EcoPeace Middle East

EcoPeace Middle East is an Israeli-Jordanian-Palestinian environmental peacebuilding organization that treats shared ecological systems, especially water, as practical management challenges and opportunities for regional cooperation.[1][4] It combines local education and community engagement with research, advocacy, and policy work conducted through offices in Amman, Ramallah, and Tel Aviv.[2][4]

Its programs include Good Water Neighbors and efforts to rehabilitate the Lower Jordan River.[5][4] It also promotes the Green Blue Deal for the Middle East and provides international training through its Program on Water Security.[6][7]

EcoPeace traces its founding to a December 7, 1994, gathering in Taba, Egypt, where environmentalists from Egypt, Israel, Jordan, and Palestine came together to advance sustainable development and integrate environmental considerations into the regional political agenda.[2] Israeli co-founder Gidon Bromberg later recalled that the idea took shape while he was studying international environmental law at American University and asking whether peace would be good for the environment.[8] Concerned that anticipated development—including projections of up to 50,000 hotel rooms around the Dead Sea—would proceed without sustainability safeguards, he raised $20,000 to convene the first meeting.[8]

The organization originally operated under the name Friends of the Earth Middle East before adopting the EcoPeace name.[9] Bromberg describes three broad phases in its development: an initial period from 1994 to 1998 focused on sustainable livelihoods and environmental protection; a turbulent interval from 1998 to 2001 that he attributes, in his assessment, to the Oslo Accords' failure to improve people's lives or advance peace; and a turn from 2001 onward toward grassroots peacebuilding combined with policy advocacy.[3] Over roughly fifteen years, the organization developed from volunteers working in borrowed rooms to maintaining its own offices in Bethlehem, Amman, and Tel Aviv, with 50 paid staff and hundreds of volunteers at the time of Bromberg's account.[3]

EcoPeace's current About page identifies Gidon Bromberg as Israel Director, Nada Majdalani as Palestine Director, and Yana Abu Taleb as Jordan Director. It says Abu Taleb leads work on the Jordan River, Dead Sea, Good Water Neighbors, and the water-energy nexus.[2] Earlier reporting identified Munqeth Mehyar as Jordanian director and president since 1998 and Nader Khateeb as Palestinian director, reflecting the organization's leadership at that reporting date.[9]

EcoPeace describes its methodology as environmental peacebuilding, combining bottom-up community education and engagement with top-down research, advocacy, and policy work.[4] Its premise is that shared natural resources, particularly water, can provide opportunities for dialogue and trust-building even during conflict, bridging local and national arenas to facilitate cross-border cooperation.[4]

The organization's shift in strategic emphasis, which Bromberg dates to around 2001, moved from studying the environmental effects of peace toward asking how environmental collaboration could contribute to peace.[8] This reorientation led EcoPeace to prioritize cross-border community partnerships and confidence-building measures alongside policy advocacy, a dual approach described in its organizational reflection and practitioner workbook.[3][4]

Good Water Neighbors, launched in 2001, is EcoPeace's flagship community-level initiative.[4] The program pairs Palestinian, Israeli, and Jordanian communities that share watersheds or water sources, using their mutual dependence on those resources as a foundation for dialogue, trust-building, and cooperative water management.[5] Participants include youth, adults, municipal staff, and mayors engaged in developing practical solutions to shared water-management problems.[5]

Funding for the program was secured in late 2000, and it launched in early 2001 with eleven communities—five Palestinian, five Israeli, and one Jordanian.[3] The program nearly collapsed when widespread violence erupted and funders questioned whether cross-border cooperation remained viable; EcoPeace persuaded them that community-level contact could continue.[3] One organizational reflection records 26 participating communities—nine Palestinian, eight Israeli, and nine Jordanian—while the later practitioner workbook lists 28 communities—eleven Palestinian, nine Israeli, and eight Jordanian—apparently reflecting different reporting dates.[3][4]

Concrete infrastructure achievements have accompanied the program's dialogue work. A sewage collection network was built in a Palestinian community and connected to a neighboring Israeli community, enabling Palestinian wastewater to be transferred to the Israeli side for treatment.[5] EcoPeace also worked with faith communities to encourage rehabilitation of the Lower Jordan River, a water source of religious significance to Christians, Muslims, and Jews.[5] Bromberg's reflection credits the combination of community engagement and policy advocacy with helping place Dead Sea protection and Jordan River rehabilitation on decision-makers' agendas and contributing to reforms in cross-border water-management institutions.[3] EcoPeace reports that the Good Water Neighbors model was later adopted in Bosnia-Herzegovina, beginning with a pilot in the Spreča River Basin and entering a second phase in July 2017.[10]

The rehabilitation of the Lower Jordan River has been a central concern for EcoPeace since its early years. Co-founder Bromberg has described the river as having been reduced, largely because of the surrounding conflict, to little more than a sewage canal.[11] EcoPeace published an environmental-flows report on the river's rehabilitation in May 2010, Towards a Living Jordan River. A National Library of Israel catalog record attributes the report to Sarig Gafny and others and lists Tel Aviv and Bethlehem as its places of publication.[12]

