The Bear, the Lion and the Eagle

Over 2,500 years ago Daniel received a stunning prophetic vision (Daniel 7:5) spotlighting four empires in his time, which God symbolized by four beasts. The second beast in this prophetic vision was a raging and carnivorous bear, which symbolized the Persian Empire. That region is today called ‘Iran’).

War has broken out in the Middle East, and the limelight is shining again on the Persian Bear. Two of the main protagonists are modern Iran (on the one hand)  and the regathered state of Israel (on the other).

Let’s leave the specific context of Daniel 7, and look for an animal which could symbolize  the Jewish people. Since the King of Israel is Messiah Yeshua, and since He is described in Revelation 5:5 as the overcoming Lion of the tribe of Judah, one could perhaps poetically say that the battle now occurring in the Arabian Gulf has the Persian Bear facing off against the the Jewish people –the Israeli Lion. And this time, the world’s premier super-power – the United States of America – has joined the fight against the Iranian Bear. Since America is often symbolized by a bald-headed Eagle, could it be said that the Persian Bear is on one side of the battlefield, while the Hebrew Lion and the American Eagle are hunkering down on the other side.

Counting the cost

Messiah Yeshua spoke a parable many years ago, one which applies both to true discipleship and to kings setting out to battle:

A house divided

Classical jihadi Islam has a Last Days vision. It can be summed up by the Arabic battle-cry: “Khaybar, Khaybar, ya yahud! Jaish Muhammad soufa yaʿoud!” (Arabic: خيبر خيبر يا يهود جيش محمد سوف يعود, lit. ’Khaybar, Khaybar, oh Jews! The army of Muhammad will return!’). This chant refers to the Battle of Khaybar of 628 CE, when Muhammad marched with a large Muslim army to besiege and slaughter the Jewish community of Khaybar, an oasis in present-day Saudi Arabia.

This murderous battle-cry is chanted at anti-Israel demonstrations and during Islamist terrorist attacks as well. Muhammad in his lifetime led 27 jihadi campaigns, and deputized 59 other jihadi battles. The original Islam was a religion of jihadi conquest, and today those who follow Muhmmad’s pattern are described by the non-Muslim world as terrorists.

A foundational sectarian division broke the Islamic Ummah (Arabic for ‘community’) into two adversarial camps at the very beginning, in 632 AD. The clash between these two main wings of Islam – the Shia and the Sunni – revolves around who was to succeed Muhammad as the leader of Islam’s burgeoning world-wide dictatorship or caliphate.

The Shia (or Shi’at Ali – ‘the Party of Ali’) believed that Muhammad had named his cousin/son-in-law Ali ibn Abi Talib, to be his successor and Islam’s leader. Shi’ites believe that Ali’s right of succession was usurped by a power-group of Muhammad’s followers, who instead chose Muhammad’s closest companion Abu Bakr (632–634) to succeed him as the caliph of Islam. 

The Sunni camp is called ‘ahl as-sunna’ in Arabic – meaning ‘the people of the habit’ or ‘the people of the [correct Islamic Muhammaden] usage which is sanctioned by tradition.’ Sunni Islam is approximately 80-85% of Islam’s adherents, while Shi’ite Islam is followed by between 10-15% of the Muslim world. The divide between the two streams of Shia and Sunna has led to over 1,400 years of battle, and is the religious clash lying behind much of Islam’s sectarian violence.  Political ambitions and regional rivalries have added to the explosive mix.

Today Iran heads up the Shi’ite minority, while Saudi Arabia champions the Sunni majority, As Ira Stoll comments in March 4, 2026’s The Washington Free Beacon, “The Sunni-Shiite split is frequently a stronger explanatory dynamic in the Middle East than settler-colonialism or U.S. imperialism or oil or whatever other favored explanation the press or academia are pushing.” Former Pentagon specialist on the Middle East Harold Rhode comments: “Shiites call the Sunnis ‘Sunni dogs’ – ‘Sag-e Sunni.’ They don’t see them as real Muslims, they see them as heretics.”

