of Israel's early immigrants came from developed countries, largely in Europe and North America, and to a lesser extent from Australia and South Africa (see Table 1). These predominantly Western settlers "had different (higher) water consumption habits than the indigenous population" (Naff and Matson, 1984; 33).
Labor statistics from 1950 show that 30% of Israel's civilian
work force, most of which was made up of Ashkenazi immigrants,
had technical and industrial skills. Most of the remaining population
placed in already established villages and in new agricultural
settlements, were given on-the-spot training as farmers. So the
early Jewish immigrants were able to lay the foundations of an
industrial and a rapidly developing Israel, hence creating a higher
standard of living than that in the neighboring Arab countries
or in local native communities. This, coupled with the large number
of farming immigrants, translated into a greater demand for water.
As shown in Table 2, Israel's total water consumption in the early
1980s was three times that of Jordan and twice that of Lebanon.
source: Naff and Matson,
1984.
Similarly, the Israeli newspaper Davar (26 November 1982)
reported a wide gap between the per capita water consumption of
Jewish settlers on the West Bank and that of the Arab population
in the same region; while the former consumed 100m3/year, the
latter consumed 40 m3/year. After 1967, Israeli authorities imposed
new and strict water regulations on the Arab residents of the
West Bank. Permits to drill water wells in Arab areas were rarely
given, and even then only for domestic purposes. This new policy,
according Davar (26 November 1978), was meant to minimize any
interference with the water being pumped to Israel proper (within
the pre-1967 borders) from there. As a result, in 1977 on the
occupied West Bank, 17 wells supplying Jewish settlements (then
inhabited by less than 30,000 Israelis) extracted 14 MCM/year
(million cubic meters per year), while 88 Arab wells (Palestinians
then numbered 600,000) were permitted to pump only 9.9 MCM/year
(Kubursi, 1982; 82).
This pattern of high domestic and agricultural water consumption is due to
2. Zionism and Agriculture
The Zionist movement was ideologically committed to agriculture,
as it initially intended to make the new immigrants feel "rooted"
in their new home, Israel. It also aimed to secure the "territorial
integrity" of the country by firmly occupying peripheral
areas, making the new country self-sufficient in food (for security
reasons), and expanding the carrying capacity of the land so it
could accommodate larger numbers of immigrants.
All of these goals have, by and large, been achieved, although
at a substantial cost to the government. Farmers in Israel enjoy
"cheap or free infrastructure, tax remission, special credit
facilities, and export assistance" (Stauffer, 1985; 77).
Moreover, the cost of water for irrigation is highly subsidized.
In the mid-1970s, water for Israeli farmers was up to three times
cheaper than water for any other economic sector. This continues
to amount to a significant cost, as agriculture consumes over
73% of the total water stock available in Israel.
Government agronomists, according to Stauffer (1985; 77), estimated
that less than one half of the country's irrigated agriculture
was economically productive and only a "fraction" of
its agricultural production was economically viable; "the
rest requires not only water but steady injections of cash subsidies."
This was due to the "negative added value per unit of water
for about half of the agricultural output" (Stauffer, 1982;
46-48).
These massive agricultural subsidies and uneconomical farming
practices necessitate closer analysis. This will be done by studying
the cost of water and labor in the various regions in the country.
For example, is the price of agricultural water in the southern
Negev desert the same as that in the water-rich Galilee region?
In these regions, what is the annual agricultural output per MCM
of water per acre, and how does this affect water planning in
Israel? Moreover, can Israeli agriculture continue its dependence
on cheap Arab labor from the west Bank and Gaza?
Water policy in Israel, which was, initially guided by Zionist
ideology, has become more pragmatic over time. According to Galnoor
(1980; 293), until the mid-1960s, "ideology dictated policy,
and policy guided planning and operations of water institutions.
[In this period] no plan for a new agricultural settlement was
ever abandoned only because the cost of supplying water was too
high." Galnoor then concludes that diseconomies dictated
by ideology and manifested in subsidized water costs could temporarily
be tolerated under conditions of conventional or perceived water
sufficiency.
In spite of severe pressures on the water capacity of the country,
ideological objectives are still being achieved within the limitations
of water development, and water policy is such that agricultural
interests prevail. Attempts to permanently reallocate water from
agricultural to domestic or industrial sectors have been mostly
unsuccessful. Although it is clear that the quantity of water
for irrigation cannot continue rising at previous rates, analysts
confirm that a change in the ideological component of Israel's
water policy has yet to occur (Galnoor, 1980; Stauffer, 1985).
