Immense bushfires devouring Australia are raging because "God is embarrassed" by the country's "stupid, dangerous creatures", according to Jeremy Clarkson.
The current Australian bushfire season is the country's worst, with blazes destroying large areas of New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, killing at least 23 people, and burning hundreds of houses to crisp. Temperatures have soared to record highs and the military has been required to evacuate thousands.
As firefighters continue to battle the vast number of infernos, with high winds complicating matters in many areas of the country, Clarkson is putting the blame on God.
The television host - who infamously told climate activist Greta Thunberg to "shut up" and said she was a "spoilt brat" - says he has "suspected for some time" that the big man above "didn't want people to live in Australia".
"He created it as a continent far, far away where he could house all his experiments that had gone wrong," Clarkson wrote in a column for British tabloid The Sun.
The host went on to list several of these "experiments", including the saltwater crocodile, the redback spider, many snakes, and an "otter with a beak" - referencing a platypus.
"He needed a home for all these things, so he made Australia.
"And to make sure people didn’t go there, he put a huge coral reef on the approaches and filled the interior with a sea of sand that goes on for ever."
He said Australia and its experiments went unnoticed for years until Captain James Cook came along and "now the world knows all about Oz and its stupid, dangerous creatures".
"Plainly, God is embarrassed. Because he's decided to set fire to it."
Clarkson said people were blaming climate change for fires, but he believes something "biblical" is happening, with skies turning to red.
The host called for people in Australia to return to Britain as "Australia isn't meant for human habitation".
The column has been slammed by many, who called it out of touch.
"What an unscrupulous and grubby attempt at relevancy by an utterly out of touch tosser," said one Twitter user.
"The absolute state of this Jeremy Clarkson piece in The Sun, in which he invites Australian citizens to ‘please come home’ to Europe. Hope he’s donating that fee of his to the RFS," said another.
"Wow, very classy Jeremy Clarkson, especially when people are dying and losing their homes. Champagne comedy, mate."
