Euphrates is drying up...

...& the battle has just begun!

Turkey, Iraq and Syria in water crisis summit

ISTANBUL, Turkey (CNN) -- Turkish, Iraqi and Syrian ministers met in Ankara on Thursday to discuss water shortages in the major Tigris and Euphrates rivers, which run through all three countries.

The Turkish government said rainfall over its part of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers plummeted by about 46 percent in the past three years.
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It's official.

The Euphrates is drying up. Strangled by the water policies of Iraq’s neighbors, Turkey and Syria; a two-year drought; and years of misuse by Iraq and its farmers, the river is significantly smaller than it was just a few years ago.

- Ancient buildings have emerged from the river bed in Iraq's western Anbar province as the Euphrates River dries up. -

- Cliffs that were once submerged now reveal pre-Christian tombs built into the rock face. -

Iraq is suffering one of the worst droughts in decades. While this is bad news for farmers, it is good news for archaeologists in the country.

"About a year ago when the waters started to recede, these artifacts began to show up. We began looking around the area, and we found clay jars and old bones, coins and even some gold jewelry," says fisherman Sa'ad Naji.

For now, he says, the looting is confined to mostly local people who don't know the value of what they've taken.
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"The Hour will not come to pass before the river Euphrates dries up to unveil the mountain of gold, for which people will fight. Ninety-nine out of one hundred will die [in the fighting], and every man among them will say: 'Perhaps I may be the only one to remain alive'." (Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim)

- The Prophet Muhammad (SAWS) -