Summary
Refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, one of the “mid-camps” not adjacent to a municipality where UNRWA remained principally in charge of water, and the site of the April 1967 conflict over a proposed piped-water project recorded in mabahith investigation papers (Governing Gaza, PDF p.192 / printed p.175).
Details
- In camps not adjacent to municipalities, such as Nuseirat and the other “mid-camps”, UNRWA, at differing levels of concert with the Administration, would remain principally in charge of water provision (PDF p.192 / printed p.175).
- Mabahith documents from April 1967 report a plan to pipe water directly into refugee homes and the crisis it engendered; the immediate question was whether local UNRWA employee ‘Ali Harb had destroyed pumps in Block C to force acceptance, the mabahith director contending residents had refused the ten-pound fee and Harb had left “one pump for all of the residents—more than 1,000 souls—while the other three are broken” (PDF p.192-193 / printed p.175-176).
- Residents’ objections centred on UNRWA’s responsibility, recorded by a policeman as “He wants to sell water pipes to the people, even though this is UNRWA’s responsibility”; four residents’ statements were divided, and a majority at a meeting with the governor-general rejected the project (PDF p.193-194 / printed p.176-177).
- The Deir Belah administrative governor ordered piped water brought in while permitting residents who could not pay to continue using the pumps; the June 1967 occupation then transformed the dynamic, limiting the crisis’s effects (PDF p.194-195 / printed p.177-178).