CHANGES in the climate have led to the heat wave in Europe, which continues to break records, the melting of large quantities of ice in Antarctica and Greenland and heavy rainfall and intense hurricanes around the world. These global events have resulted in a change in the pattern of agriculture and the production of food which has a negative impact on public health.

Western national security services claim that acute climate change and humanitarian disasters can lead to an increase in terrorism citing Iraq and Syria as examples. Retired Rear Admiral David Titley, who was once skeptical about the seriousness and impact of climate change and is now the founding director of the Center for Solutions to Weather and Climate Risk at Pennsylvania State University, says that the war in Syria is partly due to climate change.

When water resources are mismanaged as a result of backward and corrupt agricultural policies, the quality and quantity of agricultural products are affected and those who depend on the agricultural sector for a livelihood become easy prey for terrorist groups.

The war in Syria started in the ​​Hauran agricultural region and its capital Daraa. For decades, the implementation of negative socialist policies by the Assad regime served to deplete groundwater reserves, leading to a dam crisis with Turkey, a political rupture with Iraq, and massive human displacement after the Iraq war. The water disaster resulted in three quarters of a million Syrian farmers being forced to migrate to major cities.

What happened in Syria and Iraq is conclusive evidence that natural disasters, when accompanied by negligence and administrative corruption can lead to an increase in terrorism. Climate change is a disaster on its own, but when it is coupled with destructive city planning and corruption, it can emerge as a form of repressive terrorism, such as Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah and Al-Qaeda.