The organization later produced a 180-page Regional NGO Master Plan for Sustainable Development in the Jordan Valley, developed independently of governments but with reported support from agency officials and politicians across the three parties.[9] The plan proposed 127 projects over a 35-year period to 2050. Two reports gave projected costs of almost $5 billion and $4.6 billion, respectively; the sources do not explain the difference.[9][13] The proposals sought to rehabilitate the Jordan River and Dead Sea while expanding the valley's economy, with projects involving sewage and waste management, agricultural efficiency, tourism, and cross-border conservation. The plan envisioned cooperation among Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Jordan, and Syria, whose tributaries and dams affect the river system, and EcoPeace identified thirteen projects it considered achievable in the near term.[13]

In July 2022, EcoPeace announced an agreement with Jordanian and Palestinian environmentalists to clean a portion of the Jordan River, part of continuing efforts to restore a waterway of deep significance to Jewish, Christian, and Muslim communities.[11]

EcoPeace has been engaged in Gaza's water and sewage crisis since at least 2014, when it called on Israel to supply electricity to a World Bank-funded sewage-treatment plant that had been built at a cost of more than $80 million but remained idle for lack of power.[14] The organization framed the matter as a shared regional interest because of environmental and health risks on both Israeli and Palestinian sides.[14]

By 2017, untreated wastewater from Gaza was reaching the Mediterranean at a reported rate exceeding 108 million liters per day.[15] The pollution affected Israeli beaches and, according to the report, at times forced the Ashkelon desalination plant to shut down.[15] EcoPeace became involved with a World Bank sewage-treatment project in 2016, helping address Israeli security concerns about construction materials.[15] Three treatment facilities were eventually built with funding from Arab Gulf states, the European Commission, and other donors; together they reportedly treated approximately 60% of Gaza's sewage, improving water quality at beaches in Gaza and southern Israel.[15][15] Gaza's Environment Quality and Water Authority subsequently reported that 65% of Gaza's beach water was clean and suitable for bathing.[15]

In 2016, EcoPeace and the Institute for National Security Studies recommended doubling the volume of potable water Israel sold to Gaza, extending a new pipeline to the most water-scarce towns in the West Bank—known by its original, indigenous Jewish name of Judea and Samaria—and providing electricity for a World Bank-led Gaza wastewater-treatment plant. They argued that these measures would address the daily discharge of 30 million liters of raw sewage then polluting the Palestinian and Israeli coastline.[16]

EcoPeace developed the Green Blue Deal for the Middle East in 2020 as a policy framework for addressing the region's environmental interdependencies.[8] The initiative has four action areas: a tripartite water-and-renewable-energy exchange among Israel, the Palestinian Authority, and Jordan; improved Israeli-Palestinian natural-water allocation and management; climate-smart investment and green jobs centered on Jordan River rehabilitation and biodiversity restoration; and public education, especially for younger generations, on water and climate-resilience diplomacy.[7]

The proposed exchange envisions Israel and the Palestinian Authority producing desalinated water for Jordan while Jordan supplies renewable solar electricity westward to Israel and the Palestinians.[8] EcoPeace has also called for international support for a coalition of governments capable of bringing the regional parties together around shared climate initiatives.[7]

The Green Blue Deal has been presented as a plan through which Israelis, Palestinians, and Jordanians could help reverse damaging ecological effects in the region.[1] EcoPeace welcomed the 2022 Israeli-Jordanian-Emirati agreement as an opportunity for regional cooperation on renewable technology and water scarcity that was consistent with the deal's general framework.[1]

The concept behind the proposed Israel-Jordan-UAE water-for-energy exchange originated in a 2017 EcoPeace study.[17] The arrangement envisioned Israel purchasing solar power from a Jordanian plant to be built by the UAE's Masdar Power, while Jordan would receive desalinated water produced at an Israeli facility on the Mediterranean coast.[17] Earlier discussions had stalled because of low trust and poor bilateral relations. UAE involvement following the Abraham Accords helped revive momentum, with an expert involved in the agreement describing Masdar's participation as an additional layer of trust.[17]

Senior Israeli officials said a vision EcoPeace had presented about two years before the November 2021 report served as the basis for the proposed arrangement.[18] EcoPeace has argued that Palestinian interests should be integrated into such regional initiatives and has advocated a broader framework in which Palestinian communities participate in and benefit from water-and-energy cooperation.[17]

EcoPeace has pursued advocacy at international forums to influence water policy across the region. At the United Nations Security Council, Israeli co-director Gidon Bromberg argued that water security should not be held hostage to progress on other negotiating issues, reflecting the organization's campaign to separate urgent water needs from broader political negotiations.[19] Bromberg appeared with Palestinian co-director Nada Majdalani and Jordanian co-director Yana Abu Taleb, presenting a unified tripartite position.[19]