Armageddon Shi’ite style

Iran’s strikingly warlike aggression is connected to three root issues:

The jihadi leaders and generals of the Islamic Republic of Iran are going for broke on this one. They are prepared to pull the world into a Shi’ite Armageddon in pursuit of their Last Days dysphoric vision – think ‘Iranian kamikaze pilots with nuclear backpacks.’

When Shi’ite Iran attacks the Sunnis Arab world

Over the past week, Shi’ite Iran has attacked twelve Sunni Islamic countries, as well as two countries whose populations are basically either Christian or Jewish. Iran has also attacked a UK NATO-related base and an American NATO-connected base in Turkey (an Islamic country). Here is the current list of these fourteen countries, along with links specifying the locations and nature of attacks:

  1. Cyprus – Larnaca, Limassol
  2. Cyprus – UK/EU/NATO Akrotiri and Dhelkelia Air Force Bases
  3. Turkey – (Incirlik AFB  US/ NATO/ nuclear bombs are stored here by the USAF)
  4. Israel – over 500 missiles and 2,000 drones
  5. Jordan
  6. Syria
  7. Iraq – here and here
  8. Kuwait – here, here and here
  9. UAE – here, here, here and here

According to data from Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies, by Thursday March 5, Iran had launched 941 drones, 189 ballistic missiles and eight cruise missiles toward the UAE. 57 drones struck UAE territory. 755 drones and 172 missiles intercepted

  1. Qatar – here, here, here, here, here, here and here
  2. Bahrain – here and here
  3. Saudi Arabia – here, here, here, here and here
  4. Oman – here
  5. Azerbaijan – here

These unprecedented Iranian Shi’ite attacks on Sunni neighbors over the past ten days (and not only on the Jewish state of Israel) are staggering. This new and dangerous pattern in the Middle East has the potential to spread like a wildfire into a Muslim-versus-Muslim religious war, echoing the earliest decades of Muhammad’s jihadi endeavors.

‘Collateral damage’

For the past ten days Iranian missiles and drones have intensively targeted civilians in Israel. They have also targeted oil refineries, oil rigs and oil tankers in the Gulf States and in the Arabian Gulf. Iranian missiles and drones have destroyed water desalinization plants in various Gulf countries. Iran has hit shopping malls, hotels and airports; CIA bases, US Embassies and US air force bases. Iran has struck Oman, the country which until just recently labored as a mediator between Iran and the USA.

Iran’s current military behavior is reminiscent of how the Scriptures describe those who breath out arrogant threats and blasphemies:

A senior Gulf official recently described Iran’s strikes on its neighbors — particularly on its arch-rival Saudi Arabia — as a “miscalculation” and stated that Tehran had “lost all goodwill from Islamic and Arab states.”

Who makes a man unable to see? (Exodus 4:11)

The combined airforces of Israel (the IAF) and America (the USAF) have achieved amazing results in a very short time. The Supreme Leader of Iran, Khamenei, has been removed from the living, along with more than 40 of his top brass. Nuclear weapons laboratories and drone warehouse have been annihilated. The Iranian Navy has been obliterated, as well as the top GHQ of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Basij terror-police. At this rate, within 2-4 weeks it will be highly unlikely for this jihad juggernaut to ever recover and threaten Israel, America, Europe or the Middle East.

At the same time, OSINT (open-source intelligence sources) reveal that Iran has managed to strike some significant blows against America’s radar assets, causing billions of dollars in damage:

The largest American radar in the Gulf is the AN/FPS-132 Upgraded Early Warning Radar, valued at $1.1 billion. It is a fixed radar system designed to detect drones, jet fighters and missiles. Located at al Udeid Air Base, Umm Dahal in Qatar, it was hit with a Iranian missile on Saturday, February 28, 2026 and was irretrievably damaged.

