In a rare alignment, Israel’s Independence Day converges this year with International Earth Day. The timing is perfect. While wars, grief, and a profound uncertainty about the future have dominated our thoughts for over two and a half years, this date serves as a stark reminder that national independence is not just about borders. Independence is fundamentally tied to the soil beneath our feet and the air we breathe. While we fight for better lives in the present, we are quietly losing the battle for our habitat in the future.

Thirty months of war with Iran and its proxies have underlined Israel’s fragility. We often speak of energy independence, yet we are currently shooting ourselves in the foot by clinging to a vulnerable, centralized system. Yes, our domestic natural gas reserves have cushioned us from the global electricity price spikes that have crippled Europe. We haven’t had to scramble for expensive Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) on the global market.

But this ‘cushion’ is made of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, and our ability to turn it into power relies on just three processing sites in the Mediterranean. Since the start of the war in 2023, all three have been shut down at various intervals for fear of targeted attacks. Each time the gas stops flowing, we fall back on coal, the dirtiest of........

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