A two-day Conference on Science and Technology in Israel and the Middle East, which considered a wide variety of technical papers dealing with problems common to all Middle East nations, concluded here today with the reading of a message received from Israel Premier David Ben-Gurion in which he said that the people of Israel “are all hopeful that the day will not be long delayed when the experience and knowledge that we are gaining and creating today may be put by us at the disposal of all the peoples of the Middle East.”
Delegates attending the two-day Conference, considered a wide variety of technical papers dealing with problems common to all Middle East nations. Speakers at today’s sessions included Dr. Carroll V. Newsom, president of New York University, which has instituted a “lend-lease” academic training program in cooperation with Israel’s universities, under the aegis of the United States Government; J.W. O’Meara, of the Office of Saline Water of the U.S. Department of Interior; David Rose, president of the American Technion Society, which sponsored the Conference; and Benjamin Cooper, Conference chairman, who presided. Sessions were held at the Statler Hilton Hotel.
In a report reviewing progress in world-wide efforts to convert sea water to fresh water Mr. O’Meara emphasized that Israel has already “developed all of its natural supplies of fresh water. ” He warned that “if Israel is to grow and prosper, it must have more water and the only remaining sources are the presently unusable reserves of underground brackish water or the salty waters of the Mediterranean and the Gulf of Akaba. From these naturally polluted sources of supply, Israel must obtain tomorrow’s water, “he added.
Comparing desalination research projects being conducted in the United States and in Israel, he said: “American studies indicate that the greatest economies can be effected in large-scale plants, while the thinking in Israel favors small plants capable of supplying perhaps three or four families from brackish sources of supply. ” Mr. O’Meara voiced the opinion that “there are many cash crops that could be profitably harvested even in the Negev, which lacks only water to make it productive.”
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
