Sewage Stalemate In Samaria

It seems sewage has been much in the news lately, from perhaps the most epic of the epic greenfails that Steve has documented to the appalling personal hygiene of the Occupiers. Today’s sewage story comes from Samaria, where the Israelis are trying to provide proper sewage disposal in twenty Arab villages, and the Arabs want nothing to do with it:

Swirling in the strikingly green valley below the southern Samaria community of Nofim is a rambling stream amid grass and trees – filled with dangerous quantities of sewage.

A subterranean sewage pipe connects to the underbellies of four of the five surrounding settlements – Nofim, Yakir, Etz Ephraim and Sha’arei Tikva – and will within a few months also connect to that of Ma’aleh Shomron, bringing all of the effluent to a treatment facility in Eliyahu.

Despite Israeli offers to connect the 22 surrounding Palestinian villages to the same pipe, all but one of them refused the proposal, Environmental Protection Ministry and Shomron Regional Council officials explained during an exclusive tour of the area on Thursday.

Instead, their sewage flows into the aquifer below and ends up directly in the stream, according to the officials.

“That’s a testament to the fact that we are doing everything we can to prevent pollution in Judea and Samaria, but nevertheless, the Palestinians refuse to cooperate,” Environmental Protection Minister Gilad Erdan told The Jerusalem Post during the tour.

Why won’t the Palestinians allow Israel to help with their sewage? Maybe they just like things the traditional way; the only alternative explanation is political: “a third official told the Post he suspected that the local Palestinian governments were unwilling to connect their villages due to ‘political reasons’ – simply ‘because they don’t want to recognize Israel as a presence in the area.'” So they would rather swim in their own sewage than accept help from the Israelis.

I found this comment interesting:

Erdan expressed hope that donor countries would agree to only continue giving the villages financial support if they agree to connect to the sewage pipeline.

The Palestinians “receive more foreign aid per head of population than any other group of people in the world.” So they are too proud to let the Israelis dispose of their sewage, but not too proud to subsist on the charity of the European Union and other “donor countries,” including the United States.

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