http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=255347
Israel’s diplomatic reaction to recent charges that its water policy is racist exposes a preference for passivity over preemption. Water reveals a new apartheid in the Middle East. The 450,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank use as much or more water than some 2.3 million Palestinians… even if only a few dare to use the word, all indications are that the Middle East is the scene of a new apartheid…. And in this situation, water is a particular element of conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. – Excerpt from the French parliamentary report on “The Geopolitics of Water”
My most recent columns have been devoted to analyzing Israel’s public diplomacy, the reasons for its manifest ineptitude, and the mechanisms that produce this abysmal performance.
Last week, by coincidence, an illustrative example, underscoring precisely what I have been trying to convey, broke into the headlines.
It came in the form of a French parliamentary report on Israel’s water policy, authored by Jean Glavany, a Socialist member of the National Assembly, and accusing Israel of using water as an instrument of apartheid and oppression against the Palestinians.