Dismantling the Israeli occupation is climate justice politics

Dec 08, 2023

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Climate change and loss of biodiversity are major global threats whose impacts are unevenly distributed. In the Global South, the deepening of the ongoing environmental crisis will deepen existing inequalities.The consequences of the ecocrisis are also deepening in Palestine, where people, in addition to this, have also been going through ethnic cleansing and genocide under Zionist colonial forces and, before that, British colonial forces.

Dangerous heat waves, made more frequent by the climate and ecological crisis, threaten the food security and living conditions of Palestinians (1). At the same time, the Israeli occupation prevents Palestinians from utilising natural resources and adapting to the consequences of the climate crisis.

Israeli colonialism, racism and environmental racism, US geopolitical interests, and EU energy policy are linked to Israeli control over Gaza and its offshore waters. After the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, Western politicians announced their strong desire for the natural gas imports from Russia to the EU to be cut off. This heightened the EU’s interest in natural gas resources of the Eastern Mediterranean (2). A significant part of these natural gas reserves is located off the shore of both Israel and the Occupied Palestinian territories.

When the goal is to steal the resources of an area, the occupier must develop a narrative that these thefts are justified. Otherwise, the true essence of the activity would be revealed to the observer. When talking about the environmental crisis, the State of Israel has to rely on greenwashing and green colonialism. The aim of these narratives is to ignore and disguise the reality of the colonialist violence of Israel against the Palestinians. In this text, we address these tactics.

Knowing and recognising greenwashing and green colonialism is vital to promoting climate justice. This is essential as these tactics are used to justify the continuation and repetition of decades and centuries of injustices that are at the root of the ecological crises. (3)

Israel's greenwashing and green colonialism

Greenwashing is the process of covering up or diverting attention from harmful practices by pretending to be environmentally friendly. One of Israel's key greenwashing messages is the story that Israelis "made the desert bloom". In reality, Israel is polluting Palestinian land, planting water intensive species that require a lot of water, destroys Palestinian crops, and steals Palestinian water. In the West Bank, Israel uses 73% of the water, diverts 10% of water to illegal settlements and sells the remaining 17% to the Palestinians. Within a decade, the Israeli water administration managed to destroy entire rivers and, through excessive water pumping and artificial water diversion, to carry out a water reclamation project that deeply harms the local ecosystem. (4, 5)

In Zionist propaganda, typical of colonial oppression, the Palestinian right to land and water is challenged by false narratives about the Palestinian relationship with nature and land. The research collective DecolonizePalestine discusses the issue in an article on Israeli greenwashing and green colonialism. In Zionist rhetoric, Palestinian small farmers and Bedouins are said to have ruined the land and soil through their incompetence. The purpose of these racist claims is to legitimise the promotion of Zionist projects on these lands, enabling the historical and ongoing takeover of Palestinian land. (5)

When we look at the history of the Gaza Strip, which is currently being destroyed by Israel, we see that this suffering and deprivation has not always been the norm. It is the result of active theft of resources and violation of human rights. Palestinian land has been some of the most fertile land in the region, and farmers in the area have produced large agricultural surpluses using traditional farming methods. Gaza, bombed to the ground by Israel from October onwards, was a prosperous trading area in the days before Israel's colonial oppression. Gaza served as a trading centre for citrus fruits and watermelons until Israel cut off trade relations with the once thriving Gaza Strip after the 1948 Nakba. (5)

Today, as the climate debate has become more technocratic, Zionist ideology has taken advantage of this and has shaped ideas of who is entitled to land and resources. This is done by talking about who best combats climate change by leading the way to a green technology utopia (5). Israel is often marketed as holding special expertise in green technology and water related matters, while the state refuses to grant permits for Palestinian infrastructure construction projects and has for decades blocked the renewal of the Gaza water system by banning the import of needed equipment (6).

Israel is taking active steps to prevent Palestinians from using renewable energy and receiving foreign aid, for example by destroying donated solar panels (7, 8). Israel also frequently promotes it’s wastewater recycling technology, while about half of the sludge generated as a by-product of the water recycling process is dumped directly into the Mediterranean Sea (9). By blocking fuel imports into Palestine, Israel is hampering the maintenance of basic Palestinian health services, as well as the maintenance of Palestinian wastewater treatment plants and water distribution facilities (5).

Israel is using the establishment of nature reserves as a colonial tactic in the same way that European colonial settlers used the establishment of nature reserves and parks to steal land from Black and indigenous (11) people in the Americas. History repeats itself when countries such as Pakistan compensate for their carbon emissions by buying 'nature reserves' on the African continent (10). In this way, capitalism offers as a solution to the green transition yet another racist approach of stealing land from African people in the name of carbon budgets in order to 'offset' the emissions of Western consumer products manufactured in Pakistan.

How is Israel using the same colonial tactics? Israel has established 70 "national parks" in occupied territories. The establishment of nature reserves has meant a total ban on farming, foraging and grazing by local Palestinian residents, often including the suppression of local plant species by water intensive species unsuited to the arid climate, that negatively impact the land’s water reserves. Often, the establishment of a "national park" has also meant the start of housing projects for Israeli settlers. Once the settlers' homes have been built, the areas are rezoned from nature reserves to residential areas. Israel has also used tree planting as a means of covering up the remains of Palestinian villages it has destroyed (5).

EU energy policy supports Israeli occupation and Palestinian genocide

Natural gas is seen by many countries as a source of energy suitable for the green transition, as it has 40% lower emissions than coal (12). By looking at how natural gas projects in Israel and Palestine are progressing, one can see how new fossil energy discoveries are enriching the colonial state, regardless of on whose land the gas deposit is located.

