Israel's 70th Anniversary and the Convergence of End-Times Prophecies - By Isaiah Anderson -
Israel celebrated its 70th anniversary, as a reborn nation on Monday, May 14, 2018. Many Christians see the miracle of Israel, as the long-awaited fulfillment of the prophesied return of the Jewish People to their divinely given homeland.
"But you, O mountains of Israel, you shall shoot forth your branches and yield your fruit to My people Israel, for they are about to come. For indeed I am for you, and I will turn to you, and you shall be tilled and sown. I will multiply men upon you, all the house of Israel, all of it; and the cities shall be inhabited, and the ruins rebuilt. - Ezek 36:8-10 (NKJV)
Many students of Bible prophecy can't help but notice the converging End-times signs prophesied in the Bible, which will culminate with several events, chiefly the return of Jesus Christ. Before this can occur, many have longed to see the Jewish people return to their ancient homeland, which officially became a State on May 14, 1948.
The miraculous return of the Jewish people to their homeland, after nearly 2000 years of dispersion throughout the world, it was indeed a miracle! The very term "The wandering Jew" became an idiom of the Jewish plight and their endless struggle without a homeland, and it all the more reflects how much of a miracle it was.
The Jewish people made quarters for themselves in the dispersed lands they found themselves, often thriving, they built entire communities of commerce, education, and faith.
Jews experienced tremendous struggles and persecutions, and those persecutions culminated in Europe, as World War II was beginning and the world was realizing the fears of another world war. The Jewish people were experiencing the worst cruelties and horrors imaginable, the Nazi's final solution, the irrational hatred and systematic extermination of the Jewish people throughout Europe.
By supernatural intervention and the liberating armies of the allies, the Jewish people survived the nightmares of the Holocaust, leaving us with names that will forever be infamous reminders of the world's cruelty towards the Jewish people, Auschwitz, Treblinka, and Dachau. Through the spiritual cleansing of the Holocaust, God moved the shocked nations of the world into establishing the Jewish State of Israel, which became a reality May 14th, 1948, exactly seventy years ago.
'Thus says the Lord God: "On the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will also enable you to dwell in the cities, and the ruins shall be rebuilt. The desolate land shall be tilled instead of lying desolate in the sight of all who pass by. So they will say, 'This land that was desolate has become like the garden of Eden; and the wasted, desolate, and ruined cities are now fortified and inhabited.' Then the nations which are left all around you shall know that I, the Lord, have rebuilt the ruined places and planted what was desolate. I, the Lord, have spoken it, and I will do it." 'Thus says the Lord God: "I will also let the house of Israel inquire of Me to do this for them: I will increase their men like a flock. Like a flock offered as holy sacrifices, like the flock at Jerusalem on its feast days, so shall the ruined cities be filled with flocks of men. Then they shall know that I am the Lord." ' " - Ezek 36:33-38 (NKJV)
Israel became a nation in a single day, recognized by the nations of the world, which was quickly followed by the invasion of several Arab armies bent on the destruction of this infant nation. Although greatly outnumbered and with very little fighting equipment, the Jewish people won the War of 1948.
Other wars were still to come, but the miracle of the War of 1948, was not lost on many Christians, who prayed for the survival of the fledgling Jewish nation. Israel was facing six well equipped and trained Arab armies, yet with great determination and courage they prevailed over the overwhelming odds and won the war, it was indeed a miracle.
History was written, Israel was born in one day, without a fight for liberty, as most nations begin, just a simple vote at the UN and Israel was a nation. The labor started after its birth and has continued to this day. Amazingly, the Bible gives this exact prophecy, regarding the country of Israel, which was literally fulfilled seventy years ago.
Before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child. Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children. Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to bring forth? saith the Lord: shall I cause to bring forth, and shut the womb? saith thy God. - Isaiah 66:7-9 (KJV)
God demonstrates His love and patience for His people, even in their sins and rejection. God promised to restore Israel as a nation for His namesake, so the modern miracle of Israel is a witness to the world of God's grace and faithfulness.
We must remember, God returned the Jews to Israel, not because they're perfect people, far from it, he did it for His own Glory and to fulfill His promises to not only the Jews but to all mankind.
"Therefore say to the house of Israel, 'Thus says the Lord God: "I do not do this for your sake, O house of Israel, but for My holy name's sake, which you have profaned among the nations wherever you went. And I will sanctify My great name, which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst; and the nations shall know that I am the Lord," says the Lord God, "when I am hallowed in you before their eyes. For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. - Ezek 36:22-24 (NKJV)
Is this the end of the miracle, the return of Israel? Absolutely not, it's literally the only the beginning.
In this article, I hope to reflect on the rapidly changing events of the day, as we look at this event through the prism of Biblical prophecy, which begins with the promised return of the Nation of Israel and the convergence of End-times prophecies quickly coming into reality.
As Christians, we are commanded to be looking for the Lord's imminent return. Jesus said, "Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near." - Luke 21:28 (NKJV).
Jesus gives a stern warning, Christians are to be looking for the beginning manifestations of prophetic events given of the final End-times prophecies, which all begins with the rebirth of Israel.
I believe Jesus used the analogy of the fig tree to represent Israel, the generation to witness the re-birth of Israel will not pass until all things are fulfilled.
"Look at the fig tree, and all the trees. When they are already budding, you see and know for yourselves that summer is now near. So you also, when you see these things happening, know that the kingdom of God is near. Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all things take place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away. "But take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that Day come on you unexpectedly. For it will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man." - Luke 21:29-36 (NKJV)
If Israel is the beginning initiator of the End-times, which I believe the overall prophetic texts clearly indicate, how close are we and what significant converging signs should we be looking for?
The first overall sign or initiator would be the restoration of the Jewish people back to their land, control over Jerusalem and Judea. We see this prophesied in a number of the prophetic writings, but to condense the article we will only focus on the Prophet Joel.
The Prophet Joel clearly says, when we see the Jews return to Jerusalem and Judea, God will create a global issue to bring the nations of the world to judgment in the valley of Jehoshaphat or the Valley of Judgment.
God's prophetic time clock of the End-times begins with the restoration of Jerusalem and Judea. Much debate has been made on if this has been completed, it indeed doesn't seem so, but we can all agree the initial stages of restoration are clearly occurring today.
For behold, in those days and at that time, When I bring back the captives of Judah and Jerusalem, I will also gather all nations, And bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat; And I will enter into judgment with them there On account of My people, My heritage Israel, Whom they have scattered among the nations; They have also divided up My land. - Joel 3:1-2 (NKJV)
The second converging sign would be, the preoccupation with Jerusalem by the surrounding nations. The Prophet Zachariah speaks of a time when the city would become a global problem, and their fascination would ultimately lead to it being surrounded and attacked. Clearly, we see Jerusalem in the news almost daily, which is amazing when you consider the prophecy was given over 2500 year ago.
"Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of drunkenness to all the surrounding peoples, when they lay siege against Judah and Jerusalem. And it shall happen in that day that I will make Jerusalem a very heavy stone for all peoples; all who would heave it away will surely be cut in pieces, though all nations of the earth are gathered against it. - Zech 12:2-3 (NKJV)
The third converging sign is Globalism, or more specifically Global government. The Bible says we will have a global government and it will ultimately be headed by the Antichrist.
Today we literally have hundreds of global organization, all of them are substantial bureaucratic organizations, working and funded to ensure greater integration of national economies on trade and commerce, banking, military interoperations, legal systems, intelligence agencies, and government health agencies. The overall global integration of countries is almost mind-boggling, especially the primary institution for international forums on international cooperation, the United Nations.
It was granted to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them. And authority was given him over every tribe, tongue, and nation. - Rev 13:7 (NKJV)
The fourth convergence is Global communication. Clearly, the world is in a very unique period of time, nearly every electronic transaction or communication made is immediately recorded and ultimately controlled by the governments of the world.
The American Government openly acknowledged the recording of every person on the planet, whether phone and electronic activities by Government filters and surveillance agencies. All banking transactions are monitored as well. Total control is limited merely by the desire of governments will and self-constraint.
The Bible speaks of a coming time when the people of the world will be required to receive an economic identification [mark], that will allow one to work, buy, sell and trade within this global electronic system. Some believe this is far off but is it really...The technology is already being tested in small companies around the world, which should be a wake-up call to everyone!
He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, 17 and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 18 Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man: His number is 666. - Rev 13:16-18 (NKJV)
The fifth converging sign is the preparation for rebuilding the Jewish Temple. Please see my article "The coming Jewish Temple." The preparation is ongoing and very intricate, which again should be a major wake up call to anyone with ears to hear and eyes to see.
Then I was given a reed like a measuring rod. And the angel stood, saying, "Rise and measure the temple of God, the altar, and those who worship there. 2 But leave out the court which is outside the temple, and do not measure it, for it has been given to the Gentiles. And they will tread the holy city underfoot for forty-two months.Rev 11:1-2 (NKJV)
Additional signs:
- A great apostasy within the Christian faith would occur right before the coming Antichrist is revealed. Today we see the increasing departure from the Biblical faith given to us by Christ Jesus and the Apostles, but this is quickly being departed by many liberal-minded and socially oriented "Christians."
- The increased carnality and depravity would be a global phenomenon.
- The revival of the Roman Empire (Possibly some form of the EU) would be a reality.
- Increase in natural disasters.
- National and military alliances that fit the End-Times prophetic signs.
All of the above signs are currently happening with breathtaking speed. I plan to do additional articles on the above, additional signs, but for now simply seeing their passing fulfillments should be enough to open the eyes and ears of those willing to see and hear the truth.
As Jesus said, "Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near." - Luke 21:28 (NKJV).
Blessings.
Jerusalem -- End of the Line - Jack Kinsella -
By every measurable historical standard, the city of Jerusalem should have fallen into oblivion centuries ago. The city was destroyed in AD 70 by the Romans and its founders and traditional inhabitants were killed or fled into exile in foreign lands.
It has no natural wealth. It has no coastline. It sits inconveniently upon a mountain. It overlooks nothing of strategic military value.
It is on no ancient trade route. The King's Highway of David's time ran north and south through modern Jordan. Jerusalem was well off the beaten path -- folks didn't pass through Jerusalem on their way to somewhere else -- Jerusalem was the end of the line.
Like other historical 'end of the line' cities, once its reason to exist was extinguished by the destruction of its native population, so should its history.
The once-great city of Babylon is a perfect example. Once capital of the world's greatest empire, it is today little more than a living museum, devoid of influence or even much interest outside scholarly circles.
Over the centuries, it has been fought over by the Assyrians, Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks, Ptolemies, Seleucids, Romans, Byzantines, Persians, Arabs, Seljuks, Crusaders, Mongols, Mamelukes, by the Turks, the British, Jordan and most recently, by those Jordanians who became 'Palestinians' after Jordan's defeat in the 1967 War.
Jerusalem remains one of the most contested cities on earth to this day. That list doesn't include the approximately two hundred million Islamic fundamentalists or Islamic states like Iran or Saudi Arabia who have conducted a decades-long shadow war to 'liberate' the city from Jewish control.
Despite two thousand years of war aimed at destroying the Jews and seizing their city, in this generation, the Jews again inhabit an undivided Jerusalem.
"And they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled." (Luke 21:24)
Jesus' sweeping prophecy concerning the future of the city of Jerusalem and its inhabitants was fulfilled to the letter throughout history, including its restoration to Jewish hands.
Note that its restoration signals the fulfillment of the 'times of the Gentiles'.
The Apostle Paul called himself the 'apostle of the Gentiles' (Romans 11:13) but Paul had formerly been known as Saul of Tarsus, a Pharisee (lawyer) and Jewish religious leader. Paul explains that the Church is a 'graft' from the original tree (Judaism), saying,
"For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in." Romans 11:25)
Here we find the same phraseology that was employed by Jesus concerning the 'times of the Gentiles'. Jesus referred to the times of the Gentiles as being 'fulfilled'. Paul speaks of the 'fulness of the Gentiles'.
Paul says that, following the 'fulness of the Gentiles',
"And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob: For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins." (Romans 11:27)
Paul notes that, during the Church Age,
"As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes," but Paul cautions; "but as touching the election, they are beloved for the father's sakes."
Then Paul wraps it all together by saying,
"For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance." (Romans 11:29)
This is one of the great mysteries of Scripture. The Jews are enemies of the Gospel for 'our sakes'. What does that mean?
Jesus taught that His mission was to come first to the Jews. When approached by the Samaritan woman begging Him to help her daughter, Jesus told her, "I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel." (Matthew 15:24)
To the Jews He prophesied,
"I am come in My Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive." (John 5:43)
If the Jews had accepted their Messiah at His First Advent, there would have been no Church Age and the Lord would have set up the Millennial Kingdom right then and there. Salvation was only opened to the Gentiles after the Gospel was rejected by the Jews.
Jesus prophesied that because of their rejection of Him, "Behold, your house is left unto you desolate."
This prophecy was fulfilled in AD 70 with the destruction of Jerusalem. And thus begins the 'Times of the Gentiles.'
The usurper, who comes in his own name and is received by the Jews as their Messiah, is not revealed until after the 'fulness of the Gentiles' is come in.
