This photo released by Dr Marawan Abu Saada shows prematurely born Palestinian babies in Shifa Hospital in Gaza City on November 12, 2023
AS THE death toll in Gaza approaches 12,000, including nearly 5,000 children, the Al-Shifa hospital came under fierce attack from Israeli forces yesterday.
While thousands have fled the bombardment of Gaza’s largest hospital, hundreds of patients, including dozens of babies, remain in the bombed out building at risk of dying because of a lack of electricity as well as a lack of medical and food supplies.
The Israeli military said that it had placed gallons of fuel near the hospital to help power its generators, but Hamas fighters had prevented staff from reaching it.
The Health Ministry in Gaza disputed that and said the fuel would have provided less than an hour of electricity.
World Health Organisation director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a post on social media that Shifa has been without water for three days and “is not functioning as a hospital anymore.”
If all oil-producing nations followed the United Arab Emirates’ strategy, the world’s carbon budget for 1.5°C would be exceeded many times over.
COP28 host the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has plans in place to extract 38 billion barrels of oil and gas between now and 2085 – with significant further reserves that could also be extracted in that time.
If all oil producing nations followed such a strategy, the world’s carbon budget for 1.5°C would be exceeded many times over. As one of the wealthiest petrostates in the world – with a gross domestic product (GDP) per capita of $44,000 (Dh161,590) – the “common but differentiated responsibility” clause of the 2015 Paris Agreement could arguably mean that the UAE should end oil and gas production sooner than other, less wealthy nations – but as yet the UAE has no such plans.
According to exclusive data from Energy Monitor’s parent company, GlobalData, there are some 28.3 billion barrels of oil remaining in active fields in the UAE, with a further 1.5 billion barrels in fields that are currently planned.
Active fields in the UAE also have some 38.2 trillion cubic feet (trcf) of gas remaining, while planned fields contain 10.5trcf of gas. The combined volume of hydrocarbons in active and planned oil and gas fields in the UAE adds up to 38.4 billion barrels of oil equivalent.
The UAE is continuing to develop new oil and gas fields despite the International Energy Agency (IEA) repeatedly warning that for the world to meet its target of net zero by mid-century, oil and gas use must go into managed decline, with no new oil and gas fields approved for development beyond those already in existence.
The UAE’s oil plans are in the spotlight right now given the country’s high-profile role hosting the next annual UN climate conference, COP28, which is taking place in Dubai at the end of November.
Given that the burning of fossil fuels is by far the largest contributor to global warming, the UAE’s position as the world’s seventh-largest oil producer, and 14th-largest gas producer, is a major point of concern among climate experts.
Campaigners take part in a Stop Rosebank emergency protest outside the U.K. Government building in Edinburgh, after the controversial Equinor Rosebank North Sea oil field was given the go-ahead Wednesday, September 27, 2023. (Photo: Jane Barlow/PA Images via Getty Images)
Since winning a July 2023 by-election in the London suburb of Uxbridge, the UK government has made polarising voters on climate policy one of its main strategies. The Tory campaign had focused on opposing a new low emission zone for cars, and prime minister Rishi Sunak took its victory as vindication of a clear “pro-motorist” and anti-climate policy stance.
The apparent lack of public support for strict climate policies such as a ban of fossil-fuelled cars is now being used as an excuse to roll back policies urgently necessary to reach net zero targets.
In a recently study in the journal Climate Policy, we demonstrate that, by betting on a public tired of stringent climate policies, the government is backing the wrong horse.
We asked 1,911 people that are representative of the UK population in terms of age, gender and ethnicity to indicate the extent to which they support different climate policy instruments. Almost two thirds support the most stringent climate policies, while others receive even higher support.
In short, people in the UK favour all kinds of policy instruments to tackle climate change, even the most stringent ones. There is a lesson here for the opposition too, which should put forward more effective climate policies, and not shy away from regulation.
A vote in favour of UK climate politics
In our study, we asked people about actual policy proposals by UK government bodies and political parties (as opposed to hypothetical ones).
We put each into one of four categories based on the type of policy instrument: regulation (such as banning the sale of fossil-fuel-powered cars or stopping drilling for oil and gas), market instruments (carbon trading, stopping fossil fuel subsidies), informational tools (consumer labels, advertising campaigns), and voluntary initiatives (carbon offsets, non-binding product standards).
The UK public is mostly happy to support measures like phasing out petrol cars. Kittipong33 / shutterstock
Contrary to the government’s rhetoric, our findings point towards a more optimistic view of the UK’s future climate politics – at least from a voter perspective. A large majority supports strict regulations that mandate or prohibit specific behaviour. An even larger share backs market-based initiatives (78%), information tools (86%) and voluntary measures (87%).
While the important thing here is that the UK public wants a package of different policy instruments to decarbonise the economy and reach net zero, one could rightly argue that more still needs to be done to increase support for stricter measures. So what drives public support for climate policies?
Drivers of public support
In line with previous research, our study found that free market and environmental beliefs have the biggest impact on whether someone supports climate policies.
The more people believed that a free market acts in the interests of the public, the less they supported all climate policies. Similarly, people that believe nature is important voiced stronger support for all policies.
Interestingly, support for regulatory and market-based policies didn’t change according to a person’s income. This is important because the current government usually tries to appeal to working class voters in its attempts to demonise ambitious climate policies.
These are important findings that highlight the need to challenge free market ideologies by publicly and repeatedly scrutinising their validity for a functioning and just society. We also should start recognising their detrimental effect on climate policy preferences.
Regional variations in public support
However, only looking at national results might hide important differences. Our research found important regional variation, with London often being an exception compared to the rest of the UK.
