My FoEME internship…time to look back
After finishing my master’s degree in Physical Geography and Geoinformatics I was leaving Slovakia aiming to be active in implementing my academic knowledge and to learn more about problems with water management, pollution and treatment in the Middle East.
Op-Ed: In Israel, Water Prices Will Continue to Rise
On January 1st, the price of domestic water rose again in Israel. The cost of a cubic meter including sewage treatment is now 9.1 NIS for the first 3.5 cm a month and then 14.64 NIS for the rest. My neighbor reacted with frustration, “But we are blessed with such a good start to […]
Reflections of an American Intern with Friends of the Earth Middle East
I use my cab rides to practice Arabic. After a day or two interning with Friends of the Earth Middle East, I mastered a new Arabic script: a FoEME elevator pitch for cab drivers. Oh, I heard about them on the radio, drivers would respond. I’ve interned with FoEME’s Amman office for the last two […]
Desalination: A Solution to Israel’s Water Woes?
Israel’s water supply is on the verge of a state of emergency. The Israeli government has proposed an increase in desalination as the solution, and has made a plan to greatly expand their desalination program by 2020. However, the human, environmental, and financial costs of this method have not been fully explored. In a recently […]
Lessons from Australia for the lower Jordan River (Chris Hammer Series, Part 1 of 3)
Chris Hammer is a journalist and expert on Australia’s Murray-Darling Basin. This three-part blog series explores lessons learned from his visit, particularly parallels between Australia’s Murray-Darling Basin rehabilitation and FoEME’s efforts to rehabilitate the Lower Jordan River. FoEME’s Israeli director Gidon Bromberg, was originally published by Jerusalem Post on March 28th, 2012. On a family visit to Australia […]
Jordan Flirts with Nuclear Energy, Though Process Remains Opaque
One year after Fukushima’s warning to the world, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan moves ever closer to the construction of a nuclear energy power plant. Jordan’s King Abdullah recently returned from a nuclear power summit in South Korea where, according to King Abdullah’s press release, he engaged in talks “in line with Jordan’s compliance and […]
Reflection of a FoEME intern – working for peace and the environment
Josef Wenninger spent five months as an intern at the Tel Aviv office of FoEME. Here is his entry about his experiences and his work at FoEME. My time at FoEME has come to a close and the time has come to reflect on the last 5 months, the work I have done and the […]
Baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan – Epiphany ceremonies all over the world
This week, all over the world, Christians are celebrating the Epiphany, also known as the Feast of Theophany. While the Roman Catholic and Protestant churches mainly celebrate the visit of the Biblical Magi to baby Jesus in Bethlehem, the Eastern Orthodox Christian churches celebrate the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist in the River Jordan. […]
Support the Rehabilitation of the Jordan River with Pictures!
The opening of the Jordan River photography exhibition in the Catholic Church of St. Michael in Cologne, Germany this week began with a mass dedicated to the Jordan River. The extremely deteriorated state of the holy river was very touchingly remembered in light of the River’s central importance for Christianity, the baptism of Jesus and […]
Reflections of a FoEME Intern
My time at FoEME has come to a close. It’s been an incredible summer. I want to reflect briefly on the work I’ve done here and the lessons I’ve taken away. While here I helped with a number of different projects. The one that took up most of time concerned measuring pollution risk to the […]