On Ari Fuld’s loss and Palestinian incitement to kill.

Last Sunday, 16 September, a 17-year old Palestinian high-school student stabbed to death a 45-year old father of four who was shopping for groceries at Gush Etzion, south of Bethlehem.

The father was Ari Fuld, an American Jew who had immigrated to Israel in 1994 and held dual nationality, living in the nearby settlement of Efrat.

In spite of his fatal wound, he prevented his assailant from then attacking the female shop assistant, saving her life by shooting and wounding the youth.

The young attacker, Khalil Jabarin, is from the village of Yatta, some five miles south of Hebron and is receiving treatment in Israel’s Hadassah hospital in Ein Kerem. His father had informed Palestinian authorities that he was missing following an argument about skipping school, whilst his mother had notified Israeli authorities of her fears that he was intent on making an attack somewhere.¹

The Fulds and the Jabarins. Just two of many devastated families in the ‘Land of Promise’.

Incitement with Money and Lies

Such attacks are encouraged by the long-term policy of the ‘cash-strapped’ Palestinian Authority of rewarding families of injured or killed perpetrators of violence (otherwise known as ‘martyrs’) with substantial sums. In this case, the Jabarin family is eligible for some £2,500.²

But the situation is also made far worse by incitement to violence from Palestinian leaders and media, wielding claims about Palestinian ‘heritage’ and Israeli ‘occupation’ that are blatant lies. Let’s consider this in more depth.

Such attacks are encouraged not only by the ‘pay-to-slay’ policy of the PA – but also by inciteful lies from Palestinian leaders and media.

‘Al-Aqsa Intifada’

Shortly after Sunday’s attack, Palestinian media claimed that it had been carried out in defence of Al-Aqsa. According to the news agency Donia al-Watan, Ari Fuld’s murder “is a response to warnings regarding the danger of what the occupation is currently doing, and what it intends to do at the Al-Aqsa Mosque.”³ What, you may ask, was the connection with Al-Aqsa?

To understand this, we need some background. The so-called ‘Al-Aqsa Intifada’ began in 2015. Between 1 October and 31 December of that year there were 88 stabbings, 32 shootings and 14 car-ramming attacks. Allegedly ‘spontaneous’, it was accompanied by vicious incitement. In early October a Palestinian Member of the Knesset, Haneen Zoabi, had written in the Hamas-affiliated newspaper al-Resalah,

Hundreds of thousands of worshippers should go up to al-Aqsa in order to face down an Israeli plot for the blood of East Jerusalem residents. Today there are actions only by individuals, and what is needed is popular support. If only individual attacks continue without popular support, they will sputter out within a few days. Therefore the outpouring of thousands of our people will make these events a real intifada.⁴

On 9 October, in a sermon at Friday prayers in Rafah (Gaza) which was streamed online, imam Sheikh Muhammad Sallah called on Palestinians in East Jerusalem and the West Bank to “attack in threes and fours…cut them into body parts…stab the myths about the Temple in their hearts!”⁵

Around the same time, a slew of posts appeared on social media praising attacks and providing advice for how to make them effective. One Gazan, using the hashtag #Stab, posted an anatomical chart on Facebook showing which parts of the body to aim for. Using the hashtag #SlaughteringtheJews, another user posted a message addressed to "our brethren in the West Bank and all of Palestine" who wish to kill "pigs" (an Islamic epithet for Jews) in the quickest possible manner, including graphic advice.⁶

The official PA daily al-Hayat al-Jadida has acknowledged that in the first year alone of that intifada “250 [Palestinian] civilians died as Shahids [martyrs], 161 of them while carrying out stabbing operations against the occupation's soldiers and its settlers” (my emphasis).⁷

The allegedly ‘spontaneous’ Al-Aqsa Intifada has been accompanied by vicious incitement since it began in 2015.

False Claims of Excavation

This year, although the casualty rate is much lower, the Islamic rhetoric has been ramping up again.

In July a member of the Islamic Waqf in Jerusalem said on the Palestinian Authority’s official TV channel, "The blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque has no foundations now...Al-Aqsa is now empty of the rocks and that which supports it, due to the Israeli machine that is excavating under it, as rats burrow under the ground only for evil and destruction."⁸

This is pure fabrication – the only excavators of the Temple Mount since 1967 have been Muslims! Yet, a few days later, this was broadcast on PA TV:

The Fatah Movement emphasized that Israel has prepared a plan - and began carrying it out a while ago - to destroy the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque through the ongoing excavations underneath the mosque…[and] that the Al-Aqsa Mosque – above ground, under it, and around it - is a completely Islamic site to which the Jews have no right.⁹

Muslim worshippers during Ramadan, earlier this year. See Photo Credits.The provocative nature of these and many more such statements is recognised by Samir Awad, a political scientist at Bir Zeit University north of Ramallah:

Al-Aksa is a place heavily charged with emotions, people are willing to die for it and become martyrs going to heaven. A lot of Palestinians feel they are defending al-Aksa on behalf of all Muslims. Palestinians consider al-Aksa the gem of their future state. It signifies Palestine itself.¹⁰

Denying History

Denial of the existence of a Jewish Temple is an essential part of the ‘Palestinian narrative’. For example, Mahmoud Abbas said in 2000:

[The Jews] demand that we forget what happened 50 years ago to the refugees – and I speak as a living, breathing refugee – while at the same time they claim that 2000 years ago they had a temple. I challenge the assertion that this is so. But even if it is so, we do not accept it, because it is not logical for someone who wants a practical peace.¹¹

Denial of the existence of a Jewish Temple is an essential part of the ‘Palestinian narrative’.

So much for ‘logic’! Speaking to a journalist at Die Welt in 2001, Sheikh Ikrima Sabri (then Grand Mufti of Jerusalem), said,

There is not the smallest indication of the existence of a Jewish Temple on this place in the past. In the whole city, there is not even a single stone indicating Jewish history…¹²

To make such statements is not only a denial of Jewish history and archaeology, but of Islamic history! The Brief Guide to the Al-Haram Al-Sharif, published in 1924 by the Supreme Muslim Council of Jerusalem, freely states, “Its identity with the site of Solomon’s Temple is beyond dispute”, even quoting 2 Samuel 24:25. Much longer ago, Islamic historians and writers such as Abu Jafar Muhammad al-Tabari (9^th Century),¹³ Muhammad ibn Ahmad Shams al-Din al-Muqaddasi (10^th Century)¹⁴ and Nasir-I Khusraw (11^th Century)¹⁵ all acknowledged the same.

Western Perspective Change

In the West, there is still no official recognition of the ongoing anti-historical brainwashing and anti-Semitic incitement in the disputed territories, especially of young Palestinians, deceiving them into committing atrocities against ordinary Jewish people such as Ari Fuld.

Whether or not Jabarin was acting out of genuine concern for Al-Aqsa, as Palestinian media claim, the claim itself should not go unnoticed as yet another instance of incitement.

When 28-year-old American Taylor Force was stabbed to death in Tel Aviv in 2016, also as part of the Al-Aqsa Intifada, the issue of ‘martyrdom’ payments gained widespread media and political exposure in the US, with direct consequences for US-Palestinian diplomatic relations and for PA funding.

In this extraordinary window in international politics, is it too much to pray that blind eyes in Western politics and Church life would also be opened regarding the vicious incitement to violence coming from Palestinian leaders and media? At root it is all part of an intense spiritual battle against God, his covenant People and Land, but if ever there was a time when a change of perspective in the West was possible, it is now.

In the West Bank, the best hope for Palestinian youths is that Almighty God would grant them access to the truth before they reach for a knife. Surely our prayers for “the peace of Jerusalem” should be oriented in these ways.

Postscript: As the latest example of the perversion of truth in Palestinian youth, readers are advised to read about Ahed Tamimi's media tour and compare it with an interview broadcast on Russian TV, translated by Palestinian Media Watch here.

Also recommended:

• This 2-minute video from Boomerang on Palestinian indoctrination of children.
• Melanie Phillips’ recent article for the Jewish News Syndicate about the Western media’s excusal of Ari’s murder and general complicity in Palestinian violence.

References

1 Terrorist’s parents say they alerted PA, Israel before deadly stabbing of Fuld. Times of Israel, 16 September 2018.

2 PA hasn’t yet paid family of terrorist who killed Fuld, but they’ll be eligible. Times of Israel, 19 September 2018.

3 Translation by Palestinian Media Watch.

4 Eldar, S. Bibi blames everyone but himself for recent violence. Al-Monitor, 12 October 2015.

5 Gaza cleric calls on Palestinians to stab Jews, ‘cut them into body parts’. Times of Israel, 12 October 2015.

6 Social Media As A Platform For Palestinian Incitement – Part II: Video Tutorials, Tips For Achieving More 'Effective' Attacks. MEMRI Special Dispatch No.6186, 14 October 2015.

7 Marcus, I and Zilberdik, NJ. Official PA daily admits 161 Palestinians did carry out stabbing attacks during Palestinian terror wave 2015-2016. PMW Bulletin, 6 February 2018.

8 See note 3.

9 Ibid.

10 Lynfield, B. Is the ‘stabbing intifada’ back? Jerusalem Post, 23 July 2018.

11 In Kul Al-Arab on 2 August. Hollander, R. The Battle Over Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. CAMERA, 26 March 2010.

12 Ibid.

13 Friedmann, Y, 1992. The History of al-Tabari: Volume XII, The Battle of al-Qadisiyyah and the Conquest of Syria and Palestine. NY: State University of New York Press, p195.

14 Jerusalem mufti: Temple Mount never housed Jewish Temple. Times of Israel, 25 October 2015.

15 Nasir i-Khusrau, Diary of a Journey Through Syria and Palestine. Translated and prefaced by Guy Le Strange. London: Palestine Pilgrims' Text Society, 1893.

‘There is no occupation', Arab pastor tells shocked young tourists

An international group of millennials have seen the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a new light after engaging with both sides – and being shocked by what they discovered.

A party of 11 young people from seven nations were brought together for the chance to understand issues from the point of view of those living there.

They were deliberately not primed to view things from any particular perspective in order to allow them to form their own conclusions through interviews and talks with representatives of both Israelis and Palestinians.

Their three-week trip was recorded on film for a feature-length documentary called Quest 4 Truth, now available on YouTube.

It was produced by Generation 2 Generation, a UK-based organisation founded by Andrew, Daniella and Daphne Kirk committed to inspiring the next generation with an uncompromising passion for Jesus and the Gospel.

Impact of Social Media

The group – from Germany, the USA, the UK, Norway, Japan, Brazil and South Africa – were introduced to community leaders in the Palestinian territories as well as in Israel itself.

Not surprisingly, most of them are strongly influenced by social media which generally portrays a narrative of Israel as big bullies of an oppressed people. Media bias had shaped their perception of the conflict, and they were profoundly shocked to discover that the truth was very different.

“I’ve been lied to,” said one. “You realise how false these stories are,” said another.

The Deputy Mayor of Bethlehem, Essam Juha, was forced to explain why a swastika was inscribed into the fabric of the hotel where they met him. He said it was because Israel had humiliated nations in the same way they had been treated.

“It was so hard for me to keep a straight face”, said Marlea, from New Orleans. “How dare they make that comparison [with the Holocaust]?”

Media bias had shaped the millennials’ perception of the conflict, and they were profoundly shocked to discover that the truth was very different.

After hearing how Palestinians see the Israelis as occupiers of their land, they were taken aback by the response of Arab pastor Naim Khoury, who asked: “What occupation?” And as he turned towards the windows, he added: “Where is the occupation? We are completely under the Palestinian Authority.”

