[News] New Report Charges Major Corporations as Complicit in Israel's Water Apartheid

[Anti-Imperialist News]

mintpressnews.com
<https://www.mintpressnews.com/new-report-major-corporations-complicit-israel-water-apartheid/283271/>
New Report Charges Major Corporations as Complicit in Israel's Water
Apartheid
Jessica Buxbaum <https://www.mintpressnews.com/author/jessica-buxbaum/> -
January 16, 2023
------------------------------
[image: image.png]

In December, the Palestinian human rights organization, Al-Haq, released a
report
<https://www.alhaq.org/cached_uploads/download/2022/12/12/al-haq-report-2-1670826325.pdf>
accusing major corporations of maintaining Israel’s water apartheid on
Palestinians living in the occupied territories.

According to Al-Haq, businesses are instrumental in helping Israel restrict
water access to Palestinians and destroy Palestinian water infrastructure.
Additionally, foreign companies profit from Israel’s system of water
discrimination.

Al-Haq’s paper named both Israeli and international companies as:

*Complicit in the violation of the Palestinian right to self-determination
and permanent sovereignty over natural resources, as well as the war crime
of pillage and inhumane acts of expropriation of natural resources
amounting to the crime of apartheid.”*

The report detailed the actions of Israeli water companies Mekorot and
Hagihon but also included outside firms TAHAL Group International B.V.,
Hyundai, Caterpillar Inc., JC Bamford Excavators Ltd. (JCB), and Volvo Car
Group.
International companies complicit in apartheid

Generally, international companies’ involvement in Israel’s water apartheid
is through demolitions of water infrastructure such as cisterns, pipelines,
and wells. According to Al-Haq’s research, from 2017-August 2021, Hyundai
carried out 24 demolitions of Palestinian water equipment, JCB is
responsible for 16, Volvo demolished 14 structures, and Caterpillar
executed seven demolitions.

Hyundai <https://whoprofits.org/company/hyundai-heavy-industries/> is a
South Korean multinational manufacturer. Its excavators are often used in
home demolitions in addition to razing water equipment. Caterpillar
<https://whoprofits.org/company/caterpillar/> is an American manufacturer
heavily involved in Israel’s occupation through demolitions, military
agreements, and construction of the settlements and the apartheid wall. The
company’s major shareholders include BlackRock, an investment company
criticized for fueling climate change, State Farm’s investment group, and
the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust.

Volvo <https://whoprofits.org/company/volvo-group-ab-volvo/> is a Swedish
multinational company with major shareholders also, including BlackRock and
Norges Bank Investment Management, which is owned by the state of Norway.
JCB is a British construction equipment manufacturer which helped finance
<https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/boris-johnson-funder-jcb-aiding-israels-crimes>
ex-Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s campaign. In return, Johnson promoted the
company’s products on the campaign trail.
[image: Israel water theft]Machinery used for water infrastructure
demolitions documented by Al-Haq field workers between January 2017-August
2021. Source | Al-Haq
<https://www.alhaq.org/cached_uploads/download/2022/12/12/al-haq-report-2-1670826325.pdf>

Other companies involved in the destruction of water infrastructure include
Turkish company Hidromek, Japanese engineering firm Daio, and Chinese
construction company LiuGong.

Kardan N.V. is a Dutch company specializing in real estate and water
infrastructure. It owns more than 98% of Tahal International Group, which
has been involved in water development projects in Israeli settlements,
over-extraction efforts limiting the availability of water to Palestinians,
and has helped enforce the permit system for the development of wells on
Palestinian communities.

Al-Haq reached out to these companies but did not receive a response. Daio
was the only company that responded to *MintPress News’ *requests for
comment, stating, ”We have not been able to confirm the facts as you have
inquired about our group company, Daio Engineering Co., Ltd.”

Al-Haq noted that most of these demolitions are done because the structures
lack permits or are located on Israeli state land
<https://peacenow.org.il/en/what-is-a-declaration-of-state-land>, meaning
Palestinian land confiscated by Israel for allegedly not being cultivated
after a number of years. Most Palestinian buildings in Area C of the
occupied West Bank, which is under the full control of the Israeli
military, often lack the proper licenses because Israeli authorities deny
<https://www.ochaopt.org/content/most-palestinian-plans-build-area-c-not-approved>
Palestinians permits on the grounds these areas have not been zoned for
construction. Yet zoning plans in Area C
<https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-201838/> are also often
rejected by Israeli officials.