Raytheon’s AN/TPY-2 transportable x-band radar is the radar component of America’s THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) system. On Sunday March 1 or Monday March 2, Iran hit this x-band radar which was deployed at al-Ruwais Industrial City in the United Arab Emirates. The destroyed radar component is estimated to be worth $500 million. N.R. Jenzen-Jones, a munitions specialist and director of the research company Armament Research Services (ARES), told CNN the radar cannot be easily replaced and called it a significant loss. “The AN-TPY/2 radar is essentially the heart of the THAAD battery, enabling the launch of interceptor missiles and contributing to a networked air defense picture. It also happens to be an incredibly expensive piece of kit. The loss of even a single radar of this type would be an operationally significant event. ”

Two other THAAD AN/TPY-2 x-band radar systems were also hit by Iran – one at Prince Sultan AFB al-Kharj in Saudi Arabia, and one in Jordan and the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base.

These losses are grievous, but they are also a regular part of war. The loss of these ‘eyes’ shortens the warning time for Israelis and Gulf nations – time to send up interceptor anti-missiles, and time to allow civilians to make it to the safety of their own personal shelters. But these losses also reveal a more sinister development lurking beneath the geopolitical surface: Russia has been supplying intelligence information to Iran, detailing locations of US fighter jets, warships and radar installations.

 On target

Israeli and American forces have been targeting and eliminating the highest of high-value targets. The IDF’s SIGINT 8200 and VISINT 9900 obtained practicable intelligence which was then used by 50 IAF planes to drop 100 bombs on Iranian Supreme Leader Khamenei, removing both his presence and 48 of his High Command from the battlefield.

The combined forces of the USAF and the US Navy have so far destroyed over 42 Iranian Navy battleships, corvettes, frigates, cutters and drone-carriers, as well as the lion’s share of Iran’s ageing air force – (which have been comprised of 250 to 350 aging combat-capable aircraft – older F-4, F-5, F-14, MiG-29, and Su-24 jets).

Other significant targets hit and greatly degraded include Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport, the Min Zadai nuclear bomb development labs, the underground complex of factories and storehouses for missiles and nuclear weapons at Parchin.

How shall we then pray?

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

These are the days of Samson

The God of Joshua is on the move. Some Bible believers may be surprised by this reality, but it is nevertheless true: the same God who ordered Joshua to enter Canaan is calling His Jewish people back to their Promised Land – to “take the Land that remains” (see Joshua 13:1-6). Today Israel’s enemies may wear different fatigues and carry different weapons, but their aim is the same: “Come, and let’s wipe them out as a nation, so that the name of Israel will no longer be remembered. . .  Let’s possess for ourselves the pastures of God!” (Psalm 83:4,12). The current war between the Islamic jihadi terror-republic of Iran and its two main enemies (America and Israel) is the latest manifestation of this ongoing and final battle.

The two satans

For decades the Shi’ite dictatorship in Iran has labeled America as ‘the greater Satan’ (Shaytan-e Bozorg in Persian; al-Shaytan al-Akbar in Arabic) and has called Israel ‘the lesser Satan’ (Shaytân-e Kuchak in Persian; al-Shayṭān al-Aṣghar in Arabic). These nicknames speak of intense hatred and murderous intent. These names are much more radical than how Shi’ite Iranians describe Great Britain – ‘rubâh-e pir’ (‘the old fox’).  

The Islamist clerics who have enslaved Iran see the US and Israel as their main jihadi target, and are utterly committed to the destruction of both ‘satans.’ Secular Westerners just don’t get it; they are puzzled by such spiritually energized hatred.  Some American anti-Semitic pundits like Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens blame ‘the Jews’ for Iran’s attitudes, and put Shi’ite genocidal hatred down to the policies of the Jewish state or the nature of the Jewish people. But the key to this clash is eminently spiritual. This planet is returning to the 600’s AD – “these are the days of Mohammad” – the days of rampaging and murderous jihadi conquest.

“Then the Spirit of YHVH rushed upon him, and he killed thirty Philistines” (Judges 14:19)

Samson was YHVH’s secret weapon, raised up from the tribe of Dan to destroy God’s enemies the Philistines. “For behold, you will conceive and give birth to a son, and no razor shall come upon his head, for the boy shall be a Nazirite to God from the womb. And he will begin to save Israel from the hands of the Philistines” (Judges 13:5).

