Summer in Qatar is unbearable; most days reach a high of at least 104 degrees Fahrenheit. The air feels void of vapor, the land is arid and cracked, but most of all, the heat from the sun is unforgiving. Every summer, I remember accompanying my mom to the nearest auto repair shop to replace our leather car seats, which melted from the scorching heat of the metallic seatbelts. It was quite an inconvenient endeavor. When the temperature is high enough to irritate your skin, there isn’t much to do during the day, unless your idea of fun is visiting the same handful of indoor malls the country has to offer.
It may sound like I’m doing nothing more than complaining about the weather, but that’s the issue here. Some people continue to assert that climate change and its consequences are nothing more than an inconvenience. Melted car seats, summers spent indoors, itchy skin and other slight inconveniences we may encounter as a result of climate change distract us from a sinister reality: This global emergency is capable of much more than inconveniences.
This reality is already beginning to manifest itself in the extreme weather events that the Gulf has recently experienced. The Dubai flooding, which studies have already indicated was most likely exacerbated by climate change, is just one event among several that have exposed the severity of human-accelerated climate change. The floods have started a discussion surrounding the climate vulnerability of the Middle East — a conversation that is often drowned out by the distracting nature of the tense political atmosphere in the region. In fact, geopolitical instability is often made worse by these environmental calamities. As previously mentioned, the recent occurrence in Dubai was not just bad luck — scientists found the fingerprints of climate change all over Dubai’s deadly floods. For a country that only receives about four inches of rain per year accompanied with murderous heat waves, the United Arab Emirates endured nothing short of chaos on April 16. The nation witnessed its heaviest rainfall in at least 75 years, with some areas recording more than 10 inches of precipitation in less than 24 hours. Flooded streets, uprooted palm trees and shattered building facades were most of what was left from this disaster.
Having lived in the Middle East, namely in Qatar and the U.A.E., for a combined total of 13 years, I have seen firsthand how rapidly and drastically its climate has changed. Each summer felt longer than the last, and the plants my mother worked so hard to keep alive would wilt and give in to the heat. And if you won’t take my word for it, let the statistics talk for themselves. Qatar’s air temperature for the winter month of November increased by 0.47 degrees Celsius in just the decade between 2011 and 2020. What’s more, the average temperature for the month of November is projected to rise by 1.08 degrees Celsius over the next decade.
Over the years, matters have worsened in the rest of the region. In Jordan, the Dead Sea has shrunk by almost a third in the last two decades, due to decreased precipitation and higher temperatures. In June 2017, Sweihan, Abu Dhabi reached a record high of 122.7 degrees Fahrenheit. The highest recorded temperature in the Middle East to date was 152 degrees Fahrenheit in 2023. Heat-related casualties of 123.4 per every 100,000 people are projected for the Middle East by 2100 under a business-as-usual, high emissions scenario.
It should not take civilian deaths for the world to start recognizing that global warming is more than an inconvenience to our human race. The impact that this global externality has had on the Middle East and Northern Africa is just a small scale example of the true potential for disaster that this crisis carries. It’s time for us to start treating global warming as seriously as other issues instead of stripping it of its political qualities. Any issue where our welfare is at stake should be of political concern to us, not a trivial inconvenience. Regardless of your political inclination, the bottom line is this: If you care about humankind, then you should care about the climate crisis, too.
