One of our supporters asked for a letter like this. Please use it as you see fit: cut-and-paste or draw information from it.
July 2020
Dear [Member of Congress],
I write as a constituent who is greatly concerned about the looming water crisis facing people here in the United States and around the globe. The huge US racial gap in access to water documented in recent reports [1] makes it imperative for Congress to pass HR 1417, the Water Affordability, Transparency, Equity and Reliability Act.
But where is the money to come from to address the needs of 2 million people who do not have access to running water and indoor plumbing in the richest country in the world?
One very appropriate way we can begin to tackle the shocking inequities in access to clean water is to re-direct for this purpose much of the $3.8 billion of our tax dollars that the US gives annually to Israel, a country that uses water as a weapon of ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian people.
Since the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip began in 1967, Israel has seized some 80% of the water in West Bank aquifers for its own exclusive use and that of its illegal West Bank settlements. The more than 650,000 Israelis living in those settlements are allotted 6 times more water than 3 million West Bank Palestinians.
While Israeli settlers freely irrigate their land and fill swimming pools with stolen water, the Israeli army and settlers routinely destroy Palestinian wells and water infrastructure, forcing farmers off their land. Israel regularly cuts off the water supply to Palestinian towns and villages, leaving families with only two options: spending up to half of their monthly expenditure on trucked water, or leaving altogether.
In the Gaza Strip, the situation is even more dire, as 97% of the water is unfit to drink and the sole aquifer is on the verge of collapse. A 14-year-long Israeli blockade prevents the import of materials needed to repair the water and sanitation infrastructure, which has been repeatedly damaged by Israel’s military attacks.
For much too long the US has annually bestowed on Israel billions of our tax dollars, despite provisions of the US Foreign Assistance Act and the US Arms Export Control Act that prohibit assistance to any country that engages in the pattern of human rights violations documented over the years by UN bodies, civil society organizations, and the US State Department’s Country Reports on Human Rights Practices.
Now, as Prime Minister Netanyahu is poised to eviscerate international law by annexing Palestinian land outright and making Israel a de jure Apartheid state, we ask you to go beyond expressing “grave concern” at Israel’s proposed actions, and to be prepared to sanction its conduct.
It is high time to end US complicity in Israel’s war crimes by ending the funding that enables its behavior.
At this critical time our tax dollars would be much better used to benefit your constituents at home, as we struggle to deal with water inequities and the crippling impact of the Corona virus pandemic.
Sincerely,
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jun/23/full-report-read-in-depth-water-poverty-investigation
http://uswateralliance.org/sites/uswateralliance.org/files/Closing%20the%20Water%20Access%20Gap%20in%20the%20United%20States_DIGITAL.pdf
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NOTE: Two more all-encompassing sources to consider: reliefweb, UN humanitarian response
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