The Philistine enemy saw battlefield victory as connected to the victory of their own idols:

The warrior sons of Jacob saw ultimate Jewish victory as proof of YHVH’s triumph on behalf of His chosen people:

 Forty at a single blow

At 5 am on Saturday morning February 28, 2026, I awoke at home feeling restless. I came downstairs and sat in my easy chair, thinking and praying – asking God what was going to happen with the upcoming clash between Iran and America/Israel. All of a sudden, at 0540 I heard a huge noise – very low register – of many military aircraft taking off and filling the skies around our house. It was later published that over 200 IAF planes were involved in this operation, the largest coordinated air strike in the Israeli Air Forces’ history. We live not far from a major airbase. This noise was non-stop, and after a minute or two I had the sense that these squadrons were rising up in order to head out to Tehran to initiate the long-awaited attack. This massive symphony orchestra continued for something like 15 minutes.

Flight time from our region to Tehran is 2 hours and 15 minutes approximately. At  approximately 0810 hours, the IAF attacked Tehran, striking Supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei’s compound and palatial residence with 30 bombs. Over 1,200 other locations were hit simultaneously by the IAF, eliminating forty military, intelligence and political senior commanders, including Iran’s jihadi master. Many of these had been involved in the planning and preparations for Hamas’ jihadi pogrom on October 7, 2023 beside Gaza. These men had gathered that morning at various top-secret locations scattered across Tehran for strategic discussions. Here are ten names of the forty:

In parallel and in conjunction,  the US Armed Forces launched a coordinated effort named Operation Epic Fury (here, here and here), striking over 900 Iranian targets as the joint campaign expanded. Focus has been on missile stockpiles, production chains, launchers and anti-aircraft systems and radar installations (along with IAF participation), Four USAF B-2A Spirit stealth bombers (accompanied by five KC-46 tankers) traveled on a non-stop round-trip from Whiteman AFB, Missouri, dropped dozens of 2000 lb. bombs on hardened underground ballistic missile sites in Iran, before returning directly to Whiteman.

Other Allied strikes

Other targets have included General Headquarters for Iranian General Staff (the command-and-control hub linking senior leadership with security forces on the ground); the Tharallah HQ (the Tehran-based defense command center);  GHQ for Ministries of Intelligence and Defense; officers of top Military commanders' offices; the Basij HQ in Tehran (irregular police responsible for the murders of tens of thousands of anti-regime demonstrators); the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran Base in Parchin;  other Government and judiciary buildings. The IAF has achieved aerial superiority over Tehran, The IAF has intercepted more than 50 Iranian suicide-drones over the past 36 hours.

Many strategic centers have been hit by US and Israeli forces in the following cities: Tehran, Lorestan, Alborz, Tabriz, Qom, Kermanshah, Mashhad, Ardabil, Khorramabad, Urmia, Isfahan, Mehrabad, Bandar Abbas Shiraz, and others in Shi’ite-controlled Northern Iraq. US forces also sank an Iranian Navy Jamaran-class corvette at Chah Bahar pier in the Gulf of Oman.

Iranian counter-attacks

Iranian forces hit the Sky Light oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, and damaged a UAE gas platform with its Shahed 136 drone. Iranian drones and missiles also hit a French Navy base and hotels in Abu Dhabi, as well as bases and an airport in Dubai (UAE); the Crowne Plaza Manama Hotel and a US radar base in Bahrain; malls. hotels and al Udeid air base in Doha (Qatar); Kuwait’s main airport;  Muwaffaq Salti air base in Jordan; military installations in Oman, Saudi Arabia and Syria.

Muslim rioters attacked the US Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan. Consulate security shot and killed 22 invaders and left more than 120 injured.

Iran has fired over 400 ballistic missiles and 1,000 drones at Israel since the war began. Areas hit include the Greater Haifa and Tel Aviv regions (including an unoccupied children’s school); Bet Shemesh (half-way between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv) where an Iranian missile with a 479 kg. warhead demolished 10 buildings, murdering nine and wounding 48; the Negev (not far from our home); Galilee and the Golan Heights. A 32-year-old Filipina care-giver, Mary Anne Velasquez de Vera, was killed in Tel Aviv when a missile scored a direct hit on her building. She was taking care of her employer when killed. Shrapnel from an Iranian missile landed close to the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City today as well.

