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From political enmity to ecological cooperation: the Israeli–Jordanian experienceorganized by Uri Shanas (University of Haifa, Israel)SEEKING THE ECOLOGICAL DIVIDENDS IN THE MIDDLE EAST PROCESS ALON TAL, Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research, Ben Gurion University, Israel, alontal@bgu.ac.il For over a decade the peace process between Israel and its neighbors has waxed and waned. Ultimately, however, the state of war that wounded this region for so long is drawing to a close. Environmentalists in Israel and their colleagues in Arab nations saw enormous opportunities in the negotiation process for pursuing cooperative ecological and environmental initiatives. Numerous research projects have emerged, several with enormous significance for regional planning. For instance, evaluation of total pollution loadings into transboundary streams will provide the data needed to launch a comprehensive watershed approach to river restoration. Understanding air pollution transport between Israel and its neighbors is critical to a long term strategy for improving air quality. Characterizing biodiversity hotspots and the potential for ecological corridors to link nature reserves between Israel and its neighbors is also promising for long-term conservation strategies. But for the most part, ecological cooperation has taken the form of slogans or amorphous agreements for cooperation that rarely moved to an operational phase. An evaluation of the origins of past failures and the scattered successes in Middle East transboundary regions reveals a pragmatic specificity that will be required for meaningful collaboration to emerge to protect shared ecological values in the future. HUMAN SOCIETIES AND RODENT COMMUNITY STRUCTURE ALONG THE ISRAELI-JORDANIAN BORDER URI SHANAS, Yunes Abu Galyun, Mohammed Alshamlih, Jonathan Cnaani, Fares Khoury, Shacham Mittler, Khaled Nassar, Idan Shapira, Danny Simon, Hatem Sultan, Elad Topel, Dalit Ucitel, and Yaron Ziv, Department of Evolutionary and Environmental Biology, University of Haifa, Israel (US, SM, IS), Hashemite University, Zarka, Jordan (YAG, MA, FK), Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, Kibbutz Ketura, Israel (JC, DU), Jordan Society for Sustainable Development, Amman, Jordan (KN, HS), Department of Zoology, Tel Aviv University, Israel (DS), Department of Biology, Ben Gurion University, Beer Sheva, Israel (ET, YZ), shanas@research.haifa.ac.il The peace treaty between Israel and Jordan found the Arava desert ecosystem, shared by the two countries, in a state of developmental dichotomy. While on the Israeli side vast lands have been settled and transformed into agricultural fields, the Jordanian side remained relatively intact, with only a few traditional and pastoral societies. We studied the effect of different landscape units and proximity to agriculture on rodent community structure on both sides of the border. We found that in addition to the effect of proximity to agricultural fields and landscape habitat, the border between the two countries may also play a role. The differences in rodent community across the border are probably the result of favorable conditions for psammophilic gerbils in Jordan, in contrast to modern land use on the Israeli side. We suggests that in addition to effects of habitats and human obvious disturbances such as modern agricultural practices, cultural differences between societies should be accounted for when conservation plans are developed for cross border ecosystems. When comparing the effects of the western society to the effects of the pastoral traditional society, it appears that the development actions of the former have altered the community structure of rodents. REPTILE DIVERSITY ACROSS THE POLITICAL BORDER OF THE ARAVA VALLEY Khaled Nassar, RAMI SALEH, and Uri Shanas, Jordan Society for Sustainable Development, Amman, Jordan (KN, RS), Department of Biology, University of Haifa, Tivon, Israel (US), jssd@go.com.jo We studied the effect of different landscape units and proximity to agriculture on reptile diversity on the two sides of the border between Israel and Jordan. Landscape units included alluvial fans with relatively high density of acacia trees, salt marsh edges typified by silty soil, sand dunes, and stable sands mixed with gravel. From each landscape unit we chose three plots that were close (50-200 m) and three plots that were far (> 2 km) from agricultural land. Each plot was sampled for three days and nights during midwinter, spring, midsummer, and autumn by five sets of four pitfalls each connected with three sets of 18 m plastic drift fences. We found a significant difference between the landscape units in number of reptiles caught, but not in diversity (Simpson and Fisher alpha). Species diversity was found to be higher, in general, close to agriculture compared to far from agriculture. While reptile abundance was generally higher on the Israeli side of the border, diversity was significantly higher on the Jordanian side. The results show a dichotomy of reptile diversity that follows the dichotomy in land use across the political border, suggesting that differences in human societies affect diversity. THE EFFECT OF AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT ON FOX ABUNDANCE AND GERBIL FORAGING BEHAVIORS IN THE ARAVA VALLEY DESERT ECOSYSTEM ADJOINING ISRAEL AND JORDAN IDAN SHAPIRA and Uri Shanas, Department of Evolutionary and Environmental Biology, University of Haifa, Israel, the_pwr@keh.co.il Predator-prey interactions are usually maintained in a steady state in natural ecosystems. However, land modification for agricultural farming can cause imbalance in these interactions. The effects of farming on its surroundings were studied in the southern Arava desert ecosystem, which joins the lands of Israel and Jordan and represents a dichotomy in farming intensity. While the Israeli side has been intensively cultivated, the Jordanian side remained largely intact. We examined differences in the foraging behaviors and abundance of predator and prey model species, the red fox and two species of gerbil, close to and distant from farmed lands, in the field and in controlled