Jeremiah calls it the 'Time of Jacob's Trouble' (Jeremiah 30:7). Jesus calls it the 'Tribulation' (Matthew 24:29). The prophet Daniel outlines the Tribulation's six-fold purpose, from the perspective of Israel;
"(1) to finish the transgression, and (2) to make an end of sins, and (3) to make reconciliation for iniquity, and (4) to bring in everlasting righteousness, and (5) to seal up the vision and prophecy, and (6) to anoint the most Holy." (Daniel 9:24)
Assessment:
Let's connect the dots and see how the Big Picture develops here. Jesus said that the restoration of Jerusalem to Jewish control would signal that the 'fulness of the Gentiles be come in'.
Jesus said of the generation on earth at that time,
"This generation shall not pass away, till ALL be fulfilled." (Luke 21:32)
Paul says that the Jews, as an institution, rejected Jesus so that the Gentiles would have a chance at salvation. He said that God would not return His attention to Israel until 'the fulness of the Gentiles be come in'.
The 'fulness of the Gentiles' indicates a finite number -- a 'quota', so to speak -- of Gentiles who will come to know Christ during the Church Age.
Once that quota -- the Church Age 'elect' have been gathered, God returns His attention to the Jews, "And so all Israel shall be saved" -- because "the gifts and calling of God are without repentance."
That Jesus offered salvation first to Israel is confirmed by His own Words as recorded by John.
The 'Time of Jacob's Trouble' is so-called because of its purpose as outlined by Daniel -- the six-fold purpose that culminates with the 'anointment of the most Holy' as Messiah and the beginning of the Millennial Reign from Jerusalem.
Note how clearly the two Dispensations are divided. Until the Crucifixion, God's attention was focused on Israel. Until the 'fulness of the Gentiles be come in' God's attention is focused on the Church.
The Church, as the 'Bride of Christ' serves no role in Daniel's six-point outline for the Tribulation Period. Take another look at Daniel 9:24 before we go on.
The transgression was finished at the Cross. The Blood of Christ takes away all sin. (1st John 1:7) His death and resurrection reconciled the Church to God.
"And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation. To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation." (2nd Corinthians 5:18-19)
To the saved believer reconciled to God by the Blood of Christ, 'everlasting righteousness' is a gift of grace through faith, 'sealing' the vision and prophecy of the Old Covenant and introducing the New Covenant with the Church.
The believer knows that Jesus is ALREADY anointed King of King and Lord of Lords and is awaiting His return at the end of the Church Age.
There is no role for the Church Age during the Time of Jacob's Trouble -- it doesn't begin until after the 'fulness of the Gentiles' is come in. And this is the generation in which Jerusalem was recovered from Gentile control, signaling the approach of the fullness of the Gentiles'.
The Tribulation serves two main purposes; the first is the judgment of God on a Christ-rejecting world. The second is the national redemption of Israel. By definition, Church-Age believers have NOT rejected Christ, and need no further redemption.
The Bible says that, before the unfolding of the Time of Jacob's Trouble, there will come an ingathering of Church Age believers:
"Because thou hast kept the word of My patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth." (Revelation 3:10)
Jerusalem is the signal that this is the generation that will see the 'fullness of the Gentiles be come in'. It was to that generation that Paul promised:
"For this we say unto you BY THE WORD OF THE LORD, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall . . . be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord." (1st Thessalonians 4:15,17b)
The time is short. Don't let anybody steal your victory. Jesus is coming soon for His Church:
"And THEN shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of His mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming." (2nd Thessalonians 2:8)
Get excited! The time is short, the fulness of the Gentiles is at hand; the Lord IS coming soon!
"Wherefore comfort one another with these words." (2nd Thessalonians 4:18)
'This is history': U.S. Embassy opens in Jerusalem - Art Moore - http://www.wnd.com/2018/05/this-is-history-u-s-embassy-opens-in-jerusalem/?cat_orig=faith
Netanyahu: 'God bless ... the eternal undivided capital of Israel'
Amid violent Palestinian protests, the U.S. officially opened a new embassy in Jerusalem on Monday, drawing effusive praise from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
"Today, today, the embassy of the most powerful nation on earth, our greatest ally, the United States of America, opened here," Netanyahu said at a ceremony marking the event.
"God bless the United States of America and God bless Jerusalem, the eternal undivided capital of Israel," he said.
Meanwhile, the health ministry in Gaza run by Hamas, a U.S.-declared terrorist organization, claimed dozens of Palestinians protesting at the border were killed by Israeli fire. The Israeli military said it was repelling an effort by Hamas to breach the border. The Palestinians were commemorating Nakba Day, the "catastrophe" of Israel's founding 70 years ago.
Netanyahu praised President Trump for his decision in December to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital and move the U.S. Embassy. When the date for the embassy opening was announced in February, coinciding with the founding of Israel, PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat called the move a "flagrant violation of international law and agreements" signed between the Palestinians and Israel that will "destroy" the two-state solution.
What do YOU think? What are your thoughts on new U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem? Sound off in today's WND poll
Netanyahu urged the approximately 800 guests at the dedication of the new embassy building Monday in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Arnona to "remember this moment."
"This is history," he said. "President Trump, by recognizing history, you have made history."
In attendance, representing the U.S., were Ambassador David Friedman, Deputy Secretary of State John J. Sullivan, Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin, Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, the president's daughter and adviser Ivanka Trump, and Special Representative for International Negotiations Jason Greenblatt.
'We are here to stay'
Netanyahu recounted the history of the city, established, he said, as a capital by King David 3,000 years ago.
"King Solomon later built the Temple, and over 2,000 years later, we got to hear the sentence 'The Temple Mount is in our hands.' We are here in Jerusalem, and we are here to stay," he said.
Netanyahu compared the moment historically to the Balfour Declaration of 1917 and the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948.
The prime minister, amid the violent Palestinian protests, said it's also "a good day for peace."
"You can only build peace upon truth, and the truth is that Jerusalem has been the capital of Israel for 3,000 years," he said. "May the opening of this embassy spread the truth far and wide."
The Arab League planned to hold an extraordinary meeting Monday to discuss the United State's "illegal" move of its embassy to Jerusalem, reported the state news agency MENA, according to Reuters.
High-level representatives to the Arab League will meet "to counter the illegal decision taken by the United States of America to transfer its embassy to Jerusalem," the report said.
Iran, denouncing Trump as "feeble-minded," called on the Palestinians and the international community to engage in resistance, the Times of Israel reported.
"America has entered a crisis of strategic decision-making that looks at the international arena immaturely and adventurously," said parliament speaker Ali Larijani at a conference on the Palestinian situation in Tehran.
Al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri urged Muslims to take up arms and carry out jihad against the United States, saying the embassy move was evidence that negotiations and "appeasement" have failed Palestinians, reported France 24
In a video titled "Tel Aviv is Also a Land of Muslims," Zawahiri said Trump "was clear and explicit, and he revealed the true face of the modern Crusade, where standing down and appeasement does not work with them, but only resistance through the call and jihad," according to a transcript provided by the SITE monitoring agency.
