To envision how the dynamics in IR, and with regards to war and the environment, may be reformed, it is first considered what the implications of the literature as it is reveal. This then offers a research question which is set up as the focal point of this study. From this, aims towards rethinking IR in light of issues faced globally are set out. Finally, a mixed-method methodology to conduct this study is discussed. In the following chapter, a possible conceptual framework for this is explored.
Statement of Problem
The review of the literature reveals a critical stance which several authors have taken in analysing what they identify as flaws in features of IR such as dominant theories, international law, statehood, and international institutions. Tracing the genealogy of IR witnesses its colonial origins and development to embrace ignorance, the immanence of abstraction and universalism, and innocence in engaging with the persistence of coloniality. Through these epistemic mechanisms, thinking IR is thus constrained by the unequal subject-positions, often around race or class, of knowledge-producing actors and subjects.
Rooted in coloniality, the discipline has acquired a vocabulary and method that bound what is important. This is while undermining the histories, narratives, and perspectives of subjects not belonging to the class of actors privileged by the hierarchy of Whiteness. The linearity with which history is treated in IR supports this. The very entrenchment of IR thus leads to its continued coloniality. In terms of war, this means that specific definitions of what constitutes war are adhered to, to the exclusion of other forms of violence which defy periodisation. These forms of violence often occur dispersed across the globe and negatively impact those outside of Whiteness.
Wars, mostly understood in terms of impacts on the state or humans, thus occupy a security focus which offers a subsidiary role to the environment. This is despite the fact that the environment not only sustains life but can find itself on the receiving end of violence in an ecocidal fashion. A decolonial approach to war should broaden its conception and necessarily consider the environment. While many empirical studies do this, they often lack in either accessibility or an understanding of the socio-political conditions, or inequalities, which lead to war and determine its impacts.
The issue of thinking IR and analysing the impact of war on the environment could perhaps be dealt with by rethinking IR to historically and socially appreciate its coloniality. Further contending with its reliance on unequal power relations enhances an understanding of these relations through methods from both positivist and social sciences. In this way, the pertinent subject of the environment, itself in what is contended to be an Anthropocentric crisis, could become present. This is such that uneven power relations are highlighted and not perpetuated. This may offer insight into solutions to deal with issues of war, climate change, and migration, just as some examples. Specifically, the environment should be seen in its relation to other beings, living and non-living, recognising that even humans have unequally contributed to its destruction. Moreover, this should contend with linearity informing how this history is seen.
To address this issue of thinking IR and anthropocentric conceptions of the environment, the war on Gaza may provide insight as the area suffers from violence, marginalisation, and occlusions as consequences of IR. Its environment is also in crisis as a consequence of the violence in thinking about IR, war, and the environment conventionally. This case study thus reflects on the importance of this study in contending with the persistence of issues in thinking IR. This is because the discipline remains one that defines the world as we know it, but is faced by an existential threat which it contributes to – ecocide and its threat not only to people and states but the world. While this may not entail extinction in the catastrophist sense, it may threaten the extinction of IR if it is not ready to adapt to a new world in which the old assumptions to which it clings are dismantled.
As an area studied more in other disciplines than IR, the impact of war on the environment should find a home in a transformed IR which is able to grapple with history and the present. It should also grapple with the relations between different beings – the environment and planet itself being some of them. As a network of beings, an ecology of relations should be appraised by IR. Shifting the epistemology of IR can assist in shifting the practice of it, and perhaps in this way, new relations can be forged amongst the beings sharing this planet.
Research Question
How can rethinking relationality in IR create a new lens for understanding the impact of war on the environment?
Sub-Question
How has war led to ecocide in Gaza?
