COP28, Questions, Reminders (lobby!), and think of others, by Mazin Qumsiyeh

The USA dominates the COP28 summit in UAE (28th year of “talking” about
climate change) . The US ($23 trillion economy/GDP – the biggest
contributor to climate change causing greenhouse gases) pledged a tokenism
of $17 million (!) to help developing countries “adapt” and “mitigate”
climate change while pledging $14.3 billion in weapons to Israel (in
addition to billions more already given) and hundreds of billions to the US
military. Note that the US and Israeli militaries are the biggest polluters
of the environment which is producing millions of climate refugees. This is
HYPOCRISY. The problem with COP28 is the problem of the previous 27 COPs:
they are meetings of government officials beholden to lobbies and lobbyists
for the biggest polluters (2400 lobbyists attending this year’*). If
anything the quality of these participating officials (environmental
ministers etc) has gotten worse. As Greta Thunberg said, they go ‘bla bla
bla” while our world is being destroyed. While there were attempts to
challenge the US hegemony with groups like BRICS and ASEAN, the Us still
determines agendas and goals. Further, the US foreign policy is driven by
domestic lobby activities (Zionists and the military-industrial complex).
While a genocide is ongoing in Gaza, those “VIPs” frolic in swimming
pools,m drink champaign, and have all their conseverastions all recorded so
that they can be further blackmailed (see this video of a Chinese national
who found 9 recording devises in his hotel room in Abu Dhabi xxx). The
Zionist control of the UAE and other parts of the world is strong and they
already flex their muscles (xxx). COP28 will thus succeed in producing more
oil and military deals like the 27 before it. My own hope is that people of
developing countries not under this hegemony (Venezuala, Briazin, Cuba,
China, Iran etc) will form alliances to challenge this corrupt and
hypocritical system. People must become more assertive and 1) push against
militarism and war (which is a HUGE contributor to climate change and
environmental injustice, 2) push against the unipolar hegemonic ways of
Israel/US and their spineless banana republics (Arab Countries, UK, EU
countries, Canada, Australia)

*2400 lobbysists now attending the COP28 in Abu Dhabi
https://kickbigpollutersout.org/articles/release-record-number-fossil-fuel-lobbyists-attend-cop28

“Fox Guarding the Henhouse”: UAE to use COP28 climate summit to lobby for
oil and gas deals
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/11/27/climate-uae-reportedly-planned-to-use-cop28-to-lobby-for-oil-deals.html
(already this oil leader chosen to head COP28 has said that we cannot blame
fossil fuels producers for climate change!)

An Open Letter from the Climate Movement: We Stand in Solidarity with
Palestinians in Their Struggle for Liberation
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1N-vYddVmTqIi301I1eBk5eKotOzRwguQjL3k7vBVg_E/edit

Question to Israel (and its supporters in the West): What have you
accomplished in two months other than slaughter of civilians (including
7000 children and 4000 women) and turning hundreds of millions of people
around the world irreversably to hate Zionism and Israel and what you stood
for in the past 75 years (apartheid and ethnic cleansing)?
Question to the global community: In the 21st century, are you going to let
an apartheid state use denial of food, water, medicine, fuel, plus ethnic
cleansing, and relentless bombing of 2.3 million people as a method to make
the natives yield to colonial demands? n other words is genocide a
legitimate tool of war on people in teh 21st century?

Reminder 1: Israeli government and its stooges lied about everything so far
since 7 October (but also long before and lies were exposed repeatedly; See
http://ongaza.org #9)
Reminder 2: Zionist lobby in Washington determines US policy. Even when US
administration is told they can say something different for PR purposes
than what Israel says (e.g. aIsrael can say they Target civilians and the
US can say they “don’t have any hard evidence that Israel targets
civilians”. Be sure statements are coordinated. I updated the lobby paper
with new references on intelligence cooperation
https://popular-resistance.blogspot.com/2023/11/israel-lobby-in-usa.html
Reminder 3: All previous organizations fighting against
occupiers/colonizers were called terrorist organizations: The IRA in
Northern Ireland, ANC & PAC in Apartheid South Africa, native americans
fighting European colonizer, FARC in Columbia etc.
Reminder 4: Anti-Zionism is not ani-Semitism (the opposite is true).
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/zionism-antisemitism-congress/

More on the issue of Gas fields off of Gaza(part of the reasons we are in
this mess): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_gas_in_the_Gaza_Strip
and the new “trade corridor” https://ganzeer.today/the-palestinian-problem
(it is all about money)

Israel bombing civilian cars:
https://www.facebook.com/watch?v=362076989739781

Attached graphic video from one of the few remaining hospitals in Gaza
(though overwhelmed and understaffed and short on all supplies): Email me
if this video does not go through the system

A Gazan woman’s short but powerful speech

New application goes viral to allow identification of products that are
supportive of Israeli oppression of the Palestinains to boycott them
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bashsoftware.boycott&pli=1

As you prepare your breakfast, think of others (do not forget the pigeon’s
food).
As you wage your wars, think of others (do not forget those who seek peace).
As you pay your water bill, think of others (those who are nursed by
clouds).
As you return home, to your home, think of others (do not forget the people
of the camps).
As you sleep and count the stars, think of others (those who have nowhere
to sleep).
As you express yourself in metaphor, think of others (those who have lost
the right to speak).
As you think of others far away, think of yourself (say: If only I were a
candle in the dark.)
— Mahmoud Darwish, “Think of Others”

Stay Human and keep Palestine alive

Mazin Qumsiyeh
A bedouin in cyberspace, a villager at home
Professor, Founder, and (volunteer) Director
Palestine Museum of Natural History
Palestine Institute of Biodiversity and Sustainability
Bethlehem University
Occupied Palestine
http://qumsiyeh.org
http://palestinenature.org