Greta Thunberg has intensified her criticism of climate protests after footage emerged appearing to show her mocking campaigners who remain involved in the movement she founded.
In the recently released documentary On Tanks Into The Climate Crisis – How Activism Is Criminalised, the Swedish activist laughs after being told that a Fridays For Future demonstration was taking place in Berlin.
Thunberg launched Fridays For Future in 2018 at the age of 15, when she began missing school on Fridays to demand stronger action on climate change. The protest quickly developed into a worldwide movement, with students in countries around the globe joining in.
In the clip, which spread rapidly online, Thunberg appears to laugh at the news that demonstrations are still being held, asking: ‘Really? They still do that?’
After facing widespread criticism online, the 23-year-old activist addressed the issue on Instagram on Friday, defending her reaction and accusing climate protesters of distancing themselves from her increasingly prominent pro-Palestinian activism.
‘For context, this was the same day as we were blocking a weapons manufacturer there, and just found out there simultaneously was a police-permitted climate demonstration in a famously white middle-class area by the very same German climate movement who cancelled and “distanced themselves” from me for saying that Palestinians are humans too,’ she wrote.
‘Make no mistake; the world IS ridiculing Germany for being detached from reality and being stuck in extremely racist mindsets and tactics while being shamelessly complicit in genocide, ecocide and climate crisis…’
In an Instagram video, German journalist and filmmaker Hubertus Koch said the clip had been ‘taken out of context’ (Taken from @hubi_koch on Instagram)
Ms Thunberg’s activism has increasingly focused on outspoken support for the pro-Palestinian cause
Her remarks came after the documentarian who recorded the footage defended Thunberg’s reaction.
In an Instagram video, Hubertus Koch, a German journalist and filmmaker, said the clip had been ‘taken out of context’.
‘Greta does a great deal more than just participate in demonstrations – that is, practising civil disobedience, suing states, and so on,’ he said.
Koch said Thunberg had moved beyond her Fridays For Future period and concluded that organised demonstrations and panel discussions were ‘ineffective’.
‘And that’s why she laughs – in the sense of, “They’re still doing that”,’ he said.
‘Greta herself came to the conclusion that… one must operate from the outside, in opposition, and with strong activism.’
Thunberg’s comments prompted a wave of criticism online. One person on X wrote: ‘Climate was just the warm-up. Hating Israel is the real job.’
Another posted: ‘It suddenly isn’t a problem anymore. So much for climate “emergency”. Just shows the credibility that she has.’
A third commenter said: ‘Fridays For Future was a cult-like movement from the start, whose leaders secretly mocked the protesters back then and now openly mock them on camera.’
Ms Thunberg rose to prominence as the figurehead of the youth climate movement. In recent years, however, her activism has increasingly centred on outspoken support for the pro-Palestinian cause.
Last winter, she was arrested in central London while attending a demonstration in support of jailed Palestine Action protesters who were on hunger strike.
Footage showed the then-22-year-old activist holding a sign reading ‘I support Palestine Action prisoners, I oppose genocide’ outside the headquarters of an insurance company.
A City of London Police officer can be seen removing the placard before asking Ms Thunberg to stand up.
Around the same time, she spoke out in support of several imprisoned Palestine Action activists who were taking part in a hunger strike.
She called them ‘political prisoners’ and backed demands for the charges against them to be dropped.
She was also detained last year by Israel after warships intercepted an aid flotilla bound for Gaza, on which she was travelling.
That was the second such incident involving Ms Thunberg, who had also been detained by Israeli forces while aboard a separate ship heading towards the Palestinian state the previous June.
More recently, she voiced support for rapper Macklemore after he was removed from Ed Sheeran’s tour following pro-Palestinian comments made during one of his concerts.
The 23-year-old publicly supported Sheeran’s ‘cancellation’, criticising him in a statement on Instagram, in which she wrote: ‘We are witnessing one of the biggest artists in the world being cancelled because they tried to “both sides” Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people.
‘This is a clear and undeniable sign that the global consciousness has shifted. The normalisation of an apartheid state, and the attempts to sanitise or justify its actions, will no longer be tolerated. Ed, there is only one victim here: the Palestinian people.’
Greta Thunberg gestures during a press conference at the COP31 climate conference in Antalya, Turkey
Ms Thunberg sits inside a police van after being arrested by officers in London
Ms Thunberg attended the COP31 UN climate talks on Tuesday, making her first appearance at the event since the 2021 conference in Glasgow, where she went viral after dismissing world leaders’ promises as ‘blah, blah, blah’.
The conference is taking place in the Turkish resort city of Antalya after a year of deadly climate-related disasters, including heatwaves and floods, as well as another energy shock linked to the Iran war.
‘It’s a hypocrisy every year that the host countries are given an opportunity to whitewash themselves, and we know that these negotiations are filled with lobbyists, paid by the very destructive industries which are benefiting from our extremely violent status quo,’ Ms Thunberg said on arrival.
‘Our political and economic systems have become incompatible with human nature.’
COP31 co-hosts Turkey and Australia are promoting renewable energy and rooftop solar installations, although both countries continue to depend heavily on fossil fuels, particularly coal, for electricity generation.
Earlier host nations, including Brazil, the United Arab Emirates and Azerbaijan, are major oil producers.
Climate change is ‘threatening everything’, Ms Thunberg said, warning that ‘everything and everyone we love is at stake’.
‘We should act to protect and benefit people rather than constantly sacrificing the global majority and the very planet we are all living on for a fortunate few to keep making unimaginable profits and maintaining geopolitical power,’ she added.