MER Article Waterless Wadi Barada When ‘Ali was a little boy, he spent his summers swimming in the Barada River and playing in the orchards rustling in the breeze along the banks. “Summers in Wadi Barada were amazing,” says the 28-year old from the village of Kufayr al-Zayt to the west of the Syrian capital of Damascus. “I can still Francesca de Châtel, Mohammad Raba'a • 18 min read
MER Article Water, Energy and Human Insecurity in the Middle East Demand for water in the Middle East and North Africa is rapidly increasing. Projected population growth alone through 2025 will lower per capita water availability by 30-70 percent over the next few decades, assuming that renewable water supplies remain constant, which is unlikely. [1] Demand for en Jeannie Sowers • 12 min read
Current Analysis Syria's Drought and the Rise of a War Economy The grinding war in Syria brings new horrors with every passing week. The death toll and the number of displaced people continue to soar, as more areas of the country are reduced to rubble. This month, two additional issues with dire long-term consequences have been gaining attention: the possible d Omar S. Dahi • 2 min read
Current Analysis Disaster Strikes the Indus River Valley The flooding of most of the Indus River valley in Pakistan has the makings of a history-altering catastrophe. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimates that 20 million Pakistanis are in dire need, many of them homeless or displaced, others cut off from help by falle The Editors • 11 min read
MER Article Turkey's Rivers of Dispute In the waning years of the twentieth century, it was common to hear predictions that water would be the oil of the twenty-first. A report prepared for the center-right Washington think tank, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, forecast that water, not oil, would be the dominant sourc Hilal Elver • 13 min read
MER Article Water Conflict and Cooperation in Yemen Yemen is one of the oldest irrigation civilizations in the world. For millennia, farmers have practiced sustainable agriculture using available water and land. Through a myriad of mountain terraces, elaborate water harvesting techniques and community-managed flood and spring irrigation systems, the Gerhard Lichtenthaeler • 11 min read
MER Article Saudi Alchemy The abundance of oil in Saudi Arabia is staggering. With more than 250 billion barrels, the kingdom possesses one-fifth of the world’s oil reserves, affording it considerable influence Toby Jones • 14 min read
MER Article Iraq's Water Woes The eastern cusp of the Fertile Crescent is turning barren. Statistically one of the water-richest states in the Middle East, Iraq is nonetheless losing arable land as rainfall lessens, the level of the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers drops and saline water creeps northward into the Shatt al-‘Arab, the great Chris Toensing • 8 min read
MER Article Waking the Red-Dead “Look at that!” said Muhammad ‘Asfour, an environmentalist and avid nature photographer, pointing to a picture of a boat and wooden staircase perched well above the Jordanian shore of the Dead Sea. “Do you see how far they are from the waterline?” Lizabeth Zack • 6 min read
MER Article Speaking of Water “Life After People,” the History Channel’s plangently alarmist imagined documentary series on the vestiges of civilization after an unspecified catastrophe, forecasts an end for Dubai’s infamous Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world at 2,625 feet. The desert location of Dubai, coupled with the persistent engineering George R. Trumbull • 11 min read
MER Article From the Editors (Spring 2010) The Middle East is running out of water. Chris Toensing, Jeannie Sowers • 8 min read
MER Article Basic Needs vs. Swimming Pools Severe drought conditions, only recently ameliorated by heavy winter rains, and the current hostilities have exacerbated the fundamental inequality in division of the scarce water resources of Israel-Palestine between Israelis and Palestinians. Water is becoming a weapon of war aimed at quelling Pal Alwyn Rouyer • 16 min read
