Amnesty Water Report Falsehoods #3, 4

By Published On: November 1, 2009

“Palestinian consumption in the OPT is about 70 litres a day per person,” Amnesty’s “Troubled Waters” report claims on page 3.

Again on page 10 Amnesty discusses Palestinians’ per capita use of water, stating:

Palestinians have access to an average of no more than 60-70 liters per capita per day, and some survive on much less even than this, as little as 10-20 liters per person per day.

Neither statement about Palestinian water consumption includes a source or footnote, an oddity in this heavily sourced document. But it’s clear why Amnesty chose not to cite a March 22, 2009 press release from the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics marking World Water Day. The PCBS completely contradicts Amnesty’s claim about per capita daily water use, stating:

Data [from the Water Statistics Report 2007] shows that the quantity of water supplied for domestic use in the Palestinian Territory was 175.6 MCM in 2007, and that the daily allocation per capital of the supplied water for domestic use in the Palestinian Territory was 135.8 (liter/capita/day). It reached only 46.6 (liter/capita/day) in Tubas Governorate. (Emphasis added.)

In other words, the official Palestinian figure for water consumption is double the figure that Amnesty cites!

In another disparity between Amnesty and official Palestinian figures, Amnesty claims (page 10):

The total amount of water available to Palestinians from these various supplies [Jordan River, various aquifers, and water purchased from Israel] in recent years has been a maximum of some 170-180 MCM/Y, which reportedly fell to a mere 135 MCM in 2008, for a population of 2.3 million.

In contrast, the aforementioned Water Day PCBS press release states:

According to the Water Statistics Report 2007 the annual available water quantity in the Palestinian Territory was 335.4 MCM in 2007.

If Amnesty’s figures aren’t coming from official Palestinian sources, where do they originate? We will be happy to examine any theories.

See Amnesty Water Report Falsehoods 1 and 2.

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