The Black Riders of Jihad

Jihadi terror is not new – it has ancient roots. Though some in the West see themselves as ‘post-Christian,’ many in the Islamic world look back with longing for the ‘Golden Age’ when mujahidin (jihadi armies) terrorized North Africa, the Middle East and southern Europe – Muslim warriors on horseback, armed with sabers and black flags. That black flag traces its roots to the very beginning of Islam: it was traditionally carried into jihadi battle by Muhammad and his armies.

Magnus Ranstorp, an expert on Islamic fundamentalist movements and the Research Director of the Centre for Asymmetric Threat Studies at the Swedish National Defense College, notes that modern jihadi groups – al Qaeda in Iraq, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (active in Yemen and Saudi Arabia), and the al-Shabab group in Somalia – all use the same flag. “The most important thing is the color. This raya (راية), the solid black flag, was the Prophet Mohammed’s war banner. This flag compresses time and space – it harks back to where they came from and where they are going. It is not just the color of jihad and of the caliphate, but it represents the coming of what some believers see as the final battle and the day of resurrection.” There is an Islamic End-of-Days element in the flag, pitting the forces of Islam against the Christian West. “This symbol tells us where they have come from, the sacredness of their mission and what they want – a caliphate.” “In the contemporary Islamist movement, the black flag is used to symbolize both offensive jihad and the proponents of reestablishing the Islamic Caliphate.”

There is a connection between the Islamist desire for the return of the Caliphate, and the activist terror tactics of jihad – the return of the Black Riders of jihad. For some historical and literary context, see the Nazgûl, and the oprichniki.

The aching vacuum

Islam began not with a whimper but with a bang. There are four stages which can help us to understand the Muslim past and how many Muslims understand their future.

The first stage was the revelation Muhammad received from a demonic spirit-being who called himself ‘Jibril’ and conveyed teaching that God’s name is not YHVH; that the Jewish people’s calling has ended; that Yeshua is not the Son of God; that He did not die on the cross; that every knee must bow not to Yeshua but to allah through Muhammad’s message.

The second stage was that this message must be declared to the whole world (in Arabic, da’wah). If it is received, the hearers become Muslims. If it is rejected, jihad (Islamic holy war) is declared against those who have not bowed the knee to the Jibrilian revelation. The choices here are three: convert under threat; become a slave-status dhimmi (Arabic for ‘protected’, but in reality a second class citizens with few civil rights and needing to pay a punishing tax called the jizya); beheading or some other form of killing.

The third stage was the caliphate – the governmental and organizational solidification of the Islamist dictatorship in all the countries that Islam conquered.

The fourth stage was the blunting of jihadi expansion in such countries like France (Charles Martel and the Battle of Tours/Poitiers in 732 A.D.); Vienna (the Siege of Vienna in 1529, and the Battle of Vienna in 1683); the Reconquista or ‘Reconquering’ of al-Andalus/Spain between 722 and 1492 A.D.. Combined with a waning of jihadi zeal and the growth of Islamic prosperity, Islamic theology began to declare a new definition – ‘dar al-‘Ahd’/ ‘dar al-Sulh’ (‘the house of truce’ or ‘house of treaty/conciliation’) – instead of continuous military jihad leading to full Islamist conquest of the world. This breakdown in Quranic Islamist strategy was described and rebuked by Islamic scholar Ibn Taymiyya (1263-1328). He adamantly insisted that Islam’s weakenings and defeats were due to Muslim adoption of Western culture, ideas and practices and a slacking of prosecuting jihad. The modern Salafi movement agrees, believing that these former empires lost their greatness because they had fallen away from ‘authentic Islam.’ Only a return to strict (‘salafi’) interpretation of Islamic shari’a law and a restoration of caliphate government would make Islam great again. That was (and remains) their perspective.

Two strategic questions guide modern Islamist revivalists:

Should Islam’s first priority be to re-establish the caliphate, or should its first priority be to rekindle jihad?

Should Islamic jihad be targeted against the overwhelmingly non-zealous ‘apostate’ leaders of modern Islamic countries leaders, or should jihad’s target be the traditional ‘dar al-Harb’ (Arabic for ‘the house of war’) – the pagan, Christian and Jewish states of the West?

The Egyptian Godfather and his four-fold cord

The collapse of the Ottoman/Turkish caliphate in 1924 led to movements for a revival of the Caliphate. The first major one was the Muslim Brotherhood, spearheaded by Hassan al-Banna. The vision of the Muslim Brotherhood as per al-Banna: the formation of an Islamic state governed by shari’a and a return to a society modelled after that of Muhammad and his first followers. The purpose of the Muslim Brotherhood was and remains: to restore Islam to the global power and dominance over Christendom that it had wielded for more than a thousand years; and, to return Islam to its divine destiny – the unification of all regimes under the banner of the Caliphate, the universal Islamic state.

Four of Al-Banna’s disciples became the apostles of jihad: Egyptian Sayyid Qutb, Jordanian Abdullah Azzam, Yemenite/Saudi Osama bin Laden and Egyptian Yusuf al-Qaradawi.

Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966), an Egyptian political theorist and revolutionary, was a leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood and is considered the ‘father of Salafi jihadism,’ and ‘intellectual godfather of Osama bin Laden.’ His philosophy underpins those of both al-Qaedaand ISIS. Here are four links to articles explaining his significant influence on jihadi thought and action:

https://thesoufancenter.org/tsg-intelbrief-the-lasting-legacy-of-sayyid-qutb/

https://www.counterextremism.com/threat/qutbism

https://web.archive.org/web/20181002133334/https://www.abc.net.au/religion/sayyid-qutb-father-of-salafi-jihadism-forerunner-of-the-islamic-/10096380

From Qutb And The Brotherhood To Isis And The Caliphate – https://www.tutorhunt.com/resource/22045/

Qutb was the founding father and leading theoretician of the contemporary extremist movement, and was one of the two most influential Muslim thinkers of this century (the other being Indian Abul A’la Maududi). Most Sunni Islamic revolutionaries base their models of revolution on Qutb’s epic book ‘Milestones.’ William McCants, of US Military Academy’s Combating Terrorism Center, notes that the jihadi enemies of the West “cite Sayyid Qutb repeatedly and consider themselves his intellectual descendants. ”

Whereas Hassan al-Banna tried to build an Islamic society from the bottom up, Qutb developed a top-down approach, focused on removing non-Islamic rulers and governments. He advocated the use of violence to establish Islamic rule, inspiring thousands to take up the cause of “establishing God’s rule on earth” (i.e., the Caliphate). But Qutb struggled with the reality that most Muslims were not zealously committed to jihad. His perspectives can be condensed to the following three Arabic words:

Jahiliyya – originally meant to describe pre-Islamic ignorance and barbarism, Qutb expanded the term to include both the whole non-Muslim world and most of what is considered the Islamic world, since they are not ruled by a strict interpretation of shari’a (original Islamic law). Instead of adopting al-Banna’s dream of establishing an Islamic state in Egypt after a systematic and patient Islamization, Qutb called for a revolutionary vanguard which would first establish an Egyptian Islamic state by violent jihadi revolution.

Shari’a (original Islamic law) – Qutb scorned and spurned the Islamic scholars and medieval commentators, declaring that they had departed from the original early Islamic teachings of Muhammad. Their religious structures (and the states that support them) are all ‘takfir’ – heretical, and should be removed. A valid caliphate is only one which uncompromisingly holds to the teachings of Muhammad without compromise.

Violent jihad – Al-Banna and Qutb both advocated violent jihad. Qutb now provided an Islamist theological basis for violent jihad against Muslim governments as well. Specifically: Jihad is to encompass the entire world. All current Muslim governments are heretical, because they do not uncompromisingly obey shari’a. Therefore, jihad must be carried out in all countries that do not obey shari’a law. Any place where the Islamic shari’a law is not enforced and where Islam is not dominant is seen by Qutb and his followers as ‘dar al-Harb’ – the territory of war and hostilities.

Qutb’s blend of Islamist and Nazi anti-Semitism

Qutb was influenced by classical Islamist anti-Semitism, and he faithfully passed on what had been transmitted to him through his religious training. To this foundation he added classic Nazi racist teachings of Judenhass – Jew-hatred. Here are some examples of his teaching:

“Explaining the purpose of man and his historical role in philosophical terms is one of the tricks played by world Jewry, whose purpose is to eliminate all limitations, especially the limitations imposed by faith and religion, so that Jews may penetrate into body politics of the whole world and then may be free to perpetuate their evil designs. At the top of the list of these activities is usury, the aim of which is that all the wealth of mankind end up in the hands of Jewish financial institutions which run on interest” [Qutb, ‘Milestones’, pp. 110-111]

“At the beginning the enemies of the Muslim community did not fight openly with arms but tried to fight the community in its belief through intrigue, spreading ambiguities, creating suspicions. They do likewise today. They have plotted and they go on plotting against this nation. Hundreds and thousands have infiltrated the Muslim world, and they still do in the guise of Orientalists. The pupils of the latter fill today the positions of the intellectual life of the countries whose people call themselves Muslim. Their aim is clearly shown by the Protocols [of the Elders of Zion]. The Jews are behind materialism, animal sexuality, the destruction of the family and the dissolution of society. Principal among them are Marx, Freud, Durkheim and the Jew Jean-Paul Sartre.”

The Jews have confronted Islam with enmity from the moment the Islamic state was established in Medina . . . The Muslim community continues to suffer the same Jewish machinations and double-dealing which discomfited the early Muslims. This is a war which has not been extinguished ... for close on fourteen centuries its blaze has raged in all the corners of the earth and continues to this moment. (Sayyid Qutb, ‘Ma’rakatuna ma’a al-Yahud,’ (Our Battle Against the Jews) [essay written in 1951. Published in book of the same name [Ma’rakatuna ma’a al-Yahud], Jedda, Saudi Arabia, 1970). Just as Wagner and the Nazis insisted that the Jews had ‘corrupted’ ‘true’ Aryan and German culture, Qutb expounded on the idea that Jews had infiltrated and corrupted Islam. This idea may have begun from his efforts to discredit the ‘Israeliyya’ - portions of Islamic lore that were believed to have been inserted by Jews into Islamic tradition, but it bears an uncanny resemblance to Nazi propaganda.

“Just as in the past, it was the Jews who had disrupted the early Islamic community... it was the Jews who had more recently undermined Islam by installing a generation of fifth-columnists in its midst, posing as true Muslims but in reality betraying the Muslim cause... The Jews have installed... a massive army of agents in the form of professors, philosophers, doctors, researchers... some even from the ranks of the Muslim religious authorities...intending to break the creed of the Muslims by weakening the Sharia in many ways... with this and that they fulfil the ancient rule of the Jews.” (Sayyid Qutb, ‘Our Battle Against the Jews’, Jedda, Saudi Arabia, 1970). Qutb’s virulently anti-Semitism is independent of any issues related to Israel or Zionism.

From Jordanian Jenin to Russian Jihad

Sheikh Abdullah Yusuf Azzam was born in 1941, in the village of Silat al-Harithiyah northwest of Jenin (then Jordan), just south of Afula in modern Israel. He studied Islamic Law (shari’a) at Damascus University’s Sharia College and at Cairo’s al-Azhar University. He later developed the slogan “Jihad and the rifle alone: no negotiations, no conferences and no dialogues!”. In the mid-1970’s he lectured at King Abdul-Aziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where one of his reverent students and later aide-de-camp was Osama bin Laden. In 1981 Azzam moved to Pakistan, becoming one of the top figures in the Afghani jihad against the Russians in Afghanistan. The Islamic epicenter of Saudi Arabia heavily funded his jihad activities at that time. In 1984 he co-founded MAK (Maktab Khadamāt al-Mujāhidīn al-'Arab), a pre-al-Qa’eda organization for recruiting jihadi warriors to face combat against Russian forces in Afghanistan. In November and December 1989 he established a vanguard jihadi organization known as ‘al-Qaidah al-Sulbah’ (Arabic for ‘the solid base’). Azzam wrote an article at the time in the monthly al-Jihad (April 1988) declaring a global Islamic jihad:

“Every principle must have its vanguard that will carry it forth. [The vanguard] will pay a steep price and suffer many losses while paving the road for the [Islamic] society. There is no belief, either earthly or heavenly, that does not need such a vanguard, one that will give all it has for its belief to be victorious. This vanguard is the solid base (‘al-Qaidah al-Sulbah’) of the society we are awaiting.”

In December 1987 Azzam maintained close contact with Hamas as it was being established, as well as with Palestinian Islamic Jihad. This was no surprise, since both groups were birthed out if the same parent movement – the Muslim Brotherhood. Both Azzam and Hamas founders had been Muslim Brotherhood members. Azzam called Hamas spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmad Yassin “the symbol of the firm position of the Islamic movement.” Azzam’s closeness of heart to Hamas is seen in his book ‘Hamas: The Historical Roots and the Charter’, where he declares that only Hamas is capable of restoring Palestine into Muslim hands.

Abdullah Azzam worked with the CIA to arm and train Taliban jihadi fighters against Soviet Forces in Afghanistan. Azzam’s Islamic perspective was that three things were necessary for an Islamic End-of-Days scenario:

World-wide jihad must be waged wherever possible, until Islam is victorious

As countries would become exclusively Islamic territories and ruled by shari’a , Islamic sub-states could be established

When Israel is destroyed and all Christians are subjugated or killed or converted to Islam, then a world caliphate would be established.

This apocalyptic Islamist scenario is the prime motivator for the jihadi terrorists of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza and the West Bank; for HTS (Hay’at al-Tahrir as-Sham) in Syria; for much of Turkey’s leadership; for Islamic State/Da’esh in Iraq and Syria; etc. The Muslim vision for the restoration of the Caliphate, for world Islamic control and for crushing defeat of Israel and the West, is something that most Westerners (and even many Israelis) do not fully grasp. Much prayer and dedicated intercession is needed on these matters.

How shall we then pray?

Pray for revelation and courage to be given to Israel’s leaders in political, intelligence and military spheres – to understand and counteract strategies against Israel, the apple of God’s eye (Zechariah 2:8) – as jihadi armies gather at our borders.

Pray that enemy strategies against the Jewish people and their state, against Middle East Christians and other minorities – will be confounded, and that a great harvest would take place in all of these areas!