“This is part of a broader strategy of harassment against Palestinian
farmers to stop their agricultural activities,” Al-Haq wrote, describing
these demolitions’ effect on Palestinian farming and their overall economy.
Without the proper equipment, Palestinian farmers cannot irrigate their
land and, thereby are unable to grow produce.

“The World Bank has estimated that out of a total of [about 175,000 acres]
of irrigable land in the West Bank and Gaza, only [about 61,000 acres] are
irrigated, costing the Palestinian economy as much as $410.70 million…in
irrigated agriculture opportunities and 96,000 agricultural jobs,” Al-Haq
wrote.

Al-Haq argues that several Israeli and transnational companies are in
violation of international law. The authors wrote:

Since the unlimited water supply to Israeli settlements contributes to
their expansion (and prolonged occupation), corporate actors, such as
Mekorot, Gihon and Tahal Group International, Middle East Tubes Company (B
Gaon Holdings), Mehadrin, Minrav Projects, David Ackerstein Ltd., Einav
Ahets are complicit in the transfer of Israel’s civilian population into
the OPT and East Jerusalem thus acting in blatant violation of Article 43
and 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.”

[image: Palestine water]A girl fills a bottle from a tap delivering
drinking water to the Khan Yunis refugee camp in Gaza, November 28, 2022.
Majdi Fathi | NurPhoto via AP

It also accused corporations Mekorot, Volvo, Caterpillar Inc, Daio, JCB,
LiuGong, Hyundai, and Hidromek of carrying out a war crime for assisting in
the destruction and confiscation of Palestinian water infrastructure.

Many of the international companies involved in Israel’s water apartheid
have human rights policies on their website, including Volvo
<https://www.volvogroup.com/en/sustainability/social-responsibility/business-ethics/human-rights.html>,
Caterpillar
<https://www.caterpillar.com/en/company/governance/political-engagement/human-rights.html>,
Daio <https://www.daio-paper.co.jp/en/csr/integrated/>, and Hyundai
<https://www.hyundai.com/content/dam/hyundai/ww/en/images/company/sustainability/about-sustainability/policy/hyundai-human-rights-policy-eng-2021.pdf>
.

Kathryn Ravey, a business and human rights legal researcher for Al-Haq and
one of the report’s authors told *MintPress News* that Al-Haq highlighted
how these companies are going against their human rights guidelines in
their letters to the corporations.

“A lot of them even have it in their core principles that they’re going to
do due diligence, not be contributing to unequal situations or situations
in which human rights are at fault or liable of being violated,” Ravey
said. “And they basically ignore them and act against them. And this is the
frustrating aspect of business and human rights.”
A climate change issue

Despite Israel touting itself as environmentally conscious, the water
apartheid it imposes on Palestinians is actually contributing to climate
change.

“The thing with water is it’s linked to so many other things, like the
environment and the economy,” Ravey said. Israel controls
<https://visualizingpalestine.org/visuals/between-rising-tide-and-apartheid?v=large>
85% of water resources in the West Bank. As previously reported by
*MintPress* *News*
<https://www.mintpressnews.com/israels-occupation-palestine-intensifies-climate-change/279595/>,
Israel dominating the West Bank’s water sector diminishes Palestinians’
capability to adapt to climate change. Damage to water infrastructure in
Gaza and the West Bank — whether through war or direct demolition — reduces
its ability to handle heavy rainfall or prepare for droughts and heat waves.

Ravey explained that the diversity of the ecosystem also becomes disrupted
when Palestinians are prevented from harvesting various fruits and
vegetables because of the lack of water. And soil erosion problems occur
when Palestinians are denied permits to fix leaky water pipelines.

Ultimately, these issues lead to a land uncultivated and without the
necessary resources for communities to thrive. And with that, it strips
Palestinians of their sovereignty.

“A lot of Palestinian communities aren’t able to grow the agriculture that
they used to grow. And that also prevents them from profiting off of a lot
of agricultural pursuits that they used to live off of,” Ravey said. “And
not just profit, but also use from their own land.”

Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News

* Jessica Buxbaum is a Jerusalem-based journalist for MintPress News
covering Palestine, Israel, and Syria. Her work has been featured in Middle
East Eye, The New Arab and Gulf News.*

* Republish our stories! * MintPress News is licensed under a Creative
Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 International License.
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