When Deliberate Deprivation Becomes Policy: Confronting the Weaponization of Water in the West Bank

For decades, Palestinian society has waged a daily struggle to secure one of life’s most basic necessities: water. In geopolitical conflicts, water often shifts from a natural resource to a tool of domination and a means of controlling the daily routines of the population. Since the occupation of the West Bank in 1967, the Israeli authorities have transformed water resources into a strategic instrument of control, issuing military orders that prevent Palestinians from digging wells or accessing their own water without nearly impossible permits, while allowing unrestricted expansion of settlements’ access to these resources.

This systematic monopoly and control over water resources has undermined agricultural and rural potential and widened the gap between Palestinians and settlers in water allocation. As settler and military attacks on springs and water sources have intensified, water has ceased to be merely a natural resource; it has become a central arena in the daily struggle for survival and the right to life on a land whose resources are being deliberately depleted.

Evidence shows that water has never been merely a matter of services or environmental management—it is a political instrument used by the occupation to reshape both space and Palestinian life. With the increasing assaults on springs and water sources by settlers, the battle over water has become a vivid embodiment of the existential daily struggle faced by Palestinians in the West Bank.

1. Israeli Laws for the Weaponization of ‘Water Resources’

Since the 1967 occupation, Israeli authorities have enacted a series of military orders aimed at asserting full control over water resources in Palestinian territories. These laws began by stripping Palestinians of ownership over water sources, declaring them the property of the occupying entity, and granting the occupation absolute authority in managing water, including the ability to deny permits without justification. All wells and springs were placed under the authority of the military governor, with conditional permits required for water usage and strict limits set on the amounts that could be extracted.

These orders were accompanied by a range of practical measures on the ground, including prohibitions on drilling new wells, the confiscation of Palestinian wells for settlers’ use, restrictions on drilling depth, and the denial of Palestinians’ share of the Jordan River. In parallel, the occupation drilled dozens of wells within settlements, constructed small dams to retain wadi waters, and transported water from settlements into Israel.

This continued up to the signing of the Oslo Accords, which “theoretically” recognized Palestinian water rights[i], yet deferred these rights to final-status negotiations without any enforceable guarantees. During the transitional phase, the occupation maintained actual control over water resources, even in Area A, which is administratively under the Palestinian Authority, as well as in Areas B and C, where any water-related project requires Israeli approval—often met with denial or severe restrictions. The agreement ignored equitable sharing of water resources and preserved the unequal distribution, with Israelis receiving 84% of water resources compared to only 16% for Palestinians. In effect, Israel continues to control Palestinian water resources to this day, with no substantial change in control or allocation.

2. Policies of Discrimination and Exclusion in Water Distribution

Recent data highlights a deep gap in water access between Palestinians and Israelis, reflecting not only differences in available resources but also disparities in infrastructure and policy. Statistics estimate that the average Israeli consumes 247 litres of water per day, while the average Palestinian in the West Bank consumes only 82.4 litres—roughly one-third of the Israeli per capita consumption. This gap is even more pronounced in rural Palestinian areas, where approximately half of the water is used for agriculture.

Palestine relies primarily on groundwater, which accounts for about 79% of its total water resources, with limited use of surface water due to Israeli control over the Jordan River and the Dead Sea. The situation is further exacerbated by high water losses in the West Bank, which exceed 35%, primarily due to the deteriorating infrastructure of the water distribution networks.

Israeli control over water resources represents one of the most prominent forms of systematic exclusion of Palestinians. Palestinians are forced to purchase approximately 20% of their water needs from the Israeli water company “Mekorot,” a result of the deliberate limitation of their ability to utilize their natural water resources. This exclusion extends beyond quantity to the quality of water itself, as the occupation contributes to the contamination of Palestinian groundwater by discharging wastewater from settlements into the valleys near Palestinian communities, turning the water crisis into a daily tool of siege that deepens dependency and weakens resilience.

These water impoverishment policies have also reshaped agricultural practices, which are increasingly dictated by resource scarcity rather than self-sufficiency or food security needs. The agricultural sector in the West Bank has suffered shrinking farmland and reduced capacity to rely on farming as a sustainable livelihood. Farmers have been compelled to shift toward cultivating low-water-demand crops, negatively affecting crop diversity and reducing the production of high-water-demand crops without regard to local market needs.

