Marine technology as an instrumentality for peace

A further utilization of marine affairs was created two decades ago (although not foreseen as such) when the US Congress passed and the President signed the International Security Assistance Act. Known as the “Waxman Amendment” (introduced by Rep. Henry Waxman) the Act strove to encourage cooperation between Israel and her neighbors. The commonality of some of environmental problems, to both Israel and Egypt, was a natural source of encouragement toward collaboration. From October 1978 to August 1980, a small group of American, Egyptian, and Israeli oceanographers working together informally developed a series of science and technology projects that became known as “The Cooperative Marine Technology Program for the Middle East”. The program was officially accepted by USAID on August 23, 1980, as the first enterprise endorsed under the Waxman Amendment (later known as “Middle East Regional Cooperation” (MERC)). Also on that date, a dozen scientists from Israel, Egypt, and the United States quietly conducted a historic meeting at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography