Israel/Palestine
Related: About this forumIn Jordan, ‘pipeline for peace’ with Israel strikes a nerve
AMMAN, Jordan The government of Jordan has a plan to diversify its fuel supply and save its economy over $4 billion, amid a potentially destabilizing energy crisis, by purchasing gas from Israel. Theres only one hitch: nearly everyone in Jordan is against it.
With a nudge from Washington, its most important ally, Jordan in September quietly signed a memorandum of understanding on a $15 billion deal that could start meeting 30 percent of the countrys electricity demand by 2018. The kingdom of 6 million people, which imports 97 percent of its energy supplies, has long relied on its Arab neighbors to keep the lights on. But violence in the Sinai Peninsula has shuttered the pipeline from Egypt that once supplied most of Jordans gas and fewer drivers are willing to make the perilous journey across ISIL-held territory in Iraq to deliver fuel. Desperate for a cheap and reliable solution, Jordan's government negotiated a private contract between the state-owned energy company, NEPCO, and the U.S.-based Noble Energy, which is developing Israels Leviathan gas fields.
Since the government announced the deal, however, Jordanians from shopkeepers to parliamentarians have grown increasingly outraged by the idea they could soon be paying the Israeli government to heat their homes with gas they consider stolen from Palestinians.
"No matter what the government says, the people will never accept this," said Hind al-Fayez, a member of Jordans parliament known for her fiery tirades against the deal. "I will use firewood or even set myself on fire, but I will never import Israeli gas," she once said during a television interview. Why do we want to import gas from the only enemy the Arab people know?
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/5/29/in-jordan-pipeline-for-peace-strikes-a-nerve.html
Mosby
(16,311 posts)For the "Arab people" the peace agreement between Jordan and Israel only exists on paper.
Sad really.
Little Tich
(6,171 posts)Palestine already signed on to buy 1.2 billion dollars worth of gas.
Leviathan partners sign first gas export agreement with Palestinian power firm
Source: Jerusalem Post, 01/06/2014
http://www.jpost.com/Enviro-Tech/Leviathan-partners-sign-first-gas-export-agreement-with-Palestinian-power-firm-337174
shira
(30,109 posts)azurnoir
(45,850 posts)The Jordanian cabinet approved, last month, the recommendation of the Committee on Economic Development, calling for supplying Jordan with natural gas from the gas field discovered in the Palestinian water of the Gaza Marine, after coordination with the Palestinian Authority.
The Palestinians own a stake in the Gaza Marine field, located 35 kilometres away from the coast of the Gaza Strip, which was discovered at the end of the 90s, nothing has been extracted from it yet.
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/news/middle-east/13921-jordan-to-buy-15bn-of-israeli-gas