Israel's total annual internal renewable natural sources of freshwater stand at 0.75 billion cubic meters. It has roughly 265 cubic meters per year of renewable water resources per person available, well below the U.N. definition of water poverty, which is anything below 1,000 cubic meters per person per year. For groundwater, Israel relies on two main aquifers: the Coastal Aquifer and the Mountain Aquifer (which is further divided into subaquifers). Both aquifers also lie under the Palestinian territory — in Gaza and the West Bank, respectively. Israel's surface water is concentrated mainly in the north and east of the country. Israel is part of the Jordan River system, which also includes Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and the West Bank. The major rivers in the upper part of the basin include the Hasbani, Banias and the Dan rivers. These rivers converge to form the Jordan River near the border of Israel, Lebanon and Syria before flowing into the Sea of Galilee. Downstream, the Jordan River is further fed by the major tributaries of the Yarmouk and Zarqa rivers.
Crucially, more than half of Israel's total 1.78 billion cubic meters of annual renewable natural water originates outside its borders: 310 million cubic meters come from Lebanon, 375 million cubic meters come from Syria and 345 million cubic meters originate in the West Bank. All the countries in this arid region compete for the limited resources of the basin. Because concerted military efforts have been required in the past to secure water resources, Israel has had a strong incentive to develop technological solutions to improve water security. Additional domestic water resources — including increasing desalination capacity and continued efforts to recycle water — allow Israel to mitigate one of its inherent geographic constraints. Israel has substantially increased its capacity to desalinize water over the last decade. The arid country of roughly 8 million people already has a number of desalination plants — including the Sorek plant, the world's largest desalination plant of its kind, which became fully operational in October. Israel has plans to increase total desalination capacity through 2020 such that it approaches the estimated annual amount of internally generated natural water resources.
