Haaretz, Jan 16, 2017
When Israeli officers sanctimoniously warn that 95 percent of Gazas water is unfit to drink, they ignore the original absurdity: Israel forces Gaza to make do with water from the aquifer located within its borders. This aquifer, which supplied water to some 300,000 people in 1950, is now supposed to supply the same amount to two million people. Its no wonder theres overpumping and contamination by sewage and seawater.
[...] I'll say it for the millionth time: The only near-term solution is to pipe water into Gaza from Israel and the West Bank, without haggling over the price or waiting for the Palestinian reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas. Seven million to 10 million cubic meters a year is like pouring a cup of water into a swimming pool.
Desalination is impossible when sewage flows into the sea. And sewage will continue to flow into the sea until Israel relaxes its rigid restrictions on the entry of raw materials and pumps to Gaza and on the freedom of movement of engineers, contractors and consultants [....]The same is true in every other walk of life. Israeli security professionals faithfully carry out their orders to ban fishing, shoot farmers and force people to wait six hours for a two-minute interrogation by the Shin Bet security service, and then tut-tut about the decline in the number of cargo trucks entering Gaza due to the decline in purchasing power.