Today, August 15, 2022 the End Water Apartheid Campaign, launched by South African and Palestinian movements released a statement condemning South African officials for meeting with so-called Israeli water ‘experts to address the water crisis in South Africa. This is an act of blue-washing through which Israel seeks to deflect attention from its water apartheid practices against the Palestinian people:
The End Water Apartheid campaign strongly condemns Jewish National Fund (JNF) sponsored meetings last Thursday and Friday and arrangements between elected municipal officers, officials and an Israeli delegation of so-called ‘water experts.’ The DA Mayor of Tshwane, Randall Williams, MMC Sun of City of Joburg and their colleagues must be denounced for complicity with an apartheid state promulgating the myth that buying Israeli water technology will ‘solve’ our water crisis.
Israel and its water corporations weaponise water in an attempt to ethnically cleanse Palestinians. As they battle for water on the ground, Palestinians have repeatedly called on the world to stop financing this water apartheid, to boycott Israel’s water companies and refuse to greenwash Israeli crimes. Already in 2009, Amnesty International published a report that examined how Israel has stolen Palestinian water sources and restricts access to water for Palestinians while the JNF boasts of building dams and reservoirs that only serve Jewish Israelis, including their military bases.