Los Angeles Times
August 4, 2007
SCIENCE FILE
The chemicals used in cleanup efforts harm reefs more than the oil itself does, researchers say.
By Alison Williams
Times Staff Writer
Chemicals frequently used to clean up oil spills in marine environments turn out to be more toxic to coral reefs than the oil itself, researchers said this week.
Continue reading "Oil spill remedies toxic to coral, study finds" »
6 August 2007
MEDIA RELEASE
WORLD BANK TO HOLD FIRST SET OF PUBLIC HEARINGS ON "RED DEAD" CANAL PROJECT
On Sunday, August 12th, the World Bank will hold its first public hearing on the
Terms of Reference of the Feasibility Study for the "Red Dead Conduit" project.
Continue reading "World Bank to hold public hearing on Red Dead Canal" »
Haaretz
July 31, 2007
By Zafrir Rinat
The Prime Minister's Office (PMO) has asked to put off the removal of the fish cages from the Eilat Gulf by two years, despite a cabinet decision two years ago stating that they must go within three years.
Continue reading "Ministry blasts delays in removing Eilat fish farms" »
Haaretz
August 1, 2007
By Eli Ashkenazi
Interest in Lake Kinneret goes deeper and wider than its water level or its recreational aspects, as seen by Monday's seminar marking the establishment of the Authority for the Conservation of Lake Kinneret.
Continue reading "New authority seeks to conserve soil in Kinneret basin" »
Haaretz
August 2, 2007
By Haaretz Editorial
The many visitors to the Kinneret this summer are in for a disappointment. Most of the lake's shores are still surrounded by fences and an admission fee is charged. If this was not enough, entering some of the beaches is impossible because of pollution caused by raw sewage flowing into the water.
The Daily Star
July 25, 2007
By John Ehab
Special to The Daily Star
BEIRUT: The non-governmental organization Bahr Loubnan urged the Environment Ministry on Tuesday to remove polluted sand accumulated along Lebanon's shores during efforts to clean up an oil spill cause by an Israeli attack in 2006. An Israeli air strike on the Jiyyeh power plant during last summer's war spilled over 15,000 tons of crude oil into the Mediterranean, polluting much of Lebanon's coast.
Continue reading "Environmental group presses ministry to clear coastline of polluted sand" »
Arab Environmental Monitor
Monday, July 02, 2007
By: Batir Wardam
You will have to search several locations in the World to find a situation similar to Aqaba’s: Jordan’s only outlet to the sea. This is a unique case of a confined, fragile and exquisite ecosystem subject to the cumulative effect of the “triangle of environmental threats”: Industry, tourism and transport.
Continue reading "Aqaba's Environmental Prospects 2007-2010" »
Haaretz
July 8, 2007
By Zafrir Rinat, Haaretz Correspondent
Tel Aviv area beaches could become heavily polluted due to repairs being done to a cracked sewage pipe in the city.
The Dan Municipal Union for Environment and Sewage, a body responsible for the transfer of sewage across the Gush Dan area, has identified a crack in one of the main sewage lines in northern Tel Aviv. If the crack is not repaired, the pipe could collapse, spilling large amounts of sewage into residential areas. However, while the pipe is being repaired, the sewage would be spilled into the sea, causing large-scale pollution to area beaches.
Continue reading "Repairs on cracked Tel Aviv sewage pipe could pollute beaches" »
YNET
The Northern California Israeli community, of course, that hosted over15,000 people in the annual 'Israel in the Gardens' festival
Eyal Marcus
Published: 06.25.07, 12:35 / Israel Activism
Residents of San Francisco are used to weird scenes but it is possible that their jaws dropped as a procession of children screamed "Hevenu Shalom Aleichem" (We bring you peace) through the city's streets. "Israel in the Gardens" is the annual festival of Northern California Israeli community. The event – held for the 11th year – unites thousands of Israelis and Jews. This year over 15,000 people attended and carried an environmental message.
Continue reading "What does the reef in Eilat have to do with a parade in San Francisco?" »
Jordan Times
June 8, 2007
By Dalya Dajani, Jordan Times, Amman
AQABA -- Beneath the pristine waters of this Red Sea resort, a concrete paradise is giving Mother Nature and the local fishing community a helping hand.
Emerging from a featureless sandy bed in the northernmost tip of the Aqaba coast, an artificial reef has been steadily thriving over the past two years as a safe haven for the fragile marine species of this ecosystem.
Continue reading "Aqaba's artificial reef safe haven to fragile marine species" »
Jordan Times
June 4, 2007
Aqaba’s diving sites contain some of the world’s most pristine coral reefs
By Dalya Dajani
AQABA — This city’s unique marine habitat is beginning to lose its appeal among several tourist diving groups, who cite serious coral reef damage as a result of littering and other issues compromising their safety.
Continue reading "Aqaba divers concerned about coral damage, safety" »
Jordan Times
June 1, 2007
Samir Ghawi
AMMAN -- The environmental pollution worsened so much at the Himmeh tourist resort that the company operating the site had no choice but to demolish the whole facility.
"The Himmeh facility was operated intermittently during 2006 as the site was closed several times by the official health and environment authorities because the water at the resort was contaminated by wastewater leaking from cesspools of private houses adjacent to the tourist area," the Jordan Himmeh Mineral Company said in its 42nd annual report.
Continue reading "Water pollution leads to Himmeh demolition" »
The Daily Star
June 01, 2007
Daily Star staff
BEIRUT: Last summer's fuel-oil spill into the Mediterranean Sea is not the main cause behind the Lebanese coast's pollution, despite what many people think. In fact, the key factor contributing to the pollution of the sea around Lebanon has never changed: sewage, according to an article in this month's issue of Environment and Development magazine.
