As the United Nations-sponsored meetings on climate change begin in Copenhagen, 22 prominent U.S. Jewish groups signed a joint statement supporting substantial change in how the world’s countries deal with greenhouse gas emissions and calling on participants to agree on aggressive action to combat global warming. Among the signers were the Reform, Reconstructionist, and Conservative movements; the American Jewish Committee; B’nai Brith; Hadassah; and the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. Something tells us that their statement was released in a different spirit than the recent arguments from the Municipal Environmental Associations of Judea and Samaria that the West Bank construction freeze, by halting the building of certain infrastructure, is anti-green.
Oh, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will attend the Copenhagen summit, along with his Environment Minister.
Jewish Groups Call for Climate Change [JTA]
The Building Freeze is Bad for the Environment [Arutz Sheva]
Marc Tracy is a staff writer at The New Republic, and was previously a staff writer at Tablet. He tweets @marcatracy.