Research Aims
In order to challenge the epistemic limits posed by the way IR is thought in relation to the environment, a relational ecology is explored to understand the impact of war on the environment. This attempts to develop a framework that disestablishes a hierarchy of rigidly bound actors in IR and replaces it with a conception of beings, living and non-living, which are shaped by their relations to each other. In doing so, this can challenge IR and yield insights into how war impacts on the environment. Vitally, this aims to neither reaffirm the centrality of humans or anthropogenic creations like states, nor establish anything else like the planet or environment as central. Instead, to challenge the hierarchical nature of IR, it is contended that understanding the co-constitutive relations between beings such as humans and the environment can reveal insights into relationships of power, respect, destruction, and opportunity. In establishing the importance of recognising relations, it is aimed to display that IR is capable of the evolution necessary to contend with a changing world – something it is presently not in a position to do. It is further aimed to use a mixed-methods case study that attempts to highlight these relations using insights from other disciplines such as social and natural sciences. Selecting Gaza, the aim is to explore the history constituting Gaza as a location as well as the relations of its people, neighbours, environment, and world. This is done with an appreciation of the linearity with which coloniality treats history and an attempt to challenge this. Further insight into these relations is sought through a quantitative study of the impact war has had on the environment in Gaza.
Rationale
This study is of importance because it attempts to practice the rethinking of IR to understand the impact of war on the environment. Two papers released on the 10th of February 2025 have suggested that in exceeding global average temperatures by 1.5°C in 2024, the planet has crossed the threshold of 1.5°C which the 2015 Paris Agreement had sought to prevent (King and Cassidy 2025). Conducted independently by scientists in Europe and Canada, the studies revealed that historical trends and month-to-month data respectively indicated that the 1.5°C overshoot experienced in 2024 indicates that the threshold will be crossed in the long-term (King and Cassidy 2025). This was despite the collective warning of 15 364 scientists in 2017 of the catastrophic and unforeseeable effects of global warming (Grove 2019, 2). Considering that in the first 60 days of the war on Gaza, projected emissions produced from the conflict were estimated at greater than the annual total of 20 individual countries and territories, and that the carbon cost of rebuilding Gaza will be greater than over 130 countries, war represents a significant, though unreported, contribution to global warming (Neimark et al. 2024, 1). As the war has surpassed one year at the time of this writing, this suggests that emissions may have exceeded those of 20 individual countries and territories for 6 years. It is likely that the cost of rebuilding has also increased in this time.
In addition, with the aforementioned studies suggesting that the Paris Agreement has failed, the Agreement has likely definitively failed not only to curtail emissions, but to mobilise the world’s collective action. As a landmark agreement, the Paris Agreement had 195 parties, of which only 13 have met the UN deadline to submit new nationally determined contributions as an adjustable target to keep emissions below the threshold by the year 2100 (Dunne 2025). This means that the Paris Agreement has possibly failed within 10 years of its inception, and 75 years before its target (Dunne 2025). Similarly concerning is that the US, one of the world’s largest polluters, and yet one of the 13 to meet the UN deadline, has since promised to withdraw from the Agreement under President Trump (Dunne 2025).
Read together, climate change, and the exploitation of the environment more generally, has reached levels that may be irreversible and have unforeseeable effects. This has likely been augmented by war, not only in the present, but historically. Yet, IR as the discipline governing the relations of the world, has failed to stop wars or report on their effects on the climate and environment. The presumption that states as effective actors in a multilateral system could work together to resolve issues has failed to materialise. Some argue that this is reflective of IR’s persistent coloniality and the primacy it offers states, at the expense of the environment, such that states like the US, which embrace a martial logic, may evade responsibility (Grove 2019; Simangan 2020). In addition, linearity in thought precludes considerations of past injustices or present failings to consider responsibilities towards the environment of the future.
