King Abdullah II of Jordan told the attendees at COP28, the United Nations’ annual climate alarmism conference, that Palestinians were “on the frontlines of climate change” and that the world had a responsibility to be more “inclusive” of them.
The king added that “climate threats magnify the devastation of war” and claimed that this was happening in Gaza, where the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are currently engaged in an operation against the genocidal jihadist group Hamas, which rules the Gaza strip.
The IDF declared war against Hamas after the terrorist group orchestrated what it has branded the “al-Aqsa flood,” a terrorist attack of unprecedented scale in which about 1,200 civilians, including newborns, were killed, and about 250 people abducted. Eyewitnesses and forensic evidence has indicated that the attack, which took place on October 7, featured terrorists going on door-to-door raids to execute entire families, engaging in gang-rape executions of women, and torturing and burning children. The terrorists also filmed themselves desecrating the corpses of their victims.
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Jordan, like most Mideast Muslim states, has opposed Israel’s operations to prevent a repeat of the October 7 atrocities and accused Israel of targeting Palestinian “civilians” in Gaza. Amman has aggressively rejected taking in any Gaza residents seeking to flee the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
King Abdullah II nonetheless made his climate change speech primarily about Palestinians.
“As we speak, the Palestinian people are facing an immediate threat to their lives and wellbeing. In Gaza, over 1.7 million Palestinians have been displaced from their homes. Tens of thousands have been injured or killed,” he claimed, citing United Nations statistics.
“In a region already on the frontlines of climate change, the massive destruction of war makes the environmental threats of water scarcity and food insecurity even more severe,” he continued. “In Gaza—where people are living with little clean water and the bare minimum of food supplies—climate threats magnify the devastation of war.”
“So, my friends, as we meet here today to talk about inclusivity in climate response, let’s be inclusive of the most vulnerable: Palestinians, severely impacted by the war on Gaza,” he urged.
The king did not suggest that climate change was affecting Israelis or would potentially hurt Israeli civilians, who are still waiting for many of their loved ones to be returned from Hamas captivity in Gaza.
King Abdullah then boasted that Jordan was “a country where refugees make up over a third of our population” but had evolved into “a climate-action pioneer” and is “emerging as a green tech hub.” In mid-October, following the Hamas attack, King Abdullah reportedly told German Chancellor Olaf Scholz that his country would refuse to take in a single Palestinian from Gaza, and that neighboring Egypt felt the same.
“This is a red line … no refugees to Jordan and also no refugees to Egypt,” he reportedly said.
“As we work to catch up on the lost time and progress, we cannot forget the most vulnerable. Nor can we stand by, as the massive destruction of a relentless war in Gaza threatens more people and holds back progress toward a better global future,” he concluded.
The government of Jordan has opposed both taking in Palestinians and Israel’s operations against Hamas, the latter in part because the population of Jordan is generally anti-Israel. The nation saw riots in October targeting the Israeli embassy in Amman, requiring police to use tear gas to subdue violent rioters. The riot was due to news that Gaza’s al-Ahli hospital had been bombed, which the protesters blamed on Israel. In reality, the hospital was hit by a rocket shot by the jihadist terror organization Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ).
COP28 is not intended to be a conference on Mideast conflict, though it is being hosted in the Middle East this year. The Hamas terrorist attack caused a separate dispute at the conference on Monday when a delegation from Iran abruptly abandoned the summit on the grounds that Israel was also invited to discuss climate alarmism.
“The Iranian side considers Israel’s presence at COP28 ‘as contrary to the goals and guidelines of the conference and, in protest, it left the conference venue,” Iranian Energy Minister Ali Akbar Mehrabian declared.
The “Conference of Parties,” as the United Nations event is formally called, is meant to promote horror at the alleged “climate crisis” and force wealthy countries to fund “green” initiatives. This year, over 70,000 people are attending the event – in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE) – many of them arriving via private jets and other modes of transport requiring a large carbon footprint.
The event has been the subject of significant controversy this year as UAE is a major oil producer and the presiding COP28 official organizing the conference is the head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc), Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber. Environmental activists condemned the choice of host for the conference as a mockery of the movement itself, which focuses almost exclusively on carbon emissions as the only form of pollution worth combatting. In June, the U.K. Guardian revealed that Adnoc had obtained access to the COP28 email system, giving it the ability to read emails meant for the eyes of COP28 organizers only.
The Guardian discovered that Adnoc had access to COP28 email servers because the emails from COP28 officials included the text, “Adnoc classification: internal.”
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