On Moshav Na'ama, a big Israeli farm in the West Bank inside the wide Jordan Valley, Inon Rosenblum raises fresh herbs for export.

He hires Palestinians to work the fields and pack the crops. The farm is 300 feet below sea level, a desert climate where irrigation is mandatory. Rosenblum won't say exactly how much water he uses, or exactly where it comes from.

"From wells," he says. "In the mountains." Then he changes the subject.

Water is such a touchy subject here that when a European politician last year brought up disparities between the amounts used by settlers and the amounts available to Palestinians, several Israeli politicians walked out of his speech to parliament.

Map showing the location of Moshav Naama, Israel, West Bank and Gaza

Sometimes Palestinians take matters into their own hands.

Twenty minutes along a highway from Moshav Na'ama, Eed Khamis serves tea to guests in his living room — a plywood shack in a village of makeshift homes. He was born here in the scruffy desert hills between Jerusalem and the Jordan Valley, part of a Bedouin tribe evicted from Israel in the 1950s.

This encampment now gets water piped in from Israel's national water company. But Khamis says when settlements first cropped up on the nearby hills, water the Bedouin had previously used was diverted.

So they pounded holes in the pipes with nails, he says, and carried the water home. Eventually, Khamis claims, the water company sat down to bargain.

"The Israeli water company said we will give you water, so long as no one makes a hole in the pipe," he says.

Eed Khamis, a Palestinian Bedouin, walks in an encampment in the Jordan Valley. He says Israelis diverted water supplies to serve nearby Jewish settlements, until Bedouins hammered holes in the pipes for access.

Eed Khamis, a Palestinian Bedouin, walks in an encampment in the Jordan Valley. He says Israelis diverted water supplies to serve nearby Jewish settlements, until Bedouins hammered holes in the pipes for access.

Emily Harris/NPR

"This is a strong victory for us."

But it was a small victory in the political and economic fight for control of Area C.

What's Area C?

The C doesn't stand for anything. It's just one of three categories of West Bank land set up 20 years ago. It was supposed to be a temporary arrangement.

The Israeli military has had ultimate authority all over the West Bank since capturing it in the 1967 war. But under an interim deal in 1995, the Israelis and the Palestinians agreed to set up the different categories of land in the West Bank. The goal was to reach a comprehensive peace agreement within a few years, and these three categories would vanish.

But it hasn't worked out that way. As peace negotiations foundered, the segmented West Bank land and water arrangements have become more entrenched.

Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 war and has been building settlements in the territory ever since. Control of the limited water supply is also a part of the conflict.

Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 war and has been building settlements in the territory ever since. Control of the limited water supply is also a part of the conflict.

Emily Harris/NPR

Area A consists of Palestinian cities, where Palestinian officials are supposed to have political and security control.

Smaller Palestinian towns and some agricultural land are Area B. Here Palestinians are responsible for everything but security, which is shared with Israeli soldiers.

Area C is the rest. This amounts to 60 percent of the West Bank under full Israeli control. It winds around Palestinian islands of A and B and spreads into stretches of countryside. Israel controls planning, building and destruction.

In the center of the West Bank, Majid Banifadel, 16, walks among the stone, metal and plastic rubble of his home.

About a year ago, Israeli soldiers bulldozed most of the small buildings on a slope below the Palestinian town of Akraba.

"They come with their bulldozers and destroy our life," he says.

Majid Banifadel, 16, stands in the remains of his family home.

Majid Banifadel, 16, stands in the remains of his family home.

Emily Harris/NPR

Banifadel is part of a traditionally nomadic Arab tribe. Akraba, on the hill above, is designated Area B, but the land where his home stood and the broad green valley where his family herds sheep and goats are in Area C.

It's also part of the 20 percent of the West Bank — all Area C — that, according to United Nations maps, Israel has designated a closed military zone, restricting Palestinian access to the land.

Muffled gunshots come from across the valley.

Banifadel believes they are from soldiers he saw earlier, out training. He heads in that direction, where his herds are grazing — illegally in Israel's view.

Arab Bedouin tribes in the West Bank are heavily affected by restriction in Area C, because they use that land for their livelihood. But Palestinian cities, including Ramallah, and smaller towns are spilling over into Area C as their populations grow.

Israel says controlling Area C is vital for security. Israel has more than 100 Jewish settlements in the West Bank that are fenced. Israel has also put up big red signs on roads leading into Palestinian areas, warning Israeli citizens to stay out for their safety.

But the open agricultural land of Area C is a site of direct conflict. Israelis frequently destroy Palestinian crops.

The struggle over land here is of course political, and it is a factor in next Tuesday's Israeli elections. A prominent right-wing Israeli politician, Naftali Bennett, says it's time to simply annex the West Bank. He doesn't want a Palestinian state.

But backers of a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict say Area C will have to be Palestinian, serving as an economic base for a future state and giving the Palestinians the land needed for a viable state.

Several European nations and the United Nations are investing millions of dollars specifically in Area C to benefit poor Arab communities. They are paying for solar panels on Bedouin homes, putting money into schools and trying to keep Palestinians in the area.

