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The Middle East consists of 25 states of which 22 are Arab states.
The region is inhabited by more than 500 million people, two third of them live in the Arab World. They do indeed face many problems such as : environmental, political, economical, and demographic. All of these problems are pressing issues.
Million of people depend on fresh water from three major rivers. The Nile which starts in Africa, and Egypt is the last recipient of its water; the Euphrates which starts in Turkey and flows into Syria, Iraq and the Arabian Gulf; the Tigris which also starts in Turkey and flows into Iraq and the Arabian Gulf.
The environmental changes that contributed to many droughts, as well as the increase in population led to the shortage of fresh water in the Arab World.
Some Middle Eastern experts predict that the lack of fresh water in the majority of countires in the Middle East will be the spark that will ignite conflict and wars rather than oil.
What do you think? This is open for an interesting discussion.
Water is definitely going to be the next nexus of conflict and wars. It will become more precious than oil since the essence of life depends on it and we see the results of its dearth in Africa.
ReplyDeleteHowever the politics of water will be the next battle in the ME particularly in terms of the unending Israeli encroachment and greed in eating up the livelihood of the Palestinians. This is a policy of pauperization and strangulation that has become a stamp of Israeli policy against the Arabs as a whole!! At the same time the Arabs are in Dalu'na land while all of this is taking place!!
May Seikaly
I agree with Seikaly, high tech and illegal colonies are eating Palestinian lands. Now Palestinians in the West Bank are buying water from the colonies that have swimming pools.
ReplyDeleteAnother factor is the two year draught. This is especially hard on the war ravaged colonized Iraqis who are getting less water as Turkey built dams upstream from them. Syria, Turkey and Iraq meet this week to try to ease this problem.
B. Aswad