The point was further brought home by a member of the group, who observed: “I have not seen one IDF [Israeli Defence Force] soldier, or Israeli flag.”

They also learnt that the throwing of rocks – and even Molotov cocktails – at Israeli soldiers is seen by Fatah, the PA’s ruling party, as non-violent activity.

Visiting ‘the Wall’

A further learning curve involved meeting Col Danny Tirza, architect of Israel’s notorious security barrier built to keep out terrorists, who said he wanted to be the first to begin taking it down when peace finally came. But in the meantime the murder rate from terrorism had been cut by 90%.

He said that those whose land had been split by the wall – only five per cent of which is concrete, the rest being a much more discreet wire fence – are offered compensation, but refuse to accept it for fear of being labelled collaborators.

Graffiti on the wall betrays the true ambition of Palestinian agitators, with a map showing all of geographical Israel as theirs. They have no wish to share the land, or establish a state beside Israel. They want all of it.

As historian Dr Michael Brown put it: “If the Palestinians put down their weapons there’d be no more war; if Israel put down their weapons, there’d be no more Israel.”

An ex-IDF soldier said: “They use our moral standards against us.” As an example, he explained how a terrorist suspect fled to a crowded residential area, knowing they wouldn’t open fire if civilians were at risk. And when the military had the place surrounded, the fugitive duly appeared on the roof in a bid to escape, at which point they shot him in the leg. But while supporting medics were bandaging him up, the soldiers were pelted with huge rocks. Israelis risk death because of the great value they place on life.

Israelis risk death because of the great value they place on life.

The youngsters hear from Israeli-supporting Stand with Us representative Shevy Kass on a visit to Sderot.Evidence of Apartheid?

Further observations on the Palestinians included – “They are victims of their own hatred” and “They are suffering a lot because of radical people in their community.”

In the southern city of Sderot, meanwhile, a rocket-proof playground has had to be built for children so that when sirens warn of regular incoming missiles from Hamas in nearby Gaza, the kids have an immediate bolt-hole.

The group also visited Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Holocaust museum where a tearful young British woman, Megan, was visibly shocked by the way her country – in charge of the region then known as Palestine – closed the doors to Jews trying to escape Nazi-occupied Europe. And on the question of Israel practising apartheid – a charge widely disseminated by the liberal left – she added: “I haven’t seen any evidence of it.”

Dr Brown emphasised the need for Israel’s self-defence by saying that anti-Semitism levels are as high now as they were immediately before the Holocaust. A Brazilian member added: “I believe the biggest reason for anti-Semitism is lack of knowledge.” And a German youth said: “The greatest enemy of anti-Semitism is the truth.”

Watch the full documentary by clicking here (Christian version) or here (non-Christian version).

Prince William’s vehicle stoned by children taught to hate

As support for the Palestinian cause drops even in the Arab world, news that Australia has cut a $7 million ‘lifeline’ to a PLO death-cult is welcome indeed. Maybe it’s also time for Britain to get real – especially in the wake of the barely reported stoning of Prince William’s vehicle – and acknowledge the need to stop encouraging terror with taxpayers’ money.

Australia has decided to discontinue direct aid to the Palestinian Authority because it suspects the cash is freeing up funds used to back political violence.¹ And we have recently learnt that the UK gave £20 million in aid to Palestinian schools, where they teach children to hate Jews and Jihad (holy war) and martyrdom.²

Learning to Kill

A report by the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education reveals that the PA school curriculum “utilizes a variety of tools to convince children – mostly boys – to risk their lives and die as martyrs”.

The UK has given £20 million in aid to Paestinian schools, where children are taught to hate Jews.

It goes on to highlight some of the lessons being funded by British aid. For example, a science textbook explains Newton’s second law of physics – on power, mass and tensile strength – by using an image of a boy with a slingshot targeting soldiers.

Meanwhile jihadists continue their desperate attempts to engage Western sympathy by stoking up further flames in Gaza, sending burning kites to destroy Israeli crops while also trying to force their way through the border fence in order to kill Jews.

Arab Leaders Losing Patience with PalestiniansJerusalem

The Saudi Crown Prince and heir to the throne indicated something of current Arab frustration with the Palestinians by saying that it was about time they accepted offers of peace and agreed to come to the negotiating table “or they should shut up and stop complaining.”³ Mohammed bin Salman, during a meeting with American Jewish community leaders, stressed: “There are much more urgent and more important issues to deal with – such as Iran.”

Clearly, the riots in Gaza are designed to provoke Israel to war, which would inevitably draw further criticism of the Jewish state for what the world is expected to regard as disproportionate response. And this would in turn elicit fresh sympathy for the Hamas intention of destroying Israel.

PLO Support Crumbling

But as a 46-year-old Palestinian put it: “Most people want nothing to do with the riots at the border fence. Hamas does not care how many Palestinians perish. What’s important to them is that the media continues to cover it.”⁴

Bassem Eid, a Jerusalem-based Palestinian and political analyst, speaks from experience when he says that Israel “was the only nation that had given us a chance of a better life. In my opinion, the Palestinian cause has nearly reached its conclusion…I am calling on my Palestinian colleagues to wake up to the truth. The time has come for us to value life over death.”⁵

Some Palestinians are bravely speaking the truth and calling on their colleagues to wake up to it.

United Nations Blamed

Col Richard Kemp, a former British Army commander, laid the blame for Gaza bloodshed squarely with the United Nations when he addressed that body in May, saying: “Your failure to admit that Hamas is responsible for every drop of blood spilt on the Gaza border encourages their violence and use of human shields. It makes you complicit in further bloodshed.”⁶

The self-inflicted wounding of Palestinian aspirations – caused by stubbornness to recognise Israel’s right to exist – will no doubt be reflected in President Trump’s much-heralded peace deal.

Prince William’s Car Stoned

The stoning of Prince William’s vehicle during his visit to PA headquarters in Ramallah may perhaps jolt British officials into some sense of reality. The children responsible for the outrage are taught to hate Jews and to blame Britain for handing ‘their’ country over to ‘infidels’ (non-Muslims).

Britain has consistently been a soft touch for Arab terror – riots and threats of mayhem have led successive Governments to capitulate to pressure and deny justice to Israel in the process. But a first-ever official visit to Israel of a British royal is surely time to repent of reneging on our Balfour⁷ policy of supporting the Jews, which brought blessing upon our nation (Gen 12:3).

Britain has consistently been a soft touch for Arab terror.

The Prince Promises Support

During his tour Prince William told the story of how his great-grandmother Princess Alice selflessly saved members of the Cohen family from the Nazis. He said it was “a matter of great pride” for his whole family. And after being horrified at what he witnessed during his visit to Jerusalem’s Yad Vashem Holocaust museum, he said: “I am well aware that the responsibility falls now to my generation to keep the memory alive of that great crime as the Holocaust generation passes on. And I commit myself to doing this.”⁸

Israel is currently surrounded by implacable enemies committed to condemning them to another Holocaust. It’s not just a memory we need to keep alive – it’s also today’s Jewish people who are under increasing threat from anti-Semitism. We need to wake up as a nation and pray for the peace of Jerusalem, as the Word of God commands us (Ps 122:6).

References

1 World Israel News, 2 July 2018
2 Torch magazine, Christians United for Israel, June 2018
3 Israel Today magazine, June 2018
4 Ibid
5 Ibid
6 Torch magazine, June 2018
7 Balfour Declaration of 1917 through which Britain promised to do all in its power to create a homeland for the Jewish people
8 Jerusalem News Network, 28 June 2018

Britain and the West succumbs to brainwashing on an unprecedented scale

We are currently witnessing a worldwide battle of the ages between truth and lies. And in recent days much of this has been focused on Israel – specifically at a conference in Jerusalem called GAFCON and on the northern borders of the Gaza Strip.

At the Global Anglican Future Conference, attended by nearly 2,000 Anglican leaders from around the world, a British evangelist warned of the Holy Spirit departing from the traditional Anglican Church if it continued to despise the authority of Scripture.

Rico Tice was giving an interview at the third such convocation of this body since its inception ten years ago for the purpose of maintaining the truth of the Gospel in the face of growing apostasy, including support for same-sex relationships.

Another Battle

Not many miles away, on the borders of Gaza, another battle for truth is being waged as the media is largely determined to spew out lies and propaganda in support of the Palestinian narrative.

It was reported that Israeli soldiers had killed a baby caught up in the riots over the alleged right of Palestinian refugees to return to Israel. But it later emerged that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar had paid a Gazan family to lie about eight-month-old Leila al-Ghandour dying from tear gas inhalation rather than from a pre-existing medical condition.¹

The Global Anglican Future Conference was set up ten years ago to maintain the truth of the Gospel in the face of growing apostasy.

Readers may well wonder how Palestinians, or anyone else, can get away with so much deceit. But as Israel Today journalist Ryan Jones puts it, “many, if not most, Palestinians have no problem telling bald-faced lies in order to smear Israel and advance their own nationalist agenda. This is because Muslims are permitted to lie to ‘infidels’ in service to Islamic causes, a concept known as taqiyya”.²

The Prophet Isaiah spoke of such wickedness when he wrote: “…Justice is driven back and righteousness stands at a distance; truth has stumbled in the streets, honesty cannot enter. Truth is nowhere to be found, and whoever shuns evil becomes a prey” (Isa 59:14f).

Heading Towards a Sterile World

What a shoddy business. And the same people who are so ready to condemn Israel for defending her right to exist are engaged in the wicked brainwashing of Western nations on an unprecedented scale into believing that same-sex relationships are perfectly normal.

LGBTQ+ supporters in Australia.Nazi Germany’s lies about the Jews led to the systematic murder of six million people. With few exceptions, the German people blithely accepted the doctrine that Jews were a cause of all their economic and other problems, partly due to the intimidating nature of rule under the Third Reich. It was a doctrine, much like today’s new teaching on sexual ethics, that brooked no dissent, with the result that those who objected often paid with their lives.

Today, going along with the gay agenda is seen by most as the only way to maintain respectability and acceptance in social circles. This is why, in Australia, where they held a referendum on the issue, same-sex won the day. But if all those who voted for it practised what they preached, that great southern continent would soon become extinct!

The 1930s propaganda of Josef Goebbels seeped through the German national consciousness, almost without a whimper of opposition, just as the same-sex issue has done in Britain and the West where the general populace is bombarded with stories and images on national television and elsewhere glamourising, justifying and sanctioning homosexual behaviour.

Same-sex propaganda has seeped through British national consciousness, as the general populace has been bombarded with stories and images glamourising, justifying and sanctioning homosexual behaviour.

And even our church leaders have succumbed to it, undermining the authority of God’s word in the cause of breaking down boundaries of decency and propriety that have underpinned our civilisation for centuries. We are fast heading for a sterile world where the traditional family is a thing of the past and where the future holds little hope.

Hopefully the world will soon wake up in shock at the devastation it has caused, and no-one will be able to say they didn’t know what was going on.

A Different Religion

At GAFCON, meanwhile, Rico Tice, a gifted evangelist on the staff of All Souls, Langham Place, and co-author of the much-acclaimed Christianity Explored course, revealed he had resigned from the Archbishops’ Evangelism Task Group because it meant having to submit to the authority of a Bishop – Rt Rev Paul Bayes of Liverpool – who validates same-sex.

“It’s a different religion”, he said, adding: “I think it’s a great wickedness to tell people who are on the road to destruction that they are not.”³

He went on: “There is no power in evangelism unless you’re submitted to Scripture.” And he suggested that God would remove his power from the institutional Church, as he did in the days of John Wesley, if there was no repentance.

