MIDEAST UPDATE: 4.29.23 -

AnarchyStirs in Israel By Hal Lindsey The president of Israel, Isaac Herzog, recently said, “Israel is in the throes of a profound crisis.� He spoke of civil war,� and said, The abyss is within touching distance. Civil war? The abyss? Is it really that bad in Israel? It all centers on judicial reform. Extreme leftists protested proposed reforms by rioting in the streets. Others on the left protested peacefully but in large numbers.Like the nation's president, many speak of civil war and anarchy. Protests occurred in places you would never expect. Elite military officers walked off the job one Sunday in March. Many of Israel's reservists have refused to report for duty. Meanwhile, Israel's enemies watch and feel emboldened. Terrorists rampaged within Israel, and a missile barrage hit from without. The result of all this has been to effectively thrust us forward on God's end-times timeline. Benjamin Netanyahu's government won the majority in the last election partly because they promised the very judicial reforms now being protested. Voters chose the conservative coalition, not despite such reforms, but at leastpartly because of them. The reforms would allow the Knesset (Israel's parliament) to overrule Supreme Court decisions. The Knesset would also be given more of a say in who becomes a member of that court. When Americans hear that a parliamentary body would have the ability to overrule the Supreme Court, they usually think, That's unconstitutional! They forget that Israel has no constitution. And Israel's present method for choosingmembers of the Supreme Court mostly leaves out any form of accountability to the people. Even with its flaws, I prefer our system. When a Court vacancy occurs in the United States, the President nominates a replacement. The Senate can then either confirm the nominee or not. The people elect the President. The peoplealso choose Senators. So, ultimately, members of the US Supreme Court, along with other federal judges, are chosen by elected representatives of the people. It doesn't work that way in Israel. There, Supreme Court judges are chosen by something called the Judicial Selection Committee. The majority in the Knesset only holds two of the nine positions on the committee. In other words,the people have almost no say in the matter at all. Without a Constitution, Israel�'s courts have no guardrails. They began to realize their overwhelming power during the time of a man named Aharon Barak. He became a member of Israel's Supreme Court in 1978 and served as theCourt's president from 1995 until 2006. He changed everything. He praised what he called, judicial legislation.� He called judicial lawmaking the task of a supreme court. In other words, forget democracy. Forget government of, by, and for the people. Instead, an unelected few legislate for everyone else. Barak also eliminated previous constraints on the kind of cases the Court could take up.Presently, Israel is stuck with a court chosen by elites and not the people. That court can take up any issue it wants, overriding the will of the nation's elected leaders, while passing its own laws. Does Israel need judicial reform? It absolutely needs it! We often call that nation the only working democracy in the Middle East. But Israel's Supreme Court presently has the same power as Iran's mullahs. They can undo anythingIsrael's democratically chosen representatives do and replace those laws with laws of the court's own making. In the absence of a constitution, the answer seems to be to make the judiciary more accountable to the people through their elected representativesin the Knesset. On March 27th, Prime Minister Netanyahu temporarily withdrew his reform proposals. Maybe during this pause, they can figure out a better approach. But make no mistake. Without reform, the 15 judges of Israel's Supreme Courthold absolute power. And that is incompatible with the basic premise of democracy. A final word here. This is not the end of Israel. What Satan means for evil, God will use for good. And He will keep His promises. ---------------------- Israel at 75: A Rich Past, A Challenging Present and A Glorious Future! � Olivier Melnick - https://www.newantisemitism.com/antisemitism/israel-at-75-a-rich-past-a-challenging-present-and-a-glorious-future Against all human expectations and according to God�s promises, Israel is still standing. We celebrate the 75th birthday of the modern Jewish State on Yom Ha�azmaut, alsoknown as Israel�s Independence Day. Here are seven reasons to join the celebration. We celebrate because of Israel�s survival. In her entire history, Israel has been the epitome of survival. From the moment God created a people and gave them land and a law, Israel became a prime target in the world.From Pharaoh who didn�t know Joseph, to Haman to the Amalekites, the Bible is already replete with Israel�s