If, as they say, some dust thrown in my eyes Will keep my talk from getting over-wise, I'm not the one for putting off the proof. Let it be overwhelming, off a roof And round a corner, blizzard snow for dust, And blind me to a standstill if it must. (Robert Frost)
In the middle of every ones hectic holiday preparations we have been nearly blinded to a standstill two weeks ago. Just before the Jewish New Year, Yom Kippur and the Muslim ‘Eid al Adha’ we were reminded that there are horrible things going on in our Levantine neighborhood, the worst right across our border. We were tempted to possibly stay at home for days to avoid the heavily polluted air caused by an opaque ‘end of days’ dust storm over the whole Middle East. The traumatic gloom over Israel’s otherwise sunny summer skies lasted for over 5 days! The dust even entered through closed windows and settled on the freshly wiped furniture and digital screens. Tourists wandering disoriented through the nebulous streets lined with powdered cars were stunned, felt uneasy and must have thought the plane had carried them to Afghanistan by mistake.
Of course, we have sand storms now and then during spring and fall, but they never last long and their yellow remains get washed away by cleansing rains. We call this phenomenon ‘Hamsin’ (= heat from China) when during the transition seasons dust from dry areas in Saudi Arabia and Egypt is picked up by winds from South-Eastern direction and gets carried over to our area.
But this time experts informed that the dust was a direct result of the fierce civil war raging in Syria, infesting the whole region already in summer with a greyish cover with no rain in sight. Our wretched neighbor country has been afflicted, in addition to its political animosities, by a severe draught lasting already several years. Syria’s water management relies apparently to a large extend on rain. Farmers fleeing hostile action and ethnic persecution have left their fields unworked and on top of all grievances Turkey closed off an important water arm in the face of approaching ISIS slaughterers waving menacing black flags of holy war.
Reports from other countries like Iran, which has in recent years ruthlessly exploited its subterranean water in favor of a propagated high birth rate, predict a huge ecologic catastrophe with an even higher future migration wave as at present, if the Islamic rulers and insane dictators continue with blunder of natural resources and irresponsible water waste.
In Israel however the government has in recent years come more or less to terms with our notorious water shortage that caused concern over previous decades. By currently recycling 80 % of waste water used for agriculture, using drip irrigation, reservoirs, precision farming, leak detection systems, draught resistant seeds and installing cutting edge technologies for desalination of seawater, a somewhat expensive but effective water management was implemented.
Nevertheless, we tell our children to save every drop of water whenever possible. This means in daily routine only rapid showers, double flush toilets, no cleaning with hoses and attaching water saving devices to every tab.
When a couple of years ago the government placed ads on TV, prompting that we should let our gardens dry up, I wasn’t ready to comply. I found this was a very stupid way to avoid solving a fundamental problem and was already determined to commit any act of civil disobedience in order to water our trees. The connotation of ‘deserting’ and ‘desert’ came to my mind. I was convinced each of our trees provides oxygen, a home for birds, shade in the house and compost for other plants. Didn’t we come here to make the desert bloom?
But now this period is over, no more ads and nagging worries about the water level of the Sea of Galilee. The much measured inland sea is no longer the one and only water source, modern technologies have saved us at last from just depending on the whims of flighty clouds. When Israel made peace with Jordan, it was in exchange for water supply and adequate training in water management and irrigation. But Jordan is carrying now a huge burden of over a million refugees from Syria! How can they be sustained? No country in the region can isolate itself any longer and try to manage alone, we are all affected and connected in the face of a global water crisis and even the last climate change denier has to realize when ‘dust is in his eyes’ that something radical has to be done.
Israel can easily share its advanced water and agriculture innovations with the world and is already assisting in 150 countries, among them 100 in the Third World, in addition to our immediate neighbors Jordan and the Palestinian Authority.
In his mind opening book ‘Let there be water’ Seth M. Siegel writes: “With a global water crisis looming, the Israeli inclination toward taking bold steps may be the most important contribution of its water philosophy to an increasingly water-starved world.”
Education in water consciousness and training in technologies Israel has developed can be the key to a balanced water economy in the draught-plagued areas of the globe, including the South-West of the US, regions that will otherwise face severe water shortage and the danger of wars over water in just a few years.
Of course we have the tendency to lean back and enjoy our quiet lives if we are not directly affected and don’t want to be bothered, when religious fanatics somewhere else kill each other off. On the contrary, we think we can enjoy the relative peace they leave us in, while they are preoccupied with their own quarrels. Each year the holidays succeed for some time to put our worries off, at least until the middle of October. There’s a Hebrew song called “After the holidays everything will be new” and unfortunately new, together with the old troubles are usually part of the package.
Talking about troubles, even if the Syrians are officially our enemies, Israeli medical staff has already for years extended first aid to civilians fleeing for help to our border. The Israeli assistance corp IsraAid is working on the shores of Greeceand Italy to releave standed refugees. But this cannot be all. Despite all resentment and security considerations many hear, including myself , see it as our moral obligation, especially as a nation born out of the tragedy of Jews fleeing Europe and Muslim countries, to open up at least to persecuted minority groups, some with family ties in Israel, like Druze, Armenians, Arab Christians, Kurds and Yazidi to name a few, who are in immediate danger. Israel, so often untruly accused of Apartheid, is the only country in this region, where several such ethnic minorities can feel secure.
The most crucial question is however, how can the looming over-population in the Middle East be sustained in the future? One way of settling this frightening explosion is by waging wars. Hostile action and natural catastrophes are known to rid the earth of a high birthrate, a cruel and frightening prospect.
In order to avoid this grim szenario responsible and cooperative control over water, employing advanced technologies and methods developed by Israeli innovators can be seen as our most important instrument for peace. Mutual agreements are the only way to ensure commitment of all interested sides to sustainable resource sharing and a better future. The tense political situation between us and our neighbor countries, whose water household depends on the same water sources, makes reaching a satisfactory water settlement of course especially difficult. But unilateral measures, to which some of the involved parties have turned in the past, like illegal drilling, careless water pollution or closing off water sources, are ineffective and even unsettling.
Our most prominent New Year resolution should be inspired by the sand we literally had in our eyes only days ago! The threat of global water shortage, when it is not attended to immediately and solved through peaceful cooperation and exchange of know-how, will conquer us in the end and the few remaining drops will flush us down the luring drain of medieval backwardness. Here it’s not only survival of the fittest, but of the smartest.
Hopefully the unprecedented sand storm can, after the dust has settled, make us and our governments open our eyes and make us understand that without water there is no life, no morals, no religion, no science and art, culture and other human achievements. Water has become the underlying catalyst for peace in the Middle East.
I want to close my thoughts with a wish for the New Year. May we be enough courageous, compassionate and inventive to personally engage in small acts of ‘Tikun olam’(= repairing, healing the world), a concept I treasure most in rabbinical tradition, even as a non-religious person.
It suggests humanity's shared responsibility to heal and transform the world. Let’s question handed down beliefs, put ourselves into the shoes of others, listen, analyze and oppose misguided conceptions. We will not lose but gain from giving up prejudices and privileges, which serve us conveniently while living at the expense of others. Let there be dust in our eyes, even if it hurts, in order to stop, think, wipe and see more clearly and in a new light what has to be done to improve any unbearable situation.
Shana tova to you all!