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CNN SATURDAY MORNING NEWS

Struggle Over Water in Middle East

Aired April 20, 2002 - 08:11   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Religion and real estate, all tied up in the complicated Middle East picture. CNN environment correspondent Natalie Pawelski takes a look at that struggle over a limited resource, water.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NATALIE PAWELSKI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The Sea of Galilee, a rare and life-giving source of water in a parched land. But to get to this Israeli lake, the water has to flow through a tough and thirsty neighborhood, from Lebanon, Syria And Jordan, then through the Golan Heights.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There really isn't enough water to go around, so there's a high risk of conflict between these countries over who will control these crucial sources of water.

PAWELSKI: For Israel and the Palestinians, most water comes from under contested land. Drawn from aquifers beneath the West Bank, Gaza and Israel itself, it is water that both sides need to survive.

PROF. MICHAEL KLARE, HAMPSHIRE COLLEGE: Neither one can live without the water.

PAWELSKI: But a growing population is pumping water out faster than nature can replace it, and already there's not enough water to go around.

SANDRA POSTEL, DIR., GLOBAL WATER POLICY PROJECT: There's not enough water to grow all the food that the region needs to grow for itself and to provide enough drinking water and water for industries.

PAWELSKI: In the West Bank, Israeli authorities control who gets to sink wells and pump water.

KLARE: Eighty percent of the water resources right now are in the West Bank. And only about twenty percent of those are currently used by the Palestinian authority.

PAWELSKI: Experts estimate Israeli settlers in the occupied territories use three to five times as much water as their Palestinian neighbors.

POSTEL: Well, I think water is an undercurrent to the tensions that exist between the Israelis and the Palestinians.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Palestinians will say that they -- they point across the road to an Israeli settlement, where they see a swimming pool being filled. And then they point to their own community, where there's barely any water at all, and they express a great deal of anger about that.

PAWELSKI (on camera): People who study water issues say there may be one hopeful thing about the situation. Even countries with bitter histories, they say -- India and Pakistan, or since 1994, Jordan and Israel -- have managed to stick to water-sharing agreements, even when fighting over everything else.

Natalie Pawelski, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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