Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's government is taking the issue of climate change more seriously than ever before. Israel has brought a delegation of 140 members to the 26th UN Climate Change Convention in Glasgow, Scotland.

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This week, Bennett pledged Israel would stop burning coal for electricity by 2025 and become a net-zero carbon economy by 2050. While the pledges, particularly the latter, will be extremely difficult for a nation that currently relies on abundant sources of natural gas, the net result will likely be negligible compared to significantly larger countries.

Speaking at the COP26 plenary, Bennett noted, "Our carbon footprint may be small, but our impact on climate change can be mighty." He called on Israeli entrepreneurs to "be the game-changers" and harness their creativity for climate solutions, calling the Jewish state the "climate innovation nation."

In particular, Bennett announced the launch of an official task force called the "Green Sandbox" to provide funds to entrepreneurs and cut bureaucratic red tape.

Like other speakers, the prime minister noted that fighting climate change would require "new inventions and new technologies that have not yet been imagined."

In addition to the allocation of government funds, venture-capital firms are beginning to turn towards climate solutions.

At the Middle East Green Initiative Summit in Riyadh last week, Larry Fink, the CEO and chairman of Blackrock – the world's largest asset manager –shared his belief that "the next 1,000 unicorns—companies that have a market valuation over a billion dollars—won't be a search engine, won't be a media company; they'll be businesses developing green hydrogen, green agriculture, green steel, and green cement."

'Better science, better technology'

According to Itamar Weizman, partner and head of climate investments at Firstime Ventures, the convention itself represents "a huge economy."

"There are a lot of global trends in sustainable thinking that are brought forth here in terms of preventing deforestation, in terms of bringing solutions for water tech, in terms of bringing better, renewable energy to the world, in terms of weaning people off of fossil fuels, in terms of better science, better technology," he explained.

"There is more than $7 trillion worth of investors that are coming to COP," Weizman told JNS.

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Firstime Ventures hopes to become a major player in funding Israeli climate technologies. At COP26, the company announced the launch of its own $100 million venture-capital fund that would invest in around 15 Israeli startups.

"We are [investing] in Israeli companies that are promoting solutions for climate change, from renewable energy to precision agriculture to water solutions," he said. "Israel has a lot of value to bring to the world in terms of climate technologies."

Firstime further announced that "billionaire investor Jonathan Kolber" would be joining the fund.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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In a meeting with both Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Energy Minister Karine Elharrar today, British PM Boris Johnson issued his apologies to the energy minister for a misunderstanding that had occurred the previous day when she was not allowed into the COP26 climate conference due to the entrance to the venue not being wheelchair accessible.

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During the encounter, the British head of government can be seen elbow-bumping Elharrar, expressing his pleasure to see her, and quickly making sure to apologize for the events of the previous day.

"I gather there was some confusion with the arrangements yesterday. I am very, very sorry about that," said Johnson, before changing the subject to COVID-19 and hailing the efficacy of the Israeli government in providing booster shots.

Energy Minister Karine Elharrar, who has muscular dystrophy and is wheelchair-bound, told local media that she was unable to participate in the COP26 summit on Monday because neither the premises nor the shuttle offered to attendees are wheelchair-accessible.

Speaking with Channel 12 News, Elharrar said that when she arrived at the conference grounds, she found that the only ways to actually get there from the gathering area were to walk or board a special shuttle that was not suited for a wheelchair.

"I came to COP26 to meet my counterparts in the world and advance our joint struggle against the climate crisis," Elharrar had tweeted on Monday. "It's sad that the United Nations, which promotes accessibility for people with disabilities, in 2021 doesn't worry about accessibility at its own events."

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Prime Minister Naftali Bennett is slated to spend the second day of the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow in meetings with world leaders, including a first meeting with Bahraini Prime Minister Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa and a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, with whom Bennett spoke briefly on Monday.

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Also on Monday, Bennett met with French President Emmanuel Macron on the sidelines of the summit to discuss global and regional challenges facing Israel and France, especially Iran's rapid progress in enriching uranium.

Macron and Bennett agreed to strengthen collaboration between the two countries.

Aside from the Iranian issue, Bennett and Macron discussed the NSO spyware case.

Israel has been investigating whether cyber security firm NSO Group's Pegasus software, which can hack phones and according to the company is intended for vetted law enforcement and intelligence agencies, has been abused on a global scale. The Defense Ministry oversees exports of offensive cyber tools such as Pegasus.