Pray for the protection of Israeli and Jewish people from the assaults of jihadi terror organizations and Western fellow-travelers, and the return of the Jewish people to both the Land and the Messiah of Israel

There are approximately 44 to 50 living Israeli hostages remaining, kidnapped by Hamas, Islamic Jihad and PFLP/PLO. Plans are tentatively underway to release a total of 33 out the 98 remaining Israeli hostages – half who are dead. Hamas is holding on to their corpses as cold storage bargaining chips. That would leave 65 hostages with Hamas, some dead, some alive. Pray for the release of all the hostages, and for YHVH’s justice to be brought on the heads of the Hamas kidnappers

Pray for the raising up of Ezekiel’s prophetic Jewish army throughout the earth

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: https://davidstent.org/

Playing poker with Hitler

Why is Israel giving in to a hostage exchange with jihadi murderers? Wasn’t the IDF winning the war against these Islamist terrorists? What’s going on?

God bless the child

On May 9 1941 Billie Holiday stepped into Columbia Records’ Studio A at 799 Seventh Avenue in New York to record what would become perhaps her most classic song, ‘God Bless The Child.’ The song was born out of frustration and a family argument, and it was co-written with Jewish songwriter Arthur Herzog, Jr. Here is one memorable line from that hit: “Rich relations give crusts of bread and such – You can help yourself, but don’t take too much.”

The wry observations that Billie and Arthur made here have pertinent relevance to what is going on in Israel.

We’ll help you for a price – so just don’t take too much!

The determination of world powers to shrink the borders of the Jewish state (expressed so laconically by Kissinger in 1975) and to establish a terrorist jihadi state in the heartland of the Land promised by the God of Israel to Jacob’s children, is the nuclear core which has powered US realpolitik for the past 75 years:

“Israel does us more harm than good in the Arab world . . . We can’t negotiate about the existence of Israel but we can reduce its size to historical proportions . . . I think in ten to fifteen years Israel will be like Lebanon – struggling for existence, with no influence in the Arab world . . . If the issue is the existence of Israel, we can’t cooperate. But if the issue is more normal borders, we can cooperate . . . I think the Palestinian identity has to be recognized in some form … (It) will be a tremendous fight … (but) no solution is possible without it”

The tightening of American diplomatic thumbscrews on Israeli fingers over the years has caused nearly two handfuls of Israeli Prime Ministers to cry ‘Uncle’ to Uncle Sam, forcing them under superpower duress to consent to the dividing up of the Land of Israel: Begin, Rabin, Peres, Barak, Sharon, Olmert, Bennett/Lapid, and Bibi. This dangerously flawed U.S. State Department conception has led to strategically suicidal withdrawals from the Sinai (the Camp David Accords), the West Bank (the Oslo Accords), Gaza (Ariel Sharon’s Disengagement) and the latest pressures by both the Biden and incoming Trump administrations to ram through an Israeli ceasefire and withdrawal – leaving Hamas still the master of Gaza, and the Palestinian Authority jihadi terror group being granted a new lease on life under the protection of the US ‘Godfather.’

These political machinations – American and European pressure on Israel – have resulted in Israel caving in and bowing to that pressure. Internationally accepted political wisdom has determined that Israel must continue to withdraw from both the West Bank and Gaza, and that a Palestinian terrorist state must be established in the heart of the Promised Land, on lands which the God of Israel declared as Israel’s national patrimony forever (see Joel 3:1-2). The world is ‘cruising for a bruising’.

A Jekyll-and-Hyde relationship exists between Israel and the USA. On one hand, America makes state-of-the-art military weaponry available to Israel (which the Jewish state pays for, directly to the American arms industry). On the other hand, the US State Department and POTUS rudely rebuke and threaten Israel’s Prime Minister, government and military forces, treating Israel like a problem child who needs to be spanked and sent up to his room without supper. This usually happens when Israel is well on the way to decisively defeating its enemies. Recent events highlight these dynamics on steroids. They show that for America, Israel is not their priority concern in the Middle East. Thus, the US treats the Jewish state in a schizophrenic and Machiavellian fashion, strengthening the Jewish state’s enemies while simultaneously allowing munitions to flow to Israel.

The government of Israel finds itself in nearly total dependence on US arms, whether it be tank and artillery shells, bunker-buster bombs or F-35 stealth fighter jets. American displeasure has tremendous influence over IDF policies and battle strategies. This has been seen in how the Israeli government has swallowed hard many times and obeyed US diktats regarding how it is prosecuting its war on Hamas, specifically on such issues as:

accusing Israel of indiscriminate slaughter of Gazans – based on wildly inaccurate figures from Hamas:

increasing humanitarian aid without achieving the complete release of Israeli hostages, and where most of that aid ends up in Hamas hands

the supply of oil, gas, water and electricity to Hamas control, which allows Hamas’ war machine to keep firing rockets at Israeli civilians and to keep attacking IDF ground troops. This has caused over 100,000 Israeli civilians in the communities beside Gaza to flee their homes and become refugees in their own homeland

holding back pre-emptive strikes on Hezbollah (Iran’s proxy in Lebanon) for nine months, while Hezbollah has been attacking Israeli civilians in the North of the country and causing 80,000 Israelis living near the Lebanese border to abandon their homes and become refugees in their own land. This gives a combined total of at least 200,000 Israeli refugees within Israel as a result of Hamas and Hezbollah jihadi attacks

The combined political and military carrot-and-stick approach by successive US administrations has decisively influenced the IDF top brass, resulting in them making policy decisions which avoid eliminating Hamas, and which shrink the IDF’s available inventory, IDF reserves training times, and length of regular military service. As a result, the IDF has become less than fully prepared to wage and win war on seven fronts simultaneously. On top of that, the US Secretaries of State and Defense have joined with the POTUS in micro-managing Israel’s present prosecution of the war, rebuking the IDF publicly and even threatening the Jewish state with embargoes and diplomatic censure when the IDF does not respond quickly enough to American ‘suggestions.’

In the words of one of Bob Dylan’s lesser-known songs ‘Medicine Sunday’:

Well, that midnight train pulled on all down the track
You’re standing there watching, with your hands tied behind your back
And you smile so pretty, and nod to the prison guard . . .

Israeli political analyst Carolyn Glick sums up how the US Administration’s bear hug has affected Israel’s successful prosecution of the current war:

“This was why the U.S. opposed Israel’s ground operation in Gaza; supported Egypt in blocking Gazans from fleeing Gaza for shelter in Egypt or third countries; opposed Israel’s takeover of Rafah and the border with Gaza; slow-walked the delivery of offensive weapons, including assault rifles, tank and artillery shells and bombs for the air force in an effort to compel Israel to adopt a defensive posture; and consistently sought to coerce Israel to accept hostage deals with Hamas that would precipitate its strategic defeat in the war. This is why the administration began sanctioning Israeli citizens who they claim obstruct their goal of establishing a Palestinian state in Gaza, Judea and Samaria. Likewise, the administration’s consistent, unswerving pressure on Israel to admit massive quantities of goods into Gaza, under the headline ‘humanitarian aid,’ facilitated Hamas’s survival in power.”

A divided American heart leads to a divided Jewish state

The Hamas-Israel deal did not descend from the clouds on angels’ wings. It was forced through by incoming POTUS Donald Trump’s Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff on January 16 2025.

“Last Friday evening, Steven Witkoff, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's Middle East envoy, called from Qatar to tell Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's aides that he would be coming to Israel the following afternoon. The aides politely explained that was in the middle of the Sabbath but that the Prime Minister would gladly meet him Saturday night. Witkoff's blunt reaction took them by surprise. He explained to them in salty English that Shabbat was of no interest to him. His message was loud and clear.” Witkoff then said that Trump expected Israel to agree to the ceasefire, and then “things that Netanyahu had termed life-and-death issues … suddenly vanished”.

Witkoff, a longtime friend and golfing buddy of Trump, is a billionaire real-estate executive from New York City. Nancy Okail, an Egyptian American human rights activist (sentenced to jail in absentia by Egyptian court), thinks that Trump’s pick of property mogul Steve Witkoff as Middle East envoy was the “most interesting decision,” indicating as it did that the incoming president sees the region “as one giant real estate deal.”

Witkoff’s intricate connection with the Middle Eastern country of Qatar goes back to November 2013, when his Witkoff Group acquired the 610-room Park Lane Hotel in Manhattan for approximately $654 million. Due to various DOJ-connected problems, Witkoff ended up selling the property to the Qatar Investment Authority (the country’s sovereign wealth fund) for $623 million in August 2023. Journalist Caroline Glick shed light on the role of Steve Witkoff and his business ties to Hamas-supporting Qatar. “They have an enormous amount of money that they use to buy influence in the West, and especially in Donald Trump’s circle. And one of those people is Steven Witkoff”, Glick said.

At Qatar’s May 15 2024 Economic Forum, Witkoff praised Qatar, calling it “really impressive,” adding, “this is solid government.”

Witkoff has expressed similar admiration for the UAE’s pro-business agenda. In December 2024, he took the stage at Bitcoin MENA, a cryptocurrency conference in Abu Dhabi. Witkoff and Trump’s sons are cofounders of World Liberty Financial (WLF), a crypto-platform with investments from TRON (blockchain crypto-platform). There seems to be a small fly in the financial ointment here: Israeli authorities say that Hamas and other groups designated as terrorist organizations have used Tron’s low-cost, high-speed network for illicit financing. Israel’s National Bureau for Counter Terror Financing froze numerous Tron wallets since July 2021, linking many to Hamas, Hezbollah, and other groups. Crypto seizures announced by the Israeli security services since 2021 have frequently singled out Tron’s use by militants, including Hamas whose 2023 attack on Israel killed 1,200 people, according to Israeli authorities, and triggered the Gaza war. The US Treasury Department also seized Tron wallets allegedly connected to terrorism financing after the 2023 attack on Israel.

It bears mentioning that Jared Kushner (POTUS Trump’s son-in-law) was instrumental in negotiating the Abraham Accords in 2020. Kushner’s private equity firm Affinity Partners has received more than $2 billion in investments from Saudi Arabi after Kushner left the White House in 2020. Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund is an investor in Affinity. In May 2018 Kushner Companies received a bailout of its flagship New York building (666 Fifth Avenue) by Brookfield Properties, a publicly traded company headquartered in Canada, one of whose major investors in the Qatar Investment Authority. On December 20 2024 Affinity Partners raised an additional $1.5 billion from the Qatar Investment Authority and Abu Dhabi-based asset manager Lunate. Wealth funds in the United Arab Emirates and a Qatari entity (both unnamed) also have each invested over $200 million apiece in Affinity.

In November 2024, Jewish Insider noted that Witkoff’s previous financial dealings with Qatar, a country that has sought to influence him through its lobbying efforts, have raised concerns about potential conflicts of interest. Ben Baird, the director of advocacy for the Middle East Forum, commented on Witkoff’s appointment: “One can’t help but wonder if there aren’t some geopolitics at play here. It’s not a sure bet how people like Witkoff are going to enact policies.”

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani credited Witkoff on Wednesday January 15 2025, in a speech announcing the Hamas-Israel deal.

Dr Daniel Pipes notes in the Middle East Forum that the present deal releases many hundreds of jihadi murderers who have killed hundreds of Israeli civilians. “It nearly assures continued Hamas rule in Gaza. It boosts Islamist morale worldwide. It humiliates the West’s foremost Middle Eastern ally.”

Qatar is the world’s primary bankroller of Hamas. Qatar is also a full-fledged mediator (along with the USA) in this deal. Qatar also houses the US’s largest airbase in the Middle East, as well as hosting the US military’s CENTCOM and Hamas’ senior leadership. For America to allow it such influence and power in these negotiations reveals that the US has a divided heart in these matters. And for the incoming POTUS and his family to have such close financial connections with Hamas’ biggest bankroller should give us all pause for thought and for increased prayer. Qatar and the US are both on board in seeking a Palestinian state led by terrorists, to be created on land that God has promised to Israel alone.

Jihad is not just a philosophy

In ‘Neighborhood Bully’, Bob Dylan’s masterpiece about the Jewish people and the Jewish state, he wryly notes: “There's a noose at his neck and a gun at his back and a license to kill him is given out to every maniac – He's the neighborhood bully!” Hamas’ Charter declares: “The Platform of The Islamic Resistance Movement [Harakat al-Muqawima al-Islamiyya]: Israel will rise and will remain erect until Islam eliminates it as it had eliminated its predecessors.”

The Gazan enemy attacking the Jewish state is Hamas – a Muslim Brotherhood offshoot Islamically committed to Israel’s total destruction. Western secular leaders for the most part have absolutely no idea who Hamas is, and what its end-game strategy is – or what the God of Jacob says about who Israel is in His eyes, and what His end-game strategy is for them. In the rare case where some might faintly grasp these issues, most of them don’t care enough about the Jewish people for it to make any difference in their political and diplomatic decisions.

Jeremiah’s prophetic declaration rings down the corridors of time. His summation of God’s heart and coming judgments on the nations who deal casually or cruelly with Israel are crystal-clear:

“And do not fear, Jacob My servant, declares YHVH, and do not be dismayed, Israel. For behold, I am going to save you from far away, and your descendants from the land of their captivity . . . For I am with you, declares YHVH, to save you. For I will completely destroy all the nations where I have scattered you, only I will not destroy you completely . . . There is no one to plead your cause . . . All your lovers have forgotten you; They do not seek you . . . Therefore all who devour you will be devoured, and all your adversaries, every one of them, will go into captivity . . . Those who plunder you will become plunder, and all who plunder you I will turn into plunder. For I will restore you to health and I will heal you of your wounds, declares YHVH, because they have called you an outcast, saying: ‘It is Zion; no one cares for her’” (Jeremiah 30:10-17)

Yahya Sinwar’s less famous brother

On June 25 2006 a squad of Hamas terrorists attacked an IDF Merkava Mark III tank near Israel’s Kerem Shalom border crossing. Their RPG fire killed two of the tank crew, badly wounded the third, and the fourth, Corporal Gilad Shalit, was captured and taken back into Gaza. Shalit was held prisoner in Gaza for 1,934 days before being liberated in a hostage-for-terrorist deal. In the first stage, Shalit was transferred to Egypt and then to Israel. At the same time Israel released 477 prisoners. Two months later, Israel released another 550 prisoners. Lists of prominent Hamas prisoners released can be found here and here.