He admitted that the problem had been compounded by Christians who have changed their position for emotional reasons because family members had turned gay.

The Truth Brings Freedom and Peace

Meanwhile the Archbishop of Uganda has threatened to boycott future meetings called by the Archbishop of Canterbury. Stanley Ntangali said:

Unless godly order is restored in the Anglican Communion, we shall not attend other meetings invited by Canterbury…The church of Uganda is an evangelical church, and we obey Christ and the authority of the Bible, and the apostolic faith. So we have no apology for the stand we have made and will continue to proclaim the gospel of Christ to the nations, uncompromisingly.⁴

The conference has written a Letter to the Churches challenging the Archbishop of Canterbury to speak the truth about the Gospel and human sexuality clearly and publicly and to discipline those within the Anglican Communion who have abandoned it.

In a similar way, lies about Gaza stir up trouble and strife in the Middle East which could erupt into a major war. Lies destroy society whereas truth brings freedom and peace, both among families and the wider world. Spreading lies about human sexuality could well cause as much, if not more, damage to the world at large than the tendency for Arabs to be economical with the truth.

Lies destroy society whereas truth brings freedom and peace, both among families and the wider world.

Appeasement Will Not Succeed

Prince William, on his tour of Israel, will hopefully have learnt from his visit to the Holocaust Museum that the anti-Semitism displayed by Palestinian Authority politicians has all the hallmarks of another attempt at genocide. After all, that is the oft-stated aim of Israel’s opponents.

The Prince’s great-grandmother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, took sides in a previous conflict by hiding Jews who would otherwise have been murdered by the Nazis. Will the British Foreign Office allow him to take sides when Jews, now living in their own land, are equally threatened?

He says he wants peace – most of us do – but Neville Chamberlain’s experience should be a lesson to us all.

Notes

1 Jerusalem News Network, 22 June 2018, quoting Ynet News.

2 A Nation Reborn, Charles Gardner (Christian Publications International), p93.

3 Christian Concern, 19 June 2018. Click here to watch the full interview.

4 Ibid.

Our second excerpt from Sandra Teplinsky's ‘Why Still Care About Israel?’

Palestinian Injustice

A sad reality is that the War of Independence was not fought without collateral damage to both Palestinian and Jewish civilians. For the sake of perspective, no war can be fought without collateral damage - and in this instance, there would not have been a war if the Arabs had not insisted on starting one. Nevertheless, some Arab families and villages were wrongly expelled or inexcusably overrun by Jewish soldiers.^q In at least one such raid at Deir Yassin, genuinely innocent victims were massacred.³¹ Upon learning of the sordid event, Israel denounced it and sought to compensate the victims.^r

The Palestinian narrative claims that since 1948, Israel has stolen or destroyed over four hundred Arab villages. This figure, based on a recently created map of dubious veracity, cannot be objectively verified. Israeli historians point out that many Arab families who were forced to leave their homes did not actually own the lands or homes they left. Some were long-term renters - for generations - of lands sold legally, but without their knowledge, to the Jews.^s

Moreover - and without diminishing the loss some Arabs have suffered - a large Palestinian state (Jordan) existed just across the border. Those who might be displaced were expected to seek refuge there, just as 800,000 Jewish refugees were forced to leave their homes and wealth behind and relocate to Israel.^t (More on this momentarily.)

No war can be fought without collateral damage - and in 1948, there would not have been a war if the Arabs had not insisted on starting one.

Lacking objective documentation of their plight, Palestinians have amassed global sympathies through a narrative that inverts history.^u Many share tragic personal tales - that prove either unverifiable or outrageously embellished.^v Their stories tend either to romanticize Arab tribal-village life or misrepresent it as a bustling society.^w Sadly, some of these accounts are presented by Christians as honest-to-God facts. Their pitiable tales tug at the heartstrings of any hearer. It’s their personal story, we reason. How can it not be true - and how can we not be deeply moved? Emotions are stirred, then inflamed - against Israel. Gradually, hearts are hardened against the Jewish people and what God is doing with them today.

Jesus loves and died for the Palestinian people: He does not want us to disparage them. We must compassionately acknowledge their suffering and seek a right response to it. But even genuine suffering must be viewed in context to rightly ascertain truth and transform realities justly.

Palestinian - and Jewish - Refugees

Palestinians were not the only refugees to result from the War of Independence. According to official UN figures, over 800,000 Jewish refugees were forced to flee homes and lands in North Africa and the Middle East where they had lived for generations.³² Unlike some Palestinians, they were in no sense “voluntary refugees”. Jews were expelled, stripped of citizenship or both in retaliation for Israel’s declaration of statehood. Arab nations have persistently refused to compensate these refugees for their confiscated properties, valued today at billions of dollars.³³

Meanwhile, during the War of Independence, unincorporated areas proposed by the Partition Plan for a second Palestinian Arab state were illegally annexed and occupied - not by Israel but by Jordan and Egypt. Jordan seized Judea and Samaria, including East Jerusalem, while Egypt staked claim to Gaza.

Now, the Arabs’ publicly stated goal for the war had been to liberate Palestine. But neither Jordan nor Egypt ever gave the territories they annexed back to the Palestinians to liberate them. Instead, the latter were compelled - by their own brethren - to stay put indefinitely in refugee camp limbo.^x Why? you may ask. They would not talk about it; let me explain.

Lacking objective documentation of their plight, Palestinians have amassed global sympathies through a narrative that inverts history.

Israel began offering, as early as 1949, to negotiate for the refugees’ return - and full repatriation - back into the Jewish state. But no Arab leader was willing to negotiate with the Jews. Transacting with Israel, they said, would involve an implicit recognition of her existence. This they had vowed never to do.³⁴ Further, by refusing either to negotiate for the refugees’ return or to absorb them themselves, they could continue the war against Israel in the political realm.^y This they had vowed never to cease doing.

Children in Jabalia refugee camp, Gaza. See Photo Credits.In 1949 the UN established a relief fund (United Nations Relief and Works Agency or UNRWA) to provide for the refugees’ basic needs. Soon thereafter, UNRWA acceded to Arab demands to grant refugee status - for the first time in history - not only to those who fled but to their descendants, indefinitely. This redefinition of “refugee” guaranteed the Palestinian population would dramatically increase over time.³⁵ By 2013, of an estimated Palestinian population of five million, only 30,000 - or approximately half of 1 percent - actually ever left a home in Israel.³⁶

Meanwhile, many billions of dollars have been given to Palestinians by Israel and other nations to provide for their “basic needs”.^z At this writing, UNRWA remains the largest employer in the West Bank, with thousands of Palestinians on its payroll and, according to some, padding the personal fortunes of Palestinian leaders.³⁷

Former UNRWA director Ralph Galloway concluded early on:

The Arab States do not want to solve the refugee problem. They want to keep it as an open sore…as a weapon against Israel. Arab leaders don’t give a damn whether the refugees live or die.³⁸

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu similarly noted:

The consistent refusal of Arab leaders to solve this problem is particularly tragic because it would have been so easy to do…That the fifty million Arabs In 1948 could not absorb 650,000 Arab refugees - and have not finished the job even after half a century, and even after the fantastic multiplication of their oil wealth - is an indication of [how] the Arabs have manipulated the refugee issue to create reasons for world censure of Israel.³⁹

Of the situation an Arab American journalist comments:

What are the real roots of this [Palestiman-Israeli] conflict?...That Palestinians want a homeland and Muslims want control over sites they consider holy?...These two demands are nothing more than strategic deceptions. propaganda ploys. They are nothing more than phony excuses and rationalizations for the terrorism and murdering of Jews. The real goal of those making these demands is the destruction of the State of Israel.⁴⁰

Israel began offering, as early as 1949, to negotiate for the refugees’ return - and full repatriation - back into the Jewish state. But no Arab leader was willing to negotiate.

Palestinian Statehood and the Phased Plan

In 1964, Yasser Arafat assumed leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), a terror group with the stated purpose to liberate all of Palestine. It was not, however, created to liberate the West Bank and Gaza; this was never the “Palestine” to which it referred. Recall that in 1964, Gaza still belonged to Egypt and the West Bank was governed by Jordan. Since 1964 the Palestinian agenda has been to liberate a Palestine that includes, by definition, every square inch of land between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River - that is, all of Israel.^{41 aa}

Shortly after the PLO published its goals, Israel fought for her life in the Six Day War of 1967. To the world’s surprise, she defensively acquired Gaza from Egypt and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, from Jordan. Then, in 1973, Egypt and Syria launched another unprovoked attack, the Yom Kippur War. Again Israel prevailed. As a result of these mounting Arab defeats, the PLO announced its “Phased Plan” the following year. The Phased Plan has never been revoked and still represents Islamist/Arab/Palestinian strategy today.

The Phased Plan refers to the slightly revised goal of liberating Palestine not all at once, but in stages. Phase One is the establishment of an independent, combatant national authority consisting of Gaza and the West Bank. This was to a large degree accomplished by developing the PLO into the PA and by Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza. Phase Two is the reconfiguration of Gaza and the West Bank into launching pads for provoking an all-out regional war, in which Israel is wiped off the map.⁴²

This is to be accomplished by military operations, lawfare diplomacy, cyberattack or any combination thereof.

On the Occupation

When Israel pushed back her attackers in the Six Day War and gained Gaza and the West Bank, she acquired land that had been originally allotted to her in 1920. By 1967, however, the areas were inhabited by over a million Jew-hating Palestinians and angry insurgents.⁴³ Israel had no desire to “rule over” them.⁴⁴

The Six Day War ended with UN Security Council Resolution 242, a truce that purposefully did not define borders. Resolution 242 authorized Israel to remain in possession of newly acquired territories until peace was established and final borders secured. It was meticulously and explicitly worded so that Israel would not be forced to withdraw from all the newly acquired territories, back to the boundary lines from which she had just been attacked.⁴⁵

When Israel pushed back her attackers in the Six Day War and gained Gaza and the West Bank, she acquired land that had been originally allotted to her in 1920.

Those boundaries, the 1949 armistice lines ending the War of Independence, were never meant to be permanent. Nor were they intended to substitute for negotiations to determine final borders. In less than twenty years, the lines had proved indefensible,^{46 bb} leaving the middle and most populous section of the country only nine miles wide. With Palestinians having shown themselves unwilling or unable to make peace, some Israeli leaders have termed the 1949 lines “Auschwitz Borders”, referring to a notorious Nazi death camp. Nevertheless, by 2011 the international community would euphemistically call them “pre-1967 borders” and urge Israel to retreat to them - with no enforceable guarantee of peace in return.

After the Six Day War, Egypt and Jordan eventually signed peace treaties with Israel. These nations refused, however, to take back either Gaza or the West Bank. Reclaiming these territories would have betrayed the pan-Arab plan, notoriously reaffirmed after the war,⁴⁷ to leave in place a local population to help destroy Israel. As a result, Gaza and the West Bank remained in a state of perpetual war with Israel, ruled by the increasingly militant PLO. That being the case, Israel was authorized by international law to administratively govern the territories, with quasi-military powers of enforcement, until peace could be achieved. The administration of law and order in a hostile, enemy population in such circumstances is called an occupation.

Some Israelis say, however, that they have not occupied any of these areas because the land rightfully belongs to them under customary international law. Customary international law refers to the body of international law and policy that Western nations have traditionally practiced and followed.