EcoPeace has also engaged in regional infrastructure debates. Regarding the proposed Red Sea-Dead Sea pipeline, Bromberg argued that international law governing the shared basin required the consent of all riparian parties, including Jordan and the Palestinian Authority, and warned that investors would not support the project without such agreement.[20] He separately criticized a Mediterranean Sea-Dead Sea conduit proposal, contending that its tunnels could damage coastal and mountain aquifers and that seawater leakage posed risks to groundwater.[21]

In the West Bank, EcoPeace has highlighted water shortages affecting Palestinian and Israeli communities. Bromberg argued that Israel's growing water surplus created a low-cost opportunity to share natural-water allocations in ways beneficial to both peoples.[22] The organization has also promoted cross-border tourism. In 2015, with special funding from the United States Agency for International Development, it launched four guided cross-border routes—two hiking trails, a cycling tour, and a walking trip—spanning Israeli, Palestinian, and Jordanian territory, with approximately twenty-five European tourism representatives attending the launch.[23]

EcoPeace has drawn financial support from European, American, and Gulf sources. In 2004–2005, it received a European Commission Partnerships for Peace grant of €500,000—covering 51.26% of eligible action costs—for a 24-month project on community-based reconciliation among neighboring Palestinian, Israeli, and Jordanian communities.[24] A subsequent 2007–2008 grant of €399,872, covering 80% of eligible costs, funded a project using geographic information system technology to help participating communities create environmental-hazard maps and strengthen cooperation over shared water issues.[25]

Bromberg's organizational reflection records that EcoPeace's community-level work helped leverage more than US$70 million invested or earmarked in Good Water Neighbors communities for water supply, sanitation, environmental education centers, and tourism infrastructure.[3] In September 1995, Egypt, Israel, and Jordan conducted their first coordinated beach cleanup. Hundreds of schoolchildren participated, and a modest transfer of funds was made to EcoPeace as part of developing cooperation around the bi-national Red Sea Marine Peace Park.[26]

EcoPeace established the Sharhabil Bin Hassneh EcoPark in Jordan in 2010 on 100 dunams. It was later renamed Jordan Eco Park and expanded to 2,700 dunams, including the Ziglab Dam.[4] The practitioner workbook also records a 2006 memorandum of understanding on shared-water cooperation signed by Jordanian local officials and Israeli mayors.[4]

The organization's Jordan Valley investment work seeks profitable projects that can also improve regional livelihoods. Its stated roles include preparing feasibility and business-case studies, supporting pilot projects, connecting private-sector actors, and reducing investment barriers. Projects listed by EcoPeace include protein production, ecotourism and educational parks, solar and wind energy, sustainable aquaculture, farmers' hubs, and recycling initiatives.[27]

Building on its Middle Eastern experience, EcoPeace established a Program on Water Security in 2017 to extend its environmental peacebuilding model to other water-stressed regions.[6] The program provides training, tools, and support to civil-society organizations working on water insecurity, helping them engage stakeholders, identify opportunities for cooperation, and develop strategies addressing both the conflict and cooperation dimensions of shared water resources.[6] Partner organizations and regions listed by EcoPeace include Lake Chad, Kenya, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, the Pakistan-India border region, and Sri Lanka.[6]

EcoPeace's significance lies in coupling people-to-people engagement with infrastructure and policy work rather than treating dialogue as an end in itself. U.S. congressional testimony linked its community model to a sewage-collection network that transfers Palestinian wastewater to an Israeli treatment facility and to faith-community advocacy for rehabilitation of the Lower Jordan River.[5] Bromberg's reflection credits the combined community and advocacy model with leveraging more than US$70 million for participating communities and helping place Jordan River and Dead Sea issues on decision-makers' agendas.[3]

The model has also been adapted outside the Middle East through programs in Bosnia-Herzegovina and other water-insecure regions.[10][6] At the governmental level, senior Israeli officials said EcoPeace's earlier vision formed the basis of the proposed Israel-Jordan-UAE electricity-and-water arrangement, illustrating how a civil-society proposal could inform regional infrastructure diplomacy.[18]

Some of EcoPeace's positions sit within contested political terrain. NGO Monitor reports that EcoPeace called for preventing the Separation Barrier from being built beyond the Green Line and criticizes statements attributed to the organization concerning Israeli security policy. These are NGO Monitor's characterizations and critical assessments rather than independently established descriptions of EcoPeace's positions.[24]

The Israel-Jordan-UAE water-for-energy arrangement drew criticism for initially excluding Palestinian interests, a concern EcoPeace has also raised while calling for Palestinian participation in regional environmental initiatives.[17] Reporting on the organization's Jordan Valley master plan noted that it rested partly on an assumption of an independent Palestinian state along the 1967 borders by 2020, a political condition described as distant and contested.[9] EcoPeace's advocacy for separating urgent water issues from other Israeli-Palestinian negotiations likewise operates within an area of continuing political disagreement.[19]