Gaza Genocide: Who Ordered the Water Wells Blown Up?

August 4, 2024

An "Un-Approved" Campaign of Well Destruction?

Let's start with the video we weren't supposed to see. Luckily, Palestinian journalist Younis Tirawi caught it on Instagram before it was deleted, and made sure his copy was available to the public. Tirwai reported on Dropsite News, July 28 (with reporting by Ryan Grim and Hind Khoudary).

On Friday, I discovered a video posted on Instagram by an Israeli soldier from the 601st Combat Engineering Battalion, showing the calculated demolition of a chief water facility in Rafah. The video, in three parts, shows Israeli soldiers planting explosives inside and around the water pumps of a facility in the occupied city. The video—which is captioned in Hebrew, “Destruction of the Tal Sultan water reservoir in honor of Shabbat”—ends with footage of the water facility being blown up. The soundtrack is a song produced by soldiers of the 51st Golani Brigade with lyrics like, “We will burn Gaza… shake all of Gaza… for every house you destroy we will destroy ten.”

Tirawi's posting of the video on X: https://x.com/ytirawi/status/1816965332952555683

Assuming the event was new, it would be on Shabbat (Saturday), July 27th, perhaps in the pre-dawn hours, but depending on time zones and posting data, it might appear on Friday for some people. Otherwise, it might be a week-old video. Below are two screenshots from the video: soldiers wiring the place, then its detonation. The blast center is not at the main tank, but an attached building and connecting pipes probably crucial to its operation. The water supply in the tank, if any, may have survived. I couldn't say just what capabilities were actually taken out here.

Built in 1999 with funding from the Canadian International Development Agency, the Tel Sultan water station was also dubbed the "Canada Well." I'll mainly call it that here. It was equipped with a large array of solar panels to power the plant even when electricity is scarce or cut-off by Israel. Citing Gaza’s coastal municipalities water utility, Tirawi writes "the Canada well is the main water facility in the city of Rafah and provides services to 50 percent of the city’s residents, mainly in West Rafah." In one blow, these soldiers may have taken out half of Rafah's water supply. 

Tirawi notes Rachel Corrie, the activist killed by an Israeli bulldozer in 2003, "spent much of her time during the last month of her life helping to protect the municipality workers at the Canada Well" as they repaired damage caused by the bulldozers. In the current war, Tirawi reports, some employees and their family had sheltered in the protected plant until it "was struck without warning, resulting in the deaths of four of its employees’ relatives." In the destruction video, there are no longer any of the old solar panels, and in the close-up views, the place is clearly damaged by at least one previous attack. 

Tirawi writes that "Our exposure of the video on Friday immediately sparked outrage, with some describing it as evidence of war crimes." The soldier who posted the video on Instagram "quickly made his account private and deleted the stories." 

The soldier - Ido Levi - has previously posted videos of him helping destroy a school, a mosque and many homes, attaching genocidal comments to Gazans like "until nothing remains of you." (previous thread by Tirawi on X) So he doesn't seem to be a conscientious whistleblower showing us this. But this is the first time Levi was embarrassed enough to finally make his account private. Apparently, the destruction of the Canada Well was a special crime.

In a next-day update, it was added: "The IDF has not yet provided a comment, but, according to Haaretz, army sources said senior commanders did not approve the destruction of the facility. The military, Haaretz reported, is conducting an initial probe, after which it will determine whether to open an investigation." What, they jump right to pre-investigation initial probe without a pre-probe preliminary survey? This sounds like it's a very serious affair.

They say this was a field decision, if I follow correctly, approved by the 601st Battalion commanders, but allegedly without orders from higher up. But reports soon emerged of "more than 30" water wells in Khan Younis and Rafah, including this one, destroyed by Israeli forces within a ten-day span. Were these all un-approved actions?

"Destruction of Gaza water wells deepens Palestinian misery" by Hatem Khaled, Reuters, July 30

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/destruction-gaza-water-wells-deepens-palestinian-misery-2024-07-30/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=twitter

https://x.com/Reuters/status/1818460331275956514

GAZA (Reuters) -Israel's military blew up more than 30 water wells in Gaza this month, a municipality official and residents said, adding to the trauma of airstrikes that have turned much of the Palestinian enclave into a wasteland ravaged by a humanitarian crisis.

