North and East Syria has faced an increasingly existential threat in a water crisis that refuses to abate. Through a combination of climate change and Turkish weaponization of water, Syria’s Northeast has seen the water levels of the Euphrates River reach historic lows, and some parts, such as the Khabur Tributary, dry up entirely. Millions of people have had no running water for years now, with more and more of the population relying on water trucks filling up plastic tanks on their roofs, an expensive and oftentimes unsafe method as the water is not meant for drinking.
The co-chair of the Water Directorate of the Autonomous Administration recently told North Press that previously “a 22,000-liter-tanker truck needed only 40 minutes to be filled with water, now it takes two hours.” He further stated the decrease in the Hasakah region’s water supply is specifically due to the high temperatures of the summer and Turkey cutting of the Khabur Tributary of the Euphrates River, which it has controlled since occupying the city of Ras-al-Ayn and the nearby Alouk Water Station in 2019.
In the city of Qamishli, the Director of the al-Salam Hospital, Furat Maqdisi, stated that the hospital is now dealing with dozens more cases of illnesses since the summer began and temperatures skyrocketed. This due both to the heat itself and the reliance on unsafe water.
On June 22, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) said more than 1.8 million people in Syria need urgent life-saving support to access safe drinking water.
Through the construction of dams and the manipulation of the Alouk Water Station, Turkey has significantly lowered the flow of water in and through North and East Syria. With climate change meaning temperatures are reaching record-breaking highs every year as well, the water crisis in North and East Syria is expected to continue worsening in the near future.