Two Jewish lobby groups in the U.S. expressed opposing views of the embassy relocation.
AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, called it a "momentous day for the U.S.-Israel relationship" and urged other nations to follow Washington's lead.
The left-leaning J Street, meanwhile, asserted the move "has only undermined the prospects for peace, exacerbated tensions and undercut U.S. standing as an effective mediator."
"This isn't policy - it's pandering to a narrow political base," said J Street president Jeremy Ben-Ami.
British Prime Minister Theresa May said Monday the United Kingdom had no plans to move its embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, the Times of Israel reported.
A spokesman noted that the U.K. expressed disagreement in December when Trump made the announcement.
"The British embassy to Israel is based in Tel Aviv and we have no plans to move it," the spokesman said.
Clinton, Bush, Obama supported embassy move
Britain was one of 128 countries that voted in favor of a United Nations General Assembly resolution in December declaring Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel "null and void." Nine countries voted against it.
The announcement in December sparked violent protests in the Middle East and a call from Hamas for an uprising against Israel.
The Trump administration's move fulfilled the requirements of a 1995 law that was adopted overwhelmingly by the Senate (93-5) and the House (374-37).
When Trump announced the decision, he reiterated his commitment to peace in the Middle East, noting the previous policy of not recognizing "the reality" that Jerusalem is Israel's capital brought us "no closer to a lasting peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians."
The Palestinian leadership, Fatah and Hamas, claims the Jewish people have falsified their 3,000 year-old history to lay claim to Jerusalem. The holy city, the Palestinians insist, is "Palestinian" and must be the capital of a future Palestinian state.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital a milestone.
"There are major moments in the history of Zionism: the Balfour Declaration, the founding of the state, the liberation of Jerusalem and Trump's announcement yesterday," he said in a video posted to social media.
Hamas, meanwhile, said the decision "opens the gates of hell" and called for several days of protests.
After the Jerusalem Embassy Act of 1995 was passed, Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama signed every six months a waiver incorporated in the law allowing the president to delay its implementation for national security reasons.
Trump signed the waiver in June but decided in December to finally implement the law.
The three presidents who chose to delay enacting the Jerusalem Embassy Act nevertheless affirmed publicly that Jerusalem is Israel's capital, and two of them said they supported moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem.
Obama, a Democrat, told AIPAC in 2008 that Jerusalem "will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided. I have no illusions that this will be easy."
Bush, a Republican, promised during the 2000 campaign that "as soon as I take office I will begin the process of moving the U.S. ambassador to the city Israel has chosen as its capital."
And Clinton, a Democrat, entered office in 1993 saying he supported "the principle" of moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem.
The Peace of Jerusalem - Bill Wilson -
What presidents since 1995 said they were going to do, but exercised a Congressional waiver instead, President Donald Trump officially recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and moved the US Embassy there. Trump said, "Presidents issued these waivers under the belief that delaying the recognition of Jerusalem would advance the cause of peace...It would be folly to assume that repeating the exact same formula would now produce a different or better result. Therefore, I have determined that it is time to officially recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel... Israel is a sovereign nation with the right like every other sovereign nation to determine its own capital. Acknowledging this as a fact is a necessary condition for achieving peace."
Pastors John Hagee and Robert Jeffress were on hand to bless the Embassy and pray for the peace of Jerusalem, as did Rabbi Zalman Wolowik. They cited Psalm 122:6, "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee." But there was everything but peace in the reporting of this "religious" role in the dedication of the Embassy. Of course, the mainstream media-including AP, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, NY Times and more-severely criticized Hagee and Jeffress for their conservative stances on Christianity and Israel, referring to them as bigots, Islamophobes, and a host of other "isms" and "phobes." The media seemed to align with the religion of peace (Islam), whose representatives were rioting and committing acts of terror due to the US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
Turkey's dictator Recep Tayipp Erdogan said, "Israel is a terrorist state." Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri said that the move allows "Israel to spill more blood of innocent Palestinians and increases the intensity of extremism that threatens the world community." Iran's Foreign Minister called it "a day of great shame" and referred to Israel as "the world's largest open air prison." The Arab League issued a statement saying that the Embassy move is a "blatant attack on the feelings of Arabs and Muslims," and it called on the international community to oppose this "unjust decision." All of these people claimed that Israel was massacring Palestinians, ignoring that they were violently storming Israel's border.
It should be obvious to anyone with discernment that those who dedicated the US Embassy in Jerusalem want peace, are called to peace, and are willing to work toward peace, though they may know that there will be no real peace until the return of the Messiah. Those who are so worked up over the declaration of Jerusalem as Israel's capital are the ones supporting violence for anything that remotely gives the appearance of recognizing Israel's right to exist. Sadly, the godless news media continuously shows its ignorance of Holy Scripture and its bias against those who speak truth. At the same time, the media perpetuates the agenda of those who are driven by such hate that they want all Jews driven into the sea. Indeed, we need to pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
The Jerusalem Embassy and the Triumph of Truth - Caroline Glick - http://www.breitbart.com/jerusalem/2018/05/16/caroline-glick-jerusalem-embassy-and-the-triumph-of-truth/
Monday's ceremony marking the opening of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem, Israel, had a clear message: It is time to embrace truth.
Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser, put it plainly when he said, "In December last year, President Donald Trump announced to the world that the U.S. would finally recognize the truth: That Jerusalem is the capital of Israel."
Kushner noted that accepting this fundamental truth is a critical foundation of any future peace between Israel and its neighbors.
"As Israel turns 70," he said, "the search for a lasting peace turns over a new leaf, one of realism and of not being afraid to stand strongly with our allies for what is good, for what is right and for what is true.
"When there is peace in this region, we will look back upon this day and remember that the journey to peace started with a strong America recognizing the truth."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continued Kushner's theme in his speech.
Netanyahu said: "The truth and peace are interconnected. A peace that is built on lies will crash on the rocks of Middle Eastern realities. You can only build peace on truth. And the truth is that Jerusalem has been and always will be the capital of the Jewish people, the capital of the Jewish state."
The ceremony Monday was a turning point in the Middle East, and in U.S. policy and leadership in the Middle East, because it marked the first time that U.S. policy has been firmly rooted in truth.
For seventy years, and particularly since the initiation of the peace process between Israel and the PLO at a ceremony on the White House lawn on September 13, 1993, U.S. government policy has been to ignore and deny the simple fact that Jerusalem is Israel's capital.
There were many reasons given to justify this unique - and, indeed, uniquely hostile - approach to Israel. Across 12 administrations, from Israel's founding until last December, the Jewish state has been the only state in the world whose capital the American government refused to recognize.