Over 190 Israelis were murdered by these terrorists. A 2011 Israeli poll reported that, at the time, 79% of Israelis surveyed supported the exchange, while 14% opposed it. One of the Hamas prisoners release was Yahya Sinwar, who later took over leadership in Hamas, and orchestrated the October 7, 2023 jihadi massacres – resulting in the death of 1,180 Israelis (797 civilians and 383 IDF soldiers); as well as 3,400 wounded and 251 Israelis taken captive. Sinwar’s brother Mohammed (commander of Hamas’ Khan Younis Brigade) was one of the masterminds behind the October 7 pogrom. Mohammed Sinwar is currently the one leading the hostage-terrorist deal negotiations.

Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) head Ronen Bar presented data to the ministers in the Israeli government’s security cabinet on Friday January 17 2025, stating that “82% of those released in the Gilad Shalit deal in 2011 returned to terrorism,” and that 15% of them carried out attacks themselves after their release in the deal, or planned the attacks.

The deal which was brokered mandates the release of over 1,000 prisoners (most who are Hamas-connected). A partial Hebrew list of 734 of these terrorists is available here, an a very short list in English is available here.

It is to be assumed that the release of so many hardened jihadi murderers – many of them into Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and East Jerusalem – will result in many more Israeli fatalities. This deal was not the Israeli government’s choosing, nor does it reflect the heart and thoughts of most Israelis. It is a deal that has been forced on Israel by political pressure, by Israel’s allies.

Releasing the kraken

There is an old Norwegian word kraken or krakjen, which in turn comes from the Old Norse krókr (literally, ‘hook’ or ‘hooked’). This probably refers to primitive grapnel anchors shaped like hooks, which grab onto earth at the bottom of a lake or shallow body of water. In Norwegian sailor folklore, the kraken (also known as horven) is a legendary sea monster said to appear in the sea between Norway and Iceland.

Modern literary use of the word kraken includes: John Wyndham’s novel The Kraken Wakes (1953), the Kraken of Marvel Comics, the 1981 film Clash of the Titans and the 2010 remake. A kraken was also featured in two of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. There is also a professional hockey team known as the Seattle Kraken. To ‘release the kraken’ in colloquial speech means ‘to release a great destructive force.’

Many in the Western world have chosen to castigate Israel and champion Hamas in this latest terrorist-catalyzed war. As a result, a ‘kraken of anti-Semitism and hatred of Israel’ has been released across the face of the globe. Shocking though it is, even feminists and civil-rights activists have championed mass rapes of Israeli teens and women, and the murder of children and Holocaust survivors by Hamas jihadis. The moral philosophies of these people – who delight in describing themselves by the epithet ‘woke’ – have melted down into ethical idiocy and quasi-Nazi endorsements. The advocacy of Islamist anti-Semitism by these people is releasing divine judgment on their nations. This is resulting in a super-fast slide downhill into moral and spiritual darkness (as per Romans 1:18-32). As the English Standard Version accurately translates the Hebrew of Genesis 12:3: “I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse!”

Though the clash between Hamas’ jihadi terrorists and the Jewish state of Israel seems to some to be only regionally significant, the God of Israel is using international responses on this issue to sift the destinies of the nations.

How shall we then pray?

Pray for revelation and courage to be given to Israel’s leaders in political, intelligence and military spheres – to understand and counteract strategies against Israel, the apple of God’s eye (Zechariah 2:8) – as Islamic State/al Qa’eda armies gather at our borders.

Pray that enemy strategies against the Jewish people and their state, against Middle East Christians and other minorities – will be confounded, and that a great harvest would take place in all of these areas!

Pray for the protection of Israeli and Jewish people from the assaults of jihadi terror organizations and Western fellow-travelers, and the return of the Jewish people to both the Land and the Messiah of Israel

There are approximately 44 to 50 living Israeli hostages remaining, kidnapped by Hamas, Islamic Jihad and PFLP/PLO. Plans are tentatively underway to release a total of 33 out the 98 remaining Israeli hostages – half who are dead. Hamas is holding on to their corpses as cold storage bargaining chips. That would leave 65 hostages with Hamas, some dead, some alive. Pray for the release of all the hostages, and for YHVH’s justice to be brought on the heads of the Hamas kidnappers

Pray for the raising up of Ezekiel’s prophetic Jewish army throughout the earth

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: https://davidstent.org/

The morphing of the Caliphate

The defeat of the Ottoman Empire in 1917-1918 meant the downfall of the world’s only Muslim superpower. It also meant the collapse of Islam’s caliphate. Muhammad’s armies had been decisively crushed, and the body of the Muslim juggernaut was left headless on the battlefield. What would happen now?

No longer a Turkish Caliphate

Ḥusayn bin ‘Alī was a 37^th-generation direct descendant of Muhammad, coming from the Banū Hāshim clan (an offshoot of the Quraysh tribe). Though born in Constantinople, his family was from Mecca, and he grew up in Arabia. On November 1 1908 he was appointed Sharif and Emir of Mecca by the Ottoman/Turkish Sultan Abdul Hamid II. Less than eight years later, on June 10 1916 he proclaimed himself leader of the Great Arab Revolt and began a rebellion against the Ottoman Empire. Four months after that, in October 1916 his own son Abdullah declared his father Ḥusayn to be “sovereign of the Arab nation. Then all those present arose and proclaimed him ‘Malik al-Arab’, King of the Arabs.” According to US State Department sources, a formal ceremony recognizing Emir Ḥusayn as “king of the Hedjaz” then occurred in Mecca on November 6 1916. Those American sources added a note that King Ḥusayn was hoping to re-establish the Caliphate: that “a request for the recognition of an Arab caliphate was also advanced; and it is not to be doubted that, even in these early years of the war, Hussein was inspired by dreams of future imperial rank and caliphal dignity.”

Emir/King Ḥusayn (also spelled ‘Hussein’) was not running blind: he was relying on Britain’s secret diplomatic promise going back to November 1 1914. This had been communicated to him from then Consul-General of Egypt Herbert Lord Kitchener. Britain promised to “guarantee the independence, rights and privileges of the Sharifate against all foreign external aggression, in particular that of the Ottomans.” At that time, both Britain and America were generous in promising things to King Ḥusayn that were more flattery than reality, in their attempt to assuage ‘medieval dignity.’ Britain even sent British Army officer T.E. Lawrence (‘Lawrence of Arabia’; renowned archeologist and Arabist) to help Ḥusayn in military, diplomatic and intelligence preparations. As a bonus, Ḥusayn’s sons Faisal and Abdullah were appointed in 1921 as puppet-rulers of the British Crown – Faisal to Iraq (August 23 1921 – September 8 1933) and Abdullah to Transjordan (as Emir April 11 1921-May 25 1946; then as King, May 25 1946-July 20 1951). Iraq and Transjordan were two new colony-nations, created by Whitehall within the Sykes-Picot framework – part of the United Kingdom’s colonialist strategy for the Middle East.

But a deeper problem was brewing in Araby. In 1916 the new King Ḥusayn had also declared himself ‘Malik bilad al-Arab’ (‘King of all Arab lands’). Arabian warrior Abdulaziz bin Abdul Rahman al-Saud (ibn Saud), a Bedouin not descended from Muhammad’s bloodline, already had his ambitious eyes set on seizing the Meccan prize. Bad blood existed between these two leaders – the Hashemite and the Saudi – and it would end up bringing disaster to the Hashemite Ḥusayn and to his dynasty.

A short-lived Arab Caliphate

King Ḥusayn was proclaimed as the new Sharifian/Arab Caliph on March 10 1924, one week after Turkey’s new Grand National Assembly abolished the Ottoman Caliphate on March 3 1924. For much of the Arab world, this announcement of a new Arab Caliph was seen as a fleeting consolation, the culmination of a long struggle to reclaim the caliphate from Ottoman hands. On that very day, King Ḥusayn visited the Supreme Islamic Council in Jerusalem, situated on the Temple Mount, to discuss the matter with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini (a personal friend of Hitler and the Nazi High Command, and an advocate of the Holocaust). A document of allegiance to the Caliphate of Hussein bin Ali was then issued, stating:

“We, the muftis, judges, dignitaries, and representatives of the Palestinian land, the people of authority and contract, pledge our allegiance to His Majesty, the Hashemite King of the Arabs, Hussein bin Ali bin Awn al-Hashemi, with the Islamic caliphate, on the condition that the matter is conducted through consultation, as commanded by allah almighty. It is also conditioned that no actions contradict the public interest of Muslims, and that decisions regarding the affairs of Palestine, its government structure, and its opinions are made only with the consent of its people.”

That same month, in March 1924, King Ḥusayn published in Amman a public bay’ah or oath of allegiance sworn to himself as new ruler by the Muslims of Jerusalem and Amman:

“The act of the Ankara government abolishing the caliphate prompted the distinguished religious scholars of the holy sites of Mecca and Medina, as well as those of al-Aqsa Mosque and the surrounding countries, to surprise us and compel us to pledge allegiance with great enthusiasm to the grand leadership and the grand caliphate. This was in lieu of observing religious rituals and the fasting prescribed by clear legislation, due to the inadmissibility for Muslims to remain without an imam for more than three days, as explicitly stated in the recommendations of the venerable Farouk [i.e., ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb]”

King Ḥusayn received support for his becoming Caliph from the second-to-previous Ottoman/Turkish Caliph, Mehmed VI Vahideddin, according to an article published on March 18 1924 in the British newspaper ‘The Times’: “Vahideddin, who is in the Italian city of San Remo, has sent a telegram to King Hussein and announced that he recognizes Hussein as Caliph.”

But Caliph Ḥusayn would only get to rule as caliph for a short 20 months. He was forcibly removed from that office on December 23 1925, when Ibn Saud and his Wahhabi armies (known as ‘Ikhwān man Aṭāʿa allāh’ – ‘the Brotherhood of those who obey allah’) conquered what is now known as the Western Province of Saudi Arabia (the Hejaz). Ḥusayn abdicated and fled to Amman, Transjordan. But Saudi pressure on the British resulted in Ḥusayn soon being exiled to British-controlled Cyprus. Just over five years later, when Ḥusayn became gravely ill, the British allowed him to return to Amman. He died on June 4 1931. As a sharif of Mecca, Ḥusayn would traditionally have been buried in Mecca, but Ibn Saud would not permit that, so Ḥusayn was buried in the al-Arghuniyya Madrasa on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. On the window above his tomb is written the following Arabic inscription, acknowledging his brief status as caliph: (‘This is the tomb of the Commander of the believers’; ‘Haḏa qabru ʾamīri ʾal-mūˈminīna ʾal-Ḥusayn bnu ʿAlī’). On January 8 1926, the leading figures in Mecca, Medina and Jeddah proclaimed Ibn Saud as King of Hejaz; the bay’ah ceremony was held in the Great Mosque of Mecca. The non-Hashemite and non-Sayyid clan known as the House of Saud has ruled Mecca and Medina since that time – as kings but not as caliphs.

After both the Turkish abolition of the Ottoman caliphate and the Saudi non-Hashemite conquest of Mecca, a few Islamic attempts were initiated to consider how the Caliphate could be revived. In 1926 the ‘Pan-Islamic Congress for the Caliphate’ was convened in Cairo (text available in Russian) to discuss the revival of the caliphate. But most Muslim countries did not participate, and no action was taken to implement the summit’s resolutions. Various scholars in attendance promoted conflicting claims by the competing Arab sovereigns to the title of ‘caliph’. But, as Marvin Kramer states in ‘The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World,’ “All such efforts were foiled by internal rivalries or the intervention of the European powers.”

A renewed vision for the re-establishment of the Caliphate

Most Westerners didn’t pay too much attention to the collapse of the Ottoman Caliphate or how this was affecting the Muslim world. Western secularists tended to belittle Christianity and any constructive role it could play in guiding their culture and civilization. Certainly, they assumed, Islam was similarly not relevant for the Middle East. Hilaire Belloc, French writer and historian, notes, “Millions of modern people . . . have forgotten all about Islam. They have never come in contact with it. They take for granted that it is decaying, and that, anyway, it is just a foreign religion which will not concern them.”

But Islamic self-understanding of their own history is significantly different. The Muslim world had watched over centuries as their empires – whether Abbasid, Persian, Fatimid, Indian Mughal or Ottoman – declined in power, honor and influence. Back in the medieval period, Islamic philosopher-scholar Ibn Taymiyya (1263-1328) adamantly insisted that Islam’s weakenings and defeats were due to Muslim adoption of Western culture, ideas and practices. The modern Salafi movement agreed, believing that these former empires lost their greatness because they had fallen away from ‘authentic Islam.’ Only a return to strict (‘salafi’) interpretation of Islamic shari’a law and a restoration of caliphate government would make Islam great again, was their perspective.

The Salafi movement believes that the first three generations of leaders after Muhammad – the ‘salaf’ – exemplify the purest form of Islam. The writings and traditions of these ‘al-salaf al-ṣāliḥ’ or ‘pious predecessors’ are to be given authoritative precedence over later Islamic traditions. This of course means that Muhammad’s geopolitical goal – jihadi conquest of the world – is to be carried out in the same way as Muhammad himself pursued it.

With the departure of the last Caliph Abdulmejid II from Ottoman Turkey in 1923, a new wave of Islamist thinkers came on the scene. They blended a vision for Muslim renewal with a drive for the restoration of the caliphate. And they saw in Ibn Taymiyya’s teachings a Sheikh, a Muslim leader, who could lead Islam back to power, greatness and world domination through jihad – Muslim holy war. Most Islamist jihadi movements of the last 100 years (including the Muslim Brotherhood, Hizb ut-Tahrir, Hamas, al-Qaeda, Islamic State and Syria’s new HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa/Abu Muhammad al-Julani) look to Ibn Taymiyya for inspiration and legal authority. Islamic scholars like Yahya Michot have noted that Ibn Taymiyya “has thus become a sort of forefather of al-Qaeda.”

Egypt – the Brotherhood presents strategic keys

The age of modern jihadism began in 1928 with the creation of the Muslim Brotherhood, itself a reaction to the collapse of the Ottoman Caliphate in 1924.