As mentioned earlier, although the occupation of Arab land in
1967 augmented Israel's water supply by about 40%, the Jewish
state is utilizing almost all of the renewable water resources
available to it. As water demand rises, its supply is becoming
ever more finite. That raises two fundamental questions: one about
the future of the territories, and the other about the alternative
sources of water for Israel. To answer these questions one must
evaluate the Israeli economy's degree of dependence on the resources
of the occupied territories.
Israel's rapidly depleting water resources has forced it to explore
all possible means to increase the country's water supplies. for
example, water desalinization and cloud seeding were attempted
and found to be both uneconomical and unreliable. On the other
hand, the reclaiming and recycling of waste water is more successful,
and is now adopted as part of the national water plan. In 1980,
some 20% of the urban water flow was recycled and used for irrigation
purposes, thus freeing some fresh natural water for use in the
domestic sector.
Water planners in Israel intend to develop some 300 MCM/yr of
recycled water through the intensive utilization of 80% of the
available waste water in all regions of the country (Galnoor,
1980). Ambitious as it sounds, the reclaiming of waste water has
some serious environmental and social ramifications. The process
of recycling often results in waste water percolating into aquifers,
and polluting them.
Furthermore, there is the danger that demand for certain produce
may be negatively affected by the association in the minds of
the consumers between recycled water and waste. There are possible
risks of long-term damage to soil and crop yields from known and
unknown components of sewage. Despite these problems, reclaiming
waste water appears to be both an economical and a promising water-augmenting
technique.
By and large, water is a non-tradeable resource, so Israel's looming
water crisis can only have a local/regional solution. It is forecasted
that Israel will have an annual water deficit of 800 MCM by the
year 2000 (Naff and Matson, 1984). Many analysts claim that Israel's
occupation of southern Lebanon, up to the western bend of the
Litani, is partly related to Israel's water needs. For Israel
the lure of the Litani is twofold, relating to both the quantity
and quality of the river's water.
Another attractive factor is the relative ease with which the
Litani River may be diverted into the Israeli water system. Complete
control over the Litani, whose annual flow is about 900 MCM, could
augment Israel's supply of water by up to 800 MCM/yr. This represents
a 50% increase in the country's water capacity. Israel's surface
and sub-surface water sources have been under significant stress
due to scarcity and high demand, and this stress has precipitated
a deterioration of water quality. For example, the salinity level
in Lake Tiberias (Sea of Galilee), a major source of water in
Israel, is over 250 ppm. This level of salinity is too high for
some of the sensitive and pervasive crops like citrus fruit trees.
On the other hand, the Litani River's water, with a salinity level
of 20 ppm, could, if diverted to Israel, dilute the water of Lake
Tiberias.
The hydro-strategic significance of southern Lebanon is rarely
considered an explanatory factor for Israel's continued occupation
of this part of the country. While the security of northern Israel
may well be a factor in this, the Israeli-controlled security
belt potentially may serve a variety of purposes. The only feasible
solution at present to Israel's growing water problem (in terms
of water quality, volume, and proximity of the resource), given
the immense difficulty of achieving regional cooperation on water,
is the use of the Litani River. Lebanon's continuing political
vulnerability, as well as the proxy occupation of the South, make
Israel's ambition to "share" the Litani's water with
Lebanon virtually unpreventable. This could be done either through
a unilateral water diversion scheme or through bilateral negotiations
with Lebanon, where Israel could ultimately use the "security
belt" as a bargaining chip.
In the latter half of the 19th century, European Jews pursued
the objective of creating a Jewish state in historical Palestine,
to which millions of Jews in the diaspora could immigrate. Their
first major achievement in that direction was in 1917, when Britain
promised to assist the World Zionist Organization (WZO) to establish
a Jewish "national home" in Palestine.
Aware of water scarcity and its economic value, the Zionist leaders
in Europe actively lobbied the French and the British governments
to adjust the northern and northeastern borders of Palestine to
include the whole catchment of the Jordan River and a large part
of the Litani River. These demands were made explicit in a number
of letters from Chaim Weizmann, the head of the WZO, to various
British government officials (Weisgal, 1977, vol 9). In one such
letter to the British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, Weizmann
argued that Lebanon was a "well watered" region, thus
that the Litani waters were "valueless to the territory north
of the proposed frontiers. They can be used beneficially in the
country much further south." Therefore, the WZO considered
"the [Biqa`] Valley of the Litani, to a distance of 25 miles
above the bend" of the river, to be essential to the future
of the Jewish national home (Weisgal, 1977; 267).
It was the desire of the WZO that Israel's eastern borders run a few kilometers east of the Jordan River and thus include its major tributary, the Yarmouk (Weisgal, 1977; 266-267). On October 30, 1920, Weizmann wrote to Britain's new Foreign Secretary, Lord Curzon, stating that
... if Palestine were cut off from the Litany, Upper
Jordan and Yarmouk (Rivers), to say nothing of the western shore
of the (sea of) Galilee, she could not be economically independent.