In either case, Israel’s quasi-military administration known as the “occupation” is not illegal. The term “illegal occupation” is a pejorative mischaracterization, intended to conjure up images of oppression and abuse. Admittedly, Israel has not always acted fairly or justly during the difficult course of governing people dedicated to her demise. But to brand her lawful jurisdiction “illegal” or “oppressive” obscures the reality that if Palestinians sincerely accepted Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, the war and the occupation would be history. Allow me to explain.

Peace Negotiations

In 1993, the PLO morphed into the Palestinian Authority under an agreement called the Oslo Accords. At that time Palestinians gained the right to negotiate peace with Israel for themselves.^cc Sadly, rather than pursue a peaceful coexistence alongside Israel, history records how they proliferated terror instead.

Nevertheless, in 2000, Israel offered the Palestinians full sovereignty over 95 percent of the disputed territories, including East Jerusalem, with secured geographic contiguity. There was virtually nothing left for the Jews to give away. But the Palestinians said no. Offering no counterproposal to the offer, they literally walked out on negotiations⁴⁸ and immediately launched a violent intifada (“uprising”) of deadly terror lasting several years.^dd US Middle East envoy Dennis Ross, who was present, said the Palestinians’ main objection was the insertion of one critical clause in the agreement: “This is the end of the conflict."^{49 ee} The Palestinians could not end the conflict with anything less than ending Israel.^ff

In 1993, the Palestinians gained the right to negotiate peace with Israel for themselves – but rather than pursue this, they proliferated terror instead.

Yasser Arafat, who signed the Oslo Accords and walked out on the offer of a sovereign state, said (in Arabic): “I do not consider the [Oslo] agreement any more than the agreement which was signed by our prophet Muhammad and the Qurayish.”⁵⁰ Arafat referred to an agreement that established the right, called hudna, for Muslims to fake peace when they are weak so they can wait for better timing to fight when they are strong.^gg Thus an Arab saying goes like this: “When your enemy is strong, kiss his hand and pray that it will be broken one day.”⁵¹

Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs Shimon Peres signs the Oslo Accords outside the White House, alongside PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat. See Photo Credits.Faisal Husseini, a moderate Palestinian leader, compared the whole peace process to a proverbial “Trojan horse”.⁵² From the Arab perspective, it had been designed to fool Israel into letting the Palestinians arm themselves in order to destroy it. Said Husseini, “If you are asking me as a pan-Arab nationalist what are the Palestinian borders according to the higher strategy, I will immediately reply, from the [Jordan] river to the [Mediterranean] sea.”⁵³

Perhaps that would explain why, in 2008, when Israel offered Palestinians 93 percent of the territory they desired - including 98 percent of the West Bank - they again said no.⁵⁴ And why, in 2009, PA leaders said they would resume negotiations on the pre-condition that Israel stop all settlement construction - but still refused to talk when Israel complied with their demand. After that, with one perceived betrayal following another, Israelis were not so willing to believe Palestinians were sincere about peace.^hh

In 2011, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu tried to restart peace talks and pleaded at the UN with PA President Abbas to meet face-to-face, without preconditions. Abbas refused, demanding that Israel first agree to an expanded list of preconditions.ⁱⁱ Under the Oslo Accords and other agreements, however, these preconditions were in fact supposed to be the subject of the negotiations. By agreeing to all the preconditions first, there would be very little left to negotiate. So Netanyahu replied with one precondition of his own. He demanded that Palestinians recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state. If the PA would agree to the one precondition, Israel would agree to their whole list of them. But the Palestinians refused.^jj

In 2012, Palestinians sidestepped negotiations, and thus breached the Oslo Accords, by seeking to forge a path for statehood in the UN. At the same time, they launched a war from Gaza and a terror wave in the West Bank. In 2013, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon commented on the situation:

This is our history: Every time a proposal was raised to partition the land, the other side started a war. Every time we expressed willingness to give up territory, terror rose to new heights.⁵⁵

In 2012, Palestinians sidestepped negotiations, breaching the Oslo Accords, by seeking to forge a path for statehood in the UN.

Palestinians often say they resort to terror because Israeli proposals do not offer them a universal “right of return”. Israelis reply this is because Palestinians are unwilling to limit the “right” to refugees who personally left Israel; they insist on extending it to every Palestinian in Gaza, the West Bank or anywhere else in the world. Therefore, when Israel has expressed willingness to give them land, Palestinians have sometimes agreed to recognize a country named Israel - but never as a Jewish state.^kk The difference is critical. If Palestinians acknowledge Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, they relinquish a strategy for turning it into a Palestinian/Islamist one by flooding it with millions of Arabs “returning” there.^ll

The right of return has remained, at this writing, uncompromisable - even though “homeland” is only a few miles away, and even though Palestinians would finally be getting a second sovereign state. From Israel’s perspective, granting several million Muslims, many of whom are murderously militant, permission to immigrate and repopulate the country is tantamount to committing national suicide.

Israeli Settlements

In 2012, the PA began claiming that Israeli settlements were the main reason for the failure of the peace process. In fact, settlements represent only 1.6 percent of the disputed territories,⁵⁶ and 70 percent of settlers live in suburbs adjacent to major Israeli cities, not deep inside the West Bank.⁵⁷ Settlements do not disrupt Palestinian geographic contiguity. Despite public opinion to the contrary, settlements officially authorized by the Israeli government are not illegal under standards of customary international law.^mm To be sure, settlements have been built on lands whose ownership is disputed. But in this dispute, Israel actually possesses the best claim to lawful - if not politically feasible or practical - ownership.ⁿⁿ

Recall that when Israel acquired the West Bank, no state or political entity held legal title to it. The last rightful owner of the land had been Israel, and historically, a Jewish presence has been maintained in Judea and Samaria for thousands of years. After World War I, Britain obtained the land and, through international agreements, returned recognized legal title to the Jews. When the UN offered the land to Palestinian Arabs in 1947, it wrongfully tried to take that title away. But the Palestinians rejected the offer, thereby rendering it null and void.

Years later, Jordan illegally annexed the West Bank, but Israel defensively - and therefore, legally - acquired it from Jordan in the Six Day War. Under international law, the land has been technically “disputed” since 1967.^oo In the future, international bodies may decide to rule on the legality of the territories and settlements built on them. Given the nations’ collective stance toward Israel, it would likely take an act of God for a ruling in her favor to result. Which of course we cannot rule out.

In this dispute, Israel actually possesses the best claim to lawful - if not politically feasible or practical – ownership of the ‘disputed’ territories.

Meanwhile, Israel’s settlement policies are not necessarily perfect. Growing numbers of extremist settlers (and Palestinians) have turned violent, and the violence must be stopped. Some Israelis have tried to stake claim to biblical lands by erecting self-declared, unauthorized outposts. Usually these are dismantled by Israel within a short time. Jewish settlement construction has resulted in genuine hardship for some Bedouin and other Arabs, not always handled properly by Israeli courts.^pp But these proportionately few unfair cases do not make all the settlements illegal. Nor do they provide a reason to suspend peace negotiations, if the parties sincerely desire peace.

Future Palestine

Repeatedly, Israel has demonstrated her willingness and even desire to accept Palestine as a new sovereign state. But as this book goes to print, Palestinians still insist (in Arabic) their state must stretch from the “river to the sea” and encompass all of Israel.⁵⁸ Surveys consistently reveal that a solid majority of Israelis would agree to live alongside a peaceful Palestinian state. (The operative word is peaceful.) But similar surveys consistently show the majority of Palestinians say they would never accept peaceful coexistence with a Jewish state.^qq In 2011, 66 percent of West Bank Palestinians said that while they would accept a two-state solution as a “first step”, they wanted to eventually replace Israel with a single Palestinian state.⁵⁹ In 2012, 88 percent of all Palestinians preferred a strategy of terror, or another intifada, over diplomacy to achieve it.⁶⁰ In 2013, similar polls yielded similar results.⁶¹

As you can see, the root of the Palestinian plight is well hidden beneath the surface tension exposed to public view. Deep-seated realities that will not change unless faced forthrightly are disguised and distorted. I do not minimize the genuine suffering, frustration and injustice that affects some Palestinians. But, fundamentally, these conditions are not the cause of Arab and Islamist enmity toward Israel; they are the result of it. Moreover, injustices have repeatedly come about at the hands of Arab, not Israeli, leaders betraying their own people. That the world faults Israel - and threatens her survival - for a Palestinian plight that is Islamist/Arab generated, is highly unjust.

God wants transformational justice for both Israelis and Palestinians. But justice must be pursued and attained His way - according to righteousness based on truth - however His enemies try to obscure it. He wants us to “test and approve what [his] Will is - his good, pleasing and perfect will" (Romans 12:2) as He restores His ancient covenant people. Toward them we must “not be arrogant, but tremble" (Romans 11:20).

About the author: Sandra Teplinsky is a Messianic Jew who lives in Jerusalem and teaches about Israel. With her husband, Sandra runs a ministry called Light of Zion. Find out more about the book 'Why Still Care About Israel?' on its website.

References

Letters q-qq can be found on this page.

31 Bard, “The Refugees”, Jewish Virtual Library, accessed April 30, 2013; Efraim Karsh, Palestine Betrayed (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2010), 122

32 Auguste Lindt, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, “Report of the UNREF Executive Committee, Fourth Session”, Geneva, January 29 to February 4, 1957; Dr. E. Jahn, Office of the UN High Commissioner, “United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Document No.7/2/3," Libya, July 6, 1967, as cited in Alan Baker, ed., Israel's Rights as a Nation-State in International Diplomacy (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and World Jewish Congress, 2011), 50.

33 “Refugees Forever? Issues in the Palestinian-lsraeli Conflict," International Jerusalem Post, February 21, 2003, special supplement; Bard, “The Refugees."

34 Terence Prittie. “Middle East Refugees,” in Michael Curtis, Joseph Neyer, Chaim Waxman, and Allen Pollack, ed., The Palestinians: People, History, Politics (New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Books, 1975), 66—67.

35 Daniel Pipes, “Peculiar Proliferation of Palestinian Refugees,” Washington Times, February 20, 2012.

36 Donna Cassata, “Defining a Palestinian Refugee,” Associated Press. May 31, 2012.

37 Jonathan Shanzer. “Chronic Kleptocracy: Corruption within the Palestinian Political Establishment,” Hearing before House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Congressional Testimony, July 10, 2012.

38 As cited by Prittie, “Middle East Refugees," 71, emphasis mine.

39 Netanyahu, A Durable Peace, 155.

40 Joseph Farah, speech given at Messiah College, Grantham, Pennsylvania, July 3, 2003.

41 See for example Palestinian Media Watch, “PA Depicts a World Without Israel,” 2011; “Mashaal: We Will Never Give Up Any of Palestine,” International Jerusalem Post, December 14-20, 2011.

42 “Political Plan of the PLO Council," June 8, 1974.

43 Jewish Virtual Library, “Demography of Palestine & Israel, the West Bank & Gaza."

44 See for example Michael B. Oren, Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East (New York. Ballantine Books, 2002), 306-27.

45 Jewish Virtual Library, “The Meaning of Resolution 142"; Dore Gold, The Fight for Jerusalem: Radical Islam, the West and the Future of the Holy City (Washington D.C.: Regnery, Inc, 2007), 172-74; Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “Disputed Territories-Forgotten Facts About the West Bank and Gaza Strip.” February 1, 2003.

46 Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Israel's Critical Security Requirements for Defensible Borders (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs).

47 The Arabs' Khartoun Resolutions of 1967 solidified the notorious “Three No’s”: No peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel. Jewish Virtual Library, “The Khartoun Resolutions.”