The Muslim Brotherhood (‘Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin’ or ‘Society of Muslim Brothers’) was founded by an Egyptian schoolteacher and imam, Sheikh Hassan al-Banna (October 14, 1906-February 12, 1949) in March 1927 at Ismailia, Egypt. He was the son of an Islamic teacher who was both an imam and a muezzin (Islamic cantor).

Al-Banna’s memories of his first stay in Cairo as a student in his early twenties is revealing. He was living close to the al-Azhar al-Sharif – the oldest and most respected of Islamic institutions. Yet in Cairo’s adjacent Azbakiyya Quarter, al-Banna saw music and dance, coffeehouses and gambling, drinking, drugs and prostitution – all of which deeply pained him: “I saw that the social life of the beloved Egyptian nation was oscillating between its dear and precious Islam . . . and this violent Western aggression, armed and equipped with all the deadly material weapons of money, status, outward appearance, indulgence, power and the means of propaganda.”

Al-Banna learned of the abolition of the Ottoman Caliphate in 1924, while he was still a student. This event influenced him greatly: al-Banna viewed the collapse of the Caliphate as a “calamity.” He later called these events a “declaration of war against all shapes of Islam.” He attacked “the [falsely] reassuring promises and binding treaties drawn up by the Allies with the mightiest potentate of the Peninsula, King Husayn, stating that they would help him achieve the independence of the Arabs and support the authority of the Arab Caliphate.” What was needed, al-Banna concluded and asserted, was a restoration of the Caliphate: “The outcome of these steps will be, without a doubt, consolidation and a resurrection of the Islamic empire as a unified state embracing the scattered peoples of the Islamic world, raising the banner of Islam and bearing its message.”

The vision of the Muslim Brotherhood as per al-Banna: the formation of an Islamic state governed by shari’a and a return to a society modelled after that of Muhammad and his first followers. According to al-Banna, Egypt’s many problems could only be solved by a return to a society modelled after the example of Muhammad and his followers. As far as the role of jihad in this equation, al-Banna warned his readers against the “widespread belief among many Muslims” that ‘jihad of the heart’ (‘jihad bil qalb/nafs’) was greater (‘al-jihad al-akbar’) and more important than ‘jihad of the sword’ (‘jihad bis saif’). He called on Muslims to prepare for military jihad against colonial powers and against their puppet-regimes:

“Muslims [are now] compelled to humble themselves before non-Muslims, and are ruled by unbelievers. Their lands have been trampled over, and their honor besmirched. Their adversaries are in charge of their affairs, and the rites of their religion have fallen into abeyance with their own domains . . . Hence it has become an individual obligation, which there is no evading, on every Muslim to prepare his equipment, to make up his mind to engage in jihad, and to get ready for it until the opportunity is ripe and God decrees”

Jihad is central to Muslim Brotherhood ideology. In his booklet entitled “Jihad”, al-Banna clearly defines jihad as violent warfare against non-Muslims to establish Islam as dominant across the entire world: “Jihad is an obligation from allah on every Muslim and cannot be ignored nor evaded. allah has ascribed great importance to jihad and has made the reward of the martyrs and fighters in His way a splendid one. Only those who have acted similarly and who have modeled themselves upon the martyrs in their performance of jihad can join them in this reward.” Al-Banna was a devout admirer of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime.

The purpose of the Muslim Brotherhood was and remains: to restore Islam to the global power and dominance over Christendom that it had wielded for more than a thousand years; and, to return Islam to its divine destiny. To the Brotherhood, the ultimate goal of human civilization is the unification of all regimes under the banner of the Caliphate – the universal Islamic state. According to al-Banna, the Caliphate must govern all lands that were at one time under the control of Muslims. He states:

“We want the Islamic flag to be hoisted once again on high, fluttering in the wind, in all those lands that have had the good fortune to harbor Islam for a certain period of time and where the muezzin’s call sounded . . . Then fate decreed that the light of Islam be extinguished in these lands that returned to unbelief. Thus Andalusia, Sicily, the Balkans, the Italian coast, as well as the islands of the Mediterranean, are all of them Muslim Mediterranean colonies and they must return to the Islamic fold. The Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea must once again become Muslim seas, as they once were.”

Once that is accomplished, the Caliphate is to be expanded to cover the entire globe, erasing national boundaries under the flag of Islam.

World domination – the Caliphate and jihad

Al-Banna was zealous in his stated vision and goals: “It is the nature of Islam to dominate, not to be dominated, to impose its law on all nations and to extend its power to the entire planet.”

The Muslim Brotherhood’s motto is: “allah ghayatuna. Al-rasūl za‘imuna. Al-Qur’an dusturuna. Al-jihād sabīluna. Al-mawt fi sabīl allah asma amanina. allah akbar, allah akbar.” (“allah is our goal. The rasul [Islamic messenger – i.e., Muhammad] is our leader. The Quran is our Constitution. Jihad [military struggle] is our way. Death on the path of allah [in jihad] is our supreme aspiration. allah is great! allah is great!”)

After the British departed from Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood proclaimed that it could not compromise with modern secular Arab societies or military dictatorships. In the eyes of the Brotherhood’s leadership, Egypt, Algeria and even Saudi Arabia were less than purely Islamic. Most Arab and Islamic states are evil and need to be overthrown. Only strict Islamic shari’a rule and the re-establishment of the Caliphate is ultimately acceptable.

During the 1930’s and 1940’s the Muslim Brotherhood had links with the Nazis. Much of the contact went through Haj Amin al-Husseini, SS Reichsleiter Heinrich Himmler’s man in Jerusalem. The Brotherhood first established a cell in Gaza, and in May 1946 set up a Jerusalem cell in the Sheikh Jarrakh neighborhood. Yasser Arafat joined the Egyptian Brotherhood in in 1952. Brotherhood members in East Jerusalem established a shadow organization in 1953 called Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami (‘Party of Islamic Liberation’) which today is another worldwide terror organization. In the late 1970’s Brotherhood members established ‘Egyptian Islamic Jihad’ (Al-Jihad al-Islami; also called ‘the Islamic Jihad’ or ‘the Jihad Group’) led by Ayman al-Zawahiri, and ‘Jamaat al-Islamiyya’ or ‘al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya’ (‘The Islamic Group’) led by the blind Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman. Rahman served a life sentence in Florence Colorado for his role in overseeing the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993, as well as for plans to bomb NY tunnels and bridges and FBI and UN headquarters. These organizations’ goals have been to overthrow the Egyptian Government, to replace it with a Caliphate Islamic state, and to attack American and Israeli interests.

By 1948, the Muslim Brotherhood claimed half a million adherents. The primary state backers of the Muslim Brotherhood at present are Qatar and Turkey. As of 2015, the Muslim Brotherhood is considered a terrorist organization by the governments of Bahrain, Egypt, Russia, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The Muslim Brotherhood has presented the ideological model for almost all modern Sunni Islamic terrorist groups. In his October 22 2003 discussions concerning Hamas, al-Qaeda and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Richard Clarke – former U.S. National Security Council chief counterterrorism adviser – told a Senate committee: “The common link here is the extremist Muslim Brotherhood – all of these organizations are descendants of the membership and ideology of the Muslim Brothers.”

An internal Muslim Brotherhood memorandum, released during the terror-support trial of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) trial in July 2007 shows that the Brotherhood’s jihad adopts more subtle and longer range approaches in the West. A memo of May 22, 1991 states: “The Ikhwan [Brotherhood] must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and allah’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.

Sheikh Yousef al-Qaradawi was a world-respected spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood who had been deeply influenced by al-Banna. After meeting him at his school in Tanta, Egypt when al-Banna lectured, al-Qaradawi wrote of the lasting impact of this encounter, describing al Banna as “brilliantly radiating, as if his words were revelation or live coals from the light of prophecy.” Al-Qaradawi had this to say regarding the Jewish people:

“There is no dialogue between [the Jews] and us other than in one language – the language of the sword and force. allah stated: ‘Fight the war of allah against those who fight you . . . And you should kill them in every place in which you capture them, and you should expel them from all the places from which you were expelled’” [quoting the Quran; Surat al-Baqara, verse 191]

This short look at historical developments since the Ottoman abolition of the Caliphate reveals a blending of two separate but related points: an activist vision for the re-establishment of the Caliphate; and activist vision and preparation for Islamist jihad terror.

How shall we then pray?

Pray for revelation and courage to be given to Israel’s leaders in political, intelligence and military spheres – to understand and counteract strategies against Israel, the apple of God’s eye (Zechariah 2:8) – as Islamic State/al Qa’eda armies gather at our borders.

Pray that enemy strategies against the Jewish people and their state, against Middle East Christians and other minorities – will be confounded, and that a great harvest would take place in all of these areas!

Pray for the protection of Israeli and Jewish people from the assaults of jihadi terror organizations and Western fellow-travelers, and the return of the Jewish people to both the Land and the Messiah of Israel

There are approximately 44 to 50 living Israeli hostages remaining, kidnapped by Hamas, Islamic Jihad and PFLP/PLO. Plans are tentatively underway to release a total of 33 out the 98 remaining Israeli hostages – half who are dead. Hamas is holding on to their corpses as cold storage bargaining chips. That would leave 65 hostages with Hamas, some dead, some alive. Pray for the release of all the hostages, and for YHVH’s justice to be brought on the heads of the Hamas kidnappers

Pray for the raising up of Ezekiel’s prophetic Jewish army throughout the earth

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: https://davidstent.org/

The Caliphate on the Orient Express

The Islamic world of the early 1900’s was shaken to the core. The superpowers of the United Kingdom, France and Germany had burst out of the West with huge advancements in weapons, science and engineering, leaving Muslim countries in the Arabian dust. British war ships and trading ships plied the waters of the Mediterranean, the Red Sea, the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean, turning primitive Arabic-speaking principalities into Crown Colonies and Protectorates. Crisp British-uniformed brigades marched into Muslim marketplaces and souqs to the wail of Scottish bagpipes, manifesting imperial power among poverty-stricken dictatorships whose livelihood had up to that point consisted of date farming, dhow-based fishing industries, and diving for pearls. The imminent downfall of the Ottoman caliphate would be “the proof of the pudding” for some Arab thinkers and philosophers: something had drastically failed in the Islamic world.

The collapse of the Caliphate would kick-start the rise of Twentieth Century radical jihadi Islam.

Blood in the streets

Bob Dylan once said, “There’s a battle outside and it is raging. It’ll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls . . . As the present now will later be past. The order is rapidly fading, for the times they are a-changin’” (‘The times, they are a changin’’; © 1963, 1964 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1991, 1992 by Special Rider Music). Rivers of blood accompanied the dawn of the 20^th century, both in Europe and the Caucasus. The revolutionary rise of subject nations desiring to be free – and the corresponding crushing of these movements with great cruelty – let to millions being murdered, raped and exiled during this time. These included:

the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878), with between 200,000 and 330,000 killed (including 30,000 Bulgarians massacred by Ottoman troops May 11-June 9 1876 and 100,000 Bulgarian refugees; over 200,000 Muslims killed through famine, disease and massacres, and up to 500,000 refugees)

the Circassian genocide in Western Caucasus, by Russia’s Tsarist army (1863-1878), with between 625,00 and 1.5 million murdered, and 500,000 died while fleeing, involving mass killing, mass rape, death marches, exceedingly brutal torture and impalement of enemies, forced starvation, etc. 95-97% of all Circassians were murdered

the Armenian/Hamidian massacres (1894-97) named after Turkish Caliph Sultan Abdul Hamid II: up to 300,000 Armenian and Assyrian Christians massacred, at least 50,000 orphaned children as a result, accompanied by looting, forced conversion, mass rapes, ethnic cleansing

the First Balkan War (1912–1913) and Second Balkan War (1913), with over 49,000 killed on the Balkan side (Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia, Montenegro) and 56,000 killed on the Ottoman Turkish side

the Armenian Genocide (1915-16, and 1922-23) with 1.5 million Armenians murdered out of a total of 2.5 million Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, set into action through the passing of the Tehcir (‘Temporary Law of Deportation’) by the Turkish Ottoman Council of Ministers on May 27 1915, authorizing the deportation of all Armenian Ottoman citizens.

The conquest of Caliphate Constantinople

WWI was drawing to an end in the Middle East. On October 30 1918 British Admiral Somerset Arthur Gough-Calthorpe and Ottoman Minister of Maritime Affairs Hüseyin Rauf Orbay signed the Armistice of Mudros on board HMS Agamemnon in Moudros harbor on the Greek island of Lemnos, bringing combat in that theater to an end. French troops entered Istanbul/Constantinople on November 12 1918, with British troops following on November 13, and an Italian battalion entering on February 7 1919. This was the first time since 1453 (the Fall of Constantinople) that the keys to that city had changed hands – from Islamic to Christian.

The Treaty of Versailles was signed June 28 1919 in the Palace of Versailles’ Hall of Mirrors, and ratified by the defeated forces of Germany. On August 10 1920 the Treaty of Sèvres was signed (but not ratified) between the Principal Allied Powers and the Ottoman Empire. Had this treaty been ratified, large parts of Ottoman territory would have been partitioned and handed over to France, the UK, Greece and Italy. However, the treaty aroused great hostility among various streams of Turkish leadership, led by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. This led to both the Turkish War of Independence (May 19 1919–October 11 1922) and the Turkish National Movement (June 22 1919–October 29 1923). These in turn led to the abolition of the Ottoman sultanate on November 1 1922, the declaration of the Republic of Turkey on October 29 1923, and the abolition of the Ottoman Caliphate on March 3 1924.

The divvying-up of the Ottoman Empire had been foreseen and planned in the British-French Sykes-Picot Agreement (ratified May 9-16 1916). In the event of an Allied victory, the Ottoman Empire would be divided as follows:

Britain would control Jordan, southern Iraq, and the ports of Haifa and Akko, though part of what was then labeled ‘Palestine’ would fall under “international administration”

France would control southeastern Turkey, the Kurdistan Region, Syria and Lebanon

Russia would control Western Armenia, Constantinople and the Turkish Straits

Italy would control southern Anatolia

As a result of Turkish military opposition to the crushing terms of the Treaty of Sèvres , the Western Allies stepped back from pushing that agreement, and replaced it with the Treaty of Lausanne. Lausanne was ratified between August 23 1923 and July 16 1924, and signed in the Palais de Rumine in Lausanne, Switzerland, on July 24 1923. The Treaty established the following:

It recognized the sovereignty of the new Republic of Turkey

It restricted the boundaries of Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey

It forced Turkey to relinquish all claims on the Dodecanese Islands, Cyprus, Libya, Egypt, Sudan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Asir, the Hejaz and Medina

It did not recognize Armenia’s territorial hopes. Armenia was granted only a small homeland area in Soviet-controlled territory

In this treaty Lausanne granted immunity to Turkish Ottoman soldiers and military leaders for crimes they committed between 1914 and 1922 against the Armenians and the Greeks. In doing this, Lausanne established the legal right of state governments to expel large parts of their citizens on the grounds of ‘otherness’. Some seeds from this malevolent weed would sprout with a vengeance less than twenty years later during Hitler’s Holocaust.

