Making the desert bloom

Depictions of pre-Zionist landscape and agriculture

In the 18th and 19th centuries, Western Asia and North Africa became associated with aridity and emptiness in the West, wrongly believed to be desiccation caused over time by humans, especially nomadic communities.^[8] The Levant in particular was described by many foreign visitors to the area as desolate and untillable.

40 years earlier, Mark Twain provided an account of the scenery on the way to Jerusalem^[11][12] in his humorous travel book, The Innocents Abroad:

We traversed some miles of desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds—a silent, mournful expanse, wherein we saw only three persons—Arabs ... The further we went the hotter the sun got, and the more rocky and bare, repulsive and dreary the landscape became. There could not have been more fragments of stone strewn broadcast over this part of the world ... There was hardly a tree or a shrub any where. Even the olive and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country. No landscape exists that is more tiresome to the eye than that which bounds the approaches to Jerusalem.

Twain's book became a best-seller and painted the Levant's landscape to many in the Anglophone world as overwhelmingly dry and inhospitable. Archelogist Michael Press notes how Twain's depictions continue to be a point of reference for contemporary Israeli society in contrast to the afforestation and agriculture projects undertaken in present times, being mentioned by those like Benjamin Netanyahu and Alan Dershowitz.^[13]

Ahad Ha'am, in an article called Truth from Eretz Israel, spoke conversely of cultivation and vegetation within Palestine:

From abroad, we are accustomed to believe that Eretz Israel is presently almost totally desolate, a uncultivated desert, and that anyone wishing to buy land there can come and buy all he wants. But in truth that is not so. In the entire land, it is hard to find tillable land that is not already tilled [...] Not the peasants alone, but the owners of large properties as well, do not easily part with good land that has no drawbacks. Many of our people who came to buy land have been in Eretz Israel for months, and have toured its length and width, without finding what they seek.

In this piece, he also repudiated the common claim that those living there, cultivating the land, did so mindlessly: "From abroad we are accustomed to believing that the Arabs are all desert savages, like donkeys, who neither see nor understand what goes on around them. But this is a big mistake. The Arab, like all children of Shem, has a sharp intellect and is very cunning."^[14]

Halutz and Jewish labor

The ideological basis for this phrase is rooted in the concept of the halutz. Early Zionism, as the negation of the diaspora, held the stance that Jews living in Eastern Europe had become weakened, culturally inferior, and rootless due their unsettled position between assimilation and anti-antisemitism and thus, required the creation of a nation for Jews.^[15][16] In an attempt to reverse this "rootless cosmopolitan" state, the halutz, or the pioneering Jewish laborer who works the land, was born as a means to foster the "muscular Jew."^[17][18] It was believed that principally Jewish labor could transform the land and that principally agricultural labor could transform the Jewish people.^[18]

Afforestation

The key actor in the afforestation of the region was the Jewish National Fund (JNF). Since 1901, they have planted over 250 million trees, developed 250,000 acres of land, and established over 1,000 parks.^[19] The JNF purposefully chose Aleppo pine, as well as cypress and eucalyptus, as a tree that would work reasonably well with the climate and be familiar for the European Jewish population, thereby "beautifying" the land.^[20][21][22] By 1960, 85% of all trees planted by the JNF were coniferous.^[23] Later on, realizing they needed to diversify the forests, the JNF invested in other coniferous species, like Turkish pine and Stone pine, as well as deciduous and other species, like carobs, acacia, tamarisk, and palms.^[20] As of 2008, 44% of the trees in Israel are pine, and endemic plants make up only 11% of forests.^[23][21]

Kibbutzim

The concept of Halutzim manifested in the form of kibbutzim and the kibbutz system became a means of connecting the new Jewish population who had come in the second and third aliyah to the land.^[24] The first kibbutz was established in 1910.^[25] By the time World War II broke out, there were 79 kibbutzim, consisting of 24,105 people and in 1950, the number had almost tripled with around 65,000 kibbutznikim.^[26] The kibbutz movement peaked in 1989, with a population of around 129,000.^[27] A large portion of kibbutznikim were young students.^[18]

The kibbutzim also became a way for the expansion of settlements. Early on, Mizrahi Jews were often placed at the peripheral of Zionist settlements, sometimes leading to conflict caused by coerced placement there.^[28] It also saw the inclusion of women in quasi-manual labor jobs such as in tree nurseries, which also were often placed at the peripheries, pushing for expansion.^[17]

Water technology

Innovations in water technologies began before the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948, beginning with the creation of the company Mekorot in 1937.^[29] In the following decades after its creation, Mekorot would develop numerous project in water technology, including cloud seeding and the construction of pipelines and wastewater treatment plants.^[30][31] By the '50s, water as a resource was nationalized and entrusted to the state.^[32] Since the 2000s, Israel has begun to invest in desalination projects, which makes up around 60-80% of Israel's drinking water.^[31] It has also become a major proponent of drip irrigation, making major strides in the technology in the '60s.^[32]

With the ongoing water crisis in the area, Israel sells millions of cubic meters of water and billions of dollars' worth of agricultural products annually to its neighbors Jordan and Palestine.^[33][34] Claims over water sources has played a major role in numerous conflicts between Israel and its neighbor states, including the War over Water, the Six-Day War (and the following occupation of the Golan Heights), and a few other more minor conflicts.^[35]