The Middle East is facing a triple water crisis. The first problem – the lack of water in many parts of the Middle East – has in part been at the root of much of the Arab-Israeli dispute over the past 60 years. The Arab-Israeli conflict is not just about land; it's also about water. Much as the land, there is only so much water to go around.

For decades Lebanon, to the north of Israel, has feared for the safely of its waters in the southern part of the country, primarily the Litani and Wazzani rivers. Israel, for its part, has very closely watched how its neighbors manage their water supplies, because hampering the flow of shared rivers will impact Israel's water supply – a precious commodity.

In 2002, Israel threatened to resort to force if a project by the Lebanese government to install a pumping station on the Wazzani went ahead.

Egypt, whose lifeline is the Nile River, has in the past warned Sudan and other countries up-river not to interfere with its flow. Similarly, tension rose to dangerous levels between Syria and Turkey over the waters of the Euphrates River.

But if countries in the region are prepared to go to war over water shortages, the area's second and new problem consists of too much water, that of rising tides due to global warming (see separate article titled Egypt heading toward natural disaster by Joseph Mayton) in Monday's edition of the Middle East Times). As Mayton warns, the Nile delta, Egypt's breadbasket, finds itself at risk of being submerged by the year 2020, along with the port of Alexandria.

Egyptian authorities are taking the problem very seriously and are calling for an international debate to address the issues. Indeed, if ever parts of Alexandria and/or the Delta were to be even partially flooded, resulting with the migration of hundreds of thousands of refugees into Cairo, a city already reeling under the weight of many more millions of people than it was originally designed for, the results would tax authorities in Cairo beyond the imaginable.

And finally, though by no means any less important, is the problem of water in the Gaza Strip. In Gaza it's contaminated water: water polluted by an antiquated sewage system. Like Cairo – a city initially built to house about 3 million people, but whose population swells to above 17 million people – Gaza faces similar woes.

The territory's sole sewage plant was built shortly after the occupation by Israel in 1967, when the population of the narrow coastal strip consisted of 380,000 people. Since then the population of Gaza has almost quadrupled, growing to 1.5 million.

These water woes concerns more than just the people of Egypt, Israel, Lebanon or Gaza. These are problems touching the international community. Unless duly addressed they will add to the region's already explosive problems in years to come.