48 Benny Morris, “Camp David and After: An Exchange (Interview with Ehud Barak),” New York Review of Books 49, no. 10, June 13, 2002.

49 Ambassador Dennis Ross, in a Fox News interview, as reported by David Kupelian, “The Real Reason Arafat Rejected a Palestinian State,” Whistleblower 12, no. 3 (March 2003): 7.

50 Speech by Arafat in Johannesburg, May 10, 1994 (while Oslo was in effect), as cited in Daniel Pipes, “Lessons from the Prophet Muhammad in Diplomacy,” Middle East Quarterly, September 1999.

51 Kupelian, “The Real Reason,” 8-9; Pipes, “Lessons.”

52 “Faysal al-Husseni in His Last Interview,” MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 236, July 6, 2001.

53 lbid.

54 Reuters and Aluf Benn, “PA Rejects Olmert‘s Offer,” Haaretz, August 12, 2008.

55 Mazal Mualem, “New Defense Minister No Threat to Netanyahu’s Policies,” Al-Monitor, March 13, 2013.

56 See Michelle Whiteman, “To the Media, Building Settlements in Israel’s a Crime,” Huffington Post, December 26, 2012; and Mitchell G. Bard, “The Settlements,” Myths and Facts Online, Jewish Virtual Library, accessed April 30, 2013.

57 Bard, “The Settlements.”

58 “Jerusalem-on-the-Line,” Jerusalem News Network, Prayer Letter, April 3, 2013, quoting Palestinian Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal’s speech in Arabic at a rally in Gaza City, March 30, 2013.

59 United Press International, “Poll: Arabs Reject Two-State Solution," July 26, 2011.

60 Elhanan Miller,“88 Percent of Palestinians Believe Armed Struggle Is the Best Way," Times of Israel, December 16, 2012.

61 Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, “Palestinian Public Opinion Poll No. 47," press release, April 1, 2013.

Our leaders have a veil over their eyes.

Up to 50,000 people attempted to break through the border between Gaza and Israel this week according to press reports. Their use of smoke and mirrors, petrol bombs, incendiary kites and other weapons must have been a terrifying experience for the tiny detachment of Israeli part-time soldiers guarding the border to protect Israeli citizens from slaughter.

But far from giving a factual picture of events, the BBC, The Guardian and others¹ poured out their anti-Semitic invective against Israel.

The BBC had been preparing for this event for a long time and sent some of their senior reporters to give maximum cover to criticise Israel. In the event there was no breakthrough and no massacre.

Though each life lost is a heart-rending matter, it is to the credit of those defending the border that relatively few died, and most casualties were known terrorists. Hamas called off the protest the next day after Egyptian intervention; but not before they achieved their objective of getting anti-Israel propaganda into the Western media and calling for a UN enquiry - even at the expense of lives of their own people.

The Creation of the Gazan Refugees

The whole Gaza issue is tragic, both for the people who live there and for Israel. But it has been deliberately created as the front line in the drive to destroy Israel. The Palestinians themselves are despised by the Arab nations. Before they were brought together in the 1960s, there never was a Palestinian nation.

Historically, before the Jewish resettlement began in the early 20^th Century, Palestine was a largely barren land. According to the Encyclopaedia Britannica 1900, there were less than 100 trees in the whole of Palestine with a sparse population of nomadic Arabs living in tents, whose goats ate every bit of vegetation. The absentee land-owning Arabs were only too willing to sell land to the Jews in those days.

The whole Gaza issue is tragic, but it has been deliberately created as the front line in the drive to destroy Israel.

When the state of Israel was created in 1948 the neighbouring states of Jordan, Egypt and Syria combined their armies, ordered any non-Jewish residents to leave their homes and go to two newly created refugee camps at Jericho and Gaza so that their forces could clear the land and drive the Jews into the Mediterranean. What they now call their ‘catastrophe’ was the failure of their armies to defeat the tiny group of Holocaust survivors who, in successive conflicts, went on to retake Jerusalem and to clear the whole land of foreign fighters.

With 70 years and a high birthrate the dreadful conditions in Gaza have been created by the Arab nations, who could easily have solved the situation by taking in the Palestinians. But even the small groups who succeeded in crossing the River Jordan and settling in Jordan and Syria were never accepted and today live in separate enclaves, denied citizenship. This is the measure of hypocrisy among the Arab nations who simply use the West Bank and Gaza situations for political purposes – in their drive to destroy Israel.

Leaders Without Knowledge

The Gaza issue was debated in the House of Commons this week with the usual mixture of anti-Israel and friendly comments. I was particularly disappointed to hear Alistair Burt, Foreign Office Minister for the Middle East, whom I’ve counted among my friends for the past 25 years, making a politically-correct bland statement.

The UN Security Council has strongly condemned Israel's activity at the Gaza border. See Photo Credits.As a Bible-believing evangelical brother I was hoping that he would put some backbone into the Foreign Office and declare that the time has come for Britain to implement the policy it advocated 100 years ago in the Balfour Declaration and move the British Embassy up to Jerusalem, alongside that of the USA.

But postmodernism, with its Darwinian and Marxist roots, has not only driven radical change to the social and personal values of the nation, but has spread a veil over the eyes of the leaders of both Church and state, so that they are unable to perceive the truth. They are like the leaders whom the Prophet Isaiah referred to as ‘blind watchmen’ who “all lack knowledge” (Isa 56:10). They cannot see the big picture because they do not understand the purposes of God and what is happening in the world today.

Postmodernism has spread a veil over the eyes of the leaders of both Church and state, so they are unable to perceive the truth.

Our leaders are part of a generation of biblical eunuchs: they have no understanding of the ways of God because they have turned their backs upon the word of God. For years we have been living upon the spiritual capital of our 19^th Century Victorian Bible-believing forefathers; but it is not enough to support us today, as the world moves onto the cusp of the most incredible period of turmoil since the creation of the world. There is a desperate need for people to hear the word of God before it is too late.

Coming Judgment

In the spring of 1986 there was a gathering of men and women with prophetic insight who met in Israel for a time of prayer and seeking God, to understand what is happening in the world today. One day I was standing alone with Lance Lambert on the top of Mt Carmel looking up at a remarkable sight I’d never seen before, of a complete rainbow encircling the sun; although Lance said it’s not unusual in Israel. We both received words which we shared with others in the evening meeting.

I was led to the prophecy in Haggai 2:6:

This is what the Lord Almighty says: in a little while I will once more shake the heavens and the earth, the sea and the dry land. I will shake all nations and the desired of all nations will come, and I will fill this house with glory, says the Lord Almighty.

I said that the USSR, the mighty communist empire that appeared all-powerful in 1986, would very soon collapse. Three weeks later the Chernobyl nuclear power station blew up which began the disintegration of the Soviet Union.

That same evening Lance Lambert gave one of the most remarkable prophecies of our time. He said:

It will not be long before there will come upon the world a time of unparalleled upheaval and turmoil. Do not fear for it is I the Lord who am shaking all things. I began this shaking with the First World War and I greatly increased it through the Second World War. Since 1973 I have given it an even greater impetus. In the last stage, I plan to complete it with the shaking of the universe itself, with signs in the sun and moon and stars. But before that point is reached, I will judge the nations, and the time is near.

It will not only be by war and civil war, by anarchy and terrorism, and by monetary collapses that I will judge the nations, but also by natural disasters: by earthquakes, by shortages and famines, and by old and new plague diseases. I will also judge them by giving them over to their own ways, to lawlessness, to loveless selfishness, to delusion and to believing a lie, to false religion and an apostate church, even to a Christianity without me.

Our leaders are part of a generation of biblical eunuchs: they have no understanding of the ways of God because they have turned their backs upon the word of God.

Need for the Word of God

This next stage in the history of the world has now been reached. Most of the nations of the world are conspiring to hate Israel, as foretold in the word of God: “Come, they say, let us destroy them as a nation, that the name of Israel be remembered no more” (Ps 83:4).

The Prophet Zechariah received a revelation that the day would come when the focus of the world would be upon Jerusalem. He said:

This is the word of the Lord concerning Israel…I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that sends all the surrounding peoples reeling. Judah will be besieged as well as Jerusalem. On that day, when all the nations of the earth are gathered against her, I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. All who try to move it will injure [rupture] themselves.

Never has there been a greater need for biblical truth to be brought into the affairs of the nations than today, with the nations armed with weapons capable of destroying the world and driven by a spirit of hatred and destruction.

Jeremiah foresaw the fall of the mighty Babylonian Empire and that Babylon would become “a heap of ruins, a haunt of jackals” (Jer 51:37), as it is today. So, in our lifetime, unless the nations of the world study the word of God and bring their policies in line with his truth, they will create a catastrophe that will engulf the world.

The great question is: – Will the Bible-believing faithful remnant in the Western nations break their silence and declare the word of the Lord to bring life and light to this generation, and hope for our children and grandchildren?

Notes

1 For further information on this, we recommend UK Media Watch, a watchdog seeking to hold the British media to account for their biased treatment of Israel.

An excerpt from Sandra Teplinsky’s book ‘Why Still Care About Israel’. Part I of II.

Last week on Prophecy Today UK we reviewed ‘Why Still Care About Israel’ as part of our ongoing coverage of Israel’s 70^th anniversary. This week, we are pleased to bring you the first of a two-part excerpt from this book (taken from chapter 10), focusing particularly on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Please see the base of the page for more information about the author. Reprinted with permission.

 Israeli Statehood and the Arab/Palestinian Plight

“Be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Romans 12:2

A true story opens on May 14, 1948, as the Jewish people prepare to declare a state. The air is electric. After two thousand years of exile, the sons and daughters of Jacob have come home. High-pitched excitement circles the globe.

That morning, Israel's founding father and first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, pores over maps showing the array of Arab armies poised to attack. The Jews are outnumbered 100 to 1.¹ “I feel like a mourner at a wedding," he writes in his diary.²

In a few hours Ben-Gurion will deliver Israel’s Declaration of Independence. He scribbles down notes for his speech on the only writing material at hand - sheets of toilet paper.^a

At exactly 4:00pm, he steps to the podium in an overcrowded hall in Tel Aviv, before a hushed audience. This is the moment for which millions of Jews have lived and died. As Ben-Gurion reads the Israeli Declaration of Independence, those present cling to his every word. He speaks of Bible history and the Jews’ undying hope to return to their ancestral home. Then with prophetic clarity Ben-Gurion decrees: “By virtue of the natural and historic right of the Jewish people…we hereby proclaim the establishment of the Jewish state in Palestine, to be called the State of Israel…for the fulfillment of the dream of generations—the redemption of Israel.”

At once, cheers and tears resound. Golda Meir, who would later serve as prime minister, cannot stop crying. Her sobs, she explains, are for the many who should have been there, but are no more.³ According to the nation’s chief rabbi, “The dawn of redemption has broken.”⁴

As the Jewish people prepare to declare a state, the air is electric. After two thousand years of exile, the sons and daughters of Jacob have come home. High-pitched excitement circles the globe.

Euphoria erupts in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, where traffic stops as streets swell with singing and dancing. But the party is soon interrupted. Sirens wail to warn of Egyptian bombers overhead. Joining them are the armies of Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq, together with militants from throughout the Arab world. All have a common goal: to annihilate the Jewish state in Allah’s name.⁵ The War of Independence has begun. Happy birthday, Israel.

Since 1948, tomes have been written on the history of Israel’s restoration, and the Islamist/Arab/Palestinian resistance against it. Time and space permit us to summarise only basic facts (for more detail, please refer to the notes at www.whystillcareaboutisrael.com). I think you will discover a surprising perspective on today’s conflict emerges when you consider the context from which it arose. You will see that Israel is not so much in a fight for land as for her life - and that changes everything.