Salama Shurab, head of the water networks at Khan Younis municipality, said the wells were destroyed by Israeli forces between July 18-27 in the southern towns of Rafah and Khan Younis.

The report adds: "The Israeli military did not respond to the allegations that its soldiers destroyed the wells." The closest they came was a word from "COGAT, the branch of the Israeli military that manages humanitarian activities," who said they stood ready to repair anything damaged, noting that Hamas and other militants "have been known to attack civilian infrastructures and humanitarian aid routes," complicating COGAT's needed help, and perhaps explaining any wells that were recently damaged. 

The article didn't mention the Tel Sultan station, perhaps being written before that news broke. But it is illustrated with a satellite image, obtained last-minute on July 30, of "the Canada Well water facility in Tel al-Sultan, Rafah, before the site was damaged in an Israeli Army explosion." (image at right)

If it's true that 30+ wells were destroyed between July 18 and 27, that makes at least 3 per day on average. That should be more abnormal. An Oxfam International report published July 17 had found "Israel damaged or destroyed five water and sanitation sites every three days since the start of this war," or 1.67 per day. So the July bombings would roughly double the usual rate. That's not the clearest indicator of a specific campaign, but it seemed to local authorities like a noteworthy uptick, and this near-doubling came atop all the previous damage, amid worsening summer heat, and (as discussed below) just after polio was discovered in Gaza's wastewater. 

And it was just then they upped the scale to that blast damaging the huge and crucial Canada Well. The video of that was apparently filmed Saturday, July 27, the last day of attacks mentioned in the interview, which was perhaps done as early as the 27th itself. So the attacks might have continued past then, or been meant to. But this likely wound up the capstone of the campaign, and it might have been planned that way, with the biggest blow delivered on the last day by design. 

You wouldn't think this could happen so totally just then without central orders. But I'll suggest it's entirely possible and likely enough. Orders this super-criminal would rather go unspoken, and the motive that would drive such a crime is widely understood and agreed, so that if commanders are given extra latitude to make their own calls, along with subtle hints of what calls to make, many terrible things could "just sort-of happen." This might be a sort of decentralized or "crowdsourced" genocide where the exact blame may be hard to place. 

But central orders or no, I don't see any honest, legitimate, non-genocidal reason to destroy so many water wells. They were openly or tacitly approved, judging by their happening, and the silence that prevailed right up until the video proof was posted. The video publication was probably the only part they didn't approve, and now some staged concern is required. But either way, these remain acts of the state, with responsibility ultimately running to the top. 

Water War Crimes and Germ Warfare Wishes

This destruction would well serve a genocidal agenda repeatedly championed by Israeli leaders close to the war cabinet. Perhaps foremost among these is retired Major General Giora Eiland, the former head of Israel’s National Security Council and an adviser to Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. As Younis Tirawi's report noted: "In October... Eiland, laid out the strategy to deprive Palestinians not just of water from outside Gaza, but to disrupt their ability to pump and purify water locally, on the IDF’s radio station, GLZ. ... said Eiland in a Hebrew-language interview. 

“Israel, as I understand, closed the water supply to Gaza ... But there are many wells in Gaza, which contain water which they treat locally, since originally they contain salt. If the energy shortage in Gaza makes it so that they stop pumping out water, that's good. Otherwise we have to attack these water treatment plants in order to create a situation of thirst and hunger in Gaza, and I would say, forewarn of an unprecedented economical and humanitarian crisis.”

The interviewer pushed back. “Giora, I want to check that I understand correctly. You are saying—get the residents of Gaza into thirst, into hunger. These are the terms you are using?”

“You understood correctly,” he said. “If you want to topple the Hamas regime, you won't achieve that merely through aerial attacks. And a ground invasion, it has its benefits, [but] it also comes with great risks, and it's unclear that the state of Israel needs to take these right now.” 

interview: https://api.bynetcdn.com/Redirector/glz/231010-10/PD?awCollectionId=2134&awEpisodeId=231010-10 - video w/original audio and subtitles: https://x.com/loffredojeremy/status/1819436235875664171

Eiland is correct to point out it would cost less soldiers to just sit back and let hunger, thirst, and maybe disease kill Hamas, along with whoever else, but especially children. That could possibly have prevented a ground invasion, but as it happens, the IDF moved in before Eiland spoke again, in an opinion article of 21 November, urging disease be used in particular, to help limit Israeli losses. 