The Americans said the UN General Assembly had determined in 1947 that Jerusalem should be under UN sovereignty administered as a "corpus separatum," or area with no national sovereign. Put bluntly: they did not want to upset the Arabs. They said that since the Palestinians insist Jerusalem serve as a capital of a future Palestinian state, any recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital would harm the prospects for peace.
The fact that the UN partition resolution of 1947 has no power of law, and was rendered null and void the moment five Arab states invaded Israel the day it declared independence, made no impression on American officials.
The fact that the Arabs needed the U.S. far more than the U.S. needed the Arabs also never made anyone in Washington wake up. They kept trouncing Israel's basic rights as a means to appease Arabs who should have been appeasing the Americans who protected them and developed their oil fields, providing them with trillions of dollars of unearned wealth.
The fact that the Palestinians rejected three Israeli offers of peace and statehood - offers which included concessions over wide swathes of Jerusalem, including the Temple Mount - didn't cause the State Department or the Clinton, Bush or Obama administrations to rethink their discrimination against truth and Israel.
Indeed, the more extreme the Palestinians became, the more unwilling the White House and State Department were to provide even backhanded recognition of Israel's sovereignty over its capital city. The Obama administration was so hostile to the reality of Jerusalem's attachment to Israel that the State Department edited its photo archives to remove the word "Israel" from captions of photos taken in Jerusalem.
No one ever seemed to realize that giving the UN or the Arab world or the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) veto power over the basic fact that Jerusalem is Israel's capital did not advance the cause of peace. With Washington willing to sacrifice Israel's basic right to its capital, the Palestinians had every reason to believe that eventually Washington would be willing to sacrifice Israel's right to exist.
Kushner opened his remarks by noting, "Jerusalem is the eternal heart of the Jewish people." It was such a simple statement of fact. Jerusalem stands at the center of Jewish faith, national identity and survival. Jerusalem is central to every Jewish ritual from birth to death. For three thousand years, Jews have prayed in the direction of Jerusalem three times a day. It is impossible to imagine the Jews surviving two thousand years of exile only to return to reconstitute their national homeland without Jerusalem.
And yet, despite all of this, for seventy years no U.S. administration would base its Middle East policy on a basic recognition of one of the eternal truths in human history.
On Monday that all changed. And with that change, everything has changed. And there is no going back.
No future administration will be able to reverse Trump's decision without exposing itself as delusional and openly hostile to the Jewish people and the Jewish state. Whereas every president until Monday could say that he was pro-Israel while enacting a policy of deliberate discrimination against Israel, going forward, no such protestation will be taken at face value.
This change will require all administrations in the future to at least take the basic truth of Israel's sovereign rights into account when they forge their policies towards it and towards the region.
Monday's ceremony, unlike other memorable historic ceremonies involving Israel, wasn't about reaching for the sky without relation to the ground below.
The 1993 signing ceremony on the White House lawn, which initiated the peace process between Israel and the PLO, reached for the sky while ignoring completely the absence of firm ground. The only one who seemed aware of the absurdity of the notion that PLO chief Yasser Arafat - the architect of modern terrorism, a mass murderer, and a genocidal Jew -hater had suddenly become a man of peace was then Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. Throughout the hour-long ceremony, as everyone around him beamed and strutted, Rabin stood next to then-President Bill Clinton, swaying uncomfortably. Rabin twitched. He stared at the ground. He took out his glasses and started cleaning them. He pulled out his speech and then folded it up again.
Rabin seldom looked at the crowd. He never smiled. And when Clinton compelled him to shake Arafat's hand, bringing the crowd to its feet, Rabin looked like he was about to be sick.
Last week, Eitan Cabel, a long-serving lawmaker from Rabin's Labor Party, said that if Rabin knew the devastating toll the so-called peace process with the PLO would take on Israel, he never would have agreed to it. In his words, "I think if he knew what the price Israel was going to pay in the wake of the Oslo...[peace process with the PLO] if I said that the Oslo Accords would never have come out - in my estimation - he would not have accepted or made the Oslo agreements as they were."
But from the video of the ceremony, it is clear Rabin foresaw the devastation that permitting Arafat and his terrorists to enter Gaza and Judea and Samaria would wreak. It was written all over his face. He just couldn't stand his ground for the truth, surrounded as he was by men who wished to be deceived by Arafat's lies.
Rabin would no doubt have loved Monday's ceremony. The people in attendance certainly did.
Indeed, perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of Monday's event was how extraordinarily happy everyone there was. To the extent that guests at normal diplomatic events - embassy parties, signing ceremonies, etc. - feel any shared bond with one another, they generally feel the fraternity of members of the select set deemed important enough to merit an invitation.
On Monday, the feeling was different. From the front rows to the nosebleed section, from the press box to the military officers in the stands, everyone was happy and moved by what was happening. People didn't act like elitists. There was no snobbery. Cabinet members walked around hugging attendees.
As one woman put it, "This isn't a normal happiness. This is no normal joy. I don't know that I've ever felt this way before. It starts in the pit of my stomach and goes up through my heart and my head. I just can't believe this is happening. I can't believe this is really happening."
It wasn't that the ceremony was fancy. It was devoid of opulence. No doves were sent flying into the sky. No random groups of schoolchildren were brought in to sit on the side, acting as props to demonstrate everyone's commitment to the future, as happened at the White House ceremony Rabin stared at the ground and fidgeted like a caged lion throughout.
Monday's ceremony was a simple affair. The embassy put up a big tent and rented stadium chairs. The guests were given water and pretzels, and a commemorative baseball cap and coin. One speech followed another. A singer performed a couple songs, and it was over. Ambassador David Friedman probably came in well under budget.
But it was spectacular all the same.
Because once it was over, everything had changed. After 70 years, the U.S. government, under President Donald Trump, had officially shifted U.S. Middle East policy.
What was heretofore predicated on denying the truth, is now based on acknowledging it. Americans, Israelis, and the nations of the world as a whole can only be grateful and hopeful today. The future is unknowable still. But grounded as it now is in truth, U.S. Middle East policy has a better chance of succeeding than it ever has before.
The Significance of The Embassy Move - By Jonathan S. Tobin - http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/article.cfm?recent_news_id=2263
For decades, it was a consensus issue. Israel's supporters of all political stripes agreed that the refusal of the United States to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital was an anachronistic outrage. That's why both Democrats and Republicans included a promise to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv in their platforms every four years.
But now that the moment has finally arrived, many of those who once agreed that a policy switch was both just and necessary aren't happy.
The reason is obvious: It's because of the identity of the man who finally kept his word. That Donald Trump is the one who fulfilled his vow, and gave Israel and its people a memorable 70th birthday present is a bitter pill for most American Jews to swallow.