Caliph on the Orient Express

The defeat of Caliphate forces on the battlefield and the conquering of the Caliphate’s capital city of Constantinople/Istanbul were events which echoed deeply in the soul of the Islamic world. For many, it would mark the zenith of the Infidel West’s domination of Islam. Many years later Osama bin Laden would reflect this perspective less than 30 days after 9/11 in his videotaped address on October 7, 2001:

“Here is America struck by God Almighty in one of its vital organs, so that its greatest buildings are destroyed. Grace and gratitude to allah. America has been filled with horror from north to south and east to west, and thanks be to allah. What America is tasting now is only a copy of what we have tasted. Our Islamic nation has been tasting the same for more than 80 years of humiliation and disgrace, its sons killed and their blood spilled, its sanctities desecrated.”

Professor Bernard Lewis (deceased), formerly Cleveland E. Dodge Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University, noted in his article ‘The Revolt of Islam’:

“We can be fairly sure that bin Laden’s Muslim listeners – the people he was addressing – picked up the allusion immediately and appreciated its significance. In 1918, the Ottoman sultanate, the last of the great Muslim empires, was finally defeated – its capital, Constantinople, occupied, its sovereign held captive, and much of its territory partitioned between the victorious British and French Empires. The Turks eventually succeeded in liberating their homeland, but they did so not in the name of Islam but through a secular nationalist movement. One of their first acts, in November, 1922, was to abolish the sultanate. The Ottoman sovereign was not only a sultan, the ruler of a specific state; he was also widely recognized as the caliph, the head of all Sunni Islam, and the last in a line of such rulers that dated back to the death of the Prophet Muhammad, in 632 A.D. After a brief experiment with a separate caliph, the Turks, in March, 1924, abolished the caliphate, too. During its nearly thirteen centuries, the caliphate had gone through many vicissitudes, but it remained a potent symbol of Muslim unity, even identity, and its abolition, under the double assault of foreign imperialists and domestic modernists, was felt throughout the Muslim world.”

At the end of the Turkish War of Independence, the Ottoman Empire became defunct. The Turkish National Movement’s Grand National Assembly took over the government of the new Republic. They then voted to take two drastic measures: one, to separate the caliphate from the sultanate into two separate offices; and two, and to abolish the Ottoman Sultanate – which act they legislated on November 1 1922. On November 19 1922, Crown Prince Abdülmecid II was elected Caliph (the 28^th and last Ottoman caliph) by the Turkish National Assembly. Abdulmejid chose to use the ceremonial title Halîfe-i Müslimîn (‘Caliph of the Muslims’) to describe his status, instead of the more traditional Emîrü’l-Mü’minîn (‘Amīr al-Muʾminīn’; Commander of the believers).

But the position had been stripped of any authority, and Abdulmejid’s purely ceremonial reign would be short-lived – sixteen months in toto. When Abdulmejid was declared caliph, Kemal refused to allow the traditional Ottoman sword ceremony to take place, bluntly declaring: “The Caliph has no power or position except as a nominal figurehead” In response to Abdulmejid’s petition for an increase in his allowance, Kemal wrote: “Your office, the Caliphate, is nothing more than a historic relic. It has no justification for existence. It is a piece of impertinence that you should dare write to any of my secretaries!

On October 29 1923, the National Assembly declared Turkey a republic, and proclaimed Ankara its new capital. After over 600 years, the Ottoman Empire had officially ceased to exist.

Abdulmejid II served as caliph under the authority of the newly founded Turkish Republic until March 3 1924, when the Grand National Assembly of Turkey and President of the Turkish Republic (Mustafa Kemal Atatürk) constitutionally abolished the caliphate and ordered Abdulmejid into exile. The ex-caliph and his family entourage (and 725 Kg of personal luggage) left the Dolmabahçe Palace at 05:00 the next morning, before boarding the ‘Simplon Express’ (also called ‘The Orient Express’) from the Çatalca Train Station, bound for Switzerland. Abdulmejid stayed at the Grand Alpine Hotel on the shore of Lake Geneva. He later moved to Nice on the French Riviera in October 1924, and finally to Paris, where he dedicated his time to painting, playing the piano, and collecting butterflies. He passed away on August 23 1944 of a heart attack, which date coincided with the liberation of Paris from Nazi occupation. The Turkish government did not permit him to be interred in Turkey, so his remains were preserved at the Grand Mosque of Paris for ten years. His body was eventually transferred to Medina, Saudi Arabia where he was subsequently buried.

The last sultan of the Ottoman Empire, Mehmed VI, died at his San Remo, Liguria, Italy exile on May 16 1926 and was buried at the Sulaymaniyya Takiyya mosque complex in Damascus, Today the royal family of these previous sultans and caliphs is known as the Osmanoğlu family.

In March 1924, Muhammad al-Jizawi, Rector of Cairo‘s prestigious al-Azhar University, in direct response to the collapse of the Caliphate, issued a statement calling for a possible pan-Islamic conference to elect a new Caliph:

“Whereas the Caliphate in Islam implies general control of the spiritual and temporal affairs of Islam; Whereas the Turkish Government deprived the Caliph Abdul Mejid of his temporal powers, thereby disqualifying him from becoming Caliph in the sense that Islam required; seeing that in principle the Caliph is destined to be the representative of the Prophet, safeguarding everything concerning Islam, which necessarily means the Caliph should be subject of respect, veneration and obedience; and whereas the Caliph Abdul Mejid no longer possesses such qualifications and has not even the power to live in his native land; now therefore it has been decided to convene an Islamic conference in which all Muslim nations shall be represented in order to consider who should be appointed Caliph.”

The abolition and exile of the last Ottoman Caliph did not mean that the hopes and vision of a reborn Caliphate had died. The 20^th century would see this hope become a major motivator and stimulus to a reborn jihadi movement that would shake both the Middle East and the Western world to its foundations.

How shall we then pray?

Pray for revelation and courage to be given to Israel’s leaders in political, intelligence and military spheres – to understand and counteract strategies against Israel, the apple of God’s eye (Zechariah 2:8) – as Islamic State/al Qa’eda armies gather at our borders.

Pray that enemy strategies against the Jewish people and their state, against Middle East Christians and other minorities – will be confounded, and that a great harvest would take place in all of these areas!

Pray for the protection of Israeli and Jewish people from the assaults of jihadi terror organizations and Western fellow-travelers

Pray for the return of the Jewish people to both the Land and the Messiah of Israel

Pray for the physical rescue of the approximately 44 to 50 living Israeli hostages (including babies) kidnapped by Hamas, Islamic Jihad and PFLP/PLO. At this moment some of these hostages are being tortured, raped and starved (this based on testimonies of recently released hostages). Sadly, over 100 of all Israeli hostages are dead; Hamas is holding on to their corpses as cold storage bargaining chips

Pray for the raising up of Ezekiel’s prophetic Jewish army throughout the earth

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: https://davidstent.org/

The collapse of the Caliphate

The Islamic Caliphate has played a significant role in history past, as well as in our day. It still has a role to play in the prophetic future. In a 1948 speech to the British House of Commons, Winston Churchill once said, “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” It has also been said that “a text without a context is a pretext.” It is our hope that this newsletter will contribute to a deeper understanding of the historical context of the Muslim Caliphate, and how these matters are connected to fast-paced present and future developments in the Middle East.

The Caliphate was birthed in Arabia, though it later moved its capital to Syria, Iraq and Egypt. After 900 years it set up shop in what is today called Turkey – in the geographical belt which Ezekiel once called ‘the Land of Magog.’ Over the centuries, Islam’s leadership morphed from a Caliphate based on Muḥammad’s bloodline to a power consortium of Machiavellian generals-autocrats. What changed when the Caliphate sank its roots down into Turkish soil? And how will present and future developments in Turkey affect the Middle East – indeed, even the whole world?

The original Turks

Anatolia is an ancient Hellenistic name for Turkey, coming from the Greek word verb ἀνατέλλω – ‘I rise up.’ It is meant to recall the rising of the sun in the East. For Greeks, the morning sunrise broke every day from the direction of Turkish Anatolia.

At the beginning of recorded history Anatolia was called ‘the Land of Hatti.’ A non-Semitic and non-European people known as the Hattians lived there circa 2,000 B.C. Their capital city was Hattusa (near modern Boğazkale, Turkey).

About 1650 B.C. the Hittite people (see Genesis 15:20; 23:10; Exodus 3:8; Numbers 13:29; Deuteronomy 7:1; Joshua 1:4; Judges 1:26; 2 Samuel 11:3; 1 Kings 10:29; 11:1; 2 Kings 7:6; etc.) moved from the Black Sea area into north-central Anatolia/Turkey, establishing at least three sub-kingdoms. The Hittites called themselves the ‘Neša’ or the ‘Kaneš.’ Their Hittite Empire reached its peak between 1400 and 1200 B.C., at times clashing with the New Kingdom of Egypt, the Middle Assyrian Empire and the Mitanni Empire. The ‘Treaty of Kadesh’ between the Hittite King Hattušiliš III and the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramesses II (1259 B.C.) fixed the boundaries between these two empires as being in southern Canaan. The Bible tells us that, in Solomon’s day, the Hittites had solid mercantile connections with Israel, much of it involving the trade in horses (2 Chronicles 1:17).

In 1160 B.C. Assyrian King Tiglath-Pileser I defeated the Anatolian Mushki in Turkish Phrygia (probably the ‘Meshech’ of Ezekiel 38:2). The Mushki lived not far from another southern Anatolian people – the Tabal (mentioned also in Ezekiel 38:2 as the Tubal).

Another group of settler-conquerors moved into Turkey nearly 1,000 years later; these were the Galatians, a Celtic people whose origins are subject to much discussion. The Galatians came from the following regions: France (‘the Gauls’ and the ‘La Tène culture’); Germany (the ‘Hallstatt culture’); Ireland (as in the ‘Gaelic’ language); Thrace, the Balkans and Hungary. Thracian Gauls invaded the Balkans in 279 B.C., later moving into the Turkish provinces of Ankara and Eskişehir,. They gave that region the name ‘Galatia.’ Paul the Apostle’s Letter to the Galatians was addressed to Messianic Jews and Gentiles living in that area. In his ‘Antiquities of the Jews,’ Josephus connects the Galatians to another people-group from Ezekiel 38:6, Gomer: “For Gomer founded those whom the Greeks now call Galatians (Galls), but were then called ‘Gomerites.’”

Mongol and Turks

The leaders of Islam were a combination of warriors and religious authorities known as ‘the Caliphs’. Their successive administrations were known as ‘the Caliphate.’ That imperial organization morphed in stages from Rashidun to Umayyad and Abbasid manifestations. As this happened, the Caliphates mutated from being world conquerors to turning into shadows of their former ‘glory’. The cruel Arab desert warriors who (in the seventh century A.D.) ran roughshod over the Middle East and Europe, had at that time given those populations a ‘take it or leave it’ choice between decapitation, enslavement and full submission to Muḥammad’s ‘Jibrilian revelations.’ But by 1300 A.D. these Caliphs and their Caliphates ended up being more on the receiving end – bulldozed by Mongol invaders from the East who were descendants of Genghis Khan.

The origins of Mongol-inhabited regions goes back to the khanates – Turkic, Mongol and Tatar-ruled tribal states populated by nomadic wanderers and invaders. The first connection between Mongols and Anatolia/Turkey was in the days of the Il-Khan khanate, established by Genghis Khan’s grandson Hülegü Khan, between 1256 and 1335 A.D. At its zenith, the core territory of this khanate included Turkey, Azerbaijan and Iran, as well as parts of Syria, Armenia, Georgia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Dagestan and Pakistan. This khanate empire controlled Anatolia/Turkey for one hundred years, slowly disintegrating by 1353 A.D.

The next conquerors of Anatolia/Turkey were Muslim nomadic tribes of Oghuz Turks, ‘Oghuz’ being a common Turkic word for ‘tribe.’ This Turkic tribal confederacy had founded the Oghuz Yabgu State back in 766 A.D., between the coasts of the Caspian and Aral Seas. The Oghuz nomads moved back and forth in the pastureland steppes between Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and China.

Seljuk (Selçuk) (who died in 1007 A.D.) was an Oghuz Turk warlord living in Central Asia and leader of a tribe later called ‘the Seljuks.’ About 985 A.D. Seljuk separated from the bulk of the Oghuz Turks and converted to Islam. During that same time period, Islamic writers began to call the Oghuzis ‘Muslim Turkmens.’ By the 1100’s A.D. that name stuck with the Byzantines as well.

Seljuk’s grandsons Chaghri Beg and Tughril I led Muslim armies which invaded Persia/Iran in the 1000’s A.D., establishing their administrative center in the province of Khorasan (modern Iran, Turkmenistan and Afghanistan). These battles included the Battle of Nisa Plains near Ashgabat in modern Turkmenistan (June 1035 A.D.), and the Battle of Dandanaqan near the city of Merv in modern Turkmenistan (May 23 1040 A.D.)

Another grandson of Seljuk, Ibrahim Inal, defeated the 50,000 strong Byzantine-Georgian armies at the Battle of Kapetron on September 10 1048, bringing back (so it was reported) 100,000 captives as slaves, as well as a vast booty on the backs of 10,000 camels. The Seljuk army (under Tughril I) moved on to conquer Baghdad, the weakened seat of the Abbasid Caliphate, in 1055. Alp Arslan, Seljuk’s great-grandson, defeated Armenia and Georgia at the Battle of Akhalkalaki in 1066 A.D., and on August 26, 1071 vanquished the Byzantine army at the Battle of Manzikert in Muş Province, East Anatolia, Turkey, capturing the Byzantine Emperor Romanos IV Diogenes. This breakthrough battle sealed the future of Anatolia, which would now undergo the dual processes of Turkification and Islamization.

