Aerial view of Kibbutz Kochav Dromi, with newly planted agricultural fields in the foreground

From the Icecap to the Sea

A guest-essay by Langwill Cadwalader
April 1, 2024

In 2010 the first Israeli scientists and technicians founded what eventually became Kibbutz Kochav Dromi. Fourteen years later, the little village they established has grown and prospered, and now boasts a population of 1,251 that includes families with children.

Kochav Dromi (Hebrew for “Southern Star”) is located on the coast of Antarctica just south of the Antarctic Circle, between Zhongshan Station and Davis Station on the shoreline of Prydz Bay, facing the Cooperation Sea. It consists of a small cluster of buildings and structures designed to withstand long months of severe winter weather. Houses and storage buildings are built with reinforced walls, and are partially recessed into the ground to help them retain heat.

Despite the rigors of the climate, the inhabitants of Kochav Dromi follow their daily routines year round. There is a school, a commissary, and a synagogue for worship services. In the warmer months the children are able to engage in sporting activities on a small playing field.

The most remarkable thing about Kibbutz Kochav Dromi is that it is practicing agriculture. Several types of crops are planted and harvested each year during the brief growing season, and the kibbutz hopes to become self-sufficient within the next decade.

When they first landed at the site of Kochav Dromi, the early arrivals found a wasteland of barren scree between the ice dome and the shoreline. In order to be able to farm the land under these inhospitable conditions, scientists contrived to alter the micro-climate in that little portion of Prydz Bay. This was accomplished by injecting genetically modified plankton beneath the ice sheets that lie most of the year between the offshore islands and the mainland. The specially designed plankton have a greatly accelerated rate of metabolism, which raises the temperature of the seawater slightly. In turn, the warmer water allows a dome of mild, moist air to form over the shore, bringing just enough additional heat to permit the planting of crops — notably soybeans, alfalfa, and sorghum — all of them also genetically modified for the short growing season. Eventually the farmers hope to be able to grow enough modified grass so that flocks of sheep and goats may be established.

The determined men and women who established the kibbutz did so in hopes of providing a sanctuary for Jews from all over the world, who now face persecution and violence everywhere outside of Israel, and are increasingly beleaguered in Israel itself. It was hoped that Kibbutz Kochav Dromi would offer a new beginning for Jews, where they would no longer find their lives and well-being constantly threatened.

Unfortunately for the residents of Kochav Dromi, however, those hopes may not be realized. As the kibbutz prospered and grew, hostility to its presence grew concomitantly. Various groups that advocate on behalf of Antarctica, most of them sponsored by Soros-affiliated organizations, have launched protests against the kibbutz in multiple cities in Australia, Europe, and North America. The most prominent of these groups is an organization dedicated to penguins’ rights, the Penguin Protection League (PPL), which is headquartered in Melbourne, with chapters in London, Amsterdam, Rome, Stockholm, Hamburg, New York, and Ottawa. These groups regularly stage demonstrations in front of Israeli embassies and consulates, attracting heavy media coverage. Unruly crowds of protesters may be heard chanting various slogans in unison, among them:

From the icecap to the sea,
Antarctica shall be free!

Advocates for penguins’ rights maintain that penguins have been displaced from their ancestral homeland in the region around Kibbutz Kochav Dromi, and have been forced to resettle in crowded unhygienic refugee areas, where food is less plentiful. Many of them are said to have starved or frozen to death.

Displaced penguins, many of them frozen or starved to death

The PPL chartered a fishing vessel last year and attempted to take their protest to Kibbutz Kochav Dromi itself. However, they encountered pack ice that froze into a sheet unusually early in the season, trapping and holding the boat. The crew issued a distress call, and the PPL passengers had to be rescued by an icebreaker operated by the Australian navy.

Demetrius Niemand, a spokesperson for the PPL, said in a press conference that the group’s activists remain undaunted, and plan to repeat the attempt next year. He told reporters: “If sufficient funds can be raised, the PPL may acquire its own icebreaker.”

The United Nations General Assembly has passed a resolution demanding that the Jews leave Antarctica and return the kibbutz to the indigenous penguins. Enforcement of the UN’s edict is problematic, however, since sovereign ownership of that stretch of the Antarctic coast is still disputed among Norway, Australia, China, and now Israel. To make matters worse, UN member states have squabbled among themselves over which nation will command the enforcement flotilla, putting the operation on indefinite hold.

So, for the time being, Kibbutz Kochav Dromi will remain, planting and harvesting crops during the brief summer and hunkering down indoors during the long, dark, frigid winter.

And slowly growing — more Jews keep arriving from places where they are routinely persecuted, such as Paris, London, Malmö, and Dearborn. In addition, eight babies were born on the kibbutz during the past year. Residents see in them a hope for the future of Jews in Antarctica.