Analysis of the climate change impact on the spatiotemporal drought in the Gaza region of the southeastern Mediterranean

Abstract

Abstract The southeast Mediterranean region of the Gaza Strip is showing traces of evolving drought patterns driven by the impacts of climate change. The analysis of rainfall data at eight meteorological stations for a period extending over 48 years from 1974 to 2021 shows obvious variations in the spatiotemporal distribution of the rainfall over the Gaza Strip. The total monthly rainfall trend analysis for the wet months indicates a decreasing trend during February, March, April, and November with a ratio ranging between −16 and −62% and an increasing trend of about 35 and 141% through October at each of the meteorological stations. However, January shows an increasing trend of about 1–27% at all meteorological stations except Nussirat where a decline of about −7% is recorded while December refers to an increasing trend of about 5–27% in the north area of Gaza and declining trend of −2 to −17% over the southern region of the Gaza Strip. The drought analysis using the SPI indicator refers to a significant development of drought during the years 1990, 1999, 2010, and 2014 in the Gaza Strip with a major incident of occurrence where specifically, the monthly drought in terms of SPI-1 is identified as moderate and mild by about 15–21 and 27–56%, respectively. The agricultural drought of SPI-3 is nominated by severe, moderate, and mild severity with an incident reaching 11%, 8–11%, and 21–52%, respectively. However, the hydrological droughts demonstrated by the 9-month SPI-9 and 12-month SPI-12 potentially occur in extreme, severe, moderate, and mild with a probability of incident defined by up to 4, 13, 15, and 28–40%, respectively, for SPI-9 and by up to 4, 6, 11 and 38% extreme, severe, moderate, and mild, respectively, in case of SPI-12.