In July, several international media organizations reported that Pegasus was used in hacking smartphones belonging to journalists, human rights activists and government officials in several countries.

NSO has rejected the reports, saying they were "full of wrong assumptions and uncorroborated theories." Pegasus was intended for use only by government intelligence and law enforcement agencies to fight terrorism and crime, NSO said.

Macron's phone was on a list of potential targets for surveillance using the Pegasus software by Morocco, the French newspaper Le Monde reported. Morocco has denied the allegation and said it did not possess Pegasus.

Macron has called for an investigation.

"It was agreed between the leaders that the subject will continue to be handled discreetly and professionally, and with the spirit of transparency between the two sides," an Israeli official said.

"It was agreed between the leaders that the subject will continue to be handled discreetly and professionally, and with the spirit of transparency between the two sides," the official said.

i24NEWS contributed to this report

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World leaders turned up the heat and resorted to end-of-the-world rhetoric on Monday in an attempt to revive sputtering international climate negotiations.

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The metaphors were dramatic and mixed at the start of the talks, known as COP26. For British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, global warming was "a doomsday device" strapped to humanity. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres told his colleagues that people are "digging our own graves." And Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, speaking for vulnerable island nations, added moral thunder, warning leaders not to "allow the path of greed and selfishness to sow the seeds of our common destruction."

Johnson – who is hosting the summit in the Scottish city of Glasgow – likened an ever-warming Earth's position to that of fictional secret agent James Bond: strapped to a bomb that will destroy the planet and trying to work out how to defuse it.

He told leaders that the only difference now is that the "ticking doomsday device" is not fiction and "it's one minute to midnight on that doomsday clock and we need to act now." The threat is climate change, triggered by the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas, and he pointed out that it all started in Glasgow with James Watt's steam engine powered by coal.

Johnson spoke at the opening of the world leaders' summit portion of the UN climate conference, which is aimed at getting governments to commit to curbing carbon emissions fast enough to keep global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels. The world has already warmed 1.1 degrees Celsius (2 degrees Fahrenheit). Current projections based on planned emissions cuts over the next decade are for it to hit 2.7C (4.9F) by the year 2100.

The other goals for the meeting are for rich nations to give poor nations $100 billion a year in climate aid and to reach an agreement to spend half of the money to adapt to worsening climate impacts.

But Mottley, of Barbados, warned negotiators are falling short.

"This is immoral and it is unjust," Mottley said. "Are we so blinded and hardened that we can no longer appreciate the cries of humanity?"

In his own call to action, Johnson pointed out that the more than 130 world leaders who gathered had an average age of over 60, while the generations most harmed by climate change aren't yet born.

The gloomy note he struck got only darker when Guterres followed him.

"We are digging our own graves," Guterres said. "Our planet is changing before our eyes – from the ocean depths to mountaintops, from melting glaciers to relentless extreme weather events."

Britain's Prince Charles told the world leaders they need to "save our precious planet" and that "the eyes and hopes of the world are upon you."

After Johnson, Guterres, Charles, and an impassioned 95-year-old Sir David Attenborough, scores of other leaders will traipse to the podium Monday and Tuesday to talk about what their country is going to do about the threat of global warming.

The biggest names, including US President Joe Biden, India's Narendra Modi, France's Emmanuel Macron and Ibrahim Solih, president of hard-hit Maldives, will take the stage Monday.

And then the leaders will leave.

The idea is that they will do the big political give-and-take, setting out broad outlines of the agreement, and then have other government officials hammer out the nagging but crucial details. That's what worked to make the historic 2015 Paris climate deal a success, former UN Climate Secretary Christiana Figueres told The Associated Press.

Thousands lined up in a chilly wind in Glasgow on Monday to get through a bottleneck at the entrance to the venue. But what will be noticeable are a handful of major absences.

Xi Jinping, president of top carbon-polluting nation China, won't be in Glasgow. Figueres said his absence isn't that big a deal because he isn't leaving the country during the pandemic and his climate envoy is a veteran negotiator.

Biden, however, has chided China and Russia for their less than ambitious efforts to curb emissions and blamed them for a disappointing statement on climate change at the end of the meeting of leaders from the Group of 20 major economies in Rome this weekend.

