[News] Bill Gates Should Know Better: How the Israeli Occupation Ravages the Environment in Palestine

[Anti-Imperialist News]

palestinechronicle.com
<https://www.palestinechronicle.com/bill-gates-should-know-better-how-the-israeli-occupation-ravages-the-environment-in-palestine/>
Bill
Gates Should Know Better: How the Israeli Occupation Ravages the
Environment in Palestine
November 10, 2021
------------------------------
American business magnate Bill Gates (L) with Israeli Prime Minister
Naftali Bennett. (Photo: video grab)

*By Ramzy Baroud <https://www.palestinechronicle.com/writers/ramzy-baroud>*

Those who are not familiar with how Israel, particularly the Israeli
military occupation of Palestine, is actively and irreversibly damaging the
environment might reach the erroneous conclusion that Tel Aviv is at the
forefront of the global fight against climate change. The reality is the
exact opposite.

In his speech at the UN Climate Change Conference COP26 in Glasgow,
Israel’s rightwing Prime Minister Naftali Bennett pushed
<https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-in-glasgow-bennett-vows-to-harness-israeli-innovation-against-climate-change-1.10343814>
the Israeli brand of “innovation and ingenuity” to “promote clean energy
and reduce greenhouse gases”.

Israel uses this particular brand to sell everything, whether to promote
itself as the savior of Africa
<https://www.jpost.com/jpost-tech/how-israel-is-bringing-water-and-energy-to-africa-608412>,
to help governments intercept
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20181227-tested-in-gaza-how-europe-uses-israeli-war-technology-against-refugees/>
fleeing refugees, to push
<https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2018/12/21/combat-proven-israels-thriving-war-business-in-europe>
deadly weapons in the global market or, as Bennett has done in Scotland,
supposedly save the environment.

Just before we hastily dismiss Bennett’s rhetoric as empty words, we must
remember that some are actually buying into this Israeli propaganda, one of
whom is the American billionaire, Bill Gates.

The day following Bennett’s speech, Gates met
<https://observatorial.com/news/economy/17631/bennett-and-gates-have-agreed-to-set-up-a-climate-change-working-group/>
with the Israeli Prime Minister on the sidelines of COP26 to discuss the
establishment of a “working group” to study potential cooperation “between
the State of Israel and the Gates Foundation in the area of climate change
innovation,” the Times of Israel newspaper reported
<https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/bill-gates-to-bennett-we-can-solve-climate-change-with-innovation/>
.

According to the newspaper, Gates, who had asserted in his meeting with
Bennett that only innovation can solve the problem of climate change, said,
“That’s really what Israel is known for”.

Gates’ obsession with ‘innovation’, however, might have blinded him from
addressing other issues that Israel is also ‘known for’ – namely, being the
world’s leading human rights violator, whose horrific track record of
racial apartheid and violence is known to every member of the United
Nations.

However, there is something else that Gates might also not be aware of –
the systematic and purposeful destruction of the Palestinian environment,
resulting from the Israeli occupation of Palestine and Tel Aviv’s
insatiable appetite for military superiority, thus constant ‘innovation’.

Every act that is carried out to entrench the military occupation
consolidates Israel’s colonial control and expanding illegal Jewish
settlements directly impacts the Palestinian environment.

Not a single day passes without a Palestinian tree or an orchard being set
ablaze
<https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/israeli-settlers-burn-400-olive-trees-in-west-bank/2075735>
or cut down
<https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20211013-israel-settlers-uproot-900-olive-trees-in-palestinian-farms/>.
‘Clearing’ the Palestinian environment is, and has always been, the
prerequisite of constructing or expanding Jewish settlements. For these
colonies to be built, countless trees have to be ‘removed’, along with the
Palestinians who have planted them.

Over the years, millions of Palestinian olive and fruit-bearing trees were
uprooted in Israel’s constant hunger for more land. The soil erosion
<https://www.thenationalnews.com/mena/2021/11/04/palestinian-olive-harvest-centuries-old-trees-and-traditions-under-threat/>
in many parts of occupied Palestine speaks volumes of this horrendous
ecocide.

