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January 30, 2007

GOOD WATER NEIGHBORS BULLETIN 41 (PARTIAL)

Friends of the Earth Middle East

Issue No. 41 (December 2006)
GOOD WATER NEIGHBORS BULLETIN

This is a monthly electronic bulletin on water and environmental issues in our
region, produced by Friends of the Earth Middle East. Friends of the Earth
Middle East (FoEME) is a regional environmental organization of Jordanians,
Israelis and Palestinians working together to promote sustainable development
and peace building through environmental awareness.

REGIONAL UPDATES FROM THE GOOD WATER NEIGHBORS PROJECT

The most important happening of November was the result of the quick response
from FoEME’s staff on the notification that work will start on the Separation
Barrier between the Good Water Neighbors (GWN) communities of Tzur Hadassa on
the Israeli side and Wadi Fukin on the Palestinian side. FoEME’s Tel-Aviv
branch responded by appealing to the Israeli Civil Administration, which
resulted in the work being postponed until a decision is made on the issue. In
the event of a negative response, FoEME is already preparing a petition to the
Israeli Supreme Court against the barrier in Wadi Fukin.

Another important issue was the second meeting between the mayors of the GWN
communities of Beit She’an and Sheikh Hussein, where a Memorandum of
Understanding was drafted as a first step to restore the streams of Nahal Harod
and Wadi Ziglab, both important tributaries to the Jordan River.

NEWS IN BRIEF [HEADLINES REPRINTED ONLY; FOR FULL STORIES SEE THE FOEME WEBSITE
OR SUBSCRIBE TO THE NEWSLETTER]

Since 'Operation Summer Rains', 90% Gazans Eat Less than Three Meals a Day, Only
a Third of Gazans have Running Water
(Ma’an News -- www.maannews.net, Palestine, November, 17th, 2006)
_____________

Cost of water to farmers to rise 20% over five years
(Ha’aretz, Israel, November 16, 2006) By Amiram Cohen

_____________

A 15 meter sink hole appeared in Deir Allah
(Al-Dustor, Jordan, November 1, 2006)

_____________

Evaporation and Israel Threatens to Vanish the Dead Sea
(Al-Jazeera Net, www.aljazeera.net, Palestine, November, 14th 2006)

_____________

ISO certificate for the water ministry
(Al-Ghad, Jordan November 21, 2006)

_____________

Israel and Jordan fight sea pollution
Ha'aretz, November 16th, 2006
_____________

Sink holes threatening the lives of South Ghour residents
(Al-Arab Al-Yaum, November 22, 2006)

Municipality of Tulkarm Urged the Residents of the District to Pay their Duties
for Electricity and Water Services
(Ma’an News -- www.maannews.net, Palestine, November, 1st, 2006)

An Israeli-Jordanian Agreement on water issues
Ha'aretz, November 23rd

This bulletin is part of Friends of the Earth Middle East's regional project:
Good Water Neighbors.

The bulletin aims to bring up to date information from the region on pertinent
water issues facing communities, focusing on water provision, allocation and
good management practices.

All issues of Good Water Neighbors bulletins are also available online at:
www.foeme.org

Contributions to this bulletin are welcome. Please send by the 24th of each
month to: info@foeme.org

The opinions expressed in this publication are those of FoEME and/or of
individual contributors and not necessarily those of our sponsors. The Good
Water Neighbors Project recognizes the support of the European Union
Partnership for Peace program, the UK Government's Global Opportunities Fund
and the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund.

This newsletter or portions thereof may be freely distributed. All quotations
from material enclosed herein should be properly cited. If cited in other
publications, please send us copies.

This project document has been produced with the financial assistance of the
European Union. The contents of this document are the sole responsibility of
EcoPeace / Friends of the Earth Middle East and can under no circumstances be
regarded as reflecting the position of the European Union.

www.foeme.org

January 14, 2007

Table of contents of AL-BIA WAL-TANMIA

AL-BIA WAL-TANMIA
The Leading Pan-Arab Environment Magazine
Volume 12, No.106, January 2007

CONTENTS

5 Nuclear energy in the Arab market (editorial by Najib Saab)
14 Globalization of nuclear energy: will Arabs run the marathon? cover story
22 Arab media forum for environment and development in Cairo
24 Environmental justice: road to an Arab renaissance
28 Me and the Environment best of a photo contest
36 Arab NGO success stories in defending their environment
40 You are what you eat
44 The endangered Arabian Tahr thrives in UAE Sir Bani Yas island reserve
48 Wild Borneo
56 The era of nanotechnology
60 Safe drinking water from the sun
62 The Mediterranean in 2025 a sea threatened by development
64 Sky hole patching a UNEP project to curb illegal trade in ozone depleting
substances
66 The global carbon market
69 Secrets of Lake Vostok a hidden world in Antarctica
72 China shifts gears car industry in China

http://www.mectat.com.lb/contents/page106.htm

October 06, 2006

"Arab Environmental Monitor"--new website/blog

FROM: Batir M Wardam

Dear Friends and Colleagues;

