The unique location of Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) at
the junction of three continents, has made it the focus of
political strife for many years. On the other hand, it has made
this .region a "bottleneck" and a crossroad for bird migration,
second to almost no other site in the world. Research over the past
decade has shown that about 500 million migrating birds fly over
Israel and the PA's narrow airspace. These birds migrate over
Lebanon, Jordan, Israel and the Palestinian Authority and through
Egypt to Africa.
The years 1994-1995 were good ones for peace in the region.
Following the peace process in the Middle East, the Society for the
Protection of Nature in Israel (SPNI) and Tel Aviv University
initiated in 1995 the establishment of the International Center for
the Study of Bird Migration located at the Israeli Armored Corps
Memorial in Latrun. The site is in the heart of Israel, midway
between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and in the center of the western
migration route, at the foothills of the West Bank Heights. In
addition, a Palestinian NGO, the Children for the Protection of
Nature in Palestine (CPNP), established in 1997 an Environmental
Education Center at the Lutheran school Thalita Kumi, Beit Jala,
the first of its kind in the PA. These two new centers are
developing an interdisciplinary project that will be connected to
the peace process and bird migration. In this framework, we will
develop "twin centers" which will advance themes connected to bird
migration, using four environmental interdisciplinary issues:
education, research, eco-tourism and conservation. These powerful
tools will bring people together, regardless of political barriers,
and hopefully advance the peace process by NGOs.
Latrun
Latrun is situated midway between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, next to
the main highway (Route 1), and 18 kms southeast of Ben-Gurion
Airport (Figure 1). The site is located at the foot of the
Jerusalem Hills, overlooking the Ayalon Valley and the Coastal
Plain.
The site has been an international crossroads throughout history,
situated near the main roads from Jaffa to Jerusalem and from Gaza
to Ramallah up to Damascus. The Israeli Armored Corps decided to
establish a memorial and museum at Latrun. The site has been very
well developed due to both its unique history and its convenient
location. In 1995 alone, 500,000 people - families, soldiers,
school children and tourists - visited the site.
Tel Aviv University and SPNI have been allocated an area of eight
acres on the western side of the site in order to establish the
International Center for the Study of Bird Migration. The complex
will include an inter-university research institute, a field study
center, a hostel, and a large auditorium that will combine a museum
and a radar system to display to the public the phenomenon of stork
and other bird migration. The radar will also be used to increase
civil and military flight safety.
Thalita Kumi
Thalita Kumi is located in Beit Jala, west of Bethlehem in the
Palestinian Authority. It is a Lutheran school for 1,100
Palestinian students, and lies on the western part of the eastern
route of white storks arid different species of . birds of prey.
The school has provided an area for the Environmental Education
Center established by the CPNP.
The region is an international crossroads for migrating birds,
crossing the skies of Israel and the PA, heading south to Africa in
the autumn and then flying north to Europe and Asia in the spring:
Latrun is located at the very heart of the western migration route
of the soaring birds, which stretches along the foothills of the
West Bank Heights. The second migration route is along the Rift
Valley and the Negev Desert, and the third is in the Eilat
mountains (see Figure 1).
The SPNI
The SPNI is a non-profit, non-governmental organization. Founded in
1953, it has become Israel's largest environmental NGO, with over
100,000 members. The SPNI involves everyone in its endeavors -
Jews, Muslims and Christians; young and old; new immigrants and
veteran Israelis; schoolchildren; families; soldiers and tourists -
in its efforts to share and spread the respect, love and
understanding of nature and the land.
The SPNI runs 26 field study centers and has 28 branches and,
approximately, 1,200,000 individuals participate in its activities
annually. The SPNI also organizes public campaigns on nature and
environmental issues; lobbies and initiates legislation on
environmental protection and conservation; gathers data and
conducts research, formulating environ¬mentally friendly
alternatives to potentially destructive development plans; and
preserves historically significant sites and buildings.
The CPNP
The Children for the Protection of Nature in Palestine is a
non-profit organization with a mission to promote peace and
coexistence in the Middle East. The CPNP utilizes the theme of
environmental action to encourage meaningful interdependence
between youth: youth working together across cultural boundaries
can demonstrate the power and potential of partnership in
addressing environmental challenges.
The CPNP has established the first Environmental Education Center
in the PA. Thalita Kumi, Beit Jala, has been chosen as the site for
the center for the following reasons: it is rich in wild life,
flora and fauna; it is in close proximity to both the Mediterranean
Sea and the Dead Sea; and has ideal and plentiful facilities,
spacious premises, lab centers, etc.
The large amount of information and data gathered on bird migration
over the past two decades, coupled with the unique position of the
PA and Israel at the junction of three continents, points to a
unique opportunity for these two centers for the research of bird
migration. They have a great potential for interdisciplinary
activity in a number of fields. This potential will help promote
additional ties between the countries of the Middle East as an
important tool to advance the peace process in this sensitive
region.
The initial idea is to develop "sister" stations where the CPNP
station will playa leading role as the "twin sister" station to
Latrun. The leading NGO in Jordan, the Royal Society for the
Conservation of Nature (RSCN), has also agreed to join. If the
peace process advances, the hope is that more countries in the
Middle East will join the project, under the title: Migrating Birds
Know No Boundaries.