Middle East Eye: “The international community warns us of a humanitarian disaster in Gaza and of severe epidemics,” retired Major General Giora Eiland, the former head of Israel’s National Security Council, wrote Sunday. “We must not shy away from this, as difficult as that may be. After all, severe epidemics in the south of the Gaza Strip will bring victory closer and reduce casualties among IDF soldiers.”

"Eiland went on to say that the Israeli government must take a “harder line” against the US and rule out discussions about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza until all the hostages held in the besieged enclave are released. The opinion article elicited an endorsement from far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who said, “I agree with every word.” " 

Smotrich has repeatedly called for the "voluntary emigration" of surviving Palestinians out of Gaza and its being annexed and settled by Israelis. Justice Minister Itamar Ben Gvir agrees, specifying "hundreds of thousands" of Gazans need to leave, if not all of them. (Times of Israel) And Ben Gvir, of course, agrees with Smotrich on denial of water and/or embrace of germ warfare against the civilian population he wants gone. During a televised discussion in November, Ben Gvir insisted no fuel could be allowed into Gaza, because "we know exactly where it goes," which is to Hamas. Another guest pointed out it's also needed to pump and purify water, which was no longer possible. He asked the minister "You don't want the people in Gaza to have water?" Pretending that lice are the worst problem people face from a lack of water, Ben Gvir declared that, yes ... until the Israeli hostages were released (and Hamas surrendered, etc.), the hostages and everyone else in Gaza should go thirsty; "let there be lice to itch them," he said.  (Middle East Eye on X)

This is not officially Israeli policy, but it doesn't need to be. It's happening anyway, through Israel's actions, shutting off water supplies they controlled and bombing others, gradually eroding Gaza's limited capabilities until, on May 8, the BBC reported "Half of Gaza water sites damaged or destroyed." On June 22, it was reported that five Gaza city workers "were killed by a targeted Israeli airstrike yesterday as they prepared to fix a well and help restore access to freshwater to the local population." (X) On July 17, Oxfam released a report on "Water War Crimes," finding that Israel was "using water as weapon of war," having damaged or destroyed 88% of Gaza's water wells and 100% of its desalination plants. (Israel using water as weapon of war as Gaza supply plummets by 94%, creating deadly health catastrophe: Oxfam  | Oxfam International) 

To be sure, Gaza's water problems predate the war. As far back as 2012, Save the Children and Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) found nearly all of the water in Gaza is polluted and "unfit for drinking," as Commondreams reported. "In five to ten years, Gaza's depleted aquifer, the sole water source, will stop producing water suitable for human consumption." That would be 2022, at the latest. 

It's also alleged that Hamas worsened the problem by digging up functional water pipes to make rockets from, as "Imam of Peace" alleges, citing a Hamas propaganda video: "They’re proud of keeping Palestinians thirsty," he said. But this looks like a barren area near the shore, likely the former Jewish settlement of Gush Khatif. The pipes there would be disconnected, irrelevant, and most likely last used by settlers to help draw down Gaza's water table before they left in 2005. Reports from 2021 said Hamas weapon-makers "repurpose plumbing pipes scavenged from abandoned Israeli settlements and components culled from dud Israeli bombs." In 2020, an Al-Jazeera documentary showed a very similar dig, explaining how the pipes had allowed "Israeli theft of Palestinian water." They're returning property here, not depriving Gazans. That remains Israel's job, self-appointed. 

As the current conflict grinds on, UNICEF's James Elder said on UN TV, July 30 that "average water availability has fallen to between two and nine litres per person, per day" whereas 15 liters for all uses is the WHO-recommended minimum in an emergency, while 3 liters just to drink is "the bare minimum for survival." It's already lower than this in some cases. Reports and images increasingly show children suffering malnutrition and dehydration, sometimes fatal, along with widespread skin diseases, kidney infections, and more. 