Several presidents from both political parties promised to move the embassy, yet once they were elected, they broke that vow. The quadrennial bipartisan charade over Jerusalem had gotten so old that even most of those who ardently believed in the idea have grown so cynical about it that the mere mention of the issue sent our eyes rolling. It caused us to subsequently believe that anyone who repeated the promise was either a transparent liar or a hopeless idealist who would never have a chance to implement it.
The cynics were right to discount the promises made by some sincere friends of Israel, including Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, as well as some less than ardent admirers of the Jewish state, like Jimmy Carter and the elder President Bush.
Indeed, the effort to pass the 1995 U.S. law to force the moving of the embassy (which included a presidential waiver that was regularly invoked by each president before Trump) was primarily the result of a transparently cynical and largely unsuccessful effort to boost the presidential candidacy of its chief sponsor Sen. Robert Dole, who up until then hadn't demonstrated much interest in Israel.
But no matter who was doing the promising, the appetite of pro-Israel activists to hear the words about the necessity of recognizing Jerusalem as the eternal capital of the Jewish state never dimmed. Or at least it didn't until it turned out that the only person who actually meant what he said about Jerusalem was someone that most of the overwhelmingly liberal American Jewish community despised.
Had a Democrat done it, Jewish liberals would have celebrated along with conservatives and Israelis. But since it's Trump, the impulse to downplay the significance of the decision has overridden any other emotion or reasoning.
That's why it's necessary to remind everyone just why Jerusalem used to be a consensus issue. It's equally important to explain that it's not an accident of history that Trump was the one who kept the promise.
It's true that moving the embassy doesn't magically transform the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Still, the presence of a U.S. embassy in West Jerusalem doesn't foreclose the possibility of a two-state solution, assuming that's what the Palestinians actually wanted.
Moving the embassy doesn't mark the final triumph of Zionism. Nor will it compel the Palestinians to compromise and make peace if, as remains the case, they are still mired in a political culture committed to their futile century-old war on the Jews, which has left the peace process dead in the water since the second intifada.
Nor will the United Nations or the scores of nations that still refuse to recognize Israeli sovereignty over any part of the holy city change their stance as a result of Trump's decision.
But the desire to discount the importance of what he's done ignores the enormous symbolic importance of the world's sole superpower dropping the legal fiction about Jerusalem that has prevailed in the international community since 1948.
There may be a legal rationale rooted in the 1947 U.N. partition resolution that allowed nations to pretend that Jerusalem belonged to no one. But after 70 years, the double standard by which Israel is judged has more to do with lingering prejudice against the concept of a Jewish state than any desire to encourage peace talks.
The idea that Israel was a permanent addition to the Middle East--rather than a crusader state with a short shelf life--was given a huge boost by the U.S. investment in its future. For all of the credit given to President Harry Truman for recognizing the newborn state of Israel in 1948, the United States didn't begin to give it serious financial support until after it became a strategic asset--as opposed to a security basket case--as a result of its overwhelming victory in the 1967 Six-Day War.
But now Trump has gone further and made it clear that the United States will no longer pay lip service to an international consensus that still refuses to treat the Jewish state like a normal nation, entitled to decide where its capital should be and to respect the 3,000-year-old Jewish ties to the city.
Far from a technicality, the stubborn refusal of the world to treat Jerusalem as Israel's capital was important precisely because it validated Palestinian intransigence, in which the Jewish state's existence is a nakba or "disaster" that must never be treated as legitimate no matter where its borders are drawn. The embassy move is a necessary rebuke to a supposed moderate like Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas, who continues to deny Jewish ties to Jerusalem and spew anti-Semitic inventive.
Trump's move is a message to the Palestinians that America is no longer prepared to join others in indulging their fantasies. Trump has broken the dam. Slowly, other nations will follow with the moving of their embassies, and the symbolism of these moves is another sign that their nightmare vision of Israel's destruction must be discarded.
There is one final point to be made about Trump's role. Those who feel that his involvement detracts from what would otherwise be a glorious day in Jewish history need to understand that he is almost certainly the only person who would have made this decision.
Virtually any other politician, including some with long histories as genuine friends of Israel, would have listened to the foreign-policy establishment and America's European allies and gone back on their promise, as all of Trump's predecessors did.
Only someone like Trump, who distrusts the experts and disdains the established rules of politics, would have ignored the predictions that the world would end if the embassy were moved. Say what you will about the abnormal nature of his presidency, without a genuine outsider like Trump in the White House, this important victory for Israel and the Jews would have never happened.
Replaced or Grafted - Bill Wilson -
The historic US recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel has drawn praise and excitement from many corners of Christianity, but criticism from other sectors. At the core of the debate is what is called Replacement Theology. Replacement Theology, also called Supersessionism, is the doctrine that the Christian Church has succeeded or replaced the Israelites as the definitive people of God and that the New Covenant supersedes the Mosaic Covenant. It gets into a lot of commentary about who are the Jews, how they were divorced by God, that Israel is not Israel and Jerusalem is not the same Jerusalem that is in the Bible. This is misguided. At the risk of drawing ire, let me explain my position.
The four main covenants that God made with Israel were The Abrahamic Covenant, The Mosaic Covenant, The Davidic Covenant, and, yes, the New Covenant. The Abrahamic Covenant is an unconditional pledge by God that he would make Abraham a great nation and by his descendants all the nations of the earth would be blessed. It is the foundation of God's plan of salvation. The Mosaic Covenant is a conditional two-sided legal agreement between God and Israel similar to a marriage contract where God's people must keep certain requirements to continue to inhabit the land. Exile from the land was punishment for not keeping the covenant, but a temporary one. According to the prophets, the people will repent at the end of days and be re-gathered to the land (Deuteronomy 4:29-31, Jeremiah 32:37-42, Ezekiel 36:24).
The Davidic Covenant is an unconditional promise (2 Samuel 7:8-17) built upon the Abrahamic covenant and provides a King from David's line to restore and rule over Israel in that land as long as the heavens and earth remain (Jeremiah 33:14-26). The New Covenant is also unconditional where God places his Word on the hearts of the Israelites; He is their God, and they are His people; God restores His people to their land; He brings justice to the earth through Messiah, and provides salvation to the Gentiles, which is the mystery of the Gospel found in Ephesians 3:1-7. The New Covenant is actually first announced in Isaiah 59:16-21, with verse 20 saying, "And the Redeemer shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob, says the Lord."
Jeremiah 31:31-37 is the most detailed of all references to the New Covenant, "Behold the days come, says the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in that day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt: which my covenant they broke...I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people...for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." Jesus spoke of the New Covenant at the last supper as ratified by his blood. The New Covenant fulfills, but in no way replaces, the other covenants.