Palestinian History: The Back Story

In the first century AD, Israel was renamed Palestine by the Romans who conquered her. This was done in derisive remembrance of the Jews’ former - and extinct - enemy, the Philistines. The Philistines had by then already died out, so despite the similarity in name, they are not related to the Palestinians of today.^b Collectively, Palestinians have no traceable ancient tie to the land of Israel and never identified as a self-governing people group. Like other Arabs in the Middle East, most of their ancestors dwelt as scattered family tribes on lands they often did not personally own. Generally, they coexisted alongside Jews who had, in small numbers, lived in Palestine since biblical times on inherited or legally purchased land.⁶ But periodically, Islamic terror would erupt⁷ and jihadi expropriation of Jewish real estate took place.⁸

From the 1500s up until World War I, the entire Middle East was ruled by the Ottoman Turkish Empire, a type of Muslim caliphate. No autonomous Arab state was on the map; most Arabs belonged to nomadic tribes wandering all over the Middle East.^c At the same time, hundreds of thousands of Jews also lived in the region under Ottoman rule. According to a census taken in 1882, approximately 25,000 of them lived in Palestine, along with 260,000 Arabs.⁹ As tourists and pilgrims testified, Palestine was by then mostly desolate and depopulated,¹⁰ a far cry from the land of milk and honey it had once been for millions of Jews.

Israel is not so much in a fight for land as for her life - and that changes everything.

By the early 1900s, Palestinian Arab identity was said to be extremely mixed.¹¹ Persons counted as indigenous Palestinian Arabs included ethnic Balkans, Greeks, Syrians, Latins, Turks, Armenians, Italians, Persians, Kurds, Germans, Afghans, Circassians, Bosnians, Sudanese, Samaritans, Algerians, Tartars and others.¹² An official British document published in 1920 stated the majority of people living in Palestine were not indigenous Arabs but only Arabic-speaking.¹³

When Zionist pioneers began arriving in the early twentieth century, the number of Arabs immigrating to Palestine also sharply increased. With Jews from the West came new job opportunities, vastly improved medical care and a higher standard of living, all of which attracted their tribal neighbors.¹⁴ Once inside Israel, most Arab immigrants continued living as bedouin, built simple villages or served for decades as tenants on farmlands owned by others. Later, countless more poured in from surrounding countries - not to carry on normal lives but to fight the formation of a Jewish state.¹⁵ Together with the small indigenous Arab population, these individuals and their descendants comprise the Palestinian people of today.

Palestinians are not, as some have rather unkindly said, “an invented people". They are flesh-and-blood human beings created in God’s image, with inherent dignity and worth. Though most of their ancestors came from across the Middle East and even beyond, they did form an identifiable collective by the mid-twentieth century. Palestinians are not the first people group formed by the force of history. They are, however, the only modern group whose creation and self-definition, as one Palestinian journalist writes,¹⁶ rests largely on the planned elimination of another, namely Israel - or as they prefer to call her, “the Zionist entity."

Zionism and the Reestablishment of a Jewish State

Zionism is defined, in a broad secular sense, as the national liberation movement of the Jewish people. The Zionist movement contends that the Jewish nation, like every other indigenous people, is entitled to live autonomously in its ancestral homeland. As such, Zionism cannot be viewed as something separate from the Jewish people and nation-state. To be anti-Zionist is akin to being anti-Israel and, to a degree, anti-Jewish.

Zionism is not and has never been entirely secular; a strong religious element has always underlain it.^d Officially launched in 1896, modern-day Zionism involves the return of the Jewish people to their God-given ancestral homeland.^e The name of the movement derives from the Bible, where Zion is used over 150 times. “You will arise and have compassion on Zion; for it is time to show favour to her; the appointed time has come…For the LORD will rebuild Zion and appear in his glory” (Psalm 102:13, 16). Zionism precipitates His Kingdom glory.

Palestinians are not the first people group formed by the force of history. They are, however, the only modern group whose creation and self-definition rests largely on the planned elimination of another, namely Israel.

In rebuilding Zion, Sovereign God has worked through nations and human beings. The modern story starts with World War I, when the Ottoman Turks aligned with Axis nations, and collectively they lost the war. As a result, the Allies dismantled the Ottoman Empire and created Syria, Lebanon, Iran and Iraq for the Arabs and Persians to inhabit.^f In an international agreement known as the San Remo Resolution of 1920, they set Palestine aside for the Jews.^g Great Britain was made responsible for implementing the resolution by unanimous vote of the League of Nations, predecessor organisation to the UN. The League of Nations directive, called the Mandate for Palestine, reserved explicitly for the Jews not just present-day Israel, but all of Judea, Samaria, Gaza and Jordan.¹⁷

The Mandate for Palestine was scarcely issued when Palestinian Arabs began rioting and conducting terror operations in protest of it. The deadly terror had nothing to do with occupation, settlements or allegedly disproportionate military force. From the beginning, Islamic terror had everything to do with opposing the existence of a Jewish state.

In an effort to appease Palestinian Arabs - and although international law forbade such an action^h - Great Britain unilaterally took back 78 percent of the land allotted to the Jews. She then gave it to Palestinian Arabs—specifically to create a Palestinian state. Today that state is known as Jordan. Palestinian Arabs were expected to move to Jordan, and any Jews living in Jordan would relocate to the 22 percent of land remaining from the San Remo and Mandatory allotments. A smaller section of land in the Golan Heights, originally designated for the Jews, was also given away by Britain to Syria. But appeasement did not work - which we would do well to remember. Those who forget history, it is said, are doomed to repeat it. The acts we engage in for appeasement today, Britain’s Winston Churchill presciently forewarned, we will have to remedy at far greater cost and remorse tomorrow.¹⁸

Not surprisingly, after Jordan was established, Palestinian rioting and terror killings of Jews persisted.ⁱ An exasperated Great Britain finally turned the political foray over to the UN (when the League of Nations failed to prevent World War II, the UN was formed to replace it). The UN’s charter required that it adopt all laws and resolutions passed by the League of Nations. So when it inherited the Mandate for Palestine, the UN became responsible for creating a Jewish state.

As you can see, plans for the reestablishment of Israel were underway well before the onset of World War II. Israel’s right to exist by international law is not fundamentally based on the Nazi Holocaust, as compelling a cause as that is from a humanitarian point of view. Certainly, the Holocaust demonstrated the need for a Jewish state to protect Jewish lives. But if we believe Israel’s right to exist is rooted in a compassionate response to the Holocaust, when that compassion wears off, so will our belief that Israel has a right to exist. Israel’s fundamental right to exist under international law rests on the recognition of the Jews’ ancestral, sovereign control over identifiable land that, since their forced removal from it, remained sparsely occupied and mostly undeveloped.

Israel’s right to exist by international law is not fundamentally based on the Nazi Holocaust, as compelling a cause as that is from a humanitarian point of view.

Notwithstanding Israel’s historical and legal right to the land, and dismissing international commitments to the Jews, the UN continued with a policy of Arab appeasement. In 1947, it partitioned the remaining 22 percent of the original Mandate for a Jewish homeland into two proposed states: one for Jews and yet another, second state for Palestinian Arabs. The Partition Plan, also called UN Resolution 181, recognized the Jews’ right to sovereign control over a sliver of space amounting to a mere 10 percent of the original British Mandate. It offered the Arabs who lived within Mandate territory a state - in addition to Jordan - consisting of Judea, Samaria and Gaza.

Zionist pioneers felt it best to accept the UN’s offer. Ten percent of the Promised Land after nearly two thousand years was better than zero. Moreover, they had no political clout or practical means with which to resist whatever the world community told them to do. The Arabs, however, thoroughly rejected the Partition Plan, which legally voided the offer to them. Ninety percent of the land, they insisted, was not enough. They wanted it all - an empire spanning the entire Middle East, leaving no place on earth for the Jews. They mobilised for a war against Israel they felt certain they would win. The world wondered, much as it does today. Will Israel survive?

Israel's Rebirth—Into War

Israel did not want the War of Independence to occur and tried extremely hard to prevent it.¹⁹ When her every effort toward peace was rebuffed, Ben-Gurion extended a final appeal to the Arabs in his Declaration of Independence speech:

We yet call upon the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve the ways of peace and play their part in the development of the State, on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its bodies and institutions…We extend our hand in peace and neighborliness to all the neighboring states and their peoples, and invite them to co-operate with the independent Jewish nation for the common good of all.²⁰

The same invitation had been offered daily for weeks.^j British Mandate authorities who were stationed on the ground testified: “Every effort is being made by the Jews to persuade the Arab populace to stay and carry on with their normal lives…and to be assured that their lives and interests will be safe.”²¹ Most, however, chose to flee, creating a local refugee crisis that would upend history. A Palestinian priest who watched the events unfold stated, “[The Arabs] fled in spite of the fact the Jewish authorities guaranteed their safety and rights as citizens of Israel.”²²

Arab-Nazi Alliance

Why did so many Palestinians run from their homes and livelihoods? An overlooked historical fact is perhaps one of the most pivotal and still fuels the conflict today. An unshakeable Islamic/Arab-Nazi alliance predated World War II, and as a result of it, many Arabs vehemently despised and feared the Jews.

Early in his career, Hitler formed a pact with Jerusalem’s grand mufti, Haj Amin al-Husseini. The notoriously anti-Semitic mufti held religious and political sway over Muslims throughout Palestine and the larger Middle East. He and Hitler schemed together to annihilate the Jewish people worldwide. The fuehrer would focus on Europe and the extraordinarily influential mufti would target Palestine’s growing Jewish population.²³

An unshakeable Islamic/Arab-Nazi alliance predated World War II, and as a result of it, many Arabs vehemently despised and feared the Jews.

Building on fundamental Islam’s anti-Jewish ideology, Husseini mobilized an Arab militia, which served as a formal Nazi brigade. Supplied with German weaponry, the brigade murdered Palestinian Jews in acts of heinous terror throughout World War II.²⁴ To keep the violence going, Husseini saturated the Middle East with lies about the Zionists via propaganda broadcasts radioed in from Berlin.^k So after the Holocaust ended in Europe, he and other Arab leaders hoped to immediately start another.

Creating a Refugee Crisis

When, to their profound dismay, Israel declared statehood, Palestinian Arabs panicked. An estimated 600,000 to 700,000 fled.^{25 l} Approximately 150,000 to 160,000 chose to remain inside the Jewish state.²⁶ Today, they and their descendants enjoy full democratic rights of Israeli citizenship, including a standard of living much higher than that of their brethren anywhere else in North Africa or the Middle East.

Under the influence of Muslim/Nazi anti-Semitism, the majority of Arabs who left their homes did so because their leaders told them to. Evacuations were ordered to make way for approaching armies that would quickly destroy the Jewish state.^m Arab leaders boasted that lsrael would be “driven into the [Mediterranean] sea" within a few days. Accordingly, the Higher Arab Executive gave Palestinians a choice: Quit and run, or accept Jewish protection and be regarded as a renegade in the Arab world that would imminently take over. The Arab National Committee in Jerusalem ordered its constituency out of their homes, adding “Any opposition to this order…is an obstacle to the holy war…and will hamper the operations of the fighters in these districts.”²⁷

The Arab Legion and Arab Liberation Army directed whole-sale civilian flight form entire villages. Leaders like Iraqi prime minister Nuri Said warned, “We will smash the country with our guns and obliterate every place the Jews seek shelter. The Arabs should conduct their wives and children to safe areas until the fighting has died down.”²⁸ To ensure compliance, some leaders planted rumours of Israeli terror operations and non-existent atrocities.^{29 n} Shortly after the war – which to their deep humiliation they did not win – Arab leaders freely admitted to having created the refugee crisis.^o Mahmoud Abbas,^p who would later serve as president of the PA, confessed:

The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny, but instead they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate and leave their homeland, and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live.³⁰

Next week: Part II concludes the chapter, looking in more depth at the refugee crisis (including claims of Israeli atrocities) and the attempts at peace settlements since.

