Israeli public sector workers are set to go on a general strike next week, which will shut down all public services, including public transport.

“From next Tuesday we will embark on an open-ended public sector strike,” Israeli main trade union, the Histadrut labor federation, said on Thursday.

The union is demanding a 3.5 percent annual wage raise for all 750,000 public sector employees over three years, an almost 11 percent increase.

However, Head of the Finance Ministry’s Wage and Labor Agreements Department Ilan Levin has offered a 0.5 percent annual increase.

Israeli Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz and Ofer Eini, the chairman of the Histadrut labor federation, are scheduled to meet on Friday over the issue.

If the strike goes ahead, it would shut down all offices, companies, the seaports and airports, university administrations, and other public institutions.

The extent of the strike could also depend on the progress in the negotiations between the Histadrut and the treasury.

More than 1.5 million Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip lack access to basic humanitarian supplies such as shortage of water resources.

Many Palestinians are forced to purchase bottled water for their daily needs, as water coming from their taps has run dry, a Press TV correspondent reported on Thursday.

The Gaza aquifer is the only source of water for residents of Gaza. Reports show that 90 percent of its water is not suitable for human consumption due to high levels of nitrate and salinity.

In an interview with Press TV, public health coordinator Tracey Wise said, “Because of such limited amounts of water in Gaza that’s acceptable for human consumption, mostly this is the shallow, coastal aquifer, and this aquifer is being over-pumped, so much water is being taken out to supply the needs of Gazans, that you have much more intrusion of sea water.”

“And then also you have upwelling of this very, very old water that has high salinity and high concentrations of other pollutants,” she added.

Meanwhile, Israel has installed huge pumping stations all along the shared border, diverting water before it reaches the aquifer of Gaza.

Israel has imposed a blockade on the region since June 2007, preventing the entry of hundreds of items, including essential industrial materials needed to repair the water infrastructure.

During the Gaza war, bombs completely destroyed three water wells and much of the water system infrastructure in Gaza.

The Coastal Municipal Water Utility (CMWU) has reported Israel’s daily water consumption per capita at around 320 liters while the consumption of Palestinians in Gaza is less than 90 liters.

“We need to start to think about unconventional water sources, [such as] the sea, along with other solutions,” said CMWU Director Munzer Shuplaq.

According to recent statistics conducted by CMWU, residents of the coastal enclave will not find healthy water to drink by the year 2015.

In another discriminatory move, an Israeli parliamentary committee has approved a bill which allows Israeli communities not to admit Palestinians.

The Knesset’s so-called Constitution, Law and Justice Committee on Wednesday unanimously approved the second and third readings of a bill which allows communities having less than 500 people to appoint admissions boards capable of rejecting residents if they do not meet the criteria of “suitability to the community’s fundamental outlook.”

The proposal provoked anger among Israeli-Arab lawmakers, who said the bill paves the way for Jews to reject Palestinians from their communities.

Many Arab lawmakers described the bill as discriminatory and racist and walked out of the Knesset debate in protest.

“This law allows the establishment of Jewish communities that want to prevent Arab residents from entering. All of the bill’s stipulations exist only in the Jewish sector,” said lawmaker Taleb El-Sana from the United Arab List — Ta’al.

“As a sign of protest, we are leaving. We will not be a part of a debate on this racist and fascist law. This is disgraceful — you have crossed the line,” he added.

The bill, which was proposed 10 years ago, is due to be presented before the Knesset in the coming weeks.