Donald Trump wages his war on wind energy from the confines of his Florida resort over Christmas vacation. His recent scathing criticism was delivered on social media. In his blog post, the congressman featured a gruesome image of a dead bird lying beneath a wind turbine that he said illustrated the dangers that windmills pose to our nation’s bald eagles. This picture has certainly raised a lot of eyebrows. As it turns out, it was not an American bald eagle, and it was actually shot in Israel.
In his announcement post, Trump claimed, “windmills are killing all of our beautiful Bald Eagles!” Where this claim has been made, it has led to a very strong reaction. By the way, that bird in the photo isn’t a bald eagle — it’s a sea eagle, a related species native to Israel. The stunning shot was taken by Hedy Ben Eliahou, an employee of Israel’s Nature and Parks Authority. It had once before appeared in a 2017 fib by Israel’s most significant Tel Aviv news service, Haaretz.
The wind turbine in the photo includes Hebrew inscription, verifying that we are indeed in Israel. According to foreign reports, Israeli wind turbines cause such damage to regional birds and bats as well as bird-age discrimination. About two dozen birds per year are killed by turbine-related blade strikes, collisions, and other serious effects. Wildlife advocates have valid and serious concerns. In response, these zoos involved in eagle-breeding programs are now directly lobbying against proposals to establish new wind farms located in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. What’s more, these proposed sites are located on critical passing grounds for the region’s endangered vulture population.
The Israeli Nature and Parks Authority views these plans with apprehension. They argue that wind turbines cause significant and unacceptable “take” of birds and bats, exceeding limits allowed by the federal wildlife agencies.
It would kill all the wind energy in America, Trump asserted. That all came crashing down when it was found that the photo he tweeted was not even from the country. His goal was to stir up the public’s rage to kill renewable energy programs. Critics were quick to denounce him for muddying the waters with alarmist overstatements of bird deaths associated with wind energy.