Since 1967, Israel has prevented Palestine from using its own oil and gas reserves. As early as 1999, Palestine discovered a significant natural gas deposit on its land, which it hoped would bring much-needed resources to the region. It is estimated that, in addition to energy independence, Palestine could have achieved the repayment of its national debt by exploiting its own natural gas reserves (16). This was not the case as Israel imposed restrictions seeking the development of local natural gas projects in the Gaza Strip. Israel took control of the waters above the natural gas reserves and sold the production licences to a major British oil and gas company, now owned by Shell. In addition, Israeli and American gas companies have also illegally stolen and destroyed Palestinian natural gas reserves (24). With the help of such policies, Israel continues to tie Palestine to energy dependency. Energy dependency is important to Israel's colonialist policy because high energy costs not only allow Israel to squeeze revenues, but also perpetuate a structural Palestinian trade deficit, thus crippling the Palestinian economy (13, 24). Trade deficits are created when multinational corporations in the Global North export low-value resources from the Global South. In this case Israel, the US and the UK export unrefined natural gas from Palestine, which Israel then sells as a refined export product back to Palestine. In this way, the value added from refining enriches the Global North and and the structural trade deficit in Palestine widens.

Since the discovery of natural gas, Israel, in turn, has rapidly secured energy self-sufficiency and, with US support, has begun a study on how to make Israel a regional energy hub. Israel's status as an energy supplier is one of the means of economic rapprochement with Egypt and Jordan, despite opposition from local people and politicians. Through natural gas trade, Israel has normalised its relations with neighbouring countries and although the Jordanian parliament voted against a natural gas agreement with Israel in 2017, following Israeli war crimes, forced displacement and genocide, this has not prevented the start of gas supplies. (13)

In 2019, a $524 billion natural gas and oil deposit called Leviathan was discovered in the territorial waters of Palestine, the occupying state of Israel and neighbouring countries (12, 28). What happened to the natural gas after this discovery? In 2022, the US and the EU signed (16) a Memorandum of Understanding (17) with Israel to import natural gas (21) from Israel, and in October 2023 Israel granted 12 permits to six different companies to explore for natural gas (18) along the Mediterranean coast. These companies include BP, ENI, Dana Petroleum, SOCAR and NewMed Energy (18, 19).

Israel and the fossil fuel companies that exploit and steal Palestinian natural gas reserves are making huge financial profits by preventing Palestine from developing own oil and gas reserves. European and international companies that buy natural gas from the Israeli distribution network are supporting war crimes (24), the occupation and the genocide of the Palestinian people by Israel.

When Russia invaded Ukraine, all Western countries collectively condemned Russia. The West aimed to embargo Russian gas and aimed to create new policies (26) to diversify the use of energy to lessen dependency from Russian energy. Israel's message to the EU has been that it offers "reliable energy" and thus an alternative to the energy sold by Russia. New natural gas agreements with Israel support the Palestinian genocide (12). For years, Israel has used brutal violence against Palestinian fishers (15) to steal natural gas off the coast of Gaza. This tacit approval of the EU, which normalises Israel's political position, can also be seen in water-related issues. Instead of supporting local Palestinians' right to water (20), the EU has offered various technical solutions to 'water scarcity' (21) and has not taken a stand against Israel's apartheid policy, which is the cause of water shortages.

Through various tactics of dehumanisation, the coloniser seeks to normalise the killing of the colonised nation or group of people and justify the theft of their land and resources. The Critical Animal Studies Network has discussed this at length in a blog post (14). In the case of Palestinian natural gas, as well as across similar cases in West Asia, the colonial state has framed their actions as fighting terrorism. Just as Israel has justified its bombing of hospitals and civilians in the Western media by naming people's homes and hospitals as Hamas bases, the US has refused to sign a natural gas export deal with Palestine, citing the possibility that money from natural gas sales could be used to 'support terrorism' (12).

An end to Israel's environmentally destructive policies is climate justice

Palestinian environmental organisations have long criticised the apolitical rhetoric of international climate forums, which aim to provide purely technological solutions to environmental issues. This rhetoric sits well with the environmentally destructive policies of Israel and its US-funded allies (22). The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has identified colonialism as a current and historical cause of the climate crisis (23).

The aim of the colonialist policy of the Zionist state of Israel is to strengthen the dominance of the US and the West in the region of West Asia. Looking at the energy policy and environmental destruction carried out by Israel and supported by the US, it is clear that Israel is part of a global colonialist architecture (27) designed to extract raw materials, such as fossil energy, for the needs of the Global North. At the same time, it seeks to create a large consumer market in the Global North and to outsource low value-added production to the Global South. This architecture, which fails to provide economic and ecological stability and a good life for the majority of people, cannot solve any global problems.

The question of land and who benefits from its resources remains fundamental in the fight for Palestinian liberation and solving the environmental crisis. The actions of the Israeli apartheid regime threaten food security and the people's right to a good life. Therefore, a just environmental policy involves the dismantling of Israeli apartheid and guaranteeing Palestinian self-determination rights to water, land and resources.

The struggle for Palestinian rights is not only about Palestinians' right to land, water and resources. It is a struggle for basic human rights and the right to a safe living environment that are threatened by colonial oppression and capitalism globally. The resources of the Global South, whether in Palestine, the Congo, Sudan or Armenia, are being harnessed and weaponised against the local communities in the name of financial gains for the richest states and global political elites. The struggle for a just distribution of resources is a collective struggle for liberation.

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