Israeli Troops Have Turned North Gaza’s Only Desalination Station Into a Military Base
Israeli troops hung a sign announcing northern Gaza’s only desalination station is now an "operational compound"
The Israeli military has apparently taken over North Gaza’s only water desalination station and turned it into a makeshift army base, according to videos posted online by Israeli soldiers.
Footage first posted by an Israeli soldier on Monday reveals the presence of Israeli forces inside the facility.
Additional footage, posted today by an Israeli officer involved in providing food services for soldiers, shows troops using the facility as a military base for their operations in Northern Gaza. A sign posted on a wall in the desalination facility shows the 162 Division logo atop the words: “Nothing can stand in the way of the Division Logistics Support Unit.”
Another sign with the 162 Division logo says “Operational Compound” beneath it.
The footage also shows military installations and equipment both inside and around the desalination station, including communication devices, rooms, trucks and other items.
The desalination plant-turned army base now marks the northern edge of a newly constructed corridor that isolates the northern Gaza towns of Beit Lahia, Jabalia, and Beit Hanoun, from Gaza City. The corridor was built as part of an Israeli military campaign of extermination and ethnic cleansing in northern Gaza that was launched in early October. Israeli troops have besieged the area completely cutting off aid, with humanitarian deliveries ceasing entirely for weeks and hardly any aid making it through since. Up to 131,000 have been forcibly displaced, many to Gaza City, according to the United Nations.
Water and sanitation conditions are particularly critical in North Gaza, where "approximately 65,000-75,000 people face immense challenges in securing access to clean drinking water and where no fuel has been allowed into the area, halting the operation of the remaining water wells, amid ongoing power cuts from Israel and the Gaza power plant," according to the UN.
The desalination station, built with funding from the Kuwaiti Fund and opened in 2019, provided vital water to over 250,000 people, primarily residents of Gaza City. The facility has been shut down since October 2023, when Israel’s brutal assault began, with operating teams unable to reach it, and it was subsequently bombed, according to Monther Shoblaq, Director General of Gaza’s Coastal Municipality Water Utility. “This is a great loss for one of the main water sources that we developed, which used to serve about 250,000 residents of Gaza City,” Shoblaq told Drop Site News, adding that the facility could potentially be restored. “But as long as they use it as a base for their operations, we fear that they will leave it and blow it up, as they did in Rafah.”
The Israeli military did not confirm or deny the takeover of the desalination facility when asked, only responding that it "was not aware of the event in question."
* This article was updated on November 20 to include a comment by the Israeli military
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The Kuwaiti government should sue Israel in an international court for the cost of the desalination plant. Bibi needs to be held accountable for his wanton destruction.