Israel set to demolish EU-funded renewables projects

West Bank project managers say the ‘stop work’ orders served against the projects are "a first step to almost automatic demolition".

Elad Orian, the co-founder of Comet-ME, which oversaw the renewables projects on the ground, said that 400 people would be left completely without electricity if the demolition plan went ahead, but one village would still have access to an expensive, noisy and gas-guzzling diesel generator.

“The people will be left without light or the ability to charge cellphones, which is the only means of communication there,” he said over the phone from the West Bank.

“You will have no refrigerators, which are crucial for the economic sustainability of farming communities, and women will be reburdened with a lot of very gender-specific manual labour.”

In all, the intiative backed by Comet-ME and the German group Medico International has built 15 solar plants and hybrid systems electrifying villages with a combined population of some 1,500 people.  

In one village facing renewable energy demolition, Shaab al-Buttum, two wind turbines and 40 solar panels currently supply 40-60 kilowatt-hours of electricity a day.

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle discussed the issue with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Ninister Ehud Barak during a recent visit, a Germany foreign ministry spokeswoman said.

“The German government together with its EU partners is watching the situation in ‘Area C’ very attentively,” the official told EurActiv.

“The government is concerned about the ‘stop work’ orders for energy systems that have been financed with German funds,” she added.

‘Area C’

Area C is a canton under full Israeli control, comprising some 60% of the West Bank and - beyond the West Bank Wall - all of Israel’s settlements, which are considered illegal under international law.

Palestinians need permits to build in this region, but a study by the Israeli group Peace Now found that between 2000 and 2007, 94% of their applications were turned down.

EU sources say that the permitting regime seems aimed at encouraging Palestinian migration to Area’s A and B. “That is what everyone tells you when you go there,” one said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “It seems obvious but politically speaking, it is very sensitive.”

The region, spanning the Dead Sea, Judean Desert and Jordan Valley, is under-developed and the German Foreign Office provided around €300,000 for the six hybrid wind and solar energy projects, which serve poor villages in the South Hebron Hills.

The last of the energy projects was completed in September 2011, but in January, Israel’s Civil Liaison Administration, which oversees the occupied territories, announced that they had to stop work as they did not have the correct permits.

Confidential report

Some EU diplomats – and many non-governmental groups – see a link in the timing with a confidential report by the EU’s top regional diplomats into settlement building and house demolitions in Area C. It called on the Commission to draft legislation “to prevent/discourage financial transactions in support of settlement activity.”

Less than two weeks after the report was leaked, notices were served on clean energy projects in Haribat al-Nabi, Shaab al-Butum, Qawawis and Wadi al-Shesh.  

“It is not just the Germans that were slapped in the face but the whole EU,” said Tsafrir Cohen, a spokesman for Medico International, one of the partner organisations behind the project. “That was their answer to the Area C report.”

EU diplomats say that more generally, Israeli settlement activity and house demolitions in Area C are increasing at an unprecedented speed but with the renewables projects, “we are particularly concerned because it is EU-funded infrastructure,” one told EurActiv.

“We expect that there will be pressure put by the Germans to have this stopped, even if it is only a drop in the ocean of this whole process,” the source said. “Action is necessary.”