Israeli Tourist Trap ‘Herod’s Pool’ Is Draining Palestinians’ Land Dry

On a hot August morning in the West Bank’s desert, an Israeli teenager performed a backflip into the cool water of an ancient reservoir. It was filled with water diverted from Palestinians’ farms. The farmers used to grow watermelons, eggplants and cucumbers in the arid Jordan Valley. But in June, their main irrigation source — a pipeline that brought spring water to their crops and a surrounding community — was severed and redirected to the reservoir, according to the farmers and the Israeli military. During a visit last month, water gushed from the pipe into the pool, where dozens of Israelis were splashing around while others picnicked nearby, trespassing on private land. “One morning nothing came out of the pipe,” said Saad Nemer, a soft-spoken 69-year-old farmer, who owns the land the pool sits on with his siblings, and who has since watched his livelihood wither under the desert sun. Within days, the pool became a summertime magnet for Israelis, drawing hundreds of visitors a week who traipsed over the Nemers’ land. A lawmaker in Israel’s Parliament on social media promoted visiting the site as an enjoyable means of “occupying the land .” No one claimed responsibility for cutting the pipe. But Israeli settlers have celebrated the refilling of the pool in videos shared on social media, while one Israeli lawmaker said that “heroic settlers” had returned the pool to “Jewish hands.” We are having trouble retrieving the article content. Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings. Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times. Thank you for your patience while we verify access. Already a subscriber? Log in . Want all of The Times? Subscribe .