Osman the Great

The last and most famous group of warrior-wanderers to settle in Anatolia were also of Oghuz Turk ethnic background. They were led by Osman I (ʿOsmān Ġāzī) son of Ertuğrul, whose dynasty-name was later Westernized to ‘Othman’ or ‘Ottoman’. Both Osman (who died in 1324 A.D.) and the Seljuks were Oghuz Turks, but from different tribes. The majority of today’s residents of Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Turkmenistan are descendants of these Oghuz Turks, and the languages they speak all belong to the Oghuz group of the Turkic language family.

At their zenith the Seljuks had established various sub-sultanates in Anatolia, one of which was the Sultanate of Rum (1077-1308 A.D.). Rum’s eventual disintegration left in its wake many smaller beyliks (Turkic sub-principalities or petty kingdoms). One of these was the Beylik of Osman or the Osmanoğlu (from the Kayi branch of Oghuz Turks). Its capital was Söğüt, in modern Bilecik Province, Turkey.

Osman’s principality gradually absorbed other beyliks under its command, like the Karasi and the Karaman. Later, the Ottoman Sultans Mehmed I, Murad II and Selim I annexed the beyliks of Ramadan and Dulkadir. The result ended up being the creation of an Islamic superpower – the Ottoman Empire – led by the Ottoman Dynasty (in Turkish, Osmanlı Hanedanı).

On May 29 1453 the 21-year-old Sultan Mehmed II (1432-1481) led his Ottoman armies in the conquest and pillaging of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire. This strategic victory enabled the Ottoman Turks to wrest control over all major land routes between Asia and Europe, as well as to solidify their domination of the Mediterranean Sea.

On the third day after the fall of Constantinople, Sultan Mehmed II entered the pillaged Hagia Sophia cathedral. This church building was originally called ‘Μεγάλη Ἐκκλησία; Megálē Ekklēsíā; ‘the Great Church’) and had been consecrated on February 15 360 A.D. by Emperor Constantius II, the son of Emperor Constantine the Great. Mehmed approached the church altar, knocked it over and trampled on it. At that point he ordered one of the ulama (Islamic scholars) who was also a muezzin (Islamic cantor) to ascend the pulpit and proclaim the shahādah (the Islamic confession) and lead the ‘Adhan’ – the communal call to prayer which is part of the Ṣalāh al-Jumuʿa (the Muslim congregational prayer service). Mehmed pronounced the khutbah, the Islamic traditional address preceding the sermon. Hagia Sophia was then converted into a mosque.

The name of the city ‘Constantinople’ was changed at that time to ‘Ḳosṭanṭīnīye’ in Turkish, ‘al-Qusṭanṭinīyya’ in Arabic, and ‘Istanbul’ in colloquial Turkish. This Turkish word came from the Medieval Arab/Armenian ‘Stamboul’ – a shortening of the Greek original ‘kon-STAN-tino-POLis’. The letter ‘P’ is usually morphed into a ‘B’ in Arabic and Turkish by reverse assimilation (e.g., ‘Panyas’ becomes ‘Banyas’, etc.), while Turkish grammar also requires the addition of a specific -i- or -ı- prefix before an s + consonant, since Turkish syllables cannot begin with more than one consonant (e.g.: Smyrna > İzmir) The result was the Turkish word ‘Istanbul’ (in Turkish, I̋s-tán-bul) to replace ‘Constantinople.’

The jihadi crushing of Byzantine Christianity

But the Conqueror of Constantinople (who was also the desecrator of Hagia Sophia cathedral) Sultan/Caliph Mehmed II, invented another word for the city, based on an Islamic word-play. He named the city ‘Islambol’ (اسلامبول) – meaning ‘full of Islam’ or ‘abundance of Islam.’ This stressed Islam’s crushing of Byzantine Christianity, and the new role the city was to play as the capital of the Ottoman Caliphate. In the 1600’s A.D., the Ottoman explorer Evliya Çelebi noted that ‘Islambol’ was the common Turkish name of the town, and the word ‘Islambol’ was minted on coinage from 1730 during the reign of Sultan Mahmud I, and on coinage from 1774 during the reign of Sultan/Caliph Mustafa III.

A severed head claimed to be that of Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI Palaiologos was nailed to a column, while the Sultan, standing in front of the severed head, proclaimed in a public speech:

“Fellow soldiers, this one thing was lacking to make the glory of such a victory complete. Now, at this happy and joyful moment of time, we have the riches of the Greeks, we have won their empire, and their religion is completely extinguished. Our ancestors eagerly desired to achieve this; rejoice now since it is your bravery which has won this kingdom for us!”

The vast majority of Constantinople’s Christians – over 50,000 – were enslaved, and more than 4,000 were immediately murdered. Thousands of women were raped. In those days these actions were considered standard behavior on the part of jihadi warriors, and such behavior has again been demonstrated in all its satanic cruelty by Hamas in its October 7 2023 murder, rape, torture and kidnapping of the civilians and farmers – pensioners, babies, children and civilians – residents of Israeli kibbutzim and towns just across the security line from Gaza.

When does a Sultan get to be a Caliph?

As the Ottoman Dynasty developed, the Ottoman capital was moved: from Söğüt to Bursa in 1326; to Edirne/Adrianople in 1363; and finally to Constantinople/Istanbul in 1453. During this time period, various sultans began to use the term ‘Caliph’ to describe their rulers. This included:

Murad I (reigned 1362-1389) after his conquest of Adrianople/Edirne in the 1360’s A.D.

Murad II (r. 1421-144; 1446-1451)

Mehmed II (r. 144-1446; 1451-1481) who also used the caliphal title ‘Amir al-Mu’minin’ (‘Commander of the Believers’)

Selim I – who ordered that the khuṭbah (invocation of the ruler’s name before public sermons are given in a mosque, as a declaration of sovereignty and suzerainty) be recited in his name as Caliph (in Tabriz 1514 and Aleppo in 1516)

Though Ottoman sultans now used the title ‘Caliph’ to describe themselves, other Islamic jurists were of the opinion that the Caliphate came to an end with the death of the last Abbasid Caliph al-Musta’sim during the Mongol sack of Baghdad in 1258. Within a short time, however, the entire Sunni Muslim world would accept Ottoman Caliphate authority and priority.

How does a Sultan get to be a Caliph?

During the reign of Sultan Selim I (1470-1520), huge conquests were made by the Ottoman Empire. By 1510 A.D. Selim I had occupied Iran, Azerbaijan, southern Dagestan, Mesopotamia/Iraq, Armenia, Khorasan and Eastern Anatolia/Turkey. By 1517 he had defeated and annexed the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt, Syria, Israel, Tihamah (the Red Sea Coast from Aqaba to Bab el Mandeb), and the Hejaz/Saudi Arabia (including Mecca and Medina). Selim then took upon himself the Islamic title ‘Ḫādimü'l Ḥaremeyn aš -Šarīfayn’ (‘The Servant/Custodian of The Two Noble Sanctuaries’).

The actual physical possession of Mecca and Medina by the Ottoman Dynasty led to the perception among many Muslims that the Ottoman claim to be the leaders of the Islamic world was a reasonable one. Did they not control Mecca and Media? Were they not one of the strongest empires in the world? The Ottomans realized that defining themselves as a Caliphate would have a number of benefits: it would hold their empire together; it would lend an Islamic ‘kosher seal of approval’ to their dynasty; it would strengthen the Sultan’s authority politically and militarily.

The decision had been made. On June 2 1517 Selim I brought the last Abbasid Caliph al-Mutawakkil III to Constantinople/Istanbul as a prisoner. According to a later tradition, at that point al-Mutawakkil transferred the caliphate authority to Sultan Selim I in a ceremony. Whether or not this actually transpired, soon afterwards Ottoman sultans started using a new title ‘Halife-i Uzma’ (‘Great Caliph’) in official documents. Defenders of the new Ottoman Caliphate argued at the time that the Ottomans could justly claim to be caliphs, since they combined in themselves the “principle of the maintenance of faith with justice, command of the good and prohibition of evil, and general leadership.”

The Sultan of the Ottoman Empire was in all respects the chief capstone of a hierarchical system. He had absolute authority in political, military, judicial, social, and religious capacities. He was was seen as responsible only to allah and to Islamic shari’a law. Two of the Arabic titles that Sultans began to use were ‘Caliph of the face of the earth’ (Ḫalife-i rū-yi zemīn; خلیفه روی زمین ) and ‘shadow of allah on Earth’ (ẓıll allāh fī'l-ʿalem; ظل الله في العالم). Any legal decree he issued was called a firman or fermān. The Sultan-Caliph was considered the supreme military commander of the realm and possessed the official title to all land in the Ottoman Empire.

After the conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Mehmed II (1432-1481), Ottoman sultans began to describe themselves as ‘successors’ (i.e., caliphs) of the Roman Empire, as seen in their occasional use of the titles ‘kayser-i Rûm’ (‘Caesar of Rome’), ‘fasiliyus’ (from Latin ‘basileus’ or king), ‘Emperor of the Romans’ (‘padişah-i Rûm’) and ‘Emperor of Constantinople’ (‘padişah-i Kostantiniye’).

A state-of-the-art tradition was then developed for newly enthroned Ottoman rulers. Rather than having their top followers swear an Islamic bay’ah or oath of allegiance to the incoming Caliph, a novel ritual – an ‘Ottoman equivalent’ of European coronation ceremonies – was created using one of the nine ‘traditional swords’ of Muhammad. In this case ‘Ma’thur al-Fijar’ (Turkish: Osman'ın Kılıcı, or the ‘Sword of Osman’ which is now stored in Istanbul’s Topkapi Museum) was used. That ceremony was deemed essential for validating the enthronement of each new Caliph. The Ottoman jurist Ebussuud Efendi called both Suleiman I ‘the Magnificent’ (1520-1566) and his son Selim II (1566-1574) “caliphs to the apostle of the lord of the worlds” – a claim to Muhammed-based succession and authority for the Ottoman Caliph. The use of a sword in these ceremonies was highly symbolic, showing that the Ottoman Caliph was being inducted into a leadership role that was first and foremost that of a warrior.

A Caliphate sealed in blood

The Ottoman Caliphate continued Muhammad’s ancient Islamic tradition of violent jihad against ‘unbelievers’ and against those who crossed swords with appointed leadership or approved teachings. This included murderous attacks on Shi’ites, Alevis and Alawites – all of them civilians living in the Caliphate.

In 1514 Selim I attacked Persian Shi’ite Shah Isma’il I’s kingdom to counter Shi’ism seeping into Ottoman territories. On his march to face Ismā’il at the Battle of Chaldiran in northwestern Persia/Iran, Selim’s forces rounded up and executed all the Shi’ites/Alevis they could find on the way and beheaded most of them – up to 40,000 in total – as enemies of the state. The massacre was the largest in Ottoman history up to the end of the 19th century. In the Turkish historical record ‘Selimşâh-name’, the following is recounted:

“The omniscient Sultan Selim I sent accurate writers all over the country to take note of the supporters of the group called ‘Qizilbāshs’ [i.e. Turcoman Shi’ites/Alevis] part by part and name by name. It has been ordered by Divan [a senior executive institution of the Ottoman Empire] to retrieve records to Divan on everyone from age seven to seventy and the names of forty thousand persons were noted in those registers, old and young. Then officials brought the registers to the administrators of all regions [of the country]. The places they went, they killed more than forty thousand by sword in these areas.”

In 1517 Selim I obtained an Islamic religious ruling (a fatwa) permitting jihad against ‘infidel’ Alawites. According to contemporaneous historical sources: “Sultan Selim I summoned some Sunnite religious men and obtained from them a fatwa to fight the ‘infidel Alawis’. It is estimated that 9,400 Shiite men assembled in Aleppo. All were maliciously murdered by the order of the Ottoman Sultan on the sanction of the Sunnite religious leader.”

There were many other mass murders instigated by the Turkish Caliphate against religious and ethnic minorities over the centuries, but limitations of space prevent further discussion here. It should be mentioned that toward the end of the Ottoman Caliphate, between 1915 and 1923, over 2 million Christian Armenians, Greeks and Assyrians were cruelly murdered in genocidal attacks in Eastern Turkey and Azerbaijan, carried out for the most part by Ottoman forces.

‘The sick man of Europe’

In September 1833 Tsar Nicholas I of Russia was having a discussion with Klemens von Metternich, Prince and Chancellor of the Austrian Empire in Mnichovo Hradiště (Münchengrätz), then Austria-Hungary. Nicholas described the Ottoman Empire/Turkey as “the sick man of Europe,” referring to the economic, social and military decline of the Caliphate in terms of the balance of power in Europe.

Whereas at one time in European history, the thought of Muslim invasion caused national leaders to shake in their boots (consider the Siege of Vienna in 1529, and the Battle of Vienna in 1683), things had changed by the 1774 Treaty of Kuchuk-Kainarji (Küçük Kaynarca). In that treaty the Ottoman Empire ceded territory and religious rights to the Russian Empire. For the first time in Ottoman history, a foreign power assumed a measure of direct responsibility for the fate and welfare of the Ottoman Empire’s Orthodox Christian subjects.

A rising tide of nationalism (especially in the Balkans), numerous revolts and wars of independence, repeated mini-invasions by Russia, France and Britain into Russian-controlled territories, and significant economic shakings – all of these contributed to a shrinking of Ottoman borders and a growing disdain for the influence of the Turkish Caliphate among world powers.

The Islamic world, represented by its Ottoman Caliphate masters, was no longer a force to be feared. Jihad was no longer an issue on the agenda. Western colonizers viewed Ottoman influence as collapsing, giving way to a hoped-for ‘Christian’ expansion across North Africa, the Levant, the Middle East, and even parts of Asia. The Islamic dream of conquering the Jewish, Christian and pagan world seemed to have faded. A resurgence of jihadi victories was no longer a realistic ‘Weltanschauung’ – a philosophic perspective or worldview – for the rapidly collapsing Caliphate. For Islam, such hopes would have to wait for another day and another century.

How shall we then pray?

Pray for revelation and courage to be given to Israel’s leaders in political, intelligence and military spheres – to understand and counteract strategies against Israel, the apple of God’s eye (Zechariah 2:8) – as Turkey-backed Islamic State/al Qa’eda armies gather at our borders.

