The Times of Israel reported in a lengthy report that more than 200 scholars from Israel and other countries have appealed to the government to halt plans to use an old pipeline to transport crude oil from the Gulf to southern Europe.
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The newspaper expressed the content of the report with the headline saying that scientists warn that “the UAE pipeline deal will endanger coral reefs in Eilat.”
The newspaper quoted a letter in this regard sent to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Finance and Environmental Protection ministries warning them that “a malfunction or a small damage in one of these tankers is sufficient to cause a major environmental disaster.”
The report stated that the “Asia Europe Oil Pipeline” company, which is state-owned and was previously known as the “Eilat-Ashkelon Pipeline” company, signed last October a memorandum of understanding with the “MED-RED Land Bridge”, an Israeli-Emirati joint venture to transport oil and its products. From a station on the Red Sea to the Mediterranean via Israel.
The newspaper mentioned that the 231 signatories of the letter, in various disciplines and from different countries, fear that an “oil spill will cause serious damage to coral reefs in the Red Sea – whose exceptional resilience in the face of rising seas can help save other coral reefs.” Endangered future. “
According to the report, these scholars believed that “such a disaster may paralyze other marine life, destroy tourism industries in Israel, Jordan and Egypt, and stop desalination off the Mediterranean coast, which supplies Israel with a lot of drinking water.”
The report described the oil-related memorandum of understanding as “one of the first tangible results of the normalization agreement, known as the Abraham Accords, which was reached through American mediation between Israel and the United Arab Emirates.”
In this regard, it was reported that the agreement allows “up to 120 oil tankers containing 30 million cubic meters of crude oil and oil derivatives to use the current EAPC port in Eilat, on the Red Sea coast in southern Israel.”
It was indicated that the transportation of oil via the EAPC pipeline will specifically pass through the Wadi Araba desert and the Negev in southern Israel to the EAPC terminal in Ashkelon, on the southern coast of the Mediterranean Sea in Israel. From there, it will be reloaded on tankers to transport it to markets in the south. Europe”.
This agreement also allows oil to be transported through the same pipeline from the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions to Asia in the other direction, while Reuters reported that the deal could generate profits for EAPC ranging from 700 to 800 million dollars over a period of time. 8 years.
Source: timesofisrael.com
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