Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Frustrated at Israel’s lack of action of climate change.
We have sinned against Israel’s land, water and air: Yom Kippur food for thought
At this solemn time of penitence, an accounting of the environmental sins we are visiting upon the Land of Israel’s ecosystems. And a plea for changeBy SUE SURKES
On Tuesday night and Wednesday, Jews throughout the world are gathering in synagogues for the most solemn day of the year, Yom Kippur — the Day of Atonement.
We cry to the Heavens that we have sinned, and we beg God for forgiveness. In silent prayer, we beat our chests and list the multiple misdeeds committed by the Jewish People as a whole.
So, in the spirit of Yom Kippur, and in the hope that the coming year will see the environment elevated to the same (or even greater) level of importance as security and diplomacy, here is a selection of sins that we have visited upon the Land of Israel’s ecosystems and the environment that sustains us all.
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We have sinned by paying too little attention to renewable energy. In a country blessed with sunshine, just 3.5% of energy was being renewably produced by the end of last year, the bulk by solar panels. By December of this year, that figure is expected to rise to only 5%. The prospect of the government reaching its declared goal of generating 10 percent of electricity from renewables by 2020, and 17% by 2030, looks increasingly remote.
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We have sinned by failing to educate the public about environmental issues and to prepare it to cope with the consequences of climate change, with the result that public awareness is pitifully low.
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Read more: https://www.timesofisrael.com/we-have-sinned-against-israels-land-water-and-air-yom-kippur-food-for-thought/
Given a population density of 1067 people / square mile, I wonder where Sue Surkes expects her countrymen to put all that new renewable infrastructure she wants them to build?
I guess there were never any extremes in Palestine before evil humans started to burn fossil fuels. (end sarcasm)
2 Samuel 23:20 – “Benaiah son of Jehoiada, a valiant fighter from Kabzeel, performed great exploits. He struck down Moab’s two mightiest warriors. He also went down into a pit on a snowy day and killed a lion.”
What about the 7 years of famine written in Genesis while Jacob (or Israel) was still alive? What about the famine that forced a Hebrew family to move to Moab written in opening chapter of Ruth? What about the 3 1/2 years of family during the time of Elijah to prophet? It amazes me that people who the little the people who claim to be religious read their own religious texts.
To all believers in the Jewish faith — read Genesis 8:22–
“While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.”
If God said this, then those who think that they have sinned by changing the weather, have actually sinned by doubting God’s promise, given after it was he who really changed the climate with the Noachian flood.
Eco-lunacy even infesting Israel….
A lot of progressive thought in Israel – never understood that. I guess it’s just the result of a successful effort of socialist progressives relabeling the extreme left Third Reich as ‘right wing’.
Agree — history revisionism. Most Europeans even now think Third Reich (National Socialists!!!!) was “right-wing”. Many don’t understand what true “right-wing” (conservatism) is.
I seem to recall a sin on the books along the lines of : Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.
Which I think we can just extend and translate to include pretty much any sort of consequential lying as being prohibited by God’s Law.
“Given a population density of 1067 people / square mile, I wonder where Sue Surkes expects her countrymen to put all that new renewable infrastructure she wants them to build?”
Hmmm on that land they have annexed from Syria (Golan Heights) springs to mind or perhaps that land they keep steeling from the Arabs in the west bank – come on Eric use your imagination.
There are numerous precedents to remove the Golan Heights from contention. The so-called “two state” solution was undermined by a failed coup and immigration reform that has been a first-order forcing of progressive dysfunction in the region.
I’m visiting Israel every year at least once. Actually, they do quite a lot for renewables, not only within the last few years. One point is, that about 90% of hot water used for daily life is heated by solar. On every roof there is one solar heated boiler per apartment. Or there are these huge solar electricity plants in the Negev desert (see for example this link: https://www.israel21c.org/take-a-tour-of-israels-huge-new-solar-energy-valley-in-the-desert/). The article is two years old, but I have personally seen the tower working in June this year. Unlike Switzerland, in Israel solar panels (for water as well as for electricity) are quite efficient.
And there is also a factory (Solav Energy, Kibbutz Dvir) producing and selling cheap, maintenance-free plug-and-play solar water heating units for developing countries.
Profits and/or faith in mortal gods.
[Catastrophic] [Anthropogenic] Global Warming, Climate Change, and other labels and judgments.
Hey, here is an option. Why not dredge a canal from the Red Sea to the Dead Sea? The energy available from the waterfall created would keep Israel in Electrical Hydro power for the next 150 years (depends on the size of the canal among other things) The other plus is fish would be able to survive in the newly filling Dead Sea so a healthy source of non meat protein is also provided. The Greens must surely agree with this clean energy clean food option.
Something like that is actually in the works! Along with Jordan, Israel plans on piping water to the Dead Sea (that has been getting too low). Once primed the water would flow on its own like siphoning a gas tank. No need for an expensive canal.
So just where would Israel get the thousands of acres of land for the solar panels and wind farms (even if those sources of energy weren’t a scam)? Maybe kick a few residents out of the country?
The Negev desert is still mostly empty, actually most of the country is, everyone lives in cities.
Climate has always changed. CO2 has no significant effect.
Depriving humanity of prosperity, and sometimes even life, by curtailing fossil fuels would be a sin.
Our rabbi has expressed similar green sentiments.My personal view is that whilst he thinks he’s doing the write thing I believe it is a clear breach of the second commandment which states that there are no other gods before me. The Jewish climate zealots are no different to the ancient Jews who lost faith and worshipped the golden calf in biblical times. The proof that the warmist cause is really a religious type of movement is the number of global religious leaders including the pope who openly endorse it. I see it as a major denigration of their own religious beliefs.
“MOSES dragged us for 40 years through the desert to bring us to the one place in the Middle East where there was no oil”, quipped Golda Meir, one of Israel’s prime ministers.
Then they found natural gas.
Was that a Sin? Well no, according to “Moses’s oily blessing” :
https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2005/06/16/mosess-oily-blessing
Moses led them to it.
Israel’s only sin against the earth is excessive irrigation.
Sucking water out of a rather brackish river and then spraying it all over the landscape is just asking for trouble in the long-term.
Environmental sins – Israel faces tighter dangers:
https://www.google.com/search?client=ms-android-huawei&sxsrf=ACYBGNSi5___EOF5F6y10a7egwBstT_sBQ%3A1571309618064&ei=MkioXcPGA8KlmwX21r-wCA&q=Israel+earth+sinkholes+dead+sea&oq=Israel+earth+sinkholes+dead+sea&gs_l=mobile-gws-wiz-serp.