...There was a story the other day about the increase in arid lands in Syria due partially to climate change and partially to the neglect of the Syrian government. If you fly from Egypt to Israel, people tell me that you can recognize where the border is when the land turns suddenly green as you get in Israel. In countries where water is scarce, they have adopted water management technologies to help ease supply needs by recycling water. Today in Israel, out of 1.1 billion cubic meters of water used for agriculture approximately 300million cubic meters were recycled effluents. I do not have any numbers about Syrian recycling but here is a true story for you that I heard first-hand.

An affluent lawyer in Damascus drives his car every other day for about 50 kilometers to buy his fruits and vegetables even though he can buy them easily in Damascus. One can find the largest lettuce heads and the biggest tomatoes in Damascus but he would not buy them for anything in the world. It turned out that the Syrian government uses its sewer water, without any recycling or possibly poor recycling, to water the farms surrounding Damascus. Untreated sewer water contains lots of fertilizers, which explains the size of the lettuce and tomatoes. The lawyer tells me they taste awful. I am ashamed of telling this story about my beloved Syria but the reality is that Assad spends billions on arms and missiles and the people eat sewer-laden food. If our leaders in Syria were accountable the way the Israeli leaders are accountable to their people, Syria would become a trading partner with Israel instead of lobbing its missiles, via Hezbollah, against Israelis.

But not everything is bad. There is something unique about Syria that I hope Israelis will get to see for themselves...