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| July 2009 |
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On May 27th, as part of the Jerusalem Environment and Nature Conference, an annual event organized by the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel, FoEME chaired a session entitled "Trans-boundary Water Management: The Israeli-Palestinian Case". This important discussion follows the release of the World Bank Report entitled "Assessment of Restrictions on Palestinian Water Sector Development" and the response of the water authorities and considerable media attention. The session brought together speakers from the World Bank, the Israeli Water Authority, the Palestinian Water Authority and academia.
FoEME is calling for the reform/replacement of the Joint Water Committee with a new body where Palestinians and Israelis are true partners in both water supply and management responsibilities. FoEME is producing a new report on the issue of Israeli / Palestinian official water cooperation that will review the different reports of the Water Authorities and the World Bank.
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FoEME continued to promote cross border peace building efforts, focusing on the tourism sector, by inviting Israeli and Palestinian tour guides and tour operators, as well as active adults from several participating “Good Water Neighbors” communities to visit the project’s Neighbors Paths in Southern Jordan. On June 3 & 4, the group toured the Baptism Site on the Eastern bank of the Jordan River, waded in the waters of the Mujeb Reserve, bicycled along the Dead Sea to see the sinkoles that plague both sides of the Sea, and visited the villages of Fifa and Safi.
According to feedback, the mixed group of Palestinians, Israelis and Jordanians traveling together was an enriching experience that will lead to the tour operators incorporating one or more Neighbors Path tours into their scheduled tours in Jordan. FoEME’s approach to encourage cross border peacebuilding through a shared environmental agenda, was received well by all of the participants.
The Good Water Neighbors project is supported by USAID and SIDA. | |
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At the annual EU Green Week conference, on June 23-26, an important session on Climate Change took place in Brussels, with  FoEME’s Jordanian Director, Munqeth Mehyar speaking under the title “The Mediterranean Region, a Climate Change Hot Spot”. Along with other speakers from the WWF, UNEP and Plan Blue, Mr. Mehyar presented FoEME’s climate change report A New Threat to Middle East Security. In closing session comments, Mr. Mehyar urged the EU to invest in climate change awareness projects in the Eastern Mediterranean region and to lobby oil producing countries to take responsibility on climate change issues. | |
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Gidon Bromberg, Israeli Director of FoEME, participated in the 6th FEMIP Conference hosted by the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the Principality of Monaco. The conference, entitled "Sustainable Water Financing and Climate Change in the Mediterranean" brought together government officials as well as representatives of water sector, international financing institutions and media organizations from around the world. Mr. Bromberg spoke in the session "Water scarcity and climate change in Mediterranean countries panel" and questioned the lack of transparency and public participation in EIB funding of large scale projects in the Eastern Mediterranean that have a high impact on climate change issues. | |
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Friends of the Earth Middle East organized 2 events on June 4, one in Ramallah and one in Tel Aviv, for the launching of a new report “Rising Temperatures, Rising Tensions” written by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), an independent Canadian environment and development research institute.
The report was initiated by Denmark in preparation for COP-15 in Copenhagen this year, and similar to FoEME’s report Climate Change: A New Threat to Middle East Security, identifies links between climate change and the risk of violent conflict in the Middle East. In the Tel Aviv event, the Danish Ambassador welcomed the guests, while author of the report, Mr. Oli Brown presented key findings, and Israeli Member of Knesset Dov Hanin and FoEME Israeli Director Gidon Bromberg gave national and regional perspectives on issues raised. | |
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On June 25, FoEME conducted the first of a series of stakeholder’s workshops on the issue of Climate Change and Israel’s readiness for the post Kyoto protocol, slated to be signed during the December 2009 Copenhagen Summit. This workshop was held before an impressive group of government ministry officials that came from the Environment, Treasury, Defense, Industry & Business, Infrastructure, Education, Transportation, and Agriculture Ministries as well as from the Prime Minister’s office.
Discussions were held concerning Israel’s role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the relationship between the economic crisis and climate change actions, and business opportunities in energy saving/sufficiency measures. Following lectures from keynote speakers including Member of Knesset Ophir Pines and Pinchas Alpert from the Porter School of Environment and others, a round table discussion was held between the government officials and specialists from NGO’s and academic circles.
FoEME's Climate Change project is supported by Heinrich Böll Stiftung. | |
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In FoEME's Community GIS project, students this month studied the impact of various hazards on groundwater. They then created a 'short list' from the various hazards already identified, selecting those that pose the greatest risk to water sources and uploaded them onto their maps.
Click here for an example of an ortho-photo GIS map with several hazards already marked, executed by students from Israel's Eshkol Regional Council. Note the map's key code, a unifying item being used by all students from the participating Israeli, Jordanian and Palestinian GWN communities.
The Community GIS project is supported by the European Union's Partnership for Peace program. | |
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