conditions. We discovered that while fox were more abundant and active close to farms, gerbils were more abundant and active distant from farms and proximity to farms had an effect on their behavior. Our results show that agriculture can act as a double-edged sword by reducing natural habitats while at the same time changing the predator-prey natural balance. We show here, for the first time, a cascade of effects, beginning with human alteration of the land, resulting in changes of abundance in predator species that in turn affect the behavior of prey species. THE IMPACT OF INTENSIVE AGRICULTURE ON THE BIRD COMMUNITY OF A SAND DUNE DESERT Fares Khoury and MOHAMMED ALSHAMLIH, Jordan Society for Sustainable Development, alshamlih@gmail.com Bird community structure and diversity measures in sand dune habitats far from and close to modern farms Wadi Araba, southwest Jordan, were compared using 52 line transects for breeding birds and habitat variables. We tested a variety of analytical methods, including multivariate analysis, to describe bird assemblages and determine the best indication of agricultural impact in arid ecosystems using quantitative data on birds. A change in the bird community of sand dune around farming projects, measured to a distance of up to 1 km, could be related neither to change in habitat structure nor to the activity of opportunistic predators, as these did not vary significantly between the two samples. The farms included lines of trees and offered a constant source of water, which attracted a variety of opportunistic species. The absence of characteristic ground dwelling species of open sand dune habitat in the structurally intact sand dunes surrounding farms was likely to be the result of localized, but effectively far-reaching habitat modification farms acting as a barrier and/or competition with some of the opportunistic species, which were common around the farms. PIT-BUILDING ANTLIONS (NEUROPTERA, MYRMELEONTIDAE) IN THE SOUTH ARAVA VALLEY NEED THE DESERT GAZELLE (GAZELLA DORCAS) TO COMPLETE THEIR LIFE CYCLE SHACHAM MITTLER, Danny Simon, and Uri Shanas, Department of Biology, University of Haifa, Israel (SM, US), Department of Zoology, Tel Aviv University, Israel (DS), smittlergeudevert@yahoo.com The survival of pit-building antlions in the desert depends on their ability to dig a pit trap. However, the digging can only take place in relatively dry, fine grain loose soils. In the Lees and Hamada desert soils of the south Arava valley a hard biological crust is being formed after rain or morning dew that usually prevents pit digging. We hypothesized that the desert gazelle (Gazella dorcas) breaks the soil crust with its hoofs and thus can be regarded as an ecosystem engineer for the antlion larvae. We found that a manipulation of breaking the soil crust indeed increased significantly the number of antlions pitfalls. In addition, we found that in the field, antlions pitfalls are built significantly more at the bottom of gazelles tracks than in other places in the same area, thus supporting the hypothesis. We show that the uneven distribution of gazelles across the border between Israel and Jordan, as a result of different conservation policies, can affect the distribution of pit building antlions. However, livestock in Jordan can often replace the gazelles as ecosystem engineers. GREEN ISLANDS IN ARID ENVIRONMENTS: THE EFFECT OF ARTIFICIALLY PRODUCTIVE PATCHES ON BEETLE ASSEMBLAGES IN ARID ENVIRONMENT ELAD TOPEL, Uri Shanas, and Yaron Ziv, Department of Life Science, Ben Gurion University, Beer Sheva, Israel (ET, YZ), Department of Biology, University of Haifa, Israel (US), eltop@013.net.il In the southern Arava region, throughout the last 17 years, artificial water-enriched vegetation patches have been created by different human base disturbances. In this study we used the Coleoptera order to explore how the highly productive artificial patches alter the invertebrate community structure, diversity and abundance. It was hypothesized that plant cover and diversity increase beetle diversity and density, while reducing the relative similarity between the artificial sites and their nearby control patches. Results show that the rare species were found to colonize mainly the artificially highly productive patches while common species colonize both artificial and natural patches. Hence similarity will be high when it is based on the abundance and diversity of the common species, and low when based on the rare species. It is therefore speculated that man-made patches will promote new arrivals, hence serving as stepping stones for invasions from the more productive regions (e.g., the Mediterranean) to the desert habitats. BUILDING PEACE THROUGH ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION MUNQETH MUHYAR, Friends of the Earth Middle East, Amman, Jordan, munqeth@foeme.org In 2002, the Jordan Society for Sustainable Development (JSSD) engaged with Arava Institute for Environmental Studies (AIES) in an innovative research program to assess the biological diversity in the southern Araba Valley. JSSD aimed in this research program to enforce regional action to protect transboundary ecologically important habitats that are under threat across international border. Joint Jordanian–Israeli research teams have built a regional experience and common vision to meet the need for regional actions and planning. The young researchers from Jordan and Israel have exchanged the information and the scientific views on different national research procedures that enriched the research implementation. In addition, these research projects create a unique opportunity to build trust among the young researches as well as taking the peace building opportunities to negotiate and work together to highlight and resolve environmental problems that have a regional cause and impact. Biodiversity is under threat especially at the transboundary zones that were isolated for decades due to the political conflict in the region and resolving political issues has opened the window to coordination and cooperation among the young generations to save our shared national heritage. | |||||||||||||||||
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