The level of the Kinneret is already 213.42 meters below sea level, or 42 centimeters below the government-mandated red line - and the summer has not even officially begun. The red line was set as the level below which water must not be pumped from the Kinneret, for fear that salt will contaminate the remaining water. Meir Ben-Meir, who served as Water Commissioner twice in the past, told Arutz-7 yesterday that despite the impending water crisis, there is no need to reduce water quotas to Israel\'s farmers: \"Contrary to what others may think, there is water to be pumped from the coastal aquifer. I agree that there must be no more pumping from the mountain aquifer, nor from the Kinneret, but the coastal aquifer is a different story. This is because in general, the danger of over-pumping is salination - but in the coastal aquifer, most of the salt comes not from the intensively salty sea, but from the much less-salty strata above. Every hydrologist knows this. If we over-pump from the mountain aquifer, a low level of salinity will result. But even if we don\'t over-pump there, then within two decades, or even less, the water will still require treatment and desalination. So why do we have to decree thirst upon Israel, if in any event the water there will have to be treated, just like the water of the Thames, and the Rhein, and even the Kinneret, is treated before drinking?
\"...There is therefore no reason to make it impossible for farmers to make a living. What, the same farmers to whom all our hearts went out because they were living in the shadow of Hizbullah attacks should now be forced out by water quotas? There is no need even to dry out our public gardens; why must we bring back the desert?... It is scandalous, but we have the ability to pump twice as much from the coastal aquifer as we are presently pumping.\"