What this presents is a need to grapple with the realities of a changing world, as well as the nexus of war and the environment driven by states, in an order governed by IR. Indeed, nothing short of removing emissions from the atmosphere may reverse the progression of climate change (King and Cassidy 2025). However, a changing world, while potentially catastrophic, may not mean the extinction of everything (beings both human and non-human), and what survives may depend on a clear understanding of the current condition (Grove 2019, 11). Hence, this study is premised on the urgency of the climate crisis and the deeper disregard for the environment and even ecocide entangled with it. It is furthermore premised on the contributions of IR and war to this crisis, further rooted in colonial epistemologies. Finally, while the current condition may be irreversible, it is important to reveal the destructive relations which helped it come to be, so that whether in the same world or a new one, these relations are not perpetuated. In understanding the capabilities of IR, its capacity to adapt to this understanding for the formation of effective policy may offer promise. As perhaps one of the greatest wars contributing to climate change and ecocide, but also as the scene of IR’s continued coloniality, Israel’s war on Gaza presents a lens through which to engage in rethinking IR for understanding the impact of war on the environment.
Methodology
This study uses a mixed-methods analysis of a case study, through desktop research. There are a few advantages to this. Quantitative methods on their own can be generalisable which means methods from different case studies can be replicated (George and Bennett 2005, 5). Replicating quantitative methods and arriving at similar results for the same study also bolsters the validity of causal interpretations derived from data (George and Bennett 2005, 191). In addition, case studies may lead to new insights and hypotheses from specific understandings (George and Bennett 2005, 20). However, supplementing quantitative data, for example in analysing the impact of war on the environment, with contextual information from a case study discussed qualitatively, may account for changes in observations not reflected by numbers themselves, enhancing these insights (George and Bennett 2005, 19; Grove 2019, 15). This is further aided by the ability of qualitative data to account for a larger number of variables, appreciating complexity and multiple causal mechanisms (George and Bennett 2005, 21, 34). For instance, if there are outliers in data, or unexplained observations, these can be understood through qualitative understandings of case studies, such as understanding why the environment may be different in Gaza versus Israel (George and Bennett 2005, 34). In addition to contextualising findings to understand causality, and enhancing complex views, mixed-methods assist in triangulating qualitative and quantitative descriptions of the same case study to verify findings (George and Bennett 2005, 35, 315).
Hence, a mixed-method study enables the researcher to replicate quantitative methods and generate new insights from qualitative understandings of case studies. Together, these contextualise the data and deepen an understanding of results, add levels of complexity in variables not easily captured in data, explain unexpected findings, and assist in verifying findings. These all lead to a richer analysis in line with this study’s approach to challenging the lack of complexity espoused by coloniality. The specific approach to pursuing this method to rethink IR by understanding Gaza’s context and analysing the impact of war on the environment at present is discussed below.
Data
The case study analysed is the Gaza Strip. In Chapter 5, a multi-linear temporal analysis is conducted to contextualise the background of the war on Gaza since October 7, 2023. This analyses the areas of Palestinian identity, societal development, the relationship to the environment, and recent political developments defined roughly after the 1917 Balfour Declaration. These are analysed through qualitative analysis of journal articles, books, and book chapters, providing context for understanding coloniality in Palestine and the events since October 7, 2023. In line with the benefits discussed above, this context may aid understandings of the data subsequently explored.
In Chapter 6, there is a focus on analysing the impact of war on the environment primarily since October 7, 2023. Though, this is not limited to only the environment or only the time since 2023 as there are necessarily historical determinants of later developments. This begins using a qualitative analysis of recent reports by agencies like UNEP and UNRWA to explicate the humanitarian situation in Gaza in terms of fatalities, displacement, infrastructure and buildings damaged, and other humanitarian indicators. Following this, the impact on the environment is discussed in several categories, discussed further below, but which each use qualitative data obtained from reports or journal articles, also not strictly limited to the time since October 2023. These describe the environmental conditions in each of these categories. There are two notable instances of quantitative methods being used. These are to analyse the number of fires in Gaza and to analyse vegetation loss. The spatial data on fires was obtained from the NASA-FIRMS database which captures fires observed by four satellites twice a day (SUOMI VIIRS C2, J2 VIIRS C1, MODIS C6.1, and J1 VIIRS C1) between the dates 7 October 2023 and 12 November 2024. The spatial data on vegetation was obtained from Landsat 8-9 satellite imagery downloaded from EO Browser for the dates 28 June 2014, 16 September 2014, 10 June 2022 and 15 June 2024, and from Sentinel 2A satellite imagery downloaded from Copernicus Browser for the dates 27 October 2021 and 26 October 2024. These images are freely available to download from these browsers which require creation of an account to login. Furthermore, this was supplemented using UNITAR (2014) identification of strike sites in the 2014 war which was also downloaded as spatial files.
