Five of Israel’s six coastal desalination plants, which convert seawater into drinking water, shut down last Sunday, CNN reported on Sept. 4, citing Mekorot, Israel’s national water company.

The plants produce more than 80 percent of Israel’s drinking water, according to Israeli media. Some privately owned plants have since resumed partial operations. But as of Sept. 3, only one was operating at full capacity. By Sept. 7, two plants remained closed and three others were operating at limited capacity for a ninth consecutive day, The Times of Israel reported. Authorities responded by restricting water use, increasing withdrawals from reservoirs and the Sea of Galilee, and limiting supplies to agriculture, Haaretz reported.

The country’s desalination facilities mostly use a technology called “reverse osmosis,” in which water is pre-treated to remove larger contaminants before it’s pushed through membranes which filter out salt, bacteria, and other molecules to leave clean drinking water. But a vast increase of algae, and the substances they produce, can foul and damage the membranes. If there’s too much suspended material in the water, the treatment processes cannot keep up.

Today’s vast microalgae bloom is believed to have originated in the Nile Delta and traveled northward with the sea’s currents up Israel’s coast. But environmental experts say untreated sewage from Gaza has worsened the nutrient-rich conditions in which algae thrive. Gaza’s six wastewater treatment plants have been damaged or destroyed during the war, allowing untreated sewage to flow into the Mediterranean for months. Damaged sewage lines have in return contaminated the aquifer on which many residents depend.

The WHO warned in early September that Gaza’s deteriorating water quality was raising the risk of disease outbreaks. Winter rains could further spread sewage and contaminated water through overcrowded displacement sites. Microbiological contamination found in water samples has nearly tripled since the beginning of 2026. Cases of acute watery diarrhea nearly doubled, from about 30,000 in March to more than 58,000 in August.

For Palestinians in Gaza, the Israeli water crisis did not begin with an algae bloom, but with the deliberate destruction of their water and sewage infrastructure as part of Netanyahu’s genocide against them. Humanity is one, and what you do to your neighbor you are doing to yourself.