webofevil | A guide for the perplexed

Given its chronic shortage of water, even the small saving gained by depriving Arab villages helps Israel, and water also played its part in the remarkable Israeli offer to give the Gaza Strip back to the Arabs – if anyone could be found to take it. A senior Israeli minister made the suggestion at the end of 1992, after an upsurge of violence by Hamas, the Islamic movement. No Israeli minister, Likud or Labour, has ever suggested returning the West Bank. The difference between the two areas is plain: Gaza is desperately short of water, a liability, while the West Bank provides Israel with water.

John Bulloch & Adel Darwish, Water Wars - Coming Conflicts in the Middle East, 1993