Following this, a discussion of genocide is presented using evidence and arguments obtained from reports, journal articles, books, and book chapters. This provides further context of links between the observed impacts to human life and the environment. These data sources all provide contributions towards understanding the impact of war on the environment in the categories discussed (explored further below).
Methods
The qualitative data above is presented primarily through written text, discussing the observations obtained with regards to the history, humanitarian situation, or impact on the environment. It notes specific links and implications as they are presented and at the end of each section. Since these are discussions of various observations which are not always quantitively universal as a data source, some of these pieces of information, such as amount of wastewater being dumped into the sea or saltwater intrusion into the groundwater table, may not be comparable to a baseline and reflect qualitative observations which are presented discursively.
However, in terms of the quantitative analysis, remote sensing is the study of a phenomenon without being in contact with it, through the detection of various phenomena such as light or radiation by sensors, which are then interpreted to evaluate something (Ajmi and Ud din 2009, 42). This evaluates the energy levels of a photon to determine, for example, the chemical composition of a sensed object (Ajmi and Ud din 2009, 43). In this way, when data has not been able to be collected through in-situ samples, analysis can nevertheless be conducted through analysis of satellite imagery through a geographical information system (GIS) software. Hence, it is vital that, even without precise data readily available, there be an effort to analyse the impact of conflict on the environment. Remote sensing is a concept informing how this could be made possible. This represents the value of some of the studies reviewed in Chapter 2, as empirical enquiries, which may use novel methods even if not always adequately grappling with the meaning of environmental security.
The quantitative data is analysed through various softwares, before generating maps which are discussed in the text. QGIS is used for the satellite data from the NASA-FIRMS, EO Browser, and Copernicus Browser platforms. This is a free software which enables the analysis of GIS data – spatial data on maps – by depicting it in various layers and assisting in calculations. This produces visual data, which is presented in the maps provided in the chapter, but may also produce numerical data. Numerical data produced was analysed in RStudio, which is a free software which allows users to input code in the open-source R programming language to perform various functions. In this case, it was used to generate from numerical data two graphs which could aid in understanding the quantitative data from the maps.
The NASA-FIRMS data was downloaded and imported into QGIS where it was transposed as layers on top of a political map of Gaza, freely available within QGIS. This gives a visual depiction of fires as red dots observed by the satellites between 7 October 2023 and 12 November 2024. QGIS is also able to count the number of fires as dots which are discussed in the chapter after the map (Figure 6.4).
The Landsat 8-9 data downloaded from EO Browser was also imported into QGIS as map layers. These consist of several images of the same date and time captured by satellites with a resolution of 30 metres (each pixel of data represents a square of 30 metres by 30 metres). Images for spectral bands 4 (B04) and 5 (B05) from Landsat 8-9 can then be used to calculate an index for normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI). This is an index between -1 and 1, where numbers closer to 1 represent the presence of vegetation and numbers closer to -1 indicate less vegetation (Dovgyi 2022). The following equation represents the calculation used to obtain the index value for each point on the map:
The maps produced from this, for the dates in 2014, and the dates in 2022 and 2024, could then be subtracted to produce a depiction of changes in vegetation, coding growths as blue and reductions as red. These provided preliminary depictions of how vegetation may have been affected by war.