Continue reading "Sewage remains primary pollutant in Lebanese waters" »
The Daily Star
May 28, 2007
An israeli attack caused the disaster, but environmentalists say Lebanese inaction made it worse
By Dona Challita
Special to The Daily Star
BEIRUT: Several forms of pollutants have fouled the sea off Lebanon for decades, including industrial effluents, untreated sewage and runoff from coastal garbage dumps. As though this were not enough, an Israeli attack during the war last summer added another hazardous element to the mix when the destruction of the storage tanks at the jiyyeh power plant south of Beirut released an estimated 15,000 tons of fuel oil into the Mediterranean.
Continue reading "Critics flay official response to Jiyyeh spill" »
Daily Star
By Mohammed Zaatari
Daily Star staff
Monday, February 12, 2007
SIDON: About 50 truckloads of garbage transported in the last three days from
the Normandy landfill in Beirut to the Southern port city of Sidon have been
dumped directly into the sea, according to a source close to the issue.
Speaking to The Daily Star on condition of anonymity, the source said three
contractors from Sidon had deposited the garbage in the sea between the Sidon
dump and the Siniq bridge south of town.
"An agreement was signed between the company charged with treating the Normandy
dump and three contractors from Sidon to transport garbage to Sidon for $140
per truckload," the source said. "Waste was unloaded in five places, with one
truck throwing its load by the coast, near the Siniq bridge."
On Sunday, Sidon's municipality erected sand barriers in the area in a bid to
block passages the trucks had used to entered the town.
Sidon Mayor Abdel-Rahman Bizri issued a statement Sunday calling on security and
military bodies to "monitor Sidon's entrances after strange waste was smuggled
into the town."
"Some parties were transporting garbage from Normandy to the Chouf region of
Sibline, but for some reasons which we do not know yet, garbage was transported
to Sidon instead," Bizri said.
According to Bizri, "Jihad Arab, a contractor charged with the transportation
process from the Normandy dump, agreed to carry waste out of Sidon at his own
expense to various other licensed places situated outside of the area."
"Environmental and health safety are as important as security," Bizri said.
Bizri called for the arrest and prosecution of those responsible for
transporting and dumping the garbage. The perpatrators should also by fined, he
said, "to prevent the reoccurrence of such a problem where environmental
conditions are exploited for financial benefits."
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=1&article_id=79447
Israel21c
Israelis raise coral out of the blue
By Karin Kloosterman January 21, 2007
Israeli scientist win US award for ecological research
While other criminal lawyers are spending their afternoons preparing court
cases, Israeli attorney Ofer Almalam is taking off his tie and heading over to
an unusual aquatic farm to dote on some special clients.
In a secret location not far from the city of Haifa, Almalam and his partner
Alon Efergan, a former engineer, are working around the clock raising coral for
their new company - Advanced Coral Propagating Technology (ACP Tech).
The coral they produce - about 8,000 pieces of 6 cm. coral a year - is living
proof that coral can be cultivated in captivity and in a closed system. It is
the first large-scale operation of its kind in the world where coral are reared
with no connection to nutrients in the sea.
The zoological research done by the unlikely pairing of a lawyer and an
engineer, they hope, may one day save the world's coral reefs from extinction -
or at least make it to the pages of National Geographic.
Pet stores and reef keepers around the world are taking notice of ACP Tech,
which has been having a hard time meeting the demand for their colourful sea
creatures. Distributed by Israeli food and agriculture giant Agrexco, major pet
store distributors in the US such as Segrest Farms in Miami and Merit Import are
placing orders faster than they can be delivered. The wholesale cost - about $15
apiece.
Like the secret location of the tanks, the precise methodologies used in raising
the finicky coral are under wraps until the company acquires patents. What they
can say is that it has taken them late nights of hard work, a whole lot of
intuition, and a special combination of technologies that give the coral the
specific conditions needed to grow.
Coral reefs in the sea serve as one of the world's most important marine
ecosystems. The exoskeletons of the small animals are home to thousands of
other aquatic plants and animals. Coral are necessary for nutrient cycling in
the sea; they are important for tourism in island economies, used in medical
studies for skin grafts and could be sources of new medicines.
But coral are sensitive to the smallest fluctuations in pH, chemical mixtures
and temperature. Global warming, fish farming, pollution and a whole host of
man-made activities are proving to be disastrous to their survival. Some
scientists believe that one-third of all coral in the sea has already died.
This year, reports CNN and New Scientist, has seen record amounts of coral
die-off.
"I feel that we are heading into a period where the coral will become extinct,"
Almalam told ISRAEL21c. "They have existed for 500 million years and have
passed a few extinctions. But we are going into an era that may have
immeasurable consequences for their survival."
"And hard corals, like the ones we are growing, are the most sensitive kind,"
says Almalam. "They need special conditions to live and require components in
the water present in a narrow range that includes such chemicals like calcium
and strontium."
Feeding his coral what he jokingly terms a "body-builder's" diet, Almalam helps
the coral grow twenty times faster than they would if they were growing
naturally in the sea. Those grown on his farm are more colorful than the native
sea varieties; they also adapt better to aquarium life.
The way ACP Tech packs and ships its coral, in special brine, also ensures a
near one-hundred-percent survival rate for coral that have to brave the long
journey from Israel to the United States.
Although environmentalists try to sway people from stealing coral in the sea,
the marine animals remain a hot commodity for hobbyists looking to add them to
exotic home aquariums.
By propagating and selling coral, Almalam says, ACP Tech is helping to offset
illegal poaching of coral. At any rate, he adds, poached coral has a low chance
of survival once someone removes it from the sea.
Much of what ACP Tech does is under wraps until the company receives patents on
their technologies and methodologies. What they can divulge is the fact that
the coral is propagated from smaller pieces of the substance through a process
known as fragmentation; the pieces are glued to a cube of concrete and then
placed in an aquarium environment that contains minerals and elements in the
"perfect" combination that coral love.
And "love" is the word Efergan uses when describing the most important
ingredient in the rearing process. "I give them the best that I can- like the
love I give to my children," he says. "I also give them the highest quality
food. They speak with me. I can feel how they feel."
