The COP21 world climate conference in Paris was a dramatic event. The participants agreed to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius and to reach zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2100. Of course, those numbers are significantly higher than originally planned. It was hoped to limit warming to just 1.5 degrees and to reach zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Nevertheless, the whole world agreeing to stop the planet from heating up is undoubtedly a historic milestone.

Even Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attended the conference (though climate affairs don’t seem to have been the reason). But the Israeli media was so focused on terror attacks, corruption and other urgent items on the national agenda that it offered scant coverage of the conference. As a rule, environmental issues get no meaningful coverage in Israel.

After the 2009 Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Israel announced that it would reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 20% by 2020. In 2010, the government went so far as to approve a national plan in which 2.2 billion shekels (about half a billion dollars) were supposed to be invested to meet that target. That program was put on hold last year without any attention whatsoever in the media.

Similarly, the Israeli government’s new program, approved in advance of the Paris summit, received very little media coverage, even though it will have a dramatic impact on all of our lives. It calls for reducing the consumption of electricity by 17% by 2030 and reducing private automobile usage by 20% by that same year.