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Today In Prophecy
Pillar of Defense "And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them, saith the LORD thy God" (Amos 9:15). The Gaza Strip in Israel has erupted into violence once again. It began as Hamas launched over seven hundred rockets randomly into Israel during November. Israel retaliated when the missiles reached Tel Aviv. News media, normally not supporters of Israel, conceded that Israel’s targeted killing of Hamas’ commander of armed forces in Gaza was a justified reprisal. Follow-up editorials, however, attached a "but" to their analysis, saying that Israel’s surgical attacks were "disproportionate." Eugene Robinson, popular editorialist for the Washington Post, claimed Israel provokes attacks by blockading Gaza’s residents as punishment for choosing Hamas. The New York Times editorialized that "it would be easier to win support for retaliatory action if Israel was engaged in serious negotiations with Hamas’ rival, the Palestinian Authority." Absent from most analyses is the guarantee from Israel to provide electricity at all times to the 1.6 million residents in Gaza, 44 percent of whom are aged 14 or under, with electricity at all times. No mention is made of Israel’s evacuation warning leaflets raining down on citizens of Gaza territories prior to each targeted bombing, only to be answered by Hamas’ warning to citizens to ignore them. A More Aggressive Hamas In the nearly four years since Operation Cast Lead ended with an Israeli victory, Hamas has generally refrained from attacks and actively prevented other active Gaza terrorist organizations from launching attacks. Since the rise to power of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, that has changed. A strong ally in Egypt has empowered Hamas to become more aggressive. The Muslim Brotherhood is ascending in many Middle East countries as a by product of the Arab Spring. Among them are Tunisia, Morocco, Jordan and Libya. In Syria, the Muslim Brotherhood is a significant opposition force to the Assad regime. The emir of Qatar pledged $400 million in restoration aid to Gaza after a recent visit. Turkey publicly condemned Israel’s retaliation as "terrorist activity" to no opposition from its formal ally the United States. Ironically, the Associated Press questioned Washington’s lack of response to Turkey’s statement. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has made it known that he wants to revive the Ottoman-era Turkish dominance of the region. The Quartet on the Middle East, made up of the United Nations, the United States, the European Union and Russia, was established in 2002 to help mediate the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Since Hamas seized power in 2007, it has adamantly refused to meet any of the three terms set in Madrid by the International Quartet. Besides calling for the annihilation of the "Zionist regime", the Hamas charter cites a discredited forgery, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, claiming that the Jews are so evil that somehow they "stood behind World War II, where they collected immense benefits from trading with war materials." Nothing is mentioned of the Holocaust.
Israel’s Land Rights Biblical In our growing secular world, both God and His promises given in the Bible are dismissed. Followers of Jesus, however, find their lifeblood in these. Among those promises, that of the re-establishment of Israel in the Land promised to Abraham is heralded as one of the most important events to happen in "the last day" of this social order. That great promise made to Abraham and reiterated to Jacob, later renamed Israel, is the reason Israel will not be moved from its borders or land under pressure from either its allies or its enemies. "The L ORD ... said, I am the LORD God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed" (Genesis 28:13-14).The prophet Ezekiel saw a vision of a valley of skeletal (dry) bones. Those bones came together, added flesh, and received God’s spirit (chapter 37). Ezekiel saw our day — the rise and the gradual resurrection of the nation of Israel. Near the end of the 19th century, the Zionist movement brought Jews to Israel from all over the world. Persecuted Jews from Russia and Russian-ruled lands became the early settlers of Israel. The Nazi persecutions of the 1930s drove many Jews out of Europe to the Holy Land. The British, however, refused to allow immigration at the urging of their Arab oil partners. The Holocaust brought a persecution of Jews not known since the days of the Chaldeans. The prophet Zechariah proclaimed God’s anger over the man-delivered chastening, "So the angel who was speaking with me said to me, Proclaim, saying, Thus says the Lord of hosts, I am exceedingly jealous for Jerusalem and Zion. But I am very angry with the nations who are at ease; for while I was only a little angry, they furthered the disaster" (Zechariah 1:14-15 NAS).The promise of being regathered to the Land of Promise continues to be fulfilled, not so much out of persecution as out of the attractiveness of living in Israel despite continued threat of violence. Since the mid 1990s, there has been a steady stream of South African Jews, American Jews, and French Jews who have either made aliyah (Hebrew, ascent), or purchased property in Israel for potential future immigration. Specifically, many French Jews have purchased homes in Israel as insurance due to the rising rate of anti-Semitism in France in recent years.On the heels of the Global Financial Crisis in 2008, American Jewish immigration to Israel rose, triggered by Israel’s lower unemployment rate combined with financial incentives offered to new immigrants. In 2009, Western aliyah was at its highest in 36 years, with 3324 North American Jews immigrating to Israel.The Bible promises that Israel will not only survive, but will thrive. "Therefore fear thou not, O my servant Jacob, saith the Lord; neither be dismayed, O Israel: for, lo, I will save thee from afar, and thy seed from the land of their captivity; and Jacob shall return, and shall be in rest, and be quiet, and none shall make him afraid. For I am with thee, saith the Lord, to save thee: though I make a full end of all nations whither I have scattered thee, yet I will not make a full end of thee: but I will correct thee in measure, and will not leave thee altogether unpunished" (Jeremiah 30:10-11). God promises that Israel will enter into Christ’s kingdom as the earthly seed of Abraham (Genesis 22:17) following the end-time battle known as Armageddon (Ezekiel 38:16, Zechariah 14:2,3, Revelation 16:16). Christ’s kingdom will be the first real opportunity for Israel to bless all people of the world. The scattering of the past three thousand years has uniquely allowed Jews to know the culture and climate of almost every nation on earth. Christ’s thousand-year Kingdom will bless all families of the Earth. Jehovah God, through Christ and the Church and the resurrected ancient worthies, will use Israel to help recover Earth’s resurrected billions (Zechariah 8:23, Isaiah 2:3). The people who came against Israel will go up to Jerusalem to acknowledge and worship God. "And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the L ORD of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles" (Zechariah 14:16). Let us pray for the peace of Jerusalem — for the peace of Jerusalem will mean the blessing of the world.
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