Drying Up: Engineering Displacement to Empty the Land in the West Bank

Despite the occupation using every means in its ongoing displacement war, it employs a more lethal weapon in silence: water. As our previous articles revealed about the tools of pastoral settlement and economic strangulation, the main machine destroying livelihoods is the absolute control over water resources. The talk of "land theft" is incomplete without revealing its hydrological mechanism: turning every drop of water into a pressure tool, every spring into a settlement site, and every water share into a means of blackmail. Israeli control over resources in the West Bank – reinforced by old military laws and temporary agreements – is used as a systematic tool for "water abstraction"; aimed at creating an impossible living environment that gradually drives Palestinians toward forced displacement, especially in areas classified as "C".

The tragedy begins at home; while Israeli settlers in the West Bank enjoy approximately 300 liters of water daily – a significant portion of which is used for recreational purposes and watering gardens and pools – Palestinians struggle to secure less than 70 liters per person per day. This rate is far below the minimum recommended by the World Health Organization (100 liters per person daily), and it approaches the threshold of a humanitarian disaster. This gap is not merely a coincidence, but rather the result of deliberate water engineering; though the groundwater aquifers in the West Bank are the sole natural source for the region, exclusive Israeli control deprives Palestinians of more than 85% of their natural share, and according to data from "B'Tselem" and human rights organizations, they receive only 15%, while Israel exploits the overwhelming remainder.

The roots of this control extend deep into a twisted legal history; Israeli military orders issued after the occupation of the West Bank in 1967 placed all water resources under the authority of the "military water officer". According to these orders, drilling a well or extending a pipe or even collecting rainwater in some regions is treated as a "crime" that warrants punishment and destruction. Article 40 of the second Oslo Agreement (1995) further entrenched this reality, as it "froze" the Palestinian water share at consumption levels from 1995, completely disregarding natural population growth and the rights of Palestinians to development. The result? The water file shifted from a fundamental human right to a political pressure tool, and chronic water scarcity became part of daily dependence engineering.

This water abstraction is not confined to numbers and laws; it transforms into a direct weapon for displacement. "If you cannot live from your land, how can you stay on it?" This question embodies the reality of farmers in the Jordan Valley, who witness historical springs being transformed into "settlement parks" or water sources for nearby settlements. Dozens of springs in areas like Hebron and Ramallah have turned into sites of apartheid, where Palestinians are prohibited from accessing them while settlers use them for recreation. The drying policy reaches its harsh peak with the demolition of water tanks and wells in areas classified as "C"; in 2023 alone, Israeli authorities demolished more than 120 Palestinian water facilities, according to reports from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). This destruction forces families to buy water from tankers at prices reaching four times the cost of water from the network, turning water from a fundamental right into an economic burden.

Here, the silent displacement equation is created: the higher the cost of securing basic water – which may consume up to 30% of the household income in some Bedouin communities – the closer the threshold of displacement looms. This explains the decline in population numbers in dozens of pastoral communities in the Jordan Valley; where pastoral settlement relies on this vicious cycle: drying sources ← destroying agriculture ← displacing populations ← expanding settlement. In this equation, water is the first and last link.

In conclusion, control over water in the West Bank is not just a resource management issue, but is at the heart of the colonial project aiming to empty the land of its people. Systematic water discrimination constitutes a blatant form of "collective punishment" prohibited under Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention. It is time for the international community to recognize water as a "displacement weapon" in the arsenal of settler colonialism, and to translate this recognition into effective pressure to end military control over natural resources. Just as regaining land requires steadfastness, restoring the right to water necessitates daily resistance that begins with supporting farmers on their land, demanding the opening of closed springs, and exposing organized drying mechanisms. Water is the first lesson of geography: whoever controls water controls life, and whoever regains their right to it establishes their sovereignty over their land.