These radical transformations are driven by Israeli policies aimed at intensifying land dispossession and transforming Palestinian farmers—viewed as geographic obstacles to be removed—into part of a deliberate strategy to create an uninhabitable environment that encourages forced displacement without the need for official eviction orders. Consequently, the impact of water scarcity extends beyond agricultural production, weakening the collective Palestinian resolve to remain on their land.

3. Escalation of Occupation Attacks on Water Sources after October 7

Following October 7, Israeli attacks on water sources in the West Bank increased markedly, systematically targeting water infrastructure in several critical areas. The Ein Samia region, east of Ramallah, emerged as a striking example of this escalation, where the spring was repeatedly attacked by settlers, including the destruction of electrical networks, pumping equipment, communication systems, and surveillance cameras.

These attacks resulted in the loss of technical and administrative control over the entire system, halting water supply to dozens of Palestinian villages and towns, thereby threatening more than 100,000 Palestinians with deprivation of their primary water source. In addition, the occupation continued demolishing water collection wells, with the number of destroyed wells exceeding 500. Settlers also took control of 45 springs between east Ramallah and the Jordan Valley, depriving farmers of vital resources necessary for sustaining their land, as part of a systematic policy aimed at weakening Palestinian access to and control over their water resources.

The most recent water shortages have exacerbated the crisis in the West Bank, particularly during the summer of this year, forcing residents to ration daily consumption and rely on limited amounts for drinking and cooking, often at the expense of personal hygiene and agricultural needs. This has heightened health concerns, with emerging signs of skin and intestinal diseases linked to compromised sanitation standards.

In villages and towns that depended on destroyed springs and wells, residents reported having to fetch water from distant sources via costly tankers or from unsafe springs, increasing the burden on women and children, who bear the primary responsibility for water collection. The village of Susya, south of Hebron, exemplifies this reality, as settlers cut off the village’s water lines in July 2025, forcing residents to describe their situation as an “unbearable thirst crisis.”

Water scarcity has also severely impacted agriculture. Many farmers in the northern West Bank—particularly in Jenin, Tulkarem, and Tubas—were compelled to leave their lands uncultivated or significantly reduce cultivated areas due to the destruction of irrigation systems and electricity networks that power pumps. Some farmers were forced to halt agricultural activity altogether. The shortage also affected livestock, preventing many from meeting their animals’ water and feed needs. According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), these environmental and service pressures have substantially reduced local production, forcing some to rely on aid or abandon their agricultural and pastoral livelihoods.

The systematic control and destruction of water infrastructure in the West Bank exemplify a deliberate strategy of resource deprivation, deepening Palestinian vulnerability while undermining their capacity to sustain livelihoods and maintain social resilience. The water crisis, thus, is not merely an environmental issue but a core element of ongoing geopolitical conflict, reflecting broader patterns of inequality, control, and dispossession.

Conclusion

The water crisis in the West Bank can no longer be understood merely as a service or humanitarian issue; ‘weaponization of thirst’ has become a strategic tool in the hands of the occupation, used to enforce control and dominance over land and population. Systematic denial of access to water resources, combined with the destruction of wells, springs, and pumping and irrigation networks, is not only aimed at disrupting the daily lives of Palestinians but also at reshaping the demographic geography to serve the encroaching settler-colonial agenda.

These “water strangulation” policies exacerbate health and livelihood crises, compel farmers to abandon their lands, and force families to relinquish their sources of income, thereby facilitating the expansion of settlements at the expense of Palestinian communities. By turning water—an essential and vital right—into a means of coercion and leverage, the occupation institutionalizes silent displacement, a form of control as pernicious as direct military violence.

In this sense, deliberate weaponization of thirst and water resources itself becomes a policy: a deliberate strategy that transforms one of the most basic necessities of survival into a mechanism for subjugating Palestinians and re-engineering their existence in the West Bank to serve the objectives of annexation and dispossession.

[i] Article 40 – Water and Sewage: “Recognising the need to develop additional water resources for various uses, and the necessity of defining Palestinian water rights in the West Bank, Israel recognises Palestinian water rights in the West Bank. These rights will be negotiated in the final status negotiations and settled in the permanent status agreement.”

NOTE: This text is adabted from original Arabic article.