Red Sea–Dead Sea Water Conveyance number of international donors. The water level in the Dead Sea is shrinking at a rate of more than one metre per year, and its surface area has shrunk by about 30% in the last 20 years. This is largely due to the diversion of over 90% of the water of the Jordan River. In the early 1960s, the river moved 1,500 million cubic metres of water every year from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea. Dams, canals, and pumping stations built by Israel, Jordan and Syria now divert water for crops and drinking, and have reduced the
Dead Sea Bible uses this term alongside two others: the Sea of the Arabah (' ), and the Eastern Sea ("" ). The designation "Dead Sea" never appears in the Bible. In prose sometimes the term ' (, "sea of death") is used, due to the scarcity of aquatic life there. In Arabic the Dead Sea is called ("the Dead Sea"), or less commonly ' (, "the Sea of Lot"). Another historic name in Arabic was the "Sea of Zoʼar", after a nearby town in biblical times. The Greeks called it "Lake Asphaltites" (Attic Greek , "", "the Asphaltite sea"). The Dead