For the dates in 2014, the following equation provided for this analysis:
This was depicted in a map (Figure 6.8), which was further transposed with spatial data from UNITAR (Figure 6.9) identifying missile strike sites, depicted as green dots, to spatially evaluate if vegetation loss was due to missile strikes.
For the dates between June 2022 and June 2024, depicted in Figure 6.7, the following equation provided for this analysis of vegetation loss or growth:
Beyond these analyses of the growth or reduction in vegetation, Sentinel 2A imagery was used to evaluate how vegetation changes occurred between 27 October 2021 and 26 October 2024. This was used to analyse precise changes as Sentinel 2A has a higher resolution of 10 metres, enabling greater detail. Similar to the Landsat images, different spectral bands were analysed to calculate NDVI. These were bands 4 (B04) and 8 (B08). This is represented in the equation below.
The results of this were then coded to depict index values above 0.2 as green, indicating the presence of vegetation. Those below 0.2 are coded as white, indicating an absence of vegetation. This is in line with a determination that an index of 0.2 indicates the presence of vegetation (Forensic Architecture 2024, 247). Within QGIS, it was possible to determine from this what area was covered by green and what area was not. This enabled a determination of how much vegetation was present in Gaza on 27 October 2021 versus 26 October 2024. These were mapped as Figures 6.12 and 6.13 respectively. As similar dates in the year, hence minimising changes due to seasonal variation, these values of vegetation (measured by square kilometre) were plotted, using RStudio. So too were disaggregated values of vegetation for each of the governorates in Gaza (North Gaza, Gaza City, Deir al-Balah, Khan Younis, and Rafah) by isolating the map for each governorate on each date. This extracted from QGIS the number of square metres, and in RStudio converted it to square kilometres and plotted a graph. The graph generated from this appears in Chapter 6 (Figure 6.10). Furthermore, to enhance this insight, it was analysed if there could be some other causal explanation for changes in vegetation, by analysing the changes in vegetation outside of Gaza in Israel from the same satellite images. The graph produced as a result of this also appears in Chapter 6 (Figure 6.11). To further depict this change, the maps containing the NDVIs for each date, before being coded as binary, were subtracted from each other, with the equation depicted below:
The results of this were then extracted for values which were negative, indicating a loss of vegetation, and coded as red. This was then transposed on Figure 6.13, showing vegetation cover in October 2024, to produce Figure 6.14, showing how much vegetation was present in October 2024, together with how much vegetation had been lost between October 2021 and 2024.
Altogether, these depictions and the qualitative data extracted from reports and other sources, contribute to the validity of the discussion analysing impact of war on the environment. This method was structured as discussed next.
Structure
Chapter 5 is structured around first discussing Zionism as a framework of understanding coloniality in Gaza. This is followed by discussions of Palestinian identity, societal development, the relationship to the environment, and recent political developments. The latter discussion is defined roughly as pertaining to the period after the 1917 Balfour Declaration. This discussion is done in order to build an understanding of the complexity of Palestinian identity and history.
Chapter 6 is structured to ground the discussion from Chapter 5 in the specific events occurring since October 7, 2023, and their humanitarian impacts. This provides context for understanding the complexity of impacts on the environment. The impacts on the environment are then discussed in the following categories in turn: water, wastewater treatment and sewage systems; solid waste, infrastructure, and debris; energy infrastructure; marine environment; terrestrial environment; air. These necessarily have overlaps but were separated as such to cover broad areas which were sufficiently similar enough so that each category could be analysed in terms of its historical state, present situation, and relation to humanitarian impacts. This was also done along the precise distinctions also used in the UNEP (2024a) report. Water was treated as a broad category related to wastewater and sewage, encompassing a category including water for consumption and the disposal of water used. Solid waste, infrastructure, and debris was treated as a broad category because this groups the accumulation of any solid waste, either due to human activity or destruction of buildings. Energy infrastructure was treated as a category to enable a discussion contextualising energy requirements in Gaza and its relation to production of energy which may use fossil fuels or renewable sources. These sources also often use materials which may have impacts on the environment, such as fuel or heavy metals. Moreover, populations may, in the absence of energy, have to burn solid waste or organic matter which may generate air pollution, representing an overlap with another category. The marine environment was treated as a category because, though related to water, encompasses complex marine ecosystems which are not understood simply in terms of water supply, consumption, and waste. The terrestrial environment was treated as a broad category because it is composed of many overlapping elements of impacts on land, from debris to vegetation loss, to the impact on animals and soil. Finally, air was treated as a category to discuss how impacts even from other areas, may all contribute to air pollution. Once more, though these categories represent overlapping and indistinctly separated categories (necessarily so as constituents of complex life-forms), they reflect broad groupings of relations in line with the UNEP report.
