Depletive Water Balance and High Vulnerability Due to Conflicts over Access and Rights

Abstract

Sustainable water supply problem becomes strategic when inelastic demand levels are overhauling maximum available supplies. The situation is more acute when the groundwater recharge area is heavily populated, consist of urban, industrial and agricultural areas and above all have typical karstic morphology and extensive regions of thin or null soil cover. During winter season the infiltrated water mixed with the wastewater leaking from poorly designed cesspits and wastewater overflow from the treatment plants of the adjacent settlements. Currently, most of the recharge area is disturbed due to the ongoing urban development in Beitar Elite and Tzur Hadassah in conjunction with the planned Security Fence (apartheid wall) threatens to extend over ~70% of the aquifer recharge area. Such massive destruction in a small watershed leads to considerable decrease in springs discharge and could completely dry-out the springs at the upper part of the valley. The aim of this research is to improve understanding of the hydrologic processes controlling water quantity and quality of springs discharging small (<1E6 m3/yr) basin in the mountain aquifer.