But it does not end here, of course. For hundreds of illegal Jewish
settlements – hosting a population of more than 600,000 settlers
<https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-59062909> – to survive, a heavy
price is being exacted from the Palestinian environment on a daily basis.
According to
<http://opiniojuris.org/2021/10/22/israels-ecological-apartheid-in-the-occupied-palestinian-territory/>
the thorough research of Ahmed Abofou, an independent Legal Researcher with
Al-Haq rights group, illegal Israeli settlements “generate around 145,000
tons of domestic waste daily.” Abofou reported that “in 2016 alone, around
83 million cubic meters of wastewater were pumped throughout the West Bank.”

Moreover, Israel has near-total control of Palestinian water resources. It
relies on the occupied West Bank’s aquifers
<https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/6/23/israel-water-as-a-tool-to-dominate-palestinians>
to supplant its need for water, while denying Palestinians access to their
own water.

According to Amnesty International, the average Israeli receives
<https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2017/11/the-occupation-of-water/#:~:text=Israeli%20settlers%20living%20alongside%20Palestinians,irrigated%20farmlands%20and%20swimming%20pools.&text=By%20contrast%2C%20an%20average%20Israeli,litres%20of%20water%20a%20day.>
300 liters of water per day, while a Palestinian receives a much smaller
share of 73 liters. The problem is accentuated when the water usage of
illegal Jewish settlers is taken into account. The average settler consumes
<https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/palestine-s-water-crisis-50-years-of-injustice/882105>
as much as 800 liters per day, while entire Palestinian communities could be
denied
<https://reliefweb.int/report/occupied-palestinian-territory/palestinian-access-water-attacks-wash-structures-area-c#:~:text=Currently%2C%20it%20is%20estimated%20that,levels%20in%20terms%20of%20water.>
a drop of water for days and weeks, often as a form of collective
punishment.

The issue with the water is not just that of outright theft, denial of
access or unequal distribution of water resources. It is also that of the
lack of clean and safe drinkable water, an issue that has been highlighted
<https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-195880/> by international
human rights groups for many years.

The result of these unfair policies has forced many Palestinians “to
purchase water brought in by trucks” at prices “ranging from 4 to 10 USD
per cubic meter,” Amnesty International found
<https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2017/11/the-occupation-of-water/>,
highlighting that, for the poorest Palestinian communities, “water expenses
can, at times, make up half of a family’s monthly income.”

As bad as the situation may sound, the plight of besieged Gaza is much
worse than that of the occupied West Bank. The tiny and overcrowded Strip
is the perfect example of Israeli cruelty. Two million Palestinians live
there, while being denied the most basic human rights, let alone freedom of
movement.

Since the Israeli military blockade on Gaza in 2007, the environment of the
coastal region has been in constant deterioration. With little electricity
and with bombed-out sewage plants, Palestinians have been forced to dump
their unprocessed sewage into the sea. Gaza’s underground water is now
polluted
<https://news.un.org/en/story/2009/09/312312-gazas-water-supply-danger-collapse-warns-un-report>
to the extent that 97 percent of the available water is now undrinkable
<https://www.un.org/unispal/document/world-bank-and-partners-invest-us117-million-in-water-for-palestinians-in-gaza-press-release/>,
according to United Nations reports.

This is only the tip of the iceberg. From the destruction of Palestinian
wells to the poisoning of trees, to the demolishing of entire ecosystems to
make space for Israel’s apartheid wall, to the use of depleted uranium
<https://www.arabnews.com/node/320099> in its various wars against Gaza,
Israel has been on an unrelenting mission to ruin Palestine’s environment
in all of its manifestations.

In truth, Mr. Gates, this is what Israel is ‘known for’ to anyone who cares
to pay attention. Allowing Bennett to present his country as a potential
savior of humanity, while validating Israel with massive investments in
‘innovation’, mischaracterizes – in fact, invalidates – the entire global
campaign to truly understand the nature of the problem at hand.

Those who are hurting the planet have no right to claim the role of being
its saviors. Israel, in its current violent state, is the enemy of the
environment, and this is what it truly should be ‘known for’.

*– Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle.
He is the author of five books. His latest is “**These Chains Will Be
Broken*
<https://www.amazon.com/These-Chains-Will-Broken-Palestinian/dp/1949762092>*:
Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons” (Clarity
Press). Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center
for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA) and also at the Afro-Middle East Center
(AMEC). His website is** www.ramzybaroud.net* <http://www.ramzybaroud.net/>
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