13. Culture

The political culture in the Middle East is an obstacle to cooperation on large-scale desalination projects. Water is a national security issue, and shared water development present a threat to national self-sufficiency in water resources. With this in mind, both the governments of Israel and Jordan have pursued unilateral development projects on the Jordan River for the past 40 years. The parties have found it difficult to agree to creative solutions for cooperative management of shared resources. Since the signing of the peace treaty between Israel and Jordan in 1994, relations between the two countries have approached a point that a joint project, such as a canal, might be possible. There is the additional factor of the Palestinian interests, which might demand a role in any large-scale diversion and desalination project.
The Dead Sea region has special historical significance for Israel. The Bible describes, in Genesis 19, the destructive earthquake near the Dead Sea area at the time of Abraham. While no evidence remains of the ancient cities of Zeboim, Admah, Bela, Sodom or Gomorrah, their sites are believed to be located near the southern end of the sea. In 1947, a young Beduin shepherd discovered an ancient scroll in a cave at Qumran, near the northern basin. The scroll was preserved by the low humidity in the cave. Additional discoveries in the area produced thousands of scroll fragments which have been pieced together and preserved at the Shrine of the Book Museum in Jerusalem. Scientists used carbon-14 dating to determine that the scrolls date back to the Essene sect, which inhabited the Qumran area from the 3rd century BCE to 68 CE.