israeli Environmental Terrorism

“The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose.” Jews and Christians alike have commandeered this prophecy from the Old Testament book of Isaiah to fit their respective Zionist agendas: for Jews, the establishment of the state of Israel; for Christians, the transfer of all Jews to Palestine so that Christ may return to earth. The verse is superimposed on photographs of kibbutzim gardens in vile propaganda used by televangelists and in slideshows seen in small country churches. After all, who better to take care of the Holy Land than God’s own Chosen People? In the 62 years since Israel was created, hard-working Jewish immigrants have turned the land from a barren desert into a veritable oasis fit for Abraham, Jacob, David and Solomon.

Right.

With respect to the nearly 800,000 Palestinians that were forced to flee their homes upon the establishment of Israel in 1948, the Jewish State’s wanton destruction of the environment in their absence merits condemnation as well. The land once known as Palestine began suffering detrimental and irrevocable changes in the early 1950s when Israel’s fledgling government drained the wetlands surrounding Lake Huleh, north of the Sea of Galilee, for a housing project. Once the lake was dry, the Palestinian Painted Frog that inhabited the wetlands became extinct. The last reported sighting of the small amphibian was in 1955. Today, many other species are facing extinction due to Israel’s gross disregard for the environment.

Israeli fish farming is killing off coral reefs in the Red Sea, threatening unique species of fish and other marine life. According to coral ecologist Dr. Yossi Loya, five million fish are bred in cages each year without permits, a $20 million per year industry protected by the Israeli agriculture lobby. Coral reefs in Aqaba and along the Sinai Peninsula continue to thrive, as Jordan and Egypt do not permit large scale fishing off the Red Sea coast.

Meanwhile, Israeli corporate greed is threatening another natural wonder, the Dead Sea. At a 2009 regional conference to address the dramatic decrease in Dead Sea water levels, it was determined that industrial development would need to be abated. Israeli company ICL Fertilizers/Dead Sea Works responded by increasing potash production in their Dead Sea facility by 30 percent. More