People living in other regions were about 30% less likely to support regulatory and market-based climate policies compared to people in Greater London, for instance.
Regulatory measures were the least popular around the country, though still had majority support everywhere and a strong majority in London. Bretter and Schulz, CC BY-SA
Drivers of these differences are both ideological and structural. People living in Greater London tend to believe less in the free market system compared to people in regions which had significantly lower support for climate policies. This indicates that neoliberal ideology favouring free markets is discouraging climate action.
Yet it is not only what people believe in. Those in more rural regions with higher emissions show less support for stricter climate policies. These tend to be regions with less access to public transport where people have to rely more heavily on high-emitting cars.
More needs to be done to improve public infrastructure in rural areas. This will require investment in affordable, low-carbon transport networks rather than championing the continuation of the combustion engine.
How the media may shape policy support
Of course, our study only captured a snapshot of people’s policy preferences. We are constantly confronted by news stories, particularly through social media.
These often act as echo chambers to reinforce existing ideologies (and by extension, policy preferences), thereby strengthening existing polarisations. This will make it harder to engage people with contrasting beliefs in a discussion on climate policies.
On the other hand, being repeatedly confronted with particular views and ideas can shift one’s beliefs. In psychology, this is referred to as “repeated priming”. In Germany, we have seen how newspaper campaigns against the slow phase-out of gas boilers have further undermined public support for this specific climate policy.
Could something similar happen in the UK? To avoid the gradual weakening of support by particular news outlets, the UK opposition parties need to be consistent and persistent in their communication of climate policies and their effects.
Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?
Palestinians inspect the damage following an Israeli airstrike on the El-Remal aera in Gaza City on October 9, 2023. Israel continued to battle Hamas fighters on October 10 and massed tens of thousands of troops and heavy armour around the Gaza Strip after vowing a massive blow over the Palestinian militants’ surprise attack. Photo by Naaman Omar apaimages. licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.
There are 149 states party to the Genocide Convention. Every one of them has the right to call out the genocide in progress in Gaza and report it to the United Nations. In the event that another state party disputes the claim of genocide – and Israel, the United States and the United Kingdom are all states party – then the International Court of Justice is required to adjudicate on “the responsibility of a State for genocide”.
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There is, at the very least, a strong prima facie case that the actions of the United States and United Kingdom and others, in openly providing direct military support to be used in genocide, are complicity in genocide. The point of Article IV is that individuals are responsible, not just states. So Netanyahu, Biden and Sunak bear individual responsibility. So, indeed, do all those who have been calling for the destruction of the Palestinians.
It is very definitely worth activating the Genocide Convention. A judgement of the International Court of Justice that Israel is guilty of genocide would have an extraordinary diplomatic effect and would cause domestic difficulties in the UK and even in the US in continuing to subsidise and arm Israel. The International Court of Justice is the most respected of international institutions; while the United States has repudiated its compulsory jurisdiction, the United Kingdom has not and the EU positively accepts it.
If the International Court of Justice makes a determination of genocide, then the International Criminal Court does not have to determine that genocide has happened. This is important because unlike the august and independent ICJ, the ICC is very much a western government puppet institution which will wiggle out of action if it can. But a determination of the ICJ of genocide and of complicity in genocide would reduce the ICC’s task to determining which individuals bear the responsibility. That is a prospect which can indeed alter the calculations of politicians.
It is also the fact that a reference for genocide would force the western media to address the issue and use the term, rather than just pump out propaganda about Hamas fighting bases in hospitals. Furthermore a judgement from the ICJ would automatically trigger a reference to the United Nations General Assembly – crucially not to the western-vetoed Security Council.
All this begs the question of why no state has yet invoked the Genocide Convention. This is especially remarkable as Palestine is one of the 149 states party to the Genocide Convention, and for this purpose would have standing before both the UN and the ICJ.
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Any one of the 139 states party could invoke the Genocide Convention against Israel and its co-conspirators. Those states include Iran, Russia, Libya, Malaysia, Bolivia, Venezuela, Brazil, Afghanistan, Cuba, Ireland, Iceland, Jordan, South Africa, Turkey and Qatar. But not one of these states has called out the genocide. Why?
The French president has called for action at a climate summit in Paris attended by heads of state and scientists before Cop28
France will spend €1bn (£880m) on polar research between now and 2030, amid rapidly rising scientific concern over the world’s melting ice caps and glaciers.
A new polar science vessel will spearhead the effort, and France is calling for a moratorium on the exploitation of the seabed in polar regions, to which the UK, Canada, Brazil and 19 other countries have so far signed up.
French president Emmanuel Macron told a summit of heads of state and scientists in Paris: “We are not talking about a threat for tomorrow, but one that is already present and accelerating. We are talking about a transformation of the cryosphere [the Earth’s ice] that already threatens millions and will threaten billions of the planet’s inhabitants with multiple direct and indirect consequences.”
The plight of the Earth’s polar regions and glaciers has sparked alarm among many scientists, as heatwaves at both poles, which were seen for the first time last year, look set to be a regular occurrence.
They heard from polar and glacier experts that temperatures were rising four times more rapidly in the Arctic than the global average, half the world’s 200,000 glaciers were set to disappear by the end of the century and that the rate of sea level rise had doubled in the last two decades.
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Glaciers were melting across the world, warned the head of the World Meteorological Organisation, Petteri Taalas. As they vanish irrecoverably, more than 1 billion people who depend on them for water and agriculture will face increasingly severe shortages. As well as cutting greenhouse gas emissions overall, there are also urgent measures that scientists believe could be taken now that would reduce or delay the risk of the collapse of glaciers or a tipping point at the poles.