"The environmental aspect is also important for me and I live the principles I
believe," added Efergan, a vegetarian who doesn't eat fish.
After studying mechanical engineering at Tel Aviv University, Efergen decided to
try his luck in the pet store business. It was then, about five years ago when
Almalam took an interest in aquariums, the two met.
Within three months of raising lionfish, Almalam had moved on to soft coral,
hard coral and then a 600 liter aquarium that found a home in his living room.
Besides buying materials and equipment from Efergan, Almalam was ordering
specialty supplies from the US and the UK.
Through their mutual love of coral and environmentalism, Almalam and Efergan
forged a bond like brotherhood, they say.
Today the aquariums are too large for the house and have been moved to a small
village outside the coastal city of Haifa.
Almalam's father Avraham Almalam an engineer with a background in agriculture
also deserves credit for ACP Tech's success. "Of course," says Almalam's
father, it was a dream of his and his wife's that their son would grow up and
become a lawyer. But it was no surprise that he would end up dedicating the
better part of his day to growing coral.
"Ofer always cared about animals and has since he was a young boy. He raised
snakes, dogs, butterflies and many kinds of varieties of mice at our home. He
grew up knowing how to be close to animals," says his father. "Developing a
closed system of raising coral was not a strange thing for my son to do. And it
is such an important thing for the world."
ACP Tech could one day - if the right investor comes along, they say- supply
coral to every corner of the world. Already, they have started supplying coral
to reef-keepers used for transplanting them in the natural environment in
efforts to keep reefs alive.
"Our production could be higher at the moment," says Almalam. "We just don't
have the system big enough to satisfy the demand."
Karin Kloosterman is a freelance reporter living in Israel.
http://www.israel21c.org/bin/en.jsp?enDispWho=Articles%5El1531&enPage=BlankPage&enDisplay=view&enDispWhat=object&enVersion=0&enZone=Democracy&
Sun, 21 Jan 2007 11:23:32 -0600
Daily Star staff
Thursday, January 18, 2007
SIDON: Fishermen in the Southern coastal city of Tyre held a protest on
Wednesday in objection to other fisherman's use of dynamite to catch fish, an
illegal practice. Speaking at a news conference in Tyre, Khalil Taha, the head
of the local fisherman's syndicate, hailed the behavior of fishermen who refuse
to break the law by fishing with explosives but instead use "more traditional,
albeit time-consuming, methods" that preserve the environment and marine fauna.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb
Taha called on the government and environmental associations to put an end to
dynamite fishing, "which not only harms the fish, but the fishermen too."
Dynamite is frequently used by fishermen at night, when sticks of the explosives
sometimes miss their targets and end up landing in the boats of other fishermen.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=1&article_id=78716
FOEME
Mayor of Tamar Regional Council, Israel and Governor of South Ghores, Jordan
Sign on MoU to Advance Sustainable Development in the Southern Dead Sea Basin
January 18, 2007
Yesterday, at the initiation of Friends of the Earth Middle East (FoEME), a
Memorandum of Understanding was signed between the Mayor of the Tamar Regional
Council in Israel, Mr. Dov Litvinoff and the Governor of South Ghores in
Jordan, Mr. Ghaleb Al-Shamayleh.
The MoU was signed with the understanding that cooperation is necessary in order
to promote sustainable development in the Southern Dead Sea Basin.
According to Dov Litvinoff, Mayor of the Tamar Regional Council, “the signing on
the MoU is a breakthrough in regional cooperation between us and the Jordanians
on issues of environment, quality of life and raising awareness of the general
environmental issues at the Dead Sea”. Mr. Litvinoff added that “the Regional
Council has declared 2007 as the year of environmental protection and regional
cooperation.”
The Dead Sea Basin is suffering from severe environmental degradation:
• The dramatic decline of the Dead Sea causes the formation of sinkholes to
appear, endangering lives of those in the area.
• Use of fertilizers that have not been properly composted, mainly on the
Jordanian side of the border, creates a significant fly problem.
• Without a border crossing in the area, tourism development and cross border
trade is being delayed.
The mayors, in signing the MoU, have identified the social and ecological
importance of the Dead Sea area, and see its inscription for a UNESCO World
Heritage Site as an important mechanism to rehabilitate the area.
In addition, they promise to work towards finding sustainable solutions to the
economic and environmental issues at hand, through the building of a compost
station, the building of an ecological cross border Peace Park at the Southern
end of the Dead Sea, and call for the opening of an additional border crossing
to promote tourism and trade crossing.
Gidon Bromberg, Israeli director of Friends of the Earth Middle East, says “this
MoU confirms the need to solve the environmental problems at the Dead Sea and
proves the ability of the communities in the area to rise above political
difficulties and work together.”
Arab Environment Monitor
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Jordanian magazine "Jordan Business" has recently published a thorough
analytical article on the joint statement by Jordan, Israel and Palestine to
conduct a feasibility and environmental impact study for the proposed Red-Dead
Canal.
This is the full text of the article:
Last month, Jordan, the Palestinian Authority and Israel launched a two-year
feasibility study for a project to replenish the rapidly disappearing Dead Sea
by way of pumping water into it from the Red Sea. Nisreen El-Shamayleh reports
on the meeting at the lowest-lying body of water on Earth.
The Red-Dead Canal project has been on the drawing board for years but has yet
to enter the construction phase. The feasibility study, to be conducted by the
World Bank, is scheduled to start in the first quarter of 2007.
Officials hope that the two-year feasibility study and environmental and social
assessment will recommend a multibillion-dollar project to link the Dead Sea
with the Red Sea, using a pipeline or canal to suck 1,900 million cubic meters
(mcm) of water annually from the Gulf of Aqaba.
France, the U.S., the Netherlands and Japan attended last month’s Dead Sea
meeting in Jordan together with the World Bank and the riparian states and have
already contributed $8.8 million to fund the $15 million study.