And a poor and impoverished Palestine would be of no advantage
to any power (cited by Hof, 1985; 11-13).
Zionist demands were, however, not met when the British Mandate
determined the boundaries of Palestine to include what is today
Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Although the WZO failed in its hydrological demands, the issue
was not forgotten. Instead, a situation of political and military
uncertainty developed as a result of which Israel hesitated and
then backed down from any coercive acquisition of Lebanese territory
up to the Litani River (Berger, 1985; Rokach, 1986).
Having access to the Litani was on the minds of Israeli government
officials early in the state's formative years. The diaries of
Moshe Sharett, Prime Minister of Israel in the mid-1959s, reveal
that David Ben-Gurion (the first Prime Minister of Israel), and
Moshe Dayan (Israel's chief of Staff and later Defense Minister)
were strong advocates of an Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon
up to the Litani River (Rokach, 1986; 22-27). Sharett quotes Dayan
as having said in 1954 that
... the only thing that's necessary is to find an
[Lebanese] officer, even just a Major. We should either win his
heart or buy him with money, to make him agree to declare himself
the savior of the [Christian] Maronite population. Then the Israeli
army will enter Lebanon, will occupy the necessary territory,
and will create a Christian regime which will ally itself with
Israel. The territory from the Litani southward will be totally
annexed to Israel and everything will be all right (Rokach, 1986;
26).
In the wake of the June War of 1967 and of Israel's territorial gains at the expense of three of its four neighbors, Moshe Dayan once again reiterated his long standing view that Israel had achieved "provisionally satisfying frontiers, with the exception of those with Lebanon" (Hof, 1985; 36).
Dayan's blueprint for Lebanon was ultimately implemented in 1978
when Israel created the so-called "security zone" in
southern Lebanon. This territory was "officially" under
the control of Sa`ad Haddad, a Christian Lebanese army Major who,
in 1979, declared a Maronite-dominated state in southern Lebanon.
Haddad then headed an Israeli-financed, trained, and equipped
Lebanese militia (later renamed the "South Lebanon Army"
or SLA). Until today, the SLA and the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF)
rule over a strip of south Lebanon up to the western bend of the
Litani River.
Israel was not under any imminent crisis of water scarcity when
it occupied the West Bank and the Golan Heights (1967), or when
it occupied southern Lebanon (1978). The declared objective of
both wars was Israel's future security and peace. Having said
this, it is significant that since then, more than 35% of Israel's
water consumption originates from territories occupied in 1967.
>From the analysis above, it becomes clear that an important second
objective of Israel's occupation of the West Bank is an economic
one, water being the major factor. A similar goal is probably
being sought in Lebanon.
This suggests a hidden Israeli objective: one that has a hydrological
dimension and is future-oriented. That is to say, Israel's current
policy in Lebanon takes into account its forecasted water needs.
The situation in southern Lebanon resembles that of the West Bank
and the Golan after the 1967 War: an Israeli occupation followed
by an enforced status quo, and then a move to reap the benefits
of occupation.
Since naturally-occurring resource scarcities befall states gradually,
they have ample time to carefully plan and develop a long term
or impact-mitigating strategy. This has been Israel's approach
to its onsetting water shortages. This type of scarcity is also
a "real" and not a "perceived" one, as was
the case during the 1973 oil embargo. Therefore, Israel's real
and onsetting water scarcity is neither sudden nor triggered.
Israel's creation of the "security belt" in 1978 signalled
the beginning of Israel's power-balancing phase in Lebanon. Israel's
occupation of southern Lebanon appears tolerable to the occupier
and to the major international powers. Furthermore, a mechanism
of socio-political control and normalization is being implemented
in the "security belt." This strategy injects greater
certainty into future policy decisions which in turn influences
the equilibrium in the balance of power. This approach to water
scarcity provides Israel with an access to new and reliable sources
of water. On the other hand, it allows Israel greater control
over the shape of the balance of power and the emerging structure
of expectations, both domestically/economically and regionally/strategically;
hence Israel's assured position as an advantaged state in the
region.
On the other hand, Lebanon is left unstable and without the capacity
to develop its resources. Under the First Republic, this was politically
tolerable. The emphasis then was on trade and on regions populated
by the dominant traditional groups of the National Pact. Under
the Second Republic, however, co-opting the Shi`a is vital to
the system's stability and security. The latter is only feasible
with complete and effective control and exploitation of the Litani
River. This type of development of the Litani is a strategic imperative
for Lebanon, not only because it thwarts Israeli designs on the
river and invalidates Israel's claim that Lebanon is wasting its
water; but also because it balances and moderates social and economic
tensions that are likely to emerge in the rebirth of a new Lebanon.
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