Tehran- Amid the ongoing Israeli aggression on Gaza and repeated American attacks on targets affiliated with resistance movements allied with Tehran, the issue of “cloud stealing directed towards the Islamic Republic, or making it non-rainy” has sparked a significant debate in Iranian circles, reigniting previous official accusations against Israel of cloud theft and causing climate change in Iran.
Following the Iranian Meteorological Organization’s prediction last summer of a rainy and snowy autumn and winter, the Iranian public was surprised by a 40% decrease in average rainfall across the country during the current hydrological year, compared to the statistical average over the past 55 years.
Against the backdrop of reduced rainfall in the capital Tehran by 56% compared to its long-term average, a segment of Iranians raised the possibility of manipulation of clouds by some foreign entities for malevolent purposes.
Conspiracy Theory
Although the “conspiracy theory that accuses foreign countries of using modern techniques to manipulate the weather and transfer rainy clouds from Iran’s sky to other areas” is not new to Tehran authorities, the viewing of several video clips showing the contrasting weather conditions on both sides of the Iran-Turkey border increased Iranians’ skepticism and directed accusations towards what is known in Tehran as the “Zionist-American Axis”.
Former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in 2012, accused “enemies” of diverting Iran’s share of rainy clouds and making them barren as they passed through Iran’s skies to cause drought within the country, following similar official statements describing the drought phenomenon as suspicious.
Six years after Ahmadinejad’s accusations, the head of the Civil Defense Organization in Iran, Brigadier General Gholamreza Jalali, revealed in 2018 “threads of foreign interventions aiming to change the climatic conditions” in his country, accusing “the Zionist entity and another regional state – without naming it – of collaborating to make Iranian clouds non-rainy”.
General Jalali based his accusation on “scientific research conducted by Iranian centers that identified traces of joint teams from some countries that intervened in Iranian climatic conditions to make clouds barren or steal snow,” according to him.
Iran accuses foreign countries of cloud theft and causing drought (Getty Images)
Human Intervention
Despite Al Jazeera Net’s attempts to communicate with the head of the Civil Defense Organization in Iran, Brigadier General Gholamreza Jalali, he declined to comment on the current controversy in his country regarding cloud theft and the organization’s stance on the rumors of foreign interventions in changing the climate.
On the other hand, Masoud Tajrishi, the former assistant to the head of the Iranian Environmental Organization, raises the hypothesis of “cloud sterilization and dissipation” in his country’s sky, confirming that scientific research has identified techniques to prevent rainfall in a geographical area, or divert clouds to other regions, as humans have become capable of cloud seeding and artificial cloud seeding.
Tajrishi referenced his experience regarding human intervention in the climate, where he attended a military parade in Russia years ago, and Moscow’s sky was cloudy at the time. The Russians succeeded in diverting the cloud path using electromagnetic spectra, preventing rainfall for a specific period.
He concluded that human technologies are now capable of diverting cloud paths in specific geographical areas, preventing them from raining, as well as discharging or artificially seeding them, albeit “on a limited scale.”
Harp Project
The highly active High-Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) from the United States has long been a source of concern for Iranian circles in recent years. Some Iranian circles hastened to point accusatory fingers at the perpetrators of this project, prompting the Institute of Environmental and Climate Change Studies in Iran to hold its first scientific conference entitled “The Role of Potential Regional Interventions in Changing Rainfall” and denied the project’s ability to dissipate clouds in the sky or sterilize them.
As Iranians increasingly interacted on social media platforms and Persian media about the reasons for the decline in celestial descents and the possibility of human manipulation in climate change, Ali Salajqa, the head of the Iranian Environmental Protection Area, instructed the Institute of Environment and the National Center for Climate Change in his country to study those allegations, but they did not reach compelling scientific evidence regarding the possibility of cloud theft or dissipation using the HAARP phenomenon.
Meanwhile, Tajrishi confirmed that the available information to him confirms the failure of the American HAARP project to control the climate.
Salajqa: Studies have not found scientific evidence proving the possibility of cloud theft or dissipation using HAARP (Iranian Press)
Climate Engineering
On his part, Mohammad Darvish, the former assistant to the head of the Iranian Environmental Protection Organization and Chairman of the UNESCO Social Health Committee, who has overseen several research projects on the environment and climate change, affirms that some Eastern and Western powers have already begun gigantic climate control programs.
Darvish states that “the United States, China, and the Israeli entity have spent a lot over the past two decades on ‘climate engineering’ and control, but they have not achieved the desired results,” adding that humans today cannot control more than 20% of cloud seeding or prevent it from raining.
He pointed out that some advanced forces face very large fires in their forests but are unable to control the climate and seed the sky to extinguish those fires, attributing the decreased rainfall rate in his country to air pollution, extravagance in building dams, and high temperatures that contribute to cloud dissipation upon reaching Iran’s sky.
Darvish added that his country began programs half a century ago on cloud seeding and cloud seeding, but they have not had a significant impact on the rate of celestial descents yet.
Darvish: Western and Eastern powers have spent a lot on climate engineering (Al Jazeera)
Key Challenges
Reducing the importance of human capacity to control the climate has not yet cooled the hot debate in Iran regarding the reasons for the decrease in rainfall in a country “suffering from severe and very severe drought waves in more than 61% of its area,” according to Babak Nakhaddari, the head of the Research Center affiliated with the Iranian Parliament.
Nakhaddari considers “climate change as the most important challenge” facing his country in the coming decades, warning of its negative repercussions on the environment, food security, energy, infrastructure, and urban management.