Perhaps more troublesome for the UN summit is the absence of several small nations from the Pacific islands that couldn't make it because of COVID-19 restrictions and logistics. That's a big problem because their voices relay urgency, Figueres said.

In addition, the heads of several major emerging economies beyond China are also skipping Scotland, including those from Russia, Turkey, Mexico, Brazil, and South Africa. That leaves India's Modi the only leader present from the so-called BRICS nations, which account for more than 40% of global emissions.

Kevin Conrad, a negotiator from Papua New Guinea who also chairs the Coalition for Rainforest Nations, said he's watching the big carbon-polluting nations. "I think it's really important for the United States and China to show leadership as the two largest emitters. If both of them can show it can be done, I think they give hope to the rest of the world," he said.

The amount of energy unleashed by such warming would melt much of the planet's ice, raise global sea levels, and greatly increase the likelihood and intensity of extreme weather, experts say.

But before the UN climate summit, the G-20 leaders offered vague climate pledges instead of commitments of firm action, saying they would seek carbon neutrality "by or around mid-century." The countries also agreed to end public financing for coal-fired power generation abroad, but set no target for phasing out coal domestically – a clear nod to China and India.

The G-20 countries represent more than three-quarters of the world's climate-damaging emissions and summit hosts Italy and Britain had been hoping for more ambitious targets.

India, the world's third-biggest emitter, has yet to follow China, the US, and the European Union in setting a target for reaching "net zero" emissions. Negotiators are hoping Modi will announce such a goal in Glasgow.

The Biden administration has tried hard to temper expectations.

Rather than a quick fix, "Glasgow is the beginning of this decade race, if you will," Biden's climate envoy, John Kerry, told reporters Sunday.

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President Joe Biden told a UN summit on Monday that actions taken this decade to contain climate change would be decisive in preventing future generations from suffering, declaring that "none of us can escape the worst that is yet to come if we fail to seize this moment."

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"Will we do what is necessary?" Biden asked. "This is the decade that will determine the answer."

The president treated the already visible crisis for the planet – flooding, volatile weather, droughts, and wildfires – as a unique opportunity to reinvent the global economy. Standing before world leaders gathered in Scotland, he sought to portray the enormous costs of limiting carbon emissions as a chance to create jobs by transitioning to renewable energy and electric automobiles.

"We can create an environment that raises the standard of living around the world," he said. "This is a moral imperative, but it's also an economic imperative."

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Below are the remarks by Prime Minister Naftali Bennett at the COP26 UN conference on climate change in Glasgow, Scotland, Nov. 1, 2021

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Mr. President,

Mr. Secretary General,

Fellow leaders.

As we gather here today in Glasgow, we know that history will judge our generation's response to this threat – not by how ambitious we are; but by the practical steps, we take. Israel is at the beginning of a revolution on climate change.

We recently started implementing our '100-step plan' which means that we're currently doing more to promote clean energy and reduce greenhouse gases, than at any other time in our country's history.

For the first time, Israel is committing to cutting greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2050 and we will phase out the use of coal by 2025.

Yes, we're making progress. But – let's be real – Israel is a.. small country. We're less than a third of the size of Scotland. Our carbon footprint may be small, but our impact on climate change – can be mighty. If we're going to move the needle, we need to contribute Israel's most valuable source of energy:

The energy and brainpower of our people. This is what fuels our innovation and ingenuity. This is where Israel can make a real difference. Israel may be 60% desert, but we managed to make it bloom, We may be in one of the driest places on earth, but we managed to become the world's number one country in water innovation.

As the country with the most start-ups per capita in the world, we must channel our efforts to saving our world. But behavioral change will only take us so far. We're going to need new inventions and new technologies – that have not yet been imagined.

Video: GPO

This is why I say to our entrepreneurs and innovators: You can be the game-changers. You can help save our planet. Instead of building yet another hyped-up App, launch startups that will help solve this global threat.

Our national pivot to climate solutions can only be achieved with the right ecosystem –  which is why I set up a Task Force called "The Green Sandbox" to provide funds to help them out and ensure that their path is free of bureaucratic bumps. As we work to keep people safe today, we will also be working for the resilience of tomorrow;

Where our children will breathe cleaner air, drink cleaner water and live in a world that treats the planet better than we did. Israel is the 'climate innovation nation' and we're ready to lead the way.

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