By July 19 it was reported that Polio was detected in Gaza's untreated wastewater, which has been widely contaminating other water sources. This means there are active infections, raising serious concerns of a major outbreak of this crippling and often deadly disease, while immunization is lower than it should be, due to the blockade and the war (CNN). This, or any of the other diseases increasing their profile in the hazardous conditions, will cause more than some "itching" and could fulfill Eiland's prophecy and bring Israel's "victory" closer to reality. And it was just then - July 18 - that this accelerated campaign of well-destructions began.

What if Netanyahu Knew?

Amid these events, on July 24, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu visited the US and lectured Congress (or the 3/4 willing to show up) how "we're protecting you" with their actions in Gaza. Five days after Polio was detected, and in the middle of the well-destruction campaign pursuant to that, he would say, among other things:

"Antisemitism is the world’s oldest hatred. For centuries, the massacre of Jews was always preceded by wild accusations. We were accused of everything from poisoning wells to spreading plagues to using the blood of slaughtered children to bake Passover matzos. These preposterous antisemitic lies led to persecution, mass murder and ultimately to history’s worst genocide, the Holocaust."

He continued: "Now, just as malicious lies were levelled for centuries at the Jewish people, malicious lies are now being levelled at the Jewish state." And they might even be of a similar character. Was he anticipating claims that Israel was deliberately poisoning the water or, let's say, systematically destroying water wells, branding it an Antisemitic lie in advance? Congressional leaders surely stand by to make that a law. 

He cites the ancient blood libel, an obvious lie originally used by ancient Romans against early Christians, until they Christianized and, as Catholics, shifted the claim onto the Jews. But he cites this alongside two possibly relevant charges - spreading disease and poisoning water - that have emerged in both ancient and modern times. Egyptian authorities alleged both of these together in 1948, when they arrested Israeli soldiers dressed as Arabs, they say, and carrying typhoid germs near a water well in Gaza, apparently planning to poison it. Israel denied the charges, Egypt executed the soldiers anyway, and then in 2022, Israeli historians Benny Morris and Benjamin Z. Kedar found evidence Egypt was right - official documentation of an operation called ‘Cast Thy Bread.’ Bigger operations inside Egypt and Lebanon were planned but called off, while mass poisoning was carried out, mainly in Palestinian areas that had been vacated. It seems the plan was more to prevent their return than to kill the residents, but Morris and Kedar found dysentery and typhoid did wind up spreading at least in the targeted city of Acre. (Haaretz article - Promised Land Museum document - Asharq al-Awsat article)

So Netanyahu lumps in these "antisemitic lies" about water and germ warfare once directed at the Jewish people, that wind up true, at least now that the Jews also have a state. He did this just as Israel was in fact helping the spread of disease in Gaza, largely with water effectively poisoned by their actions. It could still be debated whether they do this intentionally, but when they exacerbate the problem by deliberately destroying existing supplies of relatively pure water, as they were also doing just then, the case gets harder to make.

Commanders of the 601st Engineering Battalion supposedly blew the Canada Well on their own initiative, and not on Netanyahu's orders or with his awareness. So far there's no word on who decided to do the same dozens of times over in just ten days. We surely weren't supposed to see that one video, and we still don't have video proof for any of the others. So we can surmise the operation was all meant to go unseen. 

But the destruction and its devastating implications would become known. So, unless they wanted to take credit for another blatant act of genocide, Israel would need an alternate story. Perhaps Netanyahu was preparing the way for that as well, by citing those past slurs. Maybe the plan was to claim the Palestinians destroyed their own water supply over "Antisemitic fears" that Israel had poisoned the water to deliberately spread disease and, as Giora Eiland put it, bring victory closer. As it so often turns out, the Palestinians "did it to themselves."

This is a rather speculative thought, but it seemed worth airing. A decentralized or "crowdsourced" genocide, as I'm now considering, with top-level awareness and advance propaganda cover by the prime minister - that's may be hard or even impossible to prove, but if true, as I half-suspect, it's one of the evilest things ever, and surely fit for a War Crimes tribunal. What do you think?