Ministry of Water and Irrigation Official Spokesperson and Assistant General
Secretary, Adnan Zoubi, said the three regional players had decided to initiate
a feasibility study after meeting at the World Economic Forum in May 2005.
Political developments, including the rise of Hamas to power in the
Palestinian territories, delayed the launch. Jordan, which has said it is
prepared to cooperate with the Palestinians, “whether led by Hamas or any other
party,” invited the Israelis and the Palestinians, along with the main parties,
to attend last month’s gathering.
The study became possible after the international community stepped in with the
financing and after Israel apparently dropped its Med-Dead Sea canal project,
which many experts say is not feasible. The Israelis had proposed building a
canal extending from the Mediterranean coast to the Dead Sea, including a
desalination plant that would sell freshwater to both Jordanians and
Palestinians. Such a project would have left the tap under Israeli control, a
set up neither Jordan or the Palestinians would have accepted.
Construction of the project, if determined feasible, would cost around $4
billion, last over 10 years and would link the Dead Sea with the Red Sea
through a series of pipelines, canals and tunnels. The intended 180-kilometer
conduit would carry around two billion cubic meters of seawater per year to
associated power, reverse osmosis desalination facilities and would increase
freshwater availability to Jordan, Israel and Palestine by an annual 850 mcm.
The project will also include a hydro-electric plant to capitalize on the drop
in level of 400 meters from the Red Sea to the Dead Sea, generating 550
megawatts of power, which will be used to operate the desalination plant and to
nourish electricity networks in the Kingdom. The Israelis and Palestinians will
also benefit from the generated power. The proposal also envisages a shared
cross-border airport and an industrial city.
Dr. Dureid Mahasneh, former co-chairman of the Jordan-Israel Water Coordination
Committee, said Jordan is expected to get 570 mcm of freshwater through
desalination and the remaining 280 mcm would be divided among Palestinians and
Israelis annually. While Israel’s water share is not yet clear, the Israelis
see the project as a means of cementing relations with its Arab neighbors. The
Dead Sea is depleting at the rate of about 80 centimeters per year, and will be
completely dry by 2050 if urgent action is not taken. The Red-Dead project will
quash the 25-meter fall in the level of the Dead Sea over the past century.
Experts say the reduction has been caused mainly by the diversion of the Jordan
River, which feeds the Dead Sea, for irrigation and drinking water - mostly by
Israel, but also by Jordan and Syria. Today, less than 7% of the river’s
original flow reaches the Dead Sea.The annual drop in the level of the Dead Sea
has already left the nearby lands unstable and susceptible to sink holes,
which puts infrastructure, including roads, hotels and chemical plants around
the sea, in jeopardy. The natural environment has also been disrupted,
affecting bird migrations and desert wildlife.
Dr. Mahasneh said the completion of the study doesn’t necessarily mean execution
of the costly project will follow. However, he pointed out that getting funds
for the mega-project is not as difficult as it used to be five or 10 years ago
because through a build, operate and transfer basis, consumers will be paying
for the desalinated water so investors may be more tempted. He added that the
liquidity in the region could make it easier to attract investors, especially
that the project will spin off to include resort areas, fish ponds, and lakes
in Wadi Araba to bolster tourism.
Although many studies have been conducted to explore the feasibility of the
project, Dr. Mahasneh said the new study is “using totally different techniques
and is not intended to complete or build on what has been done in the past.”
Water politics
There is no doubt that the Red-Dead Canal project is highly political and not
just another water project. Professor of Hydrogeology at the University of
Jordan, Dr. Elias Salameh said the project may enhance peace and lessen
tensions in the region through joint research and scientific studies - a
sentiment shared by all the parties. “The project is very important since it
will deepen the meaning of peace in the region through joint projects and
practical work,” Mr. Zoubi said.
Now key players, the Palestinian Authority was represented by President Mahmoud
Abbas’s economic advisor, Mohammad Mustafa, who described the study as
“essential in promoting sustainable development of the entire Jordan Valley
basin.” In 1990, the Palestinians were excluded from the Red-Dead Canal
trilateral committee, consisting of Jordan, Israel and the U.S., which was
responsible for the development of the Jordan Rift Valley.
At the launch of the feasibility study in Jordan, Israeli Minister of National
Infrastructure Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told reporters the project goes beyond
protection of the Dead Sea because the economic cooperation would fortify the
peace process. The Israelis are also keen on protecting their touristic
investments along the Dead Sea.
Shimon Peres, the Israeli deputy prime minister, said the “project of the canal,
or the Peace Conduit…is vital for the preservation of the Dead Sea, but just as
much for peace and prosperity in this area,” he said. “In the Middle East we
have used too much diplomacy and strategy, and too little economy,” he added.
Regardless of these declarations there is still skepticism of Israeli
intentions, especially that it has taken more than its fair share of water. He
explained that the Israelis “falsely presume that the [new] desalinated
freshwater for the Palestinians might replace the freshwater they illegally
take from the West Bank underground aquifers.” Israel still controls 75% of
underwater aquifers in the West Bank. Drilling, licensing and water allocation
are also under Israeli control.
But not everyone supports the closer cooperation. Jordan’s Islamic-led
opposition rejects the project, which it says has the primary aim of promoting
normalization with Israel.
“From a principled attitude, we view the project a political move that has the
key aim of normalizing ties with the Zionist entity,” Secretary General of the
Islamic Action Front (IAF), Zaki Bani Ershaid, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur
after the launch of the study.
Environmental critics
Critics on opposite shores of the Dead Sea say the project is a pricey endeavor
that fails to address the root cause of the depleting sea, which could destroy
the very sea that they are trying to resuscitate. Some environmentalists have
warned that the two bodies of water may not mix well and that siphoning out
large volumes of water from the Gulf of Aqaba may damage its fragile ecosystem.
Some say that pumping less salty water into the Dead Sea could kill its delicate
micro-organisms and harm its appeal to tourists. Others argue that the Dead Sea
used to be replenished from fresh water from the River Jordan, so it should not
be harmed.
