Hydrostrategic Decisionmaking and the Arab ... - Yale University

WOLF 225of international rivers, notably the difficulty in allocating the waterof a shared river.It is precisely these conflicting elements of water sources—theirstrategic value in the traditional sense, their functional value in adomestic sense, and their practical role in delineating boundaries—which inform the central questions of this paper. “Hydrostrategic”territory must then be operationally defined as that territory whichhas strategic value primarily because of its access to water resourcesfor irrigation, drinking and/or electric power. This is distinct fromstrategic territory in a traditional military or political sense, includingwhat Cohen (1986) calls “strategic water space,” or water-relatedterritory which provides traditional strategic value.WATER AND BOUNDARIESIn this section, I seek to answer the first question posed in theintroductory section: have boundaries been drawn historically in theMiddle East on the basis of the location of water access?BOUNDARY PROPOSALS AND DELINEATION: 1913-1923After the first Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland in 1897,European Jewry began its efforts to gain the support of Ottoman orBritish authorities for a Jewish state in Palestine (which had beenunder Ottoman rule for 400 years). Even without commitments forindependent nations, both Jewish and Arab populations began toswell in Palestine—the former in waves of immigration from Yemenas well as from Europe, and the latter attracted from other parts ofthe Arab world to new regional prosperity (Sachar 1969; McCarthy1990). According to McCarthy (1990), Palestine had 340,000 peoplein 1878 and 722,000 by 1915.During World War I, as it became clear that the Ottoman Empirewas crumbling, the heirs-apparent began to jockey for positionsof favor with the inhabitants of the region. The French held favorwith the Maronite Catholics of Lebanon and therefore focused onthe northern territories of Lebanon and Syria. The British, meanwhile,began to seek a coalition with (1) the Arabs from Palestineand Arabia, for military assistance against the Turks and (2) the Jewsof Palestine, for both military assistance and the political support ofDiaspora Jewry (Ra’anan 1955). As the course of the war becameclear both the colonial powers and the local populations began torefine their territorial interests.A detailed description of the lengthy process which led to thefinal determination of boundaries for the French and British mandatesand informed the boundaries of modern Lebanon, Syria, Jordan,and Israel, is beyond the scope this paper. 3 The influence of3Details of the transition can be found in theworks of Ra’anan (1955), Sachar (1969,1987), and Fromkin (1989).YALE F&ES BULLETIN