Pray that enemy strategies against the Jewish people and their state, against Middle East Christians and other minorities – will be confounded, and that a great harvest would take place in all of these areas!

Pray for the protection of Israeli and Jewish people from the assaults of jihadi terror organizations and Western fellow-travelers

Pray for the return of the Jewish people to both the Land and the Messiah of Israel

Pray for the physical rescue of the approximately 44 to 50 living Israeli hostages (including babies) kidnapped by Hamas, Islamic Jihad and PFLP/PLO. At this moment some of these hostages are being tortured, raped and starved (this based on testimonies of recently released hostages). Sadly, over 100 of all Israeli hostages are dead; Hamas is holding on to their corpses as cold-storage bargaining chips

Pray for the raising up of Ezekiel’s prophetic Jewish army throughout the earth

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: https://davidstent.org/

Making the Caliphate great again

The world is witnessing the rise of radical jihadi Islamic nations and terrorist groups – Iran, Yemenite Houthis, Iraqi Kata’eb Hezbollah, Lebanese Hezbollah, Hamas – as well as al Qa’eda, Islamic State and ‘Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham’ (‘Organization for the Liberation of the Levant’; abbreviated HTS) in Syria, Iraq and Africa. Recent events like the New Year’s Eve ISIS terror attack on Bourbon Street in New Orleans are drawing increased international attention to something called ‘the Islamist Caliphate.’ What is that movement? What is its history? What are its tactics today and what will it look like tomorrow? Is this coming Caliphate a threat to the inhabitants of the world – whether Christian, Jewish, Hindu or secular? The next newsletters will present some answers to these questions.

Counterfeiting David’s kingdom

The covenant given by YHVH through Moses lays down the law: any prophet purporting to represent the God of Israel must not violate or pervert the clear teaching of the Mosaic Teaching (the English meaning of the Hebrew word ‘Torah’): “But the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously in My name which I have not commanded him to speak, or which he speaks in the name of other gods – that prophet shall die” (Deuteronomy 18:20).

Isaiah affirmed that same principle: “When they say to you, ‘Consult the mediums and the spiritists who whisper and mutter’ – should a people not consult their God? Should they consult the dead in behalf of the living? To the [Mosaic] Teaching and to the [Scriptures which are a witness-]testimony! If they do not speak in accordance with this word, it is because they have no dawn” (Isaiah 8:19-20). Paul added an ‘Amen!’ to this in his own day : “For if one comes and preaches another Yeshua whom we have not preached, or you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted, this you tolerate [all too] well! (2 Corinthians 11:4).

The Bible tells us that God of Jacob established an everlasting covenant with both David son of Jesse and with his physical descendants. This family dynasty would reign over both the Jewish people and all of mankind forever (according to 2 Samuel 7:11-17; Psalm 89:3-4, 19-37; Isaiah 9:7; Isaiah 55:3; Hosea 3:5; Ezekiel 34:23-24; Jeremiah 30:9; Ezekiel 37:24-25; Luke 1:33). When a person describing himself as a prophet comes

speaking in the name of a God who is not called ‘YHVH’ (see Exodus 3:15)

denying the unique Sonship of Messiah Yeshua (1 John 4:1; 2 John 1:7)

declaring that God has cursed and rejected the Jewish people, their gifts and their calling (Numbers 23:7-10; Romans 11:28-29)

then it should come as no surprise that this is a false prophet who will also end up denying the continuing validity of the Davidic Covenant, offering a counterfeit covenant in its place. The Quran’s spiritual foundations stand in direct opposition to what the Biblical Scriptures declare on these matters.

A false governmental structure

At the very beginning of Muḥammad’s revelation-based ministry, a spirit spoke to Muḥammad and informed him: “And when your lord [allah] said to the angels, ‘I am about to place my caliph (viceroy/regent/succession of rulers) in the earth’” (Quran, Surah 2, al-Baqarah [‘The Cow]’, verse 30). The Arabic phrase “Inni jaa’ilun fil ardi khalifatan,” uses the word ‘khalifa’ (خليفة) coming from the root KH.L.F. (which means ‘to come in succession’ or ‘to replace instead of’). This concept – a link of successive (though not necessarily family-connected) rulers – is called ‘al khilafa’ (الخلافة) in Arabic – hence the English derivative ‘caliphate.’ The caliphate is actually a spiritual counterfeit of God’s Davidic dynastic pattern.

Islamic Replacement Theology

Christianity is not the only world religion that has within it theological currents espousing Replacement Theology. The Samaritans did so in their day (see John 4:19-20), substituting Mount Gerizim for Mount Zion, and substituting the peoples exiled by Assyria (from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath and Sepharvaim; see 2 Kings 17:23-26) for the Jewish people. Islam followed in the footsteps of these two predecessors. Consider some of these Muslim ‘replacements’:

substituting a desert spirit called ‘allah’ for the Biblical YHVH

substituting the desert oasis of Mecca for Jerusalem

replacing Isaac by Ishmael in Islamic heilsgeschichte

replacing the Bible and substituting it with the Quran

giving the title of ‘God’s Messenger’ to Muḥammad instead of to Messiah Yeshua, while distorting and weakening that atoning calling and ministry

Quranic Replacement Theology changes and re-names the royal title of Jesse’s son David, replacing the Hebrew word meleḵ (Hebrew for king; the equivalent Arabic word is ‘mālik) with the Arabic word ‘khalifa.’ The Arabic word mālik is not used for David in the Quran, since that word would convey the idea of a Jewish king ruling over a Jewish physical kingdom in a Jewish land. Instead, King David is called a ‘khalifa,’ a vice-regent or temporary legate representing ‘allah’, Muḥammad’s family deity: “O Da’ud [Arabic for David]! We have placed you as a khalifa (caliph or vice-regent) on the earth. So judge between men with justice and follow not vain desires, lest it should lead you astray from the path of allah” (Quran, Sūrat Ṣād 38:26).

Up to the arrival of Muḥammad on the world stage, there was no concept of one Arab leader – a ‘khalifa’ – ruling over the entire Arabic-speaking world, or even over all the nations. Each tribe tended to its own business which, according to Genesis 16:11-13, Genesis 25:18, and Genesis 27:37-40, basically involved a nomadic lifestyle in the desert wilderness of the Hejaz and a livelihood of “living by the sword” – tribal clashes and ‘razzia’ (the raiding of commercial camel caravans).

Non-kosher roots, jihadi shoots

Muḥammad ibn Abdullah was born in Mecca, Arabia c. 570 A.D. His father was Abdullah ibn Abd al-Muttalib, whose own father (leader of the Quraysh tribe) was also named Abdullah.

This repeated use of the Arabic word ‘ullah’/‘allah’ in Muḥammad’s family line (e.g.: ‘Abd-ullah,’ meaning ‘slave of allah’) indicates that the existence of a spirit whose name was ‘allah’ was not a ‘new revelation’ coming down directly to Muḥammad himself, but was actually part of a generations-long tradition of idolatrous desert-spirit worship within Muḥammad’s own family of origin.

Muḥammad was eventually employed by Khadija, a wealthy businesswoman and a successful merchant in the camel-caravan trade business. At the age of 25 (in 595 A.D.) he later married her. At the age of 40, in 610 A.D., Muḥammad received a visitation from a spirit (what the Bible would classify as a fallen angel; see Galatians 4:8-9; 1 Corinthians 8:4-6; 1 John 4:1-3) who called himself ‘Jibril’ (Arabic for ‘Gabriel’). This spirit (or ‘jinn,’ from which comes the English word ‘genie’) commanded Muḥammad to read aloud words written on a ‘spiritual cloth.’ When Muḥammad confessed that he was illiterate and could not read, the spirit choked him twice, nearly to the point of death.

Other revelations eventually came through ‘Jibril,’ including one where the spirit announced to him that the demonic spirit named ‘allah’ was the only true God. That declaration came disguised as ‘monotheism,’ but it actually was ‘mono-demonism’ – the worship of an Arabian demon who was masquerading as ‘the One True God.’ Muḥammad was then told by ‘Jibril’ that he had been chosen to be ‘the true messenger of allah.’ According to Islamic tradition, his wife Khadija was the first family member to believe that revelation. Other family members followed in accepting Muḥammad’s revelations and calling, including his ten-year-old cousin (and later, son-in-law) Ali ibn Abi Talib, his close friend Abu Bakr who also happened to be one of Muḥammad’s fathers-in-law, and his temporarily-adopted son Zayd ibn Ḥāritha al-Kalbī.

From the outset, Muḥammad commanded his followers to fight ‘unbelievers’ – those who refused to submit to the ‘Jibrilian revelations.’ Fighting, conquering, converting and enslaving these populations would be the method of expanding Islam’s earthly dominion. Muḥammad’s actions and personal example are seen by Muslims everywhere as embodying the true Islamic path. In the Quran, Surat at-Tawbah 9:29, it states: “Fight those who believe not in allah and the Last Day, nor comply with what allah and his messenger [Muḥammad] have forbidden, nor embrace the [Quranic] religion of truth, [even if they are] of the People of the Book [i.e., Jews and Christians], until they pay the Jizya tax [a penalty punishment forced on all conquered peoples] with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.”During the last nine years of his life, Mohammad is “recorded as having participated in at least twenty-seven [jihad] campaigns and deputized some fifty-nine others – an average of no fewer than nine campaigns annually.” Violent conquest through jihad was Muḥammad’s example; obedient followers of Muḥammad were to imitate him even as he imitated allah’s wishes.

The Islam of Muḥammad reflects a historical tradition of conquest, forced conversion, enslavement of the conquered and beheading of those who resist such conquest.

Cosa Nostra and the Caliphate

Muḥammad’s revelatory journey started at midnight in 610 A.D. It took place in a cave on Mount Hira, close to Mecca. That night-encounter with ‘Jibril’ is called ‘Laylat al-Qadr,’ or ‘Night of Power’ in Arabic. The entirety of Muḥammad’s Islamic movement rested squarely on his role as mediator and interpreter of ‘Jibrilian revelation,’ and as a military leader and governor of his troops and followers. When he died, the questions of succession of Muḥammad’s power and authority – spiritual, military and governmental – were immediately subject to great disagreement, dispute and division among his rough band of sword-wielding jihadi conquerors.

YHVH’s prophecy in Genesis 16:11-12 concerning the destiny of Ishmael’s seed would cast a dark shadow over the developing foundations of Islam: “But he will be a wild donkey of a man. His hand will be against everyone, and everyone’s hand will be against him – and he will live in defiance of [literally ‘with his face against’] all his brothers.”

On March 16, 632 A.D. some of Muḥammad’s long-time companions (aṣ-ṣaḥāba) and followers had heard him designate his cousin and son-in-law Ali ibn Abi Talib as his successor (‘khalifa’ or caliph) three months before Muḥammad died. This occurred at a place called ‘Ghadīr Khumm’ (Arabic, ‘the pool in the Khumm Valley’), an Arabian oasis strategically located between Mecca, Medina, Egypt and Iraq. Other Islamic texts also quote Muḥammad as deliberately and repeatedly investing spiritual authority of succession on his immediate family/household, those called the ‘Ahl al-Bayt’ (Arabic for ‘the people of the House/Dynasty’).

However, on the day Muḥammad died, June 8, 632 A.D., a group of Muḥammad’s followers from Medina (called ‘al-Anṣār’ – the ‘helpers’ or ‘victorious ones’) brought together a private ‘Mafia-style’ meeting at the Saqīfah (the communal courtyard or meeting-place) of the Banu Sā’ida clan, in order to appoint Islam’s first successor-leader (or caliph). But not by accident, this gathering had not invited some significant potential participants:

Muḥammad’s cousin and son-in-law Ali

Muḥammad’s immediate family and tribe (including ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb, a senior companion and son-in-law of Muḥammad)

all the Muslim supporters from Mecca who had been exiled to Medina along with Muḥammad in what was known as the Hijra (‘the moving away from’ or ‘the migration’)

These former Meccans were known as the ‘Muhajirun’ (al-muhājirūn, ‘the ones who had moved away’ from Mecca to follow Muḥammad – from the Arabic root ‘hijra’).

Various contemporary Islamic narratives explained that the Medina-based ‘Anṣār Group’ was gathering in order to appoint a caliph – a sovereign Muslim leader – among themselves. But this caliph would not be physically descended from Muḥammad’s family, if the ‘Anṣār Group’ got its way. The ‘Anṣār Group’ intentionally excluded the Muhajirun from the meeting – this meant that Muḥammad’s choice, Ali, as well as other members of Muḥammad’s family, were simply not invited to the fateful gathering. The conspirators of Medina assumed that, with such a move, Muḥammad’s Meccans would return to Mecca and that Medina would become the capital city of the new Islamic movement – but now under the full control of the ‘Anṣār Family.’

According to early Islamic historians, ʿUmar and Abu Bakr were already meeting at the house of Abū ʿUbayda, (a top Muslim general and political ally), deeply engaged in their own plans to form an alliance led by neither Ali nor the Anṣār. According to Muslim historian Ibn Ishaq (died 767 A.D.), an anonymous messenger burst into their gathering and dramatically declared, “If you want to have command of the people, then take it before [the Anṣār’s] action becomes serious!” ʿUmar then realized that, at the Saqifah meeting, “[the Anṣār] intended to cut us off from our [Qurayshi] root and to usurp the rule from us.” The plot had thickened.

ʿUmar rushed to the Saqifah meeting, taking Abu Bakr and Abū ʿUbayda with him. He warned the gathered ‘Anṣār Cosa Nostra’ that the vast majority of Arab Muslims would not recognize the caliphate rule of anyone outside of Muḥammad’s Quraysh tribe. These three Muhajirun – ʿUmar, Abu Bakr and Abū ʿUbayda – were about to pull off an astounding political coup, removing both ‘the Medina Gang’ and ‘the Ali Family’ from the runnings for ‘First Islamic Caliph’ – all in one fell swoop. ʿUmar then immediately pressed for an oath of allegiance (a bay’ah) to be sworn to Abu Bakr as the new caliph. He had grave and understandable concerns that, in an open shūrā consultation/vote, the Anṣār Group might vote for Ali as caliph. ʿUmar grabbed Abu Bakr’s hand, swearing allegiance to him as the new caliph. Others immediately followed ʿUmar’s example.