Research
The location of the Middle East as a "bottleneck" of the migration
route for about 85 percent of the world's white stork population,
many species of birds of prey and most of the Paleartic population
of white pelicans, leads to huge numbers of migrating birds flying
over the region, thus creating excellent conditions for all aspects
of bird migration research. The aim is to bring together
researchers from the Middle East (migrating grounds), from
countries in Europe and West Asia (breeding grounds) and from
Africa (wintering grounds). Joint German-Israeli research is
currently being carried out with funding from the German Ministry
of the Environment on the migration of soaring birds (particularly
storks) and with the aid of satellite transmitters which will
enable researchers to track the birds across the world. Sixty-five
white storks were monitored with radio-transmitters and 40 more
will be followed till the year 1999.
A network of weather and bird radars will be set up at key points
in the Middle East, and will feed data into a central data base for
Israel, the PA and Jordan. This information will enable us to make
huge strides in our understanding of bird migration. We will be
able to follow the movement of concentrations of birds in real
time. An interdisciplinary research on migration issues will also
be initiated, such as the relationship between climatic changes and
changes in migration patterns, the behavior and physiology of
migrants before and after crossing the desert belt, as well as
studies in ecology, physiology and the physics of migration.
The network of bird watchers which has developed in Israel across
the country from the Mediterranean coast to the Rift Valley for the
Israel Air Force, will be expanded for a project in cooperation
with Palestinians and Jordanians. This would enable us to establish
a front line of 150 km of bird watchers who will count the number
of migrating birds on one data base.
The EMC2, a leading computer storage company in Boston, has donated
$1 million for the Latrun project to develop a regional data base
on bird migration, which will include, at the first stage, the
Jordanian and Palestinian data.
The "twin" stations at Latrun and Thalita Kumi are also developing
joint research on night migration in cooperation with the Cornell
University Laboratory of Ornithology, and the recording and
computer analyses of the voices of birds migrating at night. An
MSc. student from Israel and an MSc. student from the PA have
started working together on joint research. In the Rose Garden near
the Israeli Parliament (the Knesset), an Israeli team has been
ringing migratory birds for ten years. In 1999, the first
Palestinian ringing station will be established at Thalita Kumi,
parallel to the Israeli one in Jerusalem.
Development of a Common Educational Program
The tracking of migrating storks, eagles, and pelicans via
satellite has enabled us to develop a communication network via the
Internet, linking schoolchildren from all over the world. They are
able to "talk" to the migrating birds in order to learn about their
migratory routes, study the effects of weather changes on migration
routes, analyze the rate of movement, and more. The communication
between schoolchildren and birds will take place between schools in
various countries along the migration routes, as well as in other
Middle East countries; the children will exchange data and
information, and will cooperate on data analysis. Most importantly,
in the second stage, the students will go out into the field
together to watch the migration and also meet each other.
A joint program called "Tomorrow 98," involving the Ministry of
Education, the SPNI and Tel Aviv University, has already developed
such a program with 25 schools participating actively. The
Palestinians (CPNP) and the Jordanians (RSCN) have also decided to
join. This program is included in US Vice President Al Gore's GLOBE
project, the aim being to involve young people in environmental
research and conservation, and to encourage them to develop
responsibility for their environment. The German Ministry of the
Environment sponsored an international seminar held in Israel in
September 1997, in which 25 countries along the migration route
participated.
The establishment of Israeli and Palestinian centers will also
provide important tools to expose the public to the issues,
problems, and scientific achievements in the conservation of
migrating birds, while developing in each participant country a
national pride for its unique role and contribution along the
migration route.' Hopefully, this will reduce the widespread damage
caused to the migratory birds by hunting and other destructive
means.
Former Israeli prime minister Shimon Peres is acting as the
regional honorary chairman of the project and US Vice President Al
Gore has been asked to act as a global honorary chairman.
The Development of Regional Eco- Tourism and Bird
Watching
The economic potential of eco-tourism and bird watching, in
particular, is tremendous. Some 13 million bird watchers belong to
various related organizations throughout the world; many travel to
distant lands to see a large variety of bird species and large
concentrations of migrating birds.
A network of nine research and bird-watching stations are being set
up in Israel, situated at bird-watching "hot spots" (see Figure 1).
Each station will function as an independent field unit, with two
or three researchers and bird-watching guides. The stations will be
connected to a nationwide network whose center will be at Latrun. A
tourist arriving in Israel will be able to begin his or her trip at
Latrun, receive maps and real-time information about migrating
birds' locations, and order (on-line) a room in a hotel or hostel
in the desired area. With every location in Israel less than four
hours away, tourists could travel the same day to the station in
the migration path and start bird watching! Alternatively, the
tourist could sleep at the Field Study Center at Latrun, or make it
the last stop on his or her visit to Israel, due to its proximity
to Ben-Gurion Airport. We hope this system will also encourage the
Palestinians to develop a parallel one in places like Jericho and
Gaza to watch migratory birds and develop networks which would work
in cooperation with the Israeli system.
A systematic research framework for migrating birds will add to our
knowledge about migration, as well as preferred roosting and
wintering areas. This new information will be used to make
recommendations to decision-makers and governments concerning
sensitive and threatened migration stopover areas in need of
protection. The development of ecological tourism will lend solid
economic impetus to these recommendations.
The Message
The model of Latrun and Thalita Kumi may be copied in other
neighboring countries, enhancing both people-to-people activity and
inter-country relations. The interdisciplinary program includes
aspects of scientific research, education and communication between
schoolchildren from different countries via computer links and the
firm economic base of eco¬tourism and conservation.