The New Covenant with Israel was through the mystery of the gospel, and would include the Gentiles into the full manifestation of God's plan of redemption, as fellow heirs, and of the same body and partakers of God's promise in Christ (Ephesians 3:1-10). In Romans 11, Paul warns the Gentiles to not cast away the Jews or "boast against the branches," "For if the root be holy, so are the branches (v. 16)." Paul says that Gentiles are grafted in and of the Jews in verse 23, "And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again." Replacement Theology is built on the premise that God will not keep his covenants to restore His people to the land of Israel which is found throughout the prophets. Either you believe God keeps his word or you don't. Either you are grafted or you are not.
ALL EYES ON THE EPICENTER - Joel C. Rosenberg -
Israel turns 70. US Embassy moves to Jerusalem. 50,000 Palestinians trying to storm Israel's southern border. Al Qaeda calls for new jihad. Yet tourism at record highs. Please pray. Here's the latest.
UPDATED: (Jerusalem, Israel) - Shalom from Jerusalem. Please keep both Israelis and Palestinians in your prayers today and all month. If there was ever a time to pray for the peace of Jerusalem, this would be it for we are in a unique moment in history.
The mood here among Israeli Jews is celebratory - festive, jubilant - as Washington formally moves her Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem today in official recognition that Jerusalem is the capital of the State of Israel. The move was timed to coincide with the 70th anniversary of the modern rebirth of Israel. There are American flags everywhere. Israelis are so grateful for the friendship and alliance of the U.S. and are expressing this openly. [Watch a replay of the Embassy dedication ceremony here.]
Most Palestinians, however - and particularly Palestinian Authority leaders - are furious with the move. President Mahmoud Abbas and P.A. officials have chosen to boycott all meetings with U.S. representatives for the foreseeable future. [UPDATE: Abbas blasts U.S. Embassy Move: An insult to the world and to the Palestinians.]
The latest rhetoric against Israel by Palestinian leaders and Iranian leaders is as dark as ever. Terrorist attacks against Israel are increasing. What's more, some radical Islamist leaders are threatening all-out war against the Jewish State.
That said, it does not feel dangerous in Jerusalem or most population centers in Israel. Tens of thousands of police and security officials are on the streets of Jerusalem and deployed around the country. Most of the attacks are occurring on the southern border with Gaza, the northern border with Syria, and against Israeli settlers in Judea and Samaria (commonly known as the West Bank).
Tourism to Israel is at an all-time high - no tour groups go anywhere near dangerous areas. "An all-time record 3.6 million tourists visited Israel in 2017 - 25% more than in 2016," reported Globes, a publication which tracks the Israeli economy. "The country from which the largest number of tourists to Israel come is the US - over 700,000 tourists - 21% more than in 2016." In fact, tourism in 2018 is hitting record-highs, as well.
Lynn and I live in Jerusalem with our sons and we don't feel worried. We remain on track for welcoming The Joshua Fund tour here in July, and hosting the Epicenter Prayer Summit. Indeed, I've also been speaking to numerous Evangelical tour groups that have been visiting here in recent months and everything has been safe and wonderful.
That said, here are the latest developments worth noting. These are among the many reasons we would be grateful for your faithful and ongoing prayers.
At this hour, an estimated 50,000 Palestinians in Gaza are participating in a "Day of Rage" against Israel. Many are trying to tear down, burn down, or blow up the security fence that protects our southern border and to storm into Israel en masse.
Reports in recent days said as many as 100,000 Palestinians were planning to participate. So far it hasn't got that big - but the violence is real.
"The IDF killed three [Palestinian] terrorists who tried to plant an explosive device in the Rafah area and attacked a Hamas post in the northern strip after shots were fired on soldiers," reported Ynet News. As of 4pm Israel time, 37 Palestinians had been killed and hundreds more wounded trying to destroy the security fence and penetrate into Israel.
UPDATE: As of 6pm local time, 43 Palestinians have reportedly been killed trying to penetrate Israel's southern border fence with Gaza.
UPDATE: On Friday, "a group of some 200 Palestinians...set fire to the Gaza Strip's only fuel terminal and a conveyor belt used for raw construction materials. Two conveyor belts which brought animal feed into Gaza were also wrecked, according to the deputy director of the crossing," reported the Times of Israel. "According to assessments by Israeli and Palestinian engineers, it will take weeks to repair the damage to the pipelines, which brought diesel and gasoline into Gaza. There is no alternative. 'There's just no possibility [now] to bring fuel into Gaza,' said the senior officer from the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories liaison unit."
Since President Trump announced in December his intention to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem in keeping with U.S. law (originally passed in 1995 and unanimously reaffirmed by the Senate in 2017), the number of Palestinian terrorist attacks against Israeli soldiers and military sites has tripled.
This month, Iran directly engaged Israel militarily for the first-time ever. The attack came just after Prime Minister Netanyahu announced the Mossad had stolen 100,000 top secret Iranian nuclear warhead documents, and President Trump formally announced his decision to withdraw the U.S. from the deeply flawed and dangerous nuclear deal with Iran. "Iranian forces fired 20 rockets at Israel Defense Forces positions in the Golan Heights on Wednesday night. Four of the rockets aimed toward Israel were intercepted by the Iron Dome air defense system while the remaining rockets exploded on Syrian territory, the [Israeli] military said," reported Haaretz. "The Iranian attack prompted the most extensive Israeli strike on Syria in decades; overnight, Israel openly attacked dozens of Iranian military and logistics targets in Syria."
Meanwhile, Ayman al-Zawahiri - the Egyptian-born head of Al Qaeda - has just made a new call for Muslims to wage "jihad" against Israel.
UPDATE: Al-Qaida chief claims Tel Aviv is 'Muslim land'
And a top Shia religious cleric in Iran has just vowed that "Tel Aviv and Haifa will be totally destroyed" if Israel continues to behave "foolishly" (i.e., exist and defend herself), repeating yet again the kind of belligerent rhetoric that has characterized the Iranian regime for decades.
That's where we are at the moment. I promise to keep you posted and encourage you to follow me on Twitter for the up-to-the-minute updates.
The prophetic peril of Gaza - Bill Wilson -
On August 15, 2005, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon began forcibly removing Jewish settlers from their homes in Gaza under what was known as Israeli Disengagement. By September 12, Sharon had unilaterally given up Gaza as a peace offering to the "Palestinians," who had adopted the slogan "Gaza today, Jerusalem tomorrow." On August 15, 2005, The Daily Jot reported: "It is almost chilling to watch the events leading up to Israeli Prime Minister Arial Sharon's so-called "disengagement" plan as the world pressures Israel to unilaterally give up covenant land for the mere hope upon hope that there might be a semblance of peace between Israel and the Palestinians."
The 8/15/2005 Jot continued: "Former Sharon cabinet member and once Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu plead with Israeli leadership last week to end the disengagement plan and to come to its senses. Like many, Netanyahu believes giving up land without concessions is a demonstration that terrorism pays and that Israel's national security will be forever threatened. Certainly Israel's military understands the significance of Netanyahu's concerns. Middle East News Line reports that Israel's military has revised its withdrawal plan to account for a scenario under which the eviction of Jewish residents from the Gaza Strip would be completed amid massive Palestinian fire and heavy Israeli casualties.