Friends of the Earth warned that mixing water from the Red Sea with the unique
chemical soup of the Dead Sea could create a natural disaster. “The [Dead
Sea’s] mix of bromide, potash, magnesium and salt is like no other body of
water on the planet,” said Gidon Bromberg, the Israeli director of Friends of
the Earth in the Middle East. “By bringing in the marine water, this
composition will be changed. There is concern about algae growth and we could
see the sea change from deep blue to red and brown and the different waters
could separate.”
Some environmentalists have gone as far as charging that Red-Dead is driven by
the interests of Israeli and Jordanian construction companies eager to
capitalize on the mega-project. The Red-Dead canal is not the only solution to
the water problem; neither is it going to undo the mismanagement of Jordan’s
reources, Dr. Mahasneh explained. “Re-exporting water in the form of
watermelons and tomatoes is part of our water mismanagement that also has to
stop,” he said.
Jordan Times
AMMAN (IRIN) — Pollution, overfishing and the destruction of marine habitat are
driving commercial fisheries in the port city of Aqaba, 250km south of Amman,
to the brink of collapse, according to environmentalists and fishermen.
“Immediate action must be taken to stop the ongoing depletion of fish stocks and
damage to the ecosystem,” said Fadi Sharaiha of the Royal Marine Conservation
Society of Jordan.
Halting the destruction of coastal habitats, taking steps to control and reduce
pollution, and preventing the use of dynamite in fishing would help to restore
productivity in the area, he said.
“In a few years’ time, there will be no fish to catch in Aqaba Port,” said
Sharaiha, who is urging authorities to implement strict measures against
vessels that dump garbage and toxic waste in the sea.
Fears are growing that the fishing community may lose its livelihood, which
would have profound social consequences with resulting high unemployment.
For the past few months, tens of fishermen have stopped casting their nets into
the nearly empty waters. Out of the 147 fishermen authorised to venture into
the gulf, more than 80 have permanently anchored their boats on the shores.
Abdul Rahman Mahmoud, 44, who has been fishing since he was 12 years old, has
already started looking for a new job.
“Everyday we hear about laws and plans to protect the sea. We need deeds not
words,” Mahmoud said.
Ever-increasing marine traffic in the port and building construction onshore has
compounded the fishermen’s problems.
The government turned Aqaba into a special economic zone nearly five years ago
in a bid to attract foreign investment and transform the area into a commercial
hub.
Hundreds of millions of dollars were pumped into real estate projects on the
seafront, while marine traffic nearly tripled.
“We cannot have it all. We either make Aqaba a free trade zone, bustling with
marine traffic, or [we make it] a tourism destination,” Mahmoud said.
As a result of its semi enclosed form, the Gulf of Aqaba is susceptible to
marine pollution and ecosystem degradation.
Officials from the Ministry of Environment said they were aware of the problem
but admitted their hands were tied.
“We cannot create hurdles in front of investment projects,” Isa Shboul,
spokesman for the Ministry of Environment, said.
Recently, Parliament endorsed an environment law to protect the country’s
fragile ecosystem, which set penalties that include one year in prison and
hefty fines.
The government also proposed to fishermen to ply their trade in international
waters off the coast of Yemen, but the fishermen were not interested.
Abu Ali, 55, said the long journey was not feasible. “Our boats are too small to
handle the expenses of a long fishing journey that lasts for weeks,” said Ali.
“This is our water, we must be able to fish here, not hundreds of miles away.”
Haaretz
08.1.07 | 13:47 By Tzipi Iser-Itzik
How do you advance a project as complicated and grandiose, as expensive and
intricate, as building a canal between two seas? It's an issue that keeps
popping up in the public debate and then disappearing again because it's so
terrifically unfeasible .
First of all give it a name that can't be resisted, like "Peace Conduit". Once
it's become synonymous in international circles with regional amity, who the
hell cares if it's economically and environmentally feasible?
Yet so many formulas for peace have come and gone in the annals of history that
caution is warranted. Before starting any project, let alone one on which peace
in the Middle East is supposed to depend, one should check in advance if it's
sustainable.
Building a canal between the Red Sea and the Dead one, while blithely ignoring
the tremendous potential damage it could wreak on the water sources and ecology
of the Bay of Eilat and the Arava, could prove to be an incompetence that will
bear an enormous cost.
If risks are not evaluated ahead of time, we may find ourselves in a dreadful
situation whose solution is bad.
How? The canal is supposed to save the Dead Sea from drying up once and for all,
by pumping 1.5 billion cubic meters of water a year, which is 3 times the amount
of water transported through the National Conduit, from the Red Sea.
Is it even possible?
The Arava valley has aquifers of sweet and brackish water, that serve for
drinking and agriculture. Leaks of briny water from the canal could salinate
the water sources. Is this not a risk that should be addressed in advance?
There are plenty of other examples.
How will pumping hundreds of cubic meters of seawater affect Eilat's ecology?
The project calls for hundreds of "fish cages", for farmed fish, to be built
along the canal. These could poison the regional water supply through leaks.
The plan calls for a desalination plant to be erected, using water that drops
from the heights to 400 meters below sea level (which is how low the Dead Sea
is). But from there, the water has to be propelled 800 meters upward: how will
this effect the environment?
The seas in question sit right smack in the crack of the Great Rift Valley, that
splits the earth from southern Africa up to Syria. The entire area is prone to
earthquakes. A bad quake could badly damage the infrastructure, leaving to
potentially grave environmental damage if the canal is ruined; this too
warrants examination in advance.
Perhaps for a change, given the vastness of the project, we should replace the
empty slogans with actual thought about how to create a project sustainable for
generations.
The author is the executive director of the Israel Union for Environmental
Defense, known locally as Adam, Teva V'Din.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ArticleContent.jhtml?itemNo=810860
Jordan Times
Yusuf Mansur
Can the dead be revived? No, but if we are speaking of the Dead Sea, it is
possible, and with water, too!