I would like to announce the launching of my special website/blog named "Arab
Environmental Monitor"
www.arabenvironment.net

which also has an Arabic interface at www.arabenvironment.net/arabic/

This blog was created in February 2006 as a virtual platform for updates and
analysis of the Jordanian environmental issues and now I have decided to expand
it into an Arab platform targeting the Jordanian, Arab and international
environmental community.
I am an Ecologist by profession and education, and have worked for 10 years in
environmental management with local and international organizations in a career
that included Academic institutions, NGOs, research centers, community groups,
media and currently government. I have also worked in various activities with
the World Bank, IUCN, UNEP and most recently UNDP. In this career I focused on
issues of communication and networking and discovered that information on the
Arab environment is plentiful, contrary to what most Arab and international
environmentalists think, but it is scattered.
I thought that one of my main missions will be to try to contribute to the huge
task of bringing together such information.
I am not claiming that I can do this via a blog that is run and managed on
voluntary basis and by one individual but I will certainly try my best. I am
currently dedicating 3 hours a day for this blog with 50% spent on research for
materials, 25% for writing and 25% for promoting the blog.

I will highly appreciate if you can assist me with sending me press releases,
news, descriptions of activities, publications and events by yourselves,
organizations and networks to my e-mail batir@nets.jo
since this will give me a lot of help in minimizing research time and focus
more on diversifying and improving the content.

The sources of information I am using for the blog are as follows:
1- News from media outlets (newspapers, magazines).
2- News from regional and global networks with special focus on the Arab world.
3- News, overviews and activities of organizations in the region.
4- Publications and reports.
5- Conferences.
6- Multi-media products.
7-Best practices in the field

I have discovered the powerful potentials of blogging in the begenning of this
year. This is a very powerful and easy to manage e-tool which I believe will
transform the shape and quality of communication and media in the coming
decades. Although blogs started as personal diaries they have matured to become
strong and effective communication tools that can be managed easily with a
user-friendly system that can accommodate serious professional content as well.
To maintain its "blog" identity this site will contain a lot of personal
opinions and analysis as well as linking to and highlighting content from the
best sources of environmental knowledge in the region.
This blog will always be in a "transitional" state aiming for better content
management and I will be very proud of any critical and useful comments that
can guide the course of development of this blog.
I welcome you all and hope this platform will be useful.


Batir M Wardam
MsC in Ecology
Researcher and writer in Environment and Development
Tel 00962 6 5816845
Fax 00962 6 5560288
Mobile 00 962 79 98 666 44
P.O.Box 140823
Amman 11814
Jordan
e-mail: batir@nets.jo
Environmental Blog: http://www.arabenvironment.net

AL-BIA WAL-TANMIA Environmental Magazine

From: Stuart Schoenfeld

AL-BIA WAL-TANMIA
The Leading Pan-Arab Environment Magazine

Volume 11, No.103, October 2006

http://www.mectat.com.lb/

CONTENTS

5 Towards Arab clean development technology (editorial by Najib Saab)
9 Did Israel use depleted uranium?
10 Post-war environment (observations in Lebanon by Japanese photographer Naomi
Toyoda)
22 Crocodile hunter hunted by nature (dramatic death of Steve Irwin) (cover
story)
28 An Arab scheme for conservation (by Odeh Al-Jayoussi, IUCN regional director)
30 Sea turtles and migratory birds saved from oil pollution in Palm Islands
32 Dispute over oil-spill cleanup in Lebanon
39 Birds in the United Arab Emirates
44 Crash! (Insects killed on your windshield)
48 Answering to the Arab public's environmental demands
52 Victims of radiation in Iraq on Arabia TV
56 Renewable energies in Germany

Letters to the editor 6
Environment in a month 14
UNEP news 26
Environment
market 60
Green library 62
Calendar 64

listing of forthcoming events:

Arab Environment Day
14 October 2006

WATMED3
1 - 3 November 2006
Tripoli - Lebanon
E-mail: info@watmed.com
www.watmed.com

12th Conference of the Parties to the UN Climate Change Convention
6 - 17 November 2006
Nairobi - Kenya
http://unfccc.int

Arab Ministers Responsible for the Environment Meeting
15-16 November 2006
Cairo - Egypt

Green Industry
20 - 22 November 2006
Manama - Bahrain
http://www.green-industry.org