Swedish diplomat Yohan Shar, who represents the first European country to recognize Palestine as a state, said the fields, aquifers and quarries of Area C are vital to Palestinians.

Children play at a Bedouin camp in the Jordan Valley, West Bank. The camp is located in Area C, the 60 percent of the West Bank under exclusive Israeli control.

Children play at a Bedouin camp in the Jordan Valley, West Bank. The camp is located in Area C, the 60 percent of the West Bank under exclusive Israeli control.

Emily Harris/NPR

"This is part of Palestine," he says. "This represents agriculture, the exploitation of minerals, and so on. This is the economic base of a Palestinian state."

Copyright 2015 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

Transcript

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

As Israel prepares for elections next week, NPR is bringing you stories about the land at the center of the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians. The Israeli military has occupied the West Bank since 1967. Palestinians are in charge of local affairs in their cities in the West Bank, but most of the land around those cities - some 60 percent of the West Bank - is under exclusive Israeli control. That land is called Area C. It's a rugged landscape where mundane matters like water service take on broader meanings. NPR's Emily Harris has this report.

(SOUNDBITE OF GATE)

EMILY HARRIS, BYLINE: A sturdy metal gate rolls open at the entrance to an Israeli farming settlement in the Jordan Valley. This is part of Area C, the 60 percent of the West Bank under exclusive Israeli control. The Israeli soldier on duty points us to the greenhouses.

INON ROSENBLUM: My name is Inon Rosenblum. I live here in Moshav Na'ama.

HARRIS: Rosenblum takes us inside his herb packing room. He opens the walk-in fridge.

Freezing.

ROSENBLUM: Smell - squeeze one of the leaves and smell.

HARRIS: It's tarragon with a licorice smell. Rosenblum grows basil, mint and rosemary, too. Outside in the fields, it's warm.

Usually when I'm here, the hills that are in front of us right now are brown, yellow and dry.

ROSENBLUM: Yellow and dry, yellow and dry.

HARRIS: But right now.

ROSENBLUM: In a month from today they'll be dry, but now it's in a purple color like this. It's - wow.

HARRIS: A wet winter has colored the landscape purple and green, but this is a desert. We're below sea level and Rosenblum's herbs depend on irrigation. He won't say how much water he uses.

Where do you get the water?

ROSENBLUM: From wells in the mountains.

HARRIS: How much water do you need every year?

ROSENBLUM: We need enough. We need a lot. Yeah, I know, I know exactly how much. I show you another thing.

HARRIS: The United Nations humanitarian wing wrote a few years ago that Israeli settlers get several times more water per capita than Palestinians in the West Bank. Israel disputes this. In Area C, some Palestinians take matters into their own hands. Twenty minutes back toward Jerusalem, we turn off a highway onto what hardly seems like a road.

EED KHAMIS: (Foreign language spoken).

HARRIS: We're with Eed Khamis. He is part of a Bedouin tribe, traditionally desert nomads. In this permanent Bedouin camp, he shows us a big black plastic water tank next to a school built of mud and tires.

So where does this water come from?

KHAMIS: (Foreign language spoken).

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Three kilometers from here.

HARRIS: It's piped in from the Israeli water company. Khamis has a story about that.

KHAMIS: (Foreign language spoken).

HARRIS: He says Israel diverted water to nearby Jewish settlements when they were built in the 1980s.

KHAMIS: (Foreign language spoken).

HARRIS: So the Bedouin hammered holes in the pipes until - as Khamis tells it - the water company hooked them up.

You're laughing at that story. You think it's, for you, a victory. Would you call it a victory?

KHAMIS: (Foreign language spoken).

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: This was a strong victory for us.

HARRIS: Khamis invites us into a plywood shack that serves as his living room. Inside sits a solar panel salesman. Khaled Salahat says he is installing 100 solar units here, paid for by a European aid group.

KHALED SALAHAT: They start thinking how to make the life easy for those people in order to keep them in this area.

HARRIS: The Europeans are encouraging Bedouins to stay here because they support a Palestinian state as the way to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Arabs' physical presence on this land helps Palestinians keep their claim, just as Jewish settlements, including some right up the hill from here, help Israelis stake theirs. Israel says it needs Area C as a security buffer from potential Arab enemies and to protect hundreds of thousands of settlers. Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdullah says the complete Israeli control of this part of the West Bank known as Area C limits Palestinian development.

PRIME MINISTER RAMI HAMDULLAH: It means we cannot invest, even we cannot extract out water. Imagine - if we're going to have, and I hope we will, independent Palestinian state, this area is very important.

HARRIS: Of course land is political here, but it's also economic power. The World Bank estimates if the Palestinian Authority could develop Area C, it could stop depending on international aid. Right now one of the best economic options for a Palestinian is to work for an Israeli. Back in the Jordan Valley, Palestinian employees on Inon Rosenblum's farm cut and pack fresh basil for supermarkets overseas. Emily Harris, NPR News, the Jordan Valley. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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