Free Flow

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iplomacy

violence, loss of hope and trust and that it must speak

to the immediate concerns of people. While FoEME’s

series of policy papers on protecting the Mountain

Aquifer from sewage and solid waste pollution reflect

the continued top-down advocacy work carried out at

this time, the idea of complementing these top-down

advocacy efforts with bottom-up community-led activ-

ism was born sometime during this interim phase. By

coincidence, when funding was finally secured for

the Good Water Neighbors project in late 2000, the

new cross-border community-based effort was almost

cancelled with the outbreak of all-out violence in 2001.

Funders believed that cross-border efforts were no

longer viable. However, FoEME was able to convince

funders that community-level cooperation was possible

and the project was launched in early 2001, initially

involving 11 communities – five Palestinian, five Israeli

and one Jordanian.

The inception of the Good Water Neighbors project

marked the beginning of the third phase of FoEME’s

work and launched the process of consolidating its water

diplomacy. The organization had realized that in order

to remain relevant, it had to complement its top-down

approach with grass-roots actions undertaken through

dialogue, confidence building and cooperation activi-

ties focused on actual cross-border resources that could

directly benefit people. The project was designed to raise

awareness of the shared water problems of Palestinian,

Jordanian and Israeli communities, and harness residents

and municipal staff to the task of changing reality on the

ground. Based on identifying cross-border communities

and utilizing their mutual dependence on shared water

resources as a basis for developing dialogue and coopera-

term ‘peace process’ itself was associated with negative connotations

of increased violence and preserving the status quo. The ensuing

changes in political conditions, public opinion and national mood

among the three peoples have cast FoEME into a period of great

turmoil both internally and externally. The overdevelopment that

had been proposed by the governments was now seen as a pipe

dream, not within reach and no longer politically relevant. FoEME

itself was increasingly being condemned and attacked as an arm

of this failed peace effort. In what can be seen now as a transi-

tion period lasting until 2001, FoEME began focusing on how the

renewed conflict was holding the need to more fairly allocate shared

waters hostage to the lack of advancement of the peace process.

As part of this change, FoEME started to use its experience in

addressing cross-border water issues to shape a coherent water diplo-

macy designed to implement adaptive methods of joint management

and allocation of shared waters, thus transforming shared waters

from a source of conflict into one of cooperation. This approach was

based on the understanding that all parties involved in the region

should be convinced that water is a flexible resource, and that “by

using processes and mechanisms to focus on building and enhanc-

ing trust, even countries in conflict can reach agreements that satisfy

their citizens’ water needs and their national interests”.

FoEME’s early work on the issues of sustainable development of

the Dead Sea can now be seen as an important milestone in the

shaping of the organization’s water diplomacy during this interim

period. The need for cross-border cooperation to create a holistic

vision for a shared natural resource for the sake of the medium and

long-term interests of the three peoples has remained a basic prin-

ciple of its work on all shared waters in the region – albeit now as

a challenge to create in the midst of continued occupation, conflict

and violence. But even prior to the outbreak of the Second Intifada

in 2001, FoEME understood that medium and long-term inter-

ests were not sufficiently relevant in the midst of ever-increasing

FoEME’s community projects and advocacy efforts brought mayors from Israel,

Jordan and Palestine to an event in the Jordan River, with a clear and joint message

to their governments: “Rehabilitate the Jordan River!”

FoEME’s “Good Water Neighbors” project brings neighbouring

Palestinian and Israeli Mayors to sign on an MoU to cooperate over

shared water issues

Image: FoEME