However, just after that vote, a violent struggle broke out between ʿUmar and Abū ʿUbayda, indicating that the choice of Abu Bakr was not necessarily a cut-and-dried matter. Partisan emotions were running rather high at that meeting. Ali ibn Abi Talib (Muḥammad’s own choice for caliph) refused to recognize ʿUmar’s sleight-of-hand transferring of caliphate authority to Abu Bakr. It was only six months later that Ali resentfully reconciled himself to Abu Bakr and performed a bay’ah – a public pledge of allegiance. Abu Bakr quickly adopted the title ‘Khalīfaṫ Rasūl allāh’ (خَلِيفةُ رَسُولِ اللهِ; ‘successor/caliph of allah’s messenger’).

By advocating for and nominating ʿAbd allāh ibn ʾAbī Quḥāfa (commonly known as ʾAbū Bakr) as caliph, ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb (one of Muḥammad’s fathers-in-law) had disregarded and dismissed Muḥammad’s choosing of Ali (who was Muḥammad’s cousin and son-in-law). Of course, Abu Bakr (who consented willingly to the whole stratagem) was also part of the ‘inner circle’ of Muḥammad’s closest companions; Abu Bakr was also one of Muḥammad’s fathers-in-law. These were truly ‘succession wars’ in the ‘Mafia Family’ of Muḥammad’s first followers. Well did the God of Israel describe this Ishmaelic dynamic: “His hand will be against everyone, and everyone’s hand will be against him – and he will live in defiance of all his brothers” (Genesis 16:12).

The cold-blooded disregarding of Muḥammad’s ‘last will and testament’ – his designation of Ali as khalifa by the inner-circle of Islam’s prime leaders (including members of his own family) – on the very day of Muḥammad’s death – would lead to the first major split in Islam – between Shia (Arabic: Shīʿat ʿAlī’ or ‘the party of Ali’) and Sunni (the party of Muḥammad’s supporters who were not of his own family and bloodline). This split has divided the House of Islam ever since.

Abu Bakr held the office of being Muḥammad’s first successor or ‘khalifa’ (the First Caliph) for a period of two years, two months and 14 days, until he died of illness on August 23, 634 A.D.

Nothing succeeds like successors

The Caliphate quickly morphed into the organized governmental system of Islam under the rule of what were later called ‘the first four Caliphs’:

Abu Bakr [aka ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʾAbī Quḥāfa] (June 8, 632 A.D. – August 23, 634 A.D.). On his death bed he nominated ʿUmar to be the next successor/caliph

ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb (August 23, 634 A.D. – November 6, 644 A.D.). On his deathbed he appointed a committee of six people to choose a caliph from among those six: Abdur Rahman bin Awf, Saad ibn Abi Waqqas, Talha ibn Ubaidullah, Uthman ibn Affan, Ali ibn Abi Talib and Zubayr ibn al-Awwam

ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān (November 6, 644 A.D. – assassinated June 17, 656 A.D.). ʿUthmān was from the Umayyad tribe, and was thus a forerunner/precursor of the coming Umayyad Caliphate take-over

ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (June 17, 656 A.D. – assassinated January 28, 661 A.D.)

This entire period would later be called ‘The Rashidun/Rāšidūn Caliphate’ (in Arabic: al-Khilāfah ar-Rāšidah) or ‘The rightly-guided successors/Caliphs’ (al-Khulafaa ar-Rashidun) by Sunni Muslims. Shia Muslims, however, refused to recognize the validity of this basically Sunni Caliphate; they saw the whole thing as a putsch by enemies of Muḥammad’s immediate family – voraciously ambitious dictators who had rejected Muḥammad’s chosen successor/caliph Ali ibn Abi Talib, from ruling over them.

A fifth Caliph briefly took the leadership of the Caliphate after Ali’s assassination – Ali’s son al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī. Ḥasan was popularly acknowledged (though only briefly) as the fifth Caliph in Kufa (modern Iraq) on January 28, 661 A.D. He then shifted the Caliphate’s capital from Medina to Kufa. But barely six months later in August 661 A.D., having been wounded in an assassination attempt, he was forced to abdicate in favor of Muʿāwiya ibn Abī Sufyān, a general of Umayyad tribal origins who ended up seizing the Caliphate and a establishing a new dynasty – the Umayyad Caliphate. In early Spring 658 A.D., Muʿāwiya triumphantly entered Damascus, the ‘pearl of Islam,’ and was hailed as ‘ʾAmīr al-Muʾminīn’ (‘Commander of the believers’ – a greeting reserved only for Caliphs).

In April-May 658 A.D. Mu’awiya received the bay’ah (Islamic oath of allegiance) from Islamic leaders in Syria, completing his Caliph-validation process. He and Ḥasan (Muḥammad’s grandson and his personal choice for the office) signed a peace treaty at that time, promising that the caliphate authority would return to Ḥasan after Mu’awiya’s death and that, in case anything ‘unexpected’ should happen to Ḥasan, his brother Ḥusayn would receive the caliphate. Mu’awiya’s Umayyad Caliphate then moved the capital city to Damascus (661-744 A.D.). Eighty-three years later the Umayyads moved the capital city to Harran in modern Turkey (744-750 A.D.). But neither Ḥasan nor Ḥusayn would ever live to see that day.

The Battle of Karbala – the fateful split in Islam

The last attempt of Ali ibn Abi Talib’s family to reclaim the leadership of the Caliphate – the promise originally spoken over them by Muḥammad – occurred after the death of the First Umayyad Caliph Muʿāwiya in April 680 A.D. Over the years, Muʿāwiya had publicly revoked his ‘peace treaty’ with Ḥasan in many different ways, finally appointing his son Yazid (post-676 A.D.) to be the Second Caliph of the Umayyad Caliphate – the first hereditary succession to the caliphate in Islamic history.

Waiting in the wings, however, was Ḥasan ibn Ali’s younger brother – al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī. According to the now-violated treaty between his brother Ḥasan and Muʿāwiya, Ḥusayn should probably have stood an excellent chance at becoming Caliph at that time, for popular mood was swinging in his favor. But Yazid would not countenance such an outcome. Ḥusayn stubbornly refused to bend the knee to what he considered were Umayyad usurpers, and he would not swear an oath of allegiance to Yazid between the period of April and October 680 A.D. This would have allowed a smooth transition for the realization of Yazid’s imperial dreams. On October 10 680 A.D. the Umayyad governor of Basra in modern Iraq, ʿUbayd allāh ibn Ziyād, blocked Ḥusayn’s approach to the former Caliphate capital city of Kufa with an anti-Ḥusayn army of 4,000 soldiers. In the ensuing Battle at Karbala, Ḥusayn and his retinue of 72 soldiers were slain, and his family was taken prisoner. Ḥusayn’s severed head was sent to Yazid as a trophy, along with all surviving prisoners. Only three years later, in 683 A.D., did Caliph Yazid released the surviving members of Ḥusayn’s family from prison.

The massacre of Muḥammad’s grandson and most of his family shocked the wider Muslim community. Prior to the Battle of Karbala, the Muslim community truly was divided into two political factions, but a distinct religious stream (with distinct theological doctrines and specific set of rituals) had not yet developed among the followers of Ali. Karbala morphed this pro-Ali political stream into a crystallized religious group – the ‘Party of Ali’ (Shīʿat ʿAlī) – the Shi’ites.

A permanent breach between Sunni and Shia was now created in the world of Islam. The religious and historically-based themes of Sunni persecution of Shias, of Shia resistance and martyrdom would echo down through the corridors of time up to the present day.

At present, Shi’ites total 10-15% of all Muslims. They see themselves as carrying the banner of those who resist oppression – whether by Sunni Ottomans, by British Christians, by Sunni ‘puppet monarchies’ in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, by the Syrian and Iraqi socialist/communist Baath movements, by the Sunni jihadi movements of al Qaeda, Islamic State/Da’esh/ISIS and HTS (Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham), by the US military, and especially by the continued existence and victories of the Jewish state of Israel.

The Caliphate moves to Baghdad

The Muslim Caliphate would now undergo a third metamorphosis. The Rashidun (the First Caliphate) were the original embodiment of Muḥammad’s world Islamic government, located first in Medina, Arabia and then in Kufa, Iraq. The Umayyad Dynasty (Second Caliphate) located their capital first in Damascus, Syria and then in Harran, Turkey. The Third Caliphate was established after a successful revolt against the 14^th and last Caliph of the Umayyad Caliphate – Marwān ibn Muḥammad ibn Marwān. That revolt was led by al-Saffāḥ (Arabic for ‘the blood shedder’), whose full name was Abū al-ʿAbbās ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī. Al-ʿAbbās was a Hashemite descendant of Muḥammad’s uncle ‘Abbas ibn ‘Abd al-Muttalib – thus a potential candidate for becoming a caliph. Along with his two outstanding generals – the Persian (non-Arab) Abu Muslim and the Khorasani (Iran-based Arab) Qahtaba ibn Shabib al-Ta’i – al-ʿAbbās decisively defeated the Umayyad Caliphate at the Battle of the Zab on January 25, 750 A.D. The last Umayyad Caliph Marwan II escaped to Egypt, where he was caught and killed on August 6, 750 A.D. The remainder of his family was eliminated, except for one male descendent. Abū al-ʿAbbās then became the First Caliph of the Third Caliphate – the Abbasid Caliphate.

Abū al-ʿAbbās’ successor-caliph was the Caliph al-Manṣūr – his full Arabic name was Abū Jaʿfar ʿAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad al-Manṣūr. This second Abbasid Caliph (who ruled for 22 years – 754-775 A.D.) decided in 762 A.D. to establish a new capital city on the Tigris River (the biblical Hiddekel; see Genesis 2:14) which was barely 85 kilometres/55 miles north of ancient Babylon. The city was first called ‘Madīnat as-Salām’ (‘the City of Peace’) or ‘The Round City,’ but the name was soon changed to ‘Baghdad.’

Under the Fifth Abbasid Caliph Hārūn al-Rashīd, Baghdad and the Third Caliphate came into what is called ‘The Islamic Golden Age’ – the height of Islamic scientific, economic and cultural flourishing. This zenith is reflected in the many tales from the ‘One Thousand and One Nights’ that were set in that location. Baghdad was a center of Islamic civilization, second only to the Byzantine capital of Constantinople (modern Istanbul). Its ‘House of Wisdom’ (Bayt al-Ḥikmah) – also known as the Grand Library of Baghdad – was one of the world’s largest public libraries and collections of rare books and manuscripts. These included Arabic translations of many of the Greek and Latin philosophers, mathematicians, scientists, theologians and historians. Western scholars would re-discover these scrolls, and these Arabic manuscripts later help to catalyze Europe’s Renaissance. Several world-class academic institutions in that city garnered Baghdad’s reputation as being the international ‘Center of Learning.’

During the time of the Abbasid Caliphate, four different Caliphs were assassinated either by family or by professional rivals. In total, more than ten Caliphs were assassinated, if one combines both Sunni and Shiite rulers. Fault lines in the make-up of the Caliphs and their Caliphates led to a gradual disintegration of their empires. The wealthy Umayyads in their day tended to be less zealous and more secular than Islam’s initial caliphs, the Rashidun. Popular disappointment with corrupt Umayyad leadership in the Second Caliphate caused many non-Arab Muslim converts (the mawali, who were treated as second-class citizens throughout the empire) and many Shi’ites to yearn for a return to the glory and power of the original First Caliphate’s leaders. Most of these mawali hailed from Persia (modern Iran), and the Abbasid caliphs ended up shifting their power centers and cultural emphases to more Eastern locations and expressions. This dynamic fusion of Arabian and Persian culture weakened the Caliphate’s original foundations. Originally, Islam had been a monolithic and unified force – religiously and socially, linguistically and culturally, militarily and politically. But in Abbasid times higher level diplomats were often foreigners, leaving local Arab tribes out of the equation in terms of political and diplomatic influence. The Caliphate’s centralized structures began to disintegrate as cultural divisions grew. The fracturing of the Islamic empire into smaller independent kingdoms led to military weakness in the face of cruel invaders from the East. For many different reasons – most importantly a counterfeit spiritual foundation – Baghdad, like Daniel’s ancient Babylon, had been “weighed in the balances and found wanting” (see Daniel 5:1-30; 1 Samuel 2:6-9; Psalm 113:6-8; Luke 1:51-55).

Baghdad was sacked by the Mongols under Hülegü Khan in January-February 1258. It was then conquered by the Islamic forces of Turkic-Mongol Tamerlane/Timur in 1401. A century later Baghdad was occupied by the Persian/Iranian Shah Ismāʿīl I of the Safavid dynasty in October 1508. Three years after that in 1534, Baghdad was overrun by the armies of Turkish Sultan Süleyman I the Magnificent (of the Ottoman Caliphate). The city became part of the Ottoman Empire, remaining under Anatolian control until the end of World War I.

The mighty engine of the Caliphate conquerors had stuttered and coughed. The most powerful force in Europe and the Middle East was dwindling in power and glory. Who would make Islam’s Caliphate great again?

How shall we then pray?

Pray for light, truth and salvation to be revealed to the many people in the Islamic world who have been swept into deception by false gods, false revelation, false scriptures and false leadership

Pray for revelation and courage to be given to Israel’s leaders in political, intelligence and military spheres – to understand and counteract strategies against Israel, the apple of God’s eye (Zechariah 2:8) – as Islamic State/al Qa’eda/HTS armies gather at our borders

Pray that enemy strategies against the Jewish people and their state, against Middle East Christians and other minorities – will be confounded, and that a great harvest would take place in all of these areas

Pray for the protection of Israeli and Jewish people from the assaults of jihadi terror organizations and Western fellow-travelers

Pray for the return of the Jewish people both to the Land and to Yeshua the Messiah of Israel

Pray for the physical rescue of the approximately 44 to 50 living Israeli hostages (including two very young children) kidnapped by Hamas, Islamic Jihad and PFLP/PLO. At this moment some of these hostages are being tortured, raped and starved (this based on testimonies of recently released hostages). Sadly, over 100 of all Israeli hostages are dead; Hamas is holding on to their corpses as cold storage bargaining chips

Pray for the raising up of Ezekiel’s prophetic Jewish army throughout the earth

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: https://davidstent.org/