foes. Post-biblical history continues to trace the lineage of the Jewish people as it is punctuated by acts of anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism, goingfrom verbal to violent to lethal, peaking with the Holocaust. In spite of all the anti-Semitic hatred, Israel has survived. In spite of all the wars against her from 1948 to today, and miraculously, Israel has survived. In spite of the current waves of terrorism,Israel will survive because Israel�s complete annihilation would make God a liar and covenant breaker (Jeremiah 31:35-37.) We celebrate because of Israel�s innovative spirit When the Jewish people started to organize under the leadership of Theodor Herzl and Chaim Weizmann in the late 1890s, survival was of the essence, but creativity went handin hand with the spirit of survival. Zionism was the catalyst for a mass migration to the land of our ancestors. From a place of swamps, rocks, desert and almost no vegetation, Israel has become one of the world�s foremost providers of fresh produce. Dripirrigation was an Israeli invention out of necessity. Much more has come to our modern world from Israeli ingenuity. It makes the job of the proponents of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement (BDS) very complicated if they choose to be ethicallyconsistent, but they seldom do! We celebrate because Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East This little sliver of land the size of New Jersey almost becomes a drop of water as one places it within the whole ocean of Arab countries surrounding her. Muslim governmentsvary from somewhat moderate to fully Sharia-compliant. Women, homosexuals and even people of other faiths are often abused verbally AND physically, with their rights taken away from them. The one country in the Middle East where Arabs and Jews can actuallycoexist (at least from an Israeli perspective) is Israel. There are even Arabs as members of the Knesset (Israel Parliament.) We celebrate because Israel is a safe haven for the Jewish people. Jewish people have been in the Diaspora (Dispersion), since the destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD. We can be found just about anywhere in the world, eventhough there are only 15 million of us. Yet, it is becoming increasingly evident that the only safe haven for Jewish people worldwide is Eretz Yisrael. Anti-Semitism is on the rise everywhere. Jews are being killed in Europe, the Middle East and even America,simply for being Jewish. Nevertheless, God promised that the Jews would return to the Land of Israel (Ezekiel 37), and we see that very prophecy being fulfilled in our lifetime. We celebrate because the re-birth of Israel set the stage for much of the Bible to be fulfilled. Unfortunately, today when it comes to Israel and the Jewish people, fact-finding is the last thing people are interested in! In 1948, when Israel was reborn, the stage wasset for many prophecies to be fulfilled. The rebirth of Israel might not be specifically prophesied in the Bible, but without its rebirth, much of the end times events would not have become a reality. 1.Jacob�s descendants would regain control of Israel � Amos 9:14-15 2.Israel would be brought back to life � Ezekiel 37:10-14 3.Isaiah spoke of Israel being reborn in one day after the Tribulation � Isaiah 66:7-8 4.Israel would be re-established as a united nation � Ezekiel 37:21-22 5.Israel would be more impressive the second time � Jeremiah 16:14-15 6.Ezekiel predicted when Israel would be re-established � Ezekiel 4:3-6 7.The people of Israel would return to �their own land� � Ezekiel 34:13 8.God would watch over the people of Israel � Jeremiah 31:10 9.Israel�s army would be disproportionately powerful � Leviticus 26:3, 7-8 10.The fortunes of the people of Israel would be restored � Deuteronomy 30:3-5 We celebrate because of God�s promises to Israel Some people believe in God, while others don�t, but that doesn�t prevent God from keeping his promises for Israel, and they are numerous: •God made a covenant with Abraham: Genesis 12:1-3 •God gave specific boundaries: Genesis 15:18-21 •God�s covenant was reconfirmed through Isaac, Jacob (Israel) and his 12 sons: Genesis 26:2-4, 28:13, 50:24 •Israel will never be destroyed because of God�s promise of eternal protection: Jeremiah 31:35-37 We celebrate because of Israel�s glorious future promised by God. As bleak as the present looks, especially from a human perspective, Israel has a guaranteed glorious future, and that is indeed a cause for celebration. •God promised Israel a New Covenant when He will remember their sins no more: Jeremiah 31:31-34 •Israel�s glorious future includes a final restoration to the land: Ezekiel 39:25-29 •Israel�s glorious future is secure because of God�s character: Ezekiel 36:22-28 Happy Independence Day, Happy 75th Birthday and Am Yisrael Chai! -----------------------------