It’s hard to discuss detrimental environmental effects of using the diesel fuel needed to run generators in Gaza when people only have three hours of government-provided electricity a day, Tahani Abu Daqqa, former Palestinian Minister of Culture, has said.
Catholics are influenced by the environment in which they live, so while Catholics living in Israel are exposed to more ideas of environmental responsibility, in the Palestinian territories Catholics and other Palestinians are still facing more day-to-day struggles Mr Daqqa explained.
Action
Religion can play a major role in motivating people toward taking action on environmental issues, said Anton Khalilieh, an ecophysiologist from Beit Jalla, West Bank, who attended the conference.
“Religion has been used and abused in many things in life. So now religion can be used to change human behaviour,” he said.
“We are doing something, but not enough. We are facing a lot of obstacles, and people are just worrying about finding food for their children. Without a stable political situation, we can’t move on the environment.”
Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa, apostolic administrator of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, told about 150 participants in the May 9 conference that most of the patriarchate’s schools in Jordan were hooked up to solar panels for electricity, and Church officials hope schools in the Palestinian territories will soon follow suit.