Israel to set up water stations in East Jerusalem neighborhood after months of shortages

Water tanks on a roof in Kafr Aqab, July 2024

Chen Maanit reports in Haaretz on 22 August 2024:

The Israeli government said on Thursday it will distribute water in Kafr Aqab in East Jerusalem, a Palestinian neighborhood which has been suffering from water shortages over the past few months.

The government responded to a petition to the High Court saying it will set up water distribution stations subject to approval by security authorities.   Kafr Aqab has suffered water shortages for the past several months. One would be considered lucky to have running water for more than one day per week, one resident said.

The petition was filed by residents demanding that water supply to the neighborhood, home to 100,000 residents, be permanently secured after shortages have worsened over the height of summer in July and August. Residents reported supply dropping to as little as four to nine hours per week.

The authorities, including the Jerusalem municipality, the Israeli Water and Sewage Authority, the Mekorot national water company and Jerusalem’s municipal water company – Gihon – have shifted blame among themselves as to who is responsible for the neighborhood.

The petition before the court was filed at the beginning of August with the involvement of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel and Ir Amim, a nonprofit that describes itself as working toward “a more equitable and stable Jerusalem.”

In their response to the petition, Energy and Infrastructure Minister Eli Cohen and the Water and Sewage Authority stated that Gihon, the Jerusalem municipal water company, has surveyed the neighborhood and found significant disruption in the supply of water, forcing residents to purchase water privately for their use at home. As a result, the government acknowledges the need to deploy water distribution stations in the neighborhood.

“As long as the approvals, including from the relevant security officials, are issued and the opening of the stations are made possible, their operations can be monitored … to see if the residents use them in a way that shows whether they address the residents’ needs,” the response to the petition stated.

Kafr Aqab is within the boundaries of the Jerusalem municipality, but it lies on the other side of the separation barrier separating Israel and Jerusalem from the West Bank.

“The water situation in the neighborhood, where large numbers of permanent residents and citizens live, is additional testimony to the abandonment of the residents of the neighborhoods who have unfortunately been cut off on the other side of the separation wall,” said Tal Hassin, a lawyer for the Association for Civil Rights in Israel.

“It’s nice that the state is finally taking responsibility, but installing water stations is only a first and essential step,” she said. “The time has come so that in Kafr Aqab too, they can turn on their faucets and know that, as for everyone, water will come out.”

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