Shortly after the end of World War One, the Zionist leaders Chaim Weizmann and David Ben-Gurion presented a map to the Paris Peace Conference laying out the borders they wanted for their Jewish State in Palestine. The northern borders were defined as “starting on the North at a point on the Mediterranean Sea in the vicinity south of Sidon and following the watersheds of the foothills of the Lebanon as far as Jisr El-Karaon thence to El-Bire…”. For those unfamiliar with the geography, this would place the borders of the Jewish State some 15-30 miles north of Israel’s current internationally recognised borders. It would also include most of the Litani River basis, the biggest source of water in the area. Indeed, the border proposals were based on the work of the Zionist botanist Aaron Aaronsohn, who insisted that control of the Litani River would fulfill the Jewish State’s need for irrigation water in the north. …more