About the author: Sandra Teplinsky is a Messianic Jew who lives in Jerusalem and teaches about Israel. With her husband, Sandra runs a ministry called Light of Zion. Find out more about the book 'Why Still Care About Israel?' on its website.

References

Letters a-p refer to notes on this page.

1 The Peace Encyclopedia: Palestine, 2002.

2 Charly Wegman, “Friday May 14, 1948: Israel’s Debut”, Agence France Presse-English, 1998; Benny Morris, 1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008), 178-79.

3 Golda Meir, My Life (London: Futura Publications, 1989), 186.

4 Mark Lacqueur, “The Struggle for a Jewish State,” The Palestine-Israel Journal.

5 Palestine Post [predecessor to the Jerusalem Post], May 16, 1948.

6 Jewish Virtual Library, “Demography of Palestine & Israel, the West Bank and Gaza”.

7 Peters, From Time Immemorial, 392.

8 Benzion Dinur, “From the Conquest of the Land of Israel by the Arabs to the Crusades”, Israel in the Diaspora, Vol. 1 (Tel Aviv: Dvir, 1960), 27-30, as cited in Netanyahu, A Durable Peace, 27.

9 Howard M. Sachar, A History of Israel from the Rise of Zionism to Our Time, 2nd ed. (New York: Knopf, 1996), 24, 167.

10 Michael Rydelnik, Understanding the Arab-Israeli Conflict: What the Head-Lines Haven’t Told You (Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2004), 58-59. Israel consisted mostly of swampland, desert and barren wasteland due to the Ottoman policy of denuding forests through the centuries. Peters, From Time Immemorial, 221-68.

11 Peters, From Time Immemorial, 156-7, citing Jacob de Haas, History of Palestine (New York: Macmillan, 1934), 145, 258.

12 Peters, From Time Immemorial, 155-56, citing The Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1911 ed. While some of Peters’ research is disputed, it has also been recently corroborated.

13 Peters, From Time Immemorial, 157.

14 Peters, From Time Immemorial, 223, 396; Shimon Apisdorf, Judaism in a Nutshell: Israel (Pikesville, Md.: Leviathan Press, 2003), 62-64; see generally Walter Lowdermilk, Palestine: Land of Promise (London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1944).

15 Netanyahu, A Durable Peace, 84.

16 Ray Hanania, “The Wandering Palestinians”, Jerusalem Post, December 20, 2011.

17 See Howard Grief, The Legal Foundations and Borders of Israel Under International Law (Jerusalem: Mazo Publishers, 2008); Martin Gilbert, The Arab-Israeli Conflict: Its History in Maps (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1974), 10-11.

18 As quoted in Peters, From Time Immemorial, 412.

19 Efraim Karsh, Palestine Betrayed (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2010), 21-38.

20 The New Palestine 38, no. 18 (May 18, 1948): 1.

21 British Superintendent of Police Memo, Haifa, April 26, 1948, as quoted in Samuel Katz, Battleground: Fact and Fantasy in Palestine (New York: Bantam Books, 1973), 19.

22 Monsignor George Hakim, Greek Catholic Bishop of Galilee, New York Herald Tribune, June 30, 1949.

23 Wistrich, A Lethal Obsession, 662-683, referencing Joseph Schechtman, Mufti and the Feuhrer (Loneon: Thomas Yoseloff Publishers, 1965), 139ff., 147-52; Karsh, Palestine Betrayed, 16-20, 30, 62-63.

24 Karsh, Palestine Betrayed, 62-63.

25 Peters, From Time Immemorial, 16; Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited (Cambridge, Mass.; Cambridge University Press, 2004), 603-04; Karsh, Palestine Betrayed, 264-272, see also 8-15.

26 See for example Morris, Palestinian Refugee Problem, 588-89; Gilbert, The Arab Israeli Conflict, 57.

27 As reported in Middle Eastern Studies, January 1986, cited in Mitchell G. Bard, “The Palestinian Refugees,” Jewish Virtual Library, accessed April 30, 2013.

28 Myron Kaufman, The Coming Destruction of Israel (New York: American Library, 1970), 26-27, cited in Bard, “The Palestinian Refugees”; Iraqi prime minister Nimr el-Hawari, Sir Am Nakbah (Nazareth, Israel: 1952), as cited in “Refugees Forever?,” International Jerusalem Post, February 21, 2003, special supplement.

29 Karsh, Betrayed, 241-42.

30 Reported in Falastin a-Thaura, March 1973, as cited by Mitchell G. Bard, “The Refugees”. Myths and Facts Online, Jewish Virtual Library, accessed April 30, 2013.

Why evangelical Christians support Israel

As whipped-up Palestinian rioters cry out for Jewish blood in their days of rage against ‘occupation’ of their land, we should be praying that these dear people, for whom Christ died, would instead call on the blood of Jesus for their redemption.

This is their only hope – and ours too for that matter. As Israel is tempted to quake in fear of the vicious international hatred being vented against them, may they too cry out for help from Elohim who sent his beloved Son to die as a sacrificial Lamb to atone for the sins of all who put their trust in him. The doorposts daubed in lamb’s blood back in Egypt later became a wooden cross where God himself took the punishment we deserved.

In this battle over war and peace, the hordes of hell are being unleashed against the Anointed One and his people. But the Prince of Peace – not the diplomats or politicians – has the solution.

Christian Support is Vital

As believers the world over celebrate Pentecost (Shavuot) on Sunday, I think it is highly significant that a Jerusalem Post writer has credited evangelical Christians (or Christian Zionists as they are also known among Jews) for the current political breakthrough which has seen President Trump move the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to the ‘city of the Great King’.

“It is evangelical Christians who are standing with Israel today in ways that Nehemiah could never have dreamed about,” wrote Tuly Weisz on 12 May.¹

In this spiritual battle, the Prince of Peace – not the diplomats or politicians – has the solution.

We’re talking about their influence on the President as well as their love for the Jewish people who gave us Jesus and the Bible including almost the entire New Testament.

Weisz had asked Christian participants of a Jerusalem conference why the embassy move was so important to them. “The answer they gave is that it is foretold in the Bible,” she wrote, citing Old Testament examples of Cyrus and Nehemiah. Meanwhile Israel’s Education and Diaspora Affairs Minister Naftali Bennett said the move represented a new era in which the international community’s relationship was based on reality and fact, not fantasy and fiction.²

Gentiles and the Gospel

It’s worth noting that those 3,000 who joined the first disciples on the Day of Pentecost in response to Peter’s sermon were Jews and proselytes from all over the known world (Acts 2:5).

An indication of the significant role Gentiles would play in spreading the good news of Israel’s God came with the healing of the centurion’s servant at the start of Jesus’ ministry. The Roman officer had humbly sought the Saviour’s help, only requiring him to “say the word” as he felt unworthy to receive him into his home.

And so the Gospel – to the Jew first (the leper who preceded this incident in Matthew 8) – was now also offered to the Gentile. We hear much about amazing grace, but Jesus was amazed by this man’s faith. The only other time he is recorded as having been amazed was by the lack of faith in his home town (Mark 6:6).

Faithful Gentiles have made an extraordinary mark on the world.

I wonder too if our Lord was also prophesying of a day when faithful Gentiles would make an extraordinary mark on the world.

The beach near Capernaum, where the Roman centurion asked Jesus to heal his servant. Picture by Charles Gardner.In Yorkshire alone in recent centuries (I am biased because I live there) I can immediately think of three men who changed the world through their faith in Jesus – William Wilberforce from Hull, a co-founder of the Church’s Ministry among Jewish people who successfully campaigned for the abolition of slavery, Barnsley’s Hudson Taylor, to whom millions of Chinese Christians owe their salvation, and Bradford plumber Smith Wigglesworth, who raised 14 people from the dead as he helped to pioneer the modern-day Pentecostal movement which had such a profound impact on 20^th Century Christianity.

The Power of Prayer

In honouring the Jewish people in both word and deed, we are simply building on the foundation laid by the Apostles. But we mustn’t forget the importance of prayer – after all, a ten-day prayer meeting had preceded that great initial outpouring of the Holy Spirit!

In terms of the recognition – and restoration – of Israel, the importance of prayer from men like Rees Howells and his Bible College students at Swansea in Wales cannot be underestimated. They had prayed many long hours at the time of the UN vote in 1947 before victory was secured.

In South Africa, although the government stubbornly refuses to acknowledge Israel’s right to defend itself, many Christians are on their knees praying for the peace of Jerusalem. Farmer friends from where I grew up have just emailed me, saying: “We are extremely excited with the USA’s ambassadorial move to Jerusalem and continue to pray for this beautiful capital as well as for the region. What a privilege to witness what the prophets were only able to see in visions.”

In honouring the Jewish people in both word and deed, we mustn’t forget the importance of prayer.

Those nations who oppose Jewish aspirations are in for a big shock. For they will come to nothing, as Isaiah predicted long ago (Isa 60:12). Even the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign received a bloody nose with victory for Israel’s entrant in the Eurovision Song Contest despite their efforts.

Eyes on Jerusalem

It is significant of course that the United States should take the lead in recognising Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, just as they had done back in 1948 when President Harry Truman was the first to recognise the new-born state. Apparently he took just eleven minutes to do so, but “later regretted that he waited so long”, according to US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman.³

In fact, there will come a time – perhaps in the not-too-distant future – when Jerusalem will become the capital of the world (see Zechariah 14:9, 16).

Israel will soon be blessed with a Royal visit from Prince William, second-in-line to the British throne. But at the Second Coming of Jesus, which is surely also not far off judging by the signs (see Matthew 24, Mark 13 & Luke 21), they will welcome the King of Kings and Lord and Lords (Rev 19:16).

Come, Lord Jesus!

References

1 Time to start crediting the Christians. Jerusalem Post, 12 May 2018.

2 Jerusalem News Network, 16 May 2018, quoting the Washington Post.

3 JNN, 14 May 2018, quoting Arutz-7.

Paul Luckraft reviews ‘Why Still Care About Israel?’ by Sandra Teplinsky (Chosen, 2013).

The Gaza border protests enter their sixth week.

For several weeks now, thousands of Palestinians have lined up along the Gaza border fence in protest. Stones and Molotov cocktails have been flung, burning tyres have been rolled and attempts have been made to breach the barrier. The IDF has responded with crowd dispersals, rubber bullets and occasionally live fire, with 40 deaths so far.

But the promised break-through and subsequent flooding of Israel with millions of Gazans has not yet materialised – and events in Syria and elsewhere have gradually drawn the eye of the media away.

The so-called ‘March of Return’ began in late March, with protests planned to continue up to Israel’s 70^th anniversary in May, when a new ‘intifada’ may be launched. This article puts some facts about the protests into historical context, and then reflects a little on their biblical significance.

Some History

The recent history of the Palestinian war on Israel is composed of sporadic attacks on Israeli citizens (stabbings, kidnappings, suicide bombings), interspersed with escalations of violence known as ‘intifadas’.