How simple the cure is. The new-old initiative of connecting the Red Sea with
the Dead Sea is the most important economic project for the sustainable
development of the Kingdom in the long term.
The Dead Sea is two-thirds its size in the 1970s, in terms of water surface, and
where it used to be 395 metres below sea level, it is now 417 metres, a 22-metre
drop in 30 years; and the rate of loss is accelerating as population and unfair
usage escalate. Thus, speeding up the untimely demise of one of the most
important cultural and historical sights in the world, at the current rate, the
Dead Sea will disappear by 2050.
The unfair uncoordinated usage of the resources that feed the sea is emblematic
of the Tragedy of the Commons, a well-known concept in economics, where two or
more parties share a common resource with no penalty or fee for usage.
Consequently, since usage is costless, each party has an incentive to draw from
the resource more than the others do.
When completed, the canal will mean more to Jordan than saving one of its
greatest tourist attraction sites. It will bring with it power generation from
the hydraulic stations on the canal, water desalination capabilities (Israel is
considered the world leader in water desalination and currently uses nuclear
energy for that purpose) and a renewable water source.
Agriculture will also blossom on both sides of the canal as irrigation water
becomes available, instead of using the water of the Disi aquifer in the south
of Jordan, thus wasting one of the cleanest water resources on a low-return
product, and draining possibly the oldest aquifer in the world to plant
watermelons for export to make Jordan, one of the ten water-poorest countries
in the world, a de facto exporter of water.
Tourism and tourist projects will also pick up as the canal comes to provide
unmatched scenery in a warm spot of the world. Aqaba will become even closer as
buildings and structures will appear between the Dead Sea and Aqaba and the
economic activity will see a population shift to the Jordan Valley, where
Jordanians won’t have to worry about heating their homes with expensive fuel in
the winter.
Thousands of skilled and semi-skilled jobs will be created. Billions of dollars
of investment will accompany the canal in order to benefit from the
opportunities it generates. The canal itself will be a tourist attraction and
economic activity will grow into truly sustainable economic growth and
development.
The cost of the project is not forbidding. It would be much easier for officials
to ask for aid and grants to finance this project than had been the case when
asking for finance for less sustainable and economically feasible projects.
Besides, investors could pick up the tab for the capital outlays through a BOO
(build, own, operate), BOT (build, operate, transfer), BOOT (build, own,
operate, transfer), or any other financing scheme.
The sad fact remains that this project had been thought of in Jordan more than
30 years ago; but since there was no peace treaty between Jordan and Israel at
the time, it was considered an embarrassing taboo. Jordan presented this
project among its mega-investment projects at the MENA Economic Conference held
in Amman in 1995. It remains there, in the literature. The cost of the study,
estimated then as now at $15 million, is paltry relative to the losses
associated with losing the Dead Sea every year. The simplest cost/benefit
analysis will show the economic feasibility and the high economic return to
Jordan and its neighbours from such a project.
Jordan should continue the drive to build the canal, reviving the Dead Sea
before it is too late.
Questions and comments can be directed at: ymansur@enconsult.com
http://www.jordantimes.com/tue/opinion/opinion4.htm
Haaretz
Last update - 12:01 05/10/2006
By Revital Levy-Stein
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/770521.html
The thousands of tourists who come to Eilat during the intermediate
days of the Sukkot holiday (October 8-13) and plan to pitch tents on
the city's southern beach will be surprised to discover that, unlike
in previous years, they will have to park their cars some distance
from their tents. This is because officials from the Israel Nature and
National Parks Protection Authority (INNPPA) recently decided to limit
the entry of cars to the beach to protect the coral reef.
Eilat's southern beach - whose entire length is a marine nature
preserve of diving sites and an underwater world rich with corals and
marine animals - is expected to attract many vacationers, especially
since tenting on the north beach has been banned for the past year and
the number of Israelis traveling to the Sinai has declined
considerably. "Thousands of vacationers will sleep in tents along the
shore," says Guy Eilon, director of the Eilat district of INNPPA.
Eilat's southern beaches, including the coral reef adjacent to the
shore, have always been completely accessible to cars and vacationers.
Heavy damage has been caused to the corals and marine animal
populations have declined. For this reason, INNPPA is taking immediate
measures to reduce the access of cars to the reef, while organizing
convenient access to the water for swimmers and divers. "It is
important to us that the preserve be accessible," says Eilon, "and
that the public be able to enjoy the underwater world, while
protecting nature from damage caused by swimmers and divers."
The first thing INNPPA did was cordon off the entire length of the
waterfront and post signs indicating the nearest opening to the water.
"The ropes define the areas where swimming is allowed," explains
Eilon. "It is not a fence and can easily be traversed, but bathers
mostly respect the ropes and enter the water in the designated areas."
Eilon reports that this has significantly reduced the damage to the
corals on the upper part of the reef, across which swimmers used to
walk, and the amount of enforcement required by INNPPA. "When the
corals are healthy, all the animals that depend on them are healthy,
too," says Eilon.
Another measure implemented by INNPPA is the placing of boulders all
along the beach 10-20 meters from the water. The boulders are of the
same granite as the surrounding mountains, so they blend in with the
landscape. "The boulders completely prevent the entry of cars, as
opposed to in the past, when cars came right up to the water's edge,"
continues Eilon. "This caused tremendous damage - pollution from fuel
and oil, the disturbing of the sand and the crushing of shells and
crabs at low tide."
In addition to protecting the reef, the positioning of the boulders
has increased the number of vacationers on the beach as the cars used
to take up space that can now be occupied by tents. Other improvements
include the installation of mooring area for lowering divers into the
water, at the two most popular sites. "Diving clubs can lower divers
directly from boats into the water," says Eilon. "This will prevent
damage to the coral from divers walking on the sea bed and the
disturbing the sand."
