Amman: Jordanian Minister of Water and Irrigation, Muhammad Al-Najjar, announced that his country’s government intends to purchase quantities of water from Israel, to compensate for the water shortage that Jordan is going through.
In a related matter, Al-Najjar confirmed in a statement to the Jordanian channel Al -Mamlakah on Monday, that his ministry “will not expropriate lands that contain illegal wells.”
“Many wells are located in remote areas,” Al-Najjar was quoted as saying by the Jordan News on Monday.. “If they had been close to the water networks, though, we would have taken possession of them.”
This is not the first time that Jordan buys water from the Israeli occupation.
A crisis erupted more than a year ago, when former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delayed agreeing to supply Jordan with water.
In July 2021, Jordan and the Israeli occupation announced that they had reached an agreement under which the occupation would sell 50 million cubic meters of water annually to Amman.
For decades, Jordan has not succeeded in finding long-term solutions to the water scarcity crisis in various governorates, at a time when the Kingdom is classified according to the global water index as the second poorest country with water in the world.
With the advent of summer every year, the water crisis tops the front pages of Jordanian newspapers and media, but this year it has become more severe.