Young Palestinian holds a flag next to a water tank in the former Israeli settlement of Homesh near the West Bank city of Jenin, Thursday, Oct. 3, 2013. Picture by Mohammed Ballas AP/Press Association Images. All rights reserved. 15 January, on the very same day that diplomats from 70 countries were meeting in Paris to reaffirm their support for the two-state solution, Israeli and Palestinian officials announced that they were restarting cooperation on water issues after a six-year hiatus. The Jerusalem Post called this agreement ‘a shining example of how cooperation on issues of quality of life can build trust’, while the UN’s Middle East peace envoy, Nickolay Mladenov, proclaimed it ‘an important step towards preserving the two-state solution’.
Unfortunately, and as so often, the truth is rather different.
Though Palestinians will now have autonomy to lay pipelines, what they won’t have is any additional water to go in them – except with Israeli consent.