By Agence France Presse (AFP)
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
Pierre Sawaya
Agence France Press
BEIRUT: Lebanese beach resorts that had invested huge sums for a promising
summer season are now counting their losses with millions of dollars in damage
inflicted by Israeli strikes and ensuing oil slicks. "Our direct losses and the
loss of earnings amount to $10 million," said Roger Edde, owner of the Edde
Sands resort north of Beirut.
Israel launched a 34-day offensive against Lebanon on July 12 after the
Hizbullah captured two Israeli soldiers. The hostilities forced tourists to
flee Lebanon, which had been preparing for a record summer season.
The Israeli strikes also caused an environmental catastrophe on Lebanon's coast
by destroying fuel tanks at the Jiyyeh power station south of Beirut,
unleashing an estimated 15,000 tons of fuel oil into the Mediterranean Sea.
"We closed for three weeks to clean the beach from the oil slicks which also
evaporate, causing breathing problems, and activities have been slow since the
September 2 reopening," Edde said. "From 3,000 lunches and dinners a day before
the war, we are now serving an average of 30 meals a day."
Hussein Sharafeddin, owner of the Pangea beach resort south of Beirut, expressed
the same grievances and has been forced to carry out massive lay-offs.
"Our losses amount to $2 million. We had invested a lot in order to offer
Lebanese and tourists one of the world's most beautiful resorts," he said.
"We keep cleaning the sand and the sea, but the oil slicks keep coming back," he
added.
But Sharafeddin refuses to give up: "We intend to continue to invest and we are
considering building a hotel despite the [Israeli] threats."
Edde is also optimistic. He decided to reopen after the end of the war in order
to "keep the morale high" and to continue work on a new 2,500-seat conference
center. But he has decided to freeze future investments until the situation is
more stable.
"We want to see where the country is heading," he said.
Millions of dollars have been invested at dozens of beach resorts which have
mushroomed along Lebanon's 220-kilometer coastline in recent years.
The Bamboo Bay resort south of Beirut has reported direct losses of $560,000 and
loss of earnings of $350,000.
It opened for 10 days last month but was forced to close for lack of clients.
"We need at least two or three years to regain the tourism boom of the past few
years," said Sharafeddin.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=3&article_id=75895
(From: Stuart Schoenfeld)
French environmentalists arrive to assist in oil-spill damage control, clean-up
By Nour Samaha
Daily Star staff
Thursday, October 05, 2006
BEIRUT: French environmental experts arrived in Lebanon on Wednesday to assist
in efforts to clean up the country's largest oil spill in history and monitor
the disaster's repercussions.
The spill, caused by Israeli air strikes on the Jiyyeh power plant's fuel tanks
in July, now plagues two-thirds of Leb-anon's coastline.
"We are introducing a new technique that will deal specifically with the
clearing of oil from pebbled beaches and rock pools," said Bernard Fichaut, a
geography professor at Britannia-Breste University in France.
"This technique, otherwise known as 'surf-washing,' has been around for 30 years
and has proven to be the best method available to clear the oil quickly, cleanly
and at a low cost," he said.
The technique consists of collecting all the oil-covered rocks and stones from
the coastline and blasting them with hot water in order to remove the oil. The
process is repeated all along the beach until all the oil is caught in nets and
can be cleared.
Denis La Croix, from the French National Institute of the Sea, arrived with
Fichaut on Wednesday and will also analyze and monitor the effects of the oil
spill on local marine life.
"While at the moment we have focused on a short-term program to monitor the
effects of the oil spill on sea life, the long-term consequences are just as
important," La Croix said.
"Creatures such as plankton, mollusks and going all the way up the food chain to
fish and even birds are being directly affected; obviously this has the
potential to create an ecological disaster," he said.
La Croix said there would be additional French missions to Lebanon in the near
future to address various concerns resulting from the spill.
La Croix and Fichaut are both working in Lebanon in collaboration with Bahr
Loubnan, a local environmental organization that has already cleared 24,000
liters of oil from the Bondi-Bellevue beach and another 2,000 liters from Sands
Rock beach, both in Jiyyeh.
Mohammad Sarji, a member of Bahr Loubnan, said the organization was focusing on
removing oil from the surface of the sea.
However, while clean-up efforts have been relatively successful on the beaches
of Jiyyeh and Jbeil, an oil leak at Ramlet-el-Baida has forced work there to be
suspended since mid-September, leaving many asking how long the oil can remain
on the beach before causing irreparable damage.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=1&article_id=75929
Storied Greenpeace vessel brings 21 crew members back to Lebanon to survey oil
spill, collect oyster samples and knit during their downtime
By Iman Azzi
Special to The Daily Star
Saturday, September 30, 2006
TABARJA: Most of the rainbows glimmering on the surface of the Mediterranean Sea
off the coast of Lebanon are the unfortunate results of the attack by Israeli
warplanes on the Jiyyeh power plant on July 12 and again three days later.
However, a larger, bolder and more ecologically correct rainbow has now entered
Lebanon's harbor, hoping to lend a hand, or a fin, to the clean-up efforts - the
Rainbow Warrior, pride of the Greenpeace fleet.
The Rainbow Warrior is a Greenpeace boat licensed in the Netherlands but
designed to serve the world. It just returned to Lebanon for the second time in
as many months. The Warrior's crew is neither trained nor equipped for oil-spill
clean-up, but Greenpeace has partnered up with Italian scientists and academic
researchers at the American University of Beirut to help track the movements of
the oil slick and collect oyster samples for study.
"This trip is quite different than other Greenpeace missions. It came up
suddenly and we had to react. We usually work with more advanced planning,"
says Captain Mike Finkin of the operation, the first Greenpeace mission he has
led. A member of Greenpeace for 10 years, he previously campaigned for the
salvation of blue-fin tuna off the coast of Marseille. He has been sailing for
20 years.
Jim Footner, a British member of Greenpeace's land-locked team, agrees with
Finkin's assessment: "An oil spill is an extra-curricular activity. The
regional team is not prepared to deal with such an event on top of their normal
duties, so we send in help."