Both the First Intifada (1987-1993) and the Second (2000-2005) ended with Israeli agreements to compromise – first with the 1993 Oslo Accords, which created the Palestinian Authority (PA) and agreed a phased Israeli withdrawal from the so-called ‘Palestinian territories’, and secondly with Israel’s agreement to withdraw unilaterally from the Gaza Strip. The border fence was constructed in 1994 as part of the Oslo negotiations, to provide a security barrier limiting the movement of people and arms. It quickly became a hot spot for clashes.

The promised break-through and subsequent flooding of Israel with millions of Gazans has not yet materialised.

Since the relinquishment of Gaza and its wresting from the PA by terrorist group Hamas in 2007, the Strip has become a base for rocket attacks and tunnel warfare. But successful Israeli combating of these strategies has meant that Hamas is now resorting to higher-profile tactics, namely, people power.

Since 2007, the situation in Gaza under Hamas rule has deteriorated to the point, many say, of imminent infrastructural collapse. Relations between Hamas and the PA in the West Bank are extremely poor, and it is likely that the current protests represent a desperate, last-ditch attempt to draw global support.

Six Weeks of Violence

The ‘March of Return’ was timed to begin on what the Palestinians call ‘Land Day’, the anniversary of Israeli-Arab clashes over land in 1976 (it was also the start of Passover) and run until so-called ‘Nakba Day’ (‘Catastrophe Day’), or Israel’s independence day, with spikes each Friday.

Hamas has spent more than $10 million organising the protests, laying on free transport, meals and tented accommodation to encourage attendance. There are questions over how many of the protestors are peaceful¹ as well as how many have come voluntarily.²

Firebomb kites have been causing extensive fires in Israeli farmland. See Photo Credits.

The IDF has repeatedly warned that those getting close to the fence and trying to break through will be fired upon, seeing this as a major attempt to storm Israel and attack civilians.³ Of the 40 killed so far, at least 32 had known terrorist connections – 80% of the fatalities. All those injured and families of the deceased receive financial rewards from Hamas.

Though many have been quick to label this a massacre of peaceful innocents, photos and videos from the border tell a very different story: Palestinians throwing rocks and fire-bombs, burning tyres, planting explosives, employing automatic fire and using children as human shields.⁴

Hamas promised 100,000 on Land Day, but only about 30,000 came. The four Fridays since have seen a much lower turnout – about 10,000 each time – and reports this Friday suggest even less, around 7,000. The threat is that a million will come for Nakba Day, but this estimate is likely also over-hopeful. But what they’ve lacked in attendance, protestors have made up for in creativity, including dramatic faking of injuries to get media attention,⁵ use of literal ‘smoke and mirrors’⁶ and, latterly, kites manned with pipe bombs and marked with swastikas, reportedly in honour of Hitler’s birthday.

Though many have been quick to label this a massacre of peaceful innocents, photos and videos from the border tell a very different story.

Despite all of this, left-wing media in the West have had a field day at Israel’s expense. To them, the Palestinians can do no wrong – they are the ultimate victim group, driven to violence by the aggression of Israel. This means that Palestinian terror is excused or ignored while Israeli defensive reactions are chastised with claims of brutality.

Why?

Through all the drama, the ‘March of Return’ - by Hamas’s own admission - has several goals. One is to provoke Israel to war. Another is to pressure the Israeli Government to the point of collapse.

In the latter respect Hamas has won some PR points. Painting the protests as peaceful makes any kind of forceful response immediately look disproportionate. Indeed, if the fence were to be breached, as has happened before, it would lead to a diplomatic crisis for Israel, forced to fire on civilians marching ostensibly for freedom. However, an internal Israeli collapse remains highly improbable.

A more realistic goal is to engage the IDF in a war of attrition that will detract resources and attention from its northern border, where the threat of war from an Iran-backed Hezbollah is very real and imminent. In fact, Iran’s relationship with Hamas in Gaza suggests co-operation towards this end.⁷

Hamas’s least realistic goal is to break down the borders and march en masse into Israel, flooding it with millions of descendants of Palestinian refugees. Claiming the Land remains a fundamental part of Palestinian mindsets, which conceive of it as theirs by divine right, which is why Hamas rhetoric over the last few weeks has consistently used the phrase “right to return”.

However, the unrealistic nature of this goal is not the point – it reflects something ideological, and spiritual, which is important to understand.

The Right to Return?

The claim to a ‘right to return’ hinges on the argument that Palestinians, as the indigenous people of the area, were cruelly and unfairly forced to flee their homes in 1948 when Israel was created. Factually, of course, this is hotly disputed.

The refugee crisis in Gaza was indeed created in 1948, at Israel’s birth. However, contrary to popularly accepted propaganda, this was not due to Palestinians being forced off ‘their land’ by ‘settler-colonialist’ Jews. Nor was it due to any kind of ethnic cleansing on behalf of the Israeli authorities.

The claim to a ‘right to return’ reflects something ideological and spiritual which is important to understand.

The very claim that Palestinians were somehow a coherent people in 1948 and represented the indigenous population of Israel is bogus.⁸ But that aside, the majority of Palestinians who fled in 1948, ending up in refugee camps in Arab-controlled territories, did so because they were fleeing the coming war on Israel, which the surrounding Arab countries were sure would be won in a matter of days. Many residents were deliberately evacuated by Arab leaders. Israeli authorities made efforts to persuade people to stay – but with little success.⁹

Even PA leader Mahmoud Abbas admitted that the refugee problem was a crisis of the Arabs’ own making:

The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny, but instead they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate and leave their homeland, and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live.¹⁰

Against all odds, Israel won the 1948 war, with Egypt left occupying the Gaza Strip.¹¹ Since, it has become in the strategic interest of Palestinian leaders to keep their people languishing, to garner international support for their cause and to stir up anger and desperation among ordinary Palestinians. This hypocrisy is written from an insider perspective in testimonies such as ‘Son of Hamas’, by Hamas ‘prince’ Mosab Hassan Yousef.

Do the Facts Matter?

Of course, factual arguments aren’t as important as ideology when it comes to the Palestinian cause. Although a large part of their international appeal rests on people thinking otherwise, the ‘right to return’ does not actually refer to a few thousand refugees reclaiming small parcels of land here and there across Israel that they once used to call home.

Neither is Hamas today’s version of the US civil rights movement - those who imply otherwise are imposing Western logic onto an Islamic issue.

The ‘right to return’ is actually a broader reference to the pan-Arabic re-claiming of the whole Land of Israel – by whatever means necessary - until Israel as a state ceases to exist and its Jews (and Christians) have either been eradicated or subjugated to Islam. This has less to do, then, with specific Palestinian lived experience and more to do with general Islamic enmity towards Jews and the religious imperative to ‘liberate’ the Land from Judaism/Christianity and for Islam, “from the river to the sea” as Hamas loves to put it. According to the Palestinians, the Land is ‘waqf land’ – land eternally belonging to Islam and only temporarily ‘occupied’ by Jews.¹²

The ‘right to return’ has less to do with specific Palestinian lived experience and more to do with general Islamic enmity towards Jews and the religious imperative to ‘liberate’ the Land for Islam.

In short, the ‘March of Return’ is about the obliteration of Israel. It’s a literal walking out of anti-Zionism – the belief that the Jewish state has no right to exist and that Jews have no claim to the Land.

Of course such an obliteration is not only based on lies, it is also practically impossible, as the Bible makes clear that Israel has been resettled permanently in the Land – never to be uprooted again (Amos 9:15).

Bible Lens

Whilst of course Israelis don’t get everything right and few yet know their Messiah, it is indisputable that God has set them back in their Land, re-gathering them from around the world in fulfilment of his word, and protecting them miraculously from incessant onslaughts ever since.

It is also indisputable that the Palestinians, dreadfully abused by their own leaders and indoctrinated to hate Jews, are fundamentally setting themselves against God. Though each are loved by the Lord, and he sees the complexities of their individual predicaments, the sum of their activism represents and channels demonic hatred of God’s covenant people and covenant Land. The Bible makes it clear that ultimately this is completely futile (e.g. Ps 2) and worse – brings a curse (Gen 12:3).

Scripture does not clearly predict this current protest (really just the latest manifestation of a very long-running campaign), but it does foresee various attempts to make war on the Jewish state.

As successive storm-clouds gather and burst in the Middle East, it is not difficult to see that the Palestinians are aligning themselves with those Arab nations, such as Iran, that actively plan to wipe Israel off the map. Again, the scriptures make clear the end of those who come against Israel in this way: shame and perishing, becoming like the “whirling dust” (Ps 83:13).

The Bible foretells that the nations of the world will one day gather to make war against Israel (Zech 12). Undoubtedly, the Palestinian ‘cause’, complex though it may be, has done a huge amount to spread anti-Israel hatred around the world, and to deceive many into believing that Israel’s very existence is illegitimate. Thus, however far away we are from the coming global war on the Jewish state, these protests are helping to lay its foundations in people’s hearts, today.

However far away we are from the coming global war on the Jewish state, these protests are helping to lay its foundations in people’s hearts, today.

Watchmen on the Walls

In keeping track of this unfolding drama, it’s important that we do not become passive onlookers, for there is much we can do.

We can use the opportunity to avail ourselves of the facts and disseminate and defend the truth, engaging people in conversation and challenging wrong assumptions and bias.¹³ There are many resources and books available to this end, with more being reviewed on Prophecy Today UK in coming weeks.

We can make sure that we ourselves have built up our own understandings of the conflict from the bedrock of Scripture, more than from media reports. What we see in the flesh is symptomatic of an invisible spiritual battle that the secular media cannot comprehend.

And, not least, we can pray: that Britain will choose her side in this conflict wisely, that God will work to protect his people and Land in ways that bring great glory to his name, and that he will have a huge harvest amidst all the chaos – including from among the Palestinian people.

Fill their faces with shame, that they may seek your name, O Lord. Let them be confounded and dismayed forever; yes, let them be put to shame and perish, that they may know that You, whose name alone is the Lord, are the Most High over all the earth. (Psalm 83:16-18, NKJV, emphasis added)

References

1 Snapshots from Gazan media outlets are illuminating in this respect: see here.

2 E.g. see here.

3 Read this article for a helpful analysis from an Israeli strategic viewpoint.

4 A case is currently before the International Criminal Court to prosecute Hamas in this respect.

5 The unofficial term for this is ‘Pallywood’. E.g. see these rehearsals and this page under ‘Myth: Israel is shooting people in the back or while they are running away.’

6 Mirrors to blind IDF soldiers and huge piles of tyres set ablaze to create a smokescreen covering attempts to storm the fence. The resulting tyre shortage in Gaza was blamed on Israel.

7 See here.

8 Most Arabs living in Palestine before 1948 were immigrants from surrounding countries. Zionist pioneers brought prosperity in the 20^th Century, attracting more in-migration. The uniting of these into a coherent ‘Palestinian’ people group happened in the mid-20^th Century, chiefly out of opposition to the new Jewish state.

9 Those who did stay enjoy full citizenship rights today and a much higher standard of living than in surrounding countries.

10 Falastin a-Thaura, March 1973. Quoted here. There was unavoidable collateral damage during the 1948 war and some inexcusable instances of Jewish aggression. However, Israel denounced these latter events and sought to compensate victims. For more on this issue, we recommend this page as well as Sandra Teplinsky’s book, ‘Why Still Care About Israel?’ (2013, Chosen Books).

11 Read a brief history of the Strip here.

12 See here (Article Eleven) and here.

13 CUFI are currently encouraging people to email the Foreign Secretary, urging him to condemn Hamas’s behaviour.