Friday April 8th, 2005 10:29 Israel plans to dump tons of Israeli garbage in the West Bank

In violation of international law and treaties, Israel has decided to dump 10,000 tons of Israeli household garbage in the West Bank every month. The garbage will come from the greater Tel Aviv area and the Sharon region east of Natanya. The proposed site of the dump is a Palestinian quarry called Abu Shusha located between the Palestinian city of Nablus and the illegal Israeli colony of Qedumim.

Pollution experts say such use of the quarry will seriously jeopardize the Mountain Aquifer, one of the largest sources of fresh water in Israel and Palestine.

The construction is being carried out by Baron Industrial Park, a company jointly owned by the councils of the illegal Israeli colonies of Qedumim and Qarne Shomron and the Shomron Regional Council. The site is operated by D.S.H., a private garbage disposal company based in Netanya. The project will cover dozens of dunams and expects to yield enormous profits due to the low cost of transferring waste to the territories instead of to sites in Israel.

In addition to violating international law and treaties that prohibit such abuse of occupied territory, the company is operating in violation of Israeli law. The company has already dumped hundreds of tons of garbage without the approval of the Ministry of the Environment and the Water Commission, and the bulldozers are working on the site without a construction permit. The director of the union of Samaria local authorities for the environment said the work was done without the union’s approval and was illegal.

Despite the civil administration’s order to stop the construction, the bulldozers are still working on the site.

West Bank sources say the reason for the civil administration’s inaction is that everyone is afraid of Daniella Weiss, the council head of Qedumim, one of the owners of Baron Park.

The West Bank is already filled with illegal Palestinian garbage dumps, which constitute serious environmental hazards and jeopardize the groundwater, because the civil administration refuses to let Palestinians build modern waste disposal sites. But the most modern dump being built there - the Qedumim dump - is intended for Israeli garbage only.