Greenpeace deployed the Rainbow Warrior "to assess how oil has contaminated the
water," Footner explains. "The damage here has been fairly prolific and oil
spills are region-wide problems. You can't just put a box around the oil."
The Warrior is one of three in a Greenpeace fleet that includes the Esperanza
and the Arctic Sunrise. When it first came to Lebanon last month, the Warrior
helped transport over 75 tons of essential medical supplies, including dialysis
equipment, drugs and fuel, part of a collaboration between Greenpeace and
Medecins Sans Frontieres, from August 2-10. At the time, the Warrior dared to
sail during the Israeli-imposed sea blockade while larger ships remained docked
far off shore in safer waters. A white-and-red Medecins Sans Frontieres banner
still hangs over the cargo hold of the Warrior.
Everything else about the boat, including the color, is green. The Warrior does
not use a motor but sails to move among the waves. The ration for necessary
electricity on board is 0.3 cubic meters of fuel a day. Running a motor would
increase fuel usage by 1.7 cubic meters. Plus, smiles Finkin, "she moves faster
anyways with the sails in the right wind."
All metal components of the Warrior's exterior are painted green, with a bold
rainbow displayed on either side (one side has been repainted more recently but
the difference is minimal). The Warrior is currently flying the Dutch, Lebanese
and Greenpeace flags. There is a red hammock swinging on deck for crew members
who desire even more rocking motion.
For Finkin, originally from South Africa, the oil has become an additional yet
unwanted guest on a ship that already has a crew of 21, representing 15
nationalities.
"It's dirty. Really, it gets everywhere. Our divers come back and it's on their
gear, on their skin. I was looking at footage of the operation off the coast of
the power station. It's horrific. The tar is a foot thick," Finkin says.
When the crew is not sailing or diving, most prefer quiet time or individual
relaxation during their downtime, of which their isn't much.
"I write stories," Finkin admits. "Some knit. Others play cards or read. The
electrician is learning to play the fiddle. He can do the wedding march."
Below deck and away from the oil sludge are double-occupancy sleeping cabins, an
information-technology room filled with countless dials and switches, a library
with dozens of Lonely Planet guidebooks and photos of past Greenpeace aquatic
endeavors. There is a sewing machine with colorful spools of thread in the
cargo hold as well - ready to be used by the more domestically minded members
of the crew for making promotional material for their activism campaigns.
This is the second Greenpeace ship to take the name Rainbow Warrior. The first
Warrior, built in 1957, was bombed on July 10, 1985, by French secret service
agents in Auckland harbor. The first ship was thus a casualty in the campaign
against nuclear testing. One crew member was killed in the explosion.
Although this current mission is being carried out in coordination with the
Lebanese Navy and the ship appears to be out of harm's way, the crew cannot
ignore the tragedy that occurred in Lebanon during the summer's war.
Finkin's only visit to the dry land of Lebanon nearly brought him to tears. He
and his crew took a half-hour look at Beirut's southern suburbs, an area that
the Israelis bombed on a daily basis during the war.
"I saw huge lorries going past with rubble and I stood watching people and my
heart grew heavier. If I had stayed any longer I would have started to cry,"
the captain says.
Meanwhile, underwater, Greenpeace diver Regina Srerichs explores the damage
Israel has wrought on Lebanon's seas.
"The first dive at the power plant there was a lot of oil on the seabed,
everything was covered in oil, it was between the stones and a viscous layer on
the water's surface," she says. "This dive was cleaner."
Srerichs, a diver since 1986, has witnessed such an oil spill before - after the
collision of two oil tankers in the Baltic Sea. "This is worse," she declares.
For oil to settle into the seabed it is necessary that it finds something to
grab onto or it will it keep moving with the current. The Greenpeace diving
team started at Jiyyeh and worked its way north up the coastline, helping to
map where the oil has, or has not, settled.
"There is not much left above the water. It's all sunken below," says Footner,
noting the importance these maps will be for the oil clean-up crews.
"Most of the poison you can't see," adds Srerichs, who has been diving since
1986. "I won't touch the fish, not north of Jiyyeh until I hear the results
from the scientists. It all depends on their results. Maybe the sample will
bring good news."
As samples, the team collects 60 oysters from each dive spot and averages three
dives a day. As the Rainbow Warrior sails her way from Beirut to the Palm
Islands off the coast of Tripoli, with a possible stopover in Byblos, and then
eventually away from Lebanon altogether, her crew will continue to test the
seas, anxious about what will be found next, along with the rest of the world.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=1&article_id=75802
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=75869
Daily Star staff
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
BEIRUT/NAIROBI: An international team of experts will begin an assessment
Tuesday of the environmental damage in Lebanon caused by the recent conflict. A
press released issued by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) said
Monday the team, led by and working in close cooperation with the Lebanese
authorities, will be visiting and sampling sites thought to present potential
risks to human health, wildlife and the wider environment.
These include the Jiyyeh power plant 28 kilometers south of Beirut which
discharged an estimated 10,000 to 30,000 tons of fuel oil into the
Mediterranean after being hit in mid-July; Rafik Hariri International Airport,
where fuel tanks were set alight as a result of repeated bombing; and the
Maliban glass factory in the Bekaa Valley, destroyed by an air raid on July 19.
The team also plans to assess pollution risks at many damaged drinking-water,
sewage-treatment and hospital-facility sites.
Achim Steiner, UN undersecretary general and UNEP executive director, said:
"There is an urgent need to assess the environmental legacy of the recent
conflict and put in place a comprehensive clean-up of polluted and
health-hazardous sites."
The decision to undertake a post-conflict assessment follows a request in early
August from the Environment Ministry.
Steiner said that the UNEP "expects to have a comprehensive report on sites and
locations in need of decontamination and clean up before the end of the year. -
The Daily Star
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.aspedition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=75869