Chapter 6 concludes with discussing this impact on the environment in relation to understandings of genocide.
Ethics
This study uses publicly available data such as satellite imagery and published written material such as books, book chapters, and journal articles. There are no human participants or deidentified/anonymised human data used in this project. All software used in the data analysis is also free to use and does not require a licence. Data is sourced from various sites online, described above. Some sites do require a user sign-in with a username and password, but do not require payment or permissions. Remote sensing analysis is conducted using resources such as the guide to remote sensing (Ajmi and Ud din 2009) and a guide by the Ukrainian National Academy of Sciences on remote sensing for the environment (Dovgyi 2022).
Limitations
There were some limitations to the methods explored above. Particularly, where expertise was needed to conduct thorough analysis of variables such as air quality or where observations on impact on the environment are not yet possible due to the inability to collect samples from the affected sites (in situ). For instance, with no air quality monitors which could be found in Gaza, there would need to be a model constructed to estimate quality, taking into account a variety of factors such as time and climate. In terms of impacts on the soil and water in Gaza, especially from waste or heavy metals in bombs, these are not ascertainable without samples taken from contaminated zones. These would further require scientific analysis, representing another limitation. Furthermore, there have been studies such as the Neimark et al. (2024) estimation of carbon emissions due to the war. However, this is premised on estimates of the number and type of munitions which Israel has used, as reflected in an Al Jazeera article by Zoran Kusovac (Kusovac 2023). His methodology is not replicable because it cannot determine the amount of munitions used since its writing in November 2023.
Overall, these reflect the challenges with scientific expertise or access to information noted in the literature review that can slowly be surmounted with growths in interdisciplinary work which recognise the value of mixed-method approaches.
Beyond quantitative analysis, it is also important to recognise that desktop research of this sort may yield many complex insights. However, in light of the limitations discussed above, there may be a level of complexity, especially in understanding what is an ongoing conflict, which could be in need of further development. This is also because of limitations to understanding the lived experience of humans, animals, and plants in warzones, which may only be developed from first-hand experience or interviews. These all represent areas of further research.
Conclusion
The research design discussed above follows from the critical discussion of IR, war, the environment, and Gaza in Chapter 2. It has been shown that there is a necessity for engaging with thinking beyond the confines of IR to begin to unveil broader understandings for addressing crisis. The Gaza case study presents a pertinent example of where the coloniality of IR and the global order may be at work. This makes it an equally pertinent site of resistance for imagining beyond the anthropocentric trappings of state borders or human security. The methodology discussed above attempts to explore what this may look like by combining qualitative insights and quantitative data. This is in order to develop a deeper understanding of Zionism’s coloniality in Gaza, the impact of war on the environment, and the need to rethink IR. The specific data, methods, and structure informing the case study analysis were set out. This shows where quantitative data analysis has been conducted, where qualitative data has supplemented gaps, and where some gaps nevertheless persist despite the enhancement by a mixed-method approach. A framework for how this is analysed is discussed in the next chapter, before turning to the case study.
Chapter 4: Conceptual Framework: From Environmental Security to a Relational Ecology
This represents the work from my Master’s research, which can be found in full here.