"Netanyahu called disengagement an "evil" and urged Members of the Knesset to stop it. He said he has warned the Sharon government that the Palestinians will only use the Gaza land to establish a terrorist base of operations and that the nation of Israel's defense and security may be undermined by disengagement. He said, "I am calling on all those who grasp the danger: Gather strength and do the right thing. I don't know if the entire move can be stopped, but it still might be stopped in its initial stages." And he warned, "The government is advancing in total blindness. They have eyes but don't see. They have ears but don't hear."" By June 2006, "Palestinians" were launching missiles from Gaza at civilian targets in Israel.
Fast forward over a decade later and the headlines read "Clashes erupt along Gaza-Israel border ahead of US Embassy inauguration" and "100,000 Palestinians gather for March of Return from Gaza." Reports are saying the Hamas-led "Palestinians" want to take Jerusalem and prevent the US from moving its embassy there. The 2005 Disengagement is a reflection of Jeremiah 6:14, "They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people lightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace." Netanyahu and others who opposed "Disengagement" 13 years ago look like prophets. Sadly, those who warned of the peril of Gaza at the time are experiencing the consequences of such foolish leadership today.
Jerusalem Is Rising as Israel's Enemies Falter - By Alex Traiman - http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/article.cfm?recent_news_id=2244
In the past 70 years, no single country's stock has risen faster or farther than the State of Israel. Once a resource-poor, existentially endangered nation-state comprised of refugees from post-Holocaust Europe and Muslim countries throughout the Middle East and North Africa, Israel has emerged into a world economic, military and diplomatic superpower.
In just one week, Israel's elevated status is being put on full display, in no small part due to the unlikely and oft-polarizing duo of U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
While announcing America's exit from the flawed Iran nuclear deal--officially the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA--Trump's direct reference to Netanyahu's publication of incontrovertible evidence exposing the full nature of Iran's sophisticated nuclear-weapons program places Israel at the center of policymaking in the free world.
Just prior to Trump's speech, it was reported that Israel had briefed at least 22 nations on the full contents of the documents, photos and simulations daringly confiscated by Israel's Mossad, clearly signaling that Israel's intelligence is among the best in world. Following Trump's speech, it became clear that Israel's analysis of Iran's nuclear program and the nuclear deal now defines and supports America's policy.
In the hours after Trump announced America's withdrawal from JCPOA on May 8, a large explosion occurred at an Iranian weapons depot outside of Damascus, with reports of yet another alleged Israeli airstrike into foreign territory that penetrated its targets, despite the presence of Russian missile-defense systems in Syria.
Just a few years ago, leading up to the signing of the JCPOA in 2015, Israel was a pesky obstacle to the deal that was supposed to be the crowning foreign-policy legacy of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning President Barack Obama. At the time, Netanyahu obstinately delivered an impassioned speech before Congress opposing the deal, angering Obama, the Democratic Party, the international community and liberals at large.
Yet with Trump's exit from the deal, which he noted during his speech on Tuesday "failed to make the world safer," it now becomes clear that Netanyahu's views have prevailed. Jerusalem's position and Washington's position have aligned to dictate a new international policy towards Iran, the world's leading state sponsor of terror.
In just a few days, Washington will further crown Jerusalem's status as a leading center of international policy by officially moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Israel's historic capital city, home to the executive, judicial and legislative branches of Israel's government.
It is, of course, fitting that the very date--May 14--of the new embassy's opening ceremony corresponds both with Yom Yerushalayim ("Jerusalem Day") on the Hebrew calendar and the 70th anniversary of Israel's Independence on the secular calendar.
While the Jewish state's stock is rising, Israel's enemies are imploding. Though Iran has expanded its reach across the Middle East--wreaking havoc on Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen--severe cracks have been exposed in the dictatorial regime of the Islamic Republic.
During the past year, public protests against the regime's corruption have broken out across the country. And in the past several weeks, the value of Iran's currency, the rial, has plummeted, throwing Iran into severe economic uncertainty even before the impending onset of the "highest level of economic sanctions" about to be imposed by the United States.
At the same time, the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza are showing signs of collapse.
Gaza is an economic disaster, with billions of dollars of aid money for its nearly 2 million residents over the past several years diverted towards the building of terror tunnels and rockets meant to inflict damage on Israel. In the past year, Israel has destroyed most of the Hamas tunnel network and neutralized the impact of missiles through the Iron Dome defense system.
With close to nothing to show for its investment in Israel's destruction, Hamas now resorts to sending "flaming kites" into Israel in the hopes of starting brush fires in Israel's south.
In the West Bank, the P.A. has been exposed as a corrupt kleptocracy--led by aging autocrat Mahmoud Abbas who is now in year 13 of a four year term--hell-bent on inciting and incentivizing the murder of Jews. The P.A. is perhaps as far away as ever from the creation of a Palestinian state in the disputed Israeli territories.
Just last month, the United States passed the Taylor Force Act designed to withhold international aid to the P.A. if it continues its sophisticated practice of making payments to jailed terrorists and the families of terrorists killed in the act of murder.
Rather than comply with the regulations of the Taylor Force Act, the P.A. continues to pay terrorists, and has simultaneously ended all communication with the U.S. government over its official recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital. In just a few weeks from now, U.S. aid to the P.A. will end, likely igniting a fiscal crisis.
Israel this week advanced its equivalent of the Taylor Force Act through a first reading in Knesset. The law is intended to offset monthly transfers of taxes and tariffs collected by Israel on behalf of the P.A. at Israeli ports. A sum equivalent to nearly two months of the Palestinian annual budget will be withheld should Israel pass its version of the law.
As Israel celebrates its 70th anniversary and the official recognition of Jerusalem as its nation's modern capital, Palestinians will commemorate the nakba, or "catastrophe," on May 15 as a result of the founding of the Jewish state.
Just days after the nakba, Palestinians will begin celebrating the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, a period during which too many Palestinians in recent years have observed the modern jihadi traditions of attempted murder via car-rammings, knife-stabbings and suicide-bombings.
Yet perhaps this year, if aspiring martyrs realize that they and their families may no longer receive the financial compensation promised for terror, and that those acts are doing little to no damage to the existence of a strengthening Jewish state--even as they sometimes succeed in taking a handful precious Jewish lives--they may begin to recognize that the only way they stand to benefit is by ditching their anti-Israel activity and by aligning with Washington and Jerusalem.
Jerusalem historically has been a city of epic highs for the Jewish people, as well as challenging lows. We may yet see more difficult times ahead for Israel's oft-embattled capital city. Yet at the present, all indications are that Jerusalem is rising.
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