Iran’s new Defense Minister is a top terrorist with much Jewish blood on his hands

Yesterday Iran appointed Ahmad Vahidi as the new commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Two years ago, Argentina called for his arrest over his involvement in the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, in which 85 people were killed and 300 wounded.  Vahidi played a major role in planning and directing the suicide bombing attack of the Jewish community building in Buenos Aires. He was also involved in the car bombing terrorist attack of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia (June 25, 2006), The attack, in which the Revolutionary Guards, the office of Supreme Leader Khamenei and the Iranian intelligence ministry were directly involved, claimed the lives of 19 American soldiers and one Saudi Arabian national, and wounded more than 400.

How shall we then pray?

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

   

Shabbat shalom from Tehran

As the Islamic Republic of Iran’s jihadi dictatorship plows ahead in rebuilding its nuclear bomb factories and hypersonic missile and drone stockpiles, it continues to breath out murderous threats, chanting ‘Marg bar Âmrikâ’ (‘death to America’) and ‘Marg bar Esrâ'il’ (‘death to Israel’). Since 1979, thousands of Americans have been murdered by Iran’s Shi’ite mujahidin (jihad warriors).

This war between Shi’ite Islam and the West (with America and Israel as high-profile targets) is not new. Anti-Semitic talking heads like Tucker Carlson who try to frame this present clash as an Israeli-instigated one are ignoring dead and suffering Americans – including the 54 US hostages cruelly kidnapped from the US Embassy in Tehran by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps on November 4, 1979, and held prisoner for 444 days. Also worth remembering are the Iranians citizens protesting against the jihadi Shi’ite tyrants who are ruining their country. Between 30,000 and 60,000 have been brutally murdered, and many thousands of other have been raped, tortured, beaten and imprisoned.

The gathering of a powerful US armada continues in plain view. Eleven F-22 stealth fighter jets are positioned at IAF Uvda Airbase in the Negev. At least 14 USAF refueler tankers are deployed at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv. Two US Navy aircraft carrier strike groups (one in the Arabian Sea [USS Abraham Lincoln] and one in the Mediterranean [the USS Gerald R. Ford, the world’s largest aircraft carrier]) as well as three guided-missile destroyers are in the immediate conflict zone. At least eleven air-defence destroyers, three littoral combat ships and two to three attack submarines equipped with Tomahawk missiles are loitering in the vicinity. Between 100-150 USAF fighter jets and support aircraft (including F-35s, F-22s, F-15s, F-16s, and six of the military’s early-warning E-3 Sentry AWACS aircraft) have arrived in the area, based in Israel, Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan, Saudi Arabia and probably Crete and Cyprus. This is the largest military buildup in the Middle East since the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Gen. Charles Wald (ret.), former deputy commander of US European Command notes: “I don’t see the United States invading on the ground in Iran to change the regime. That’s not going to happen.” It seems that ‘boots on the ground’ is ruled out in this upcoming clash. There is an overwhelming American bipartisan consensus against a commitment of ground forces to any Middle East scenario at this point.

Signs of the times

The past 24 hours in Israel have presented a multitude of flashing red lights indicating rapidly approaching outbreak of hostilities. The US and Canada have called for their non-essential embassy staff to immediately depart from Israel by today at the latest. Large numbers of Americans departed Iraq via Baghdad International Airport in the past 24 hours. The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad conducted an emergency evacuation drill. Reports also indicate an evacuation of non-essential staff from the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait.

IAF Iron Dome batteries have been stationed in significant locations across Israel, including at the Knesset. Public air-raid shelters have been opened up across the nation, beginning in Beersheva. IMINT (imagery intelligence) from MizarVision  (a Chinese source) shows F-22 Raptor fighter jets lining up on the tarmac at IAF Uvda base, a hot precursor to an airborne invasion of Iran.

How shall we then pray? Prayer possibilities from the Book of Esther

Monday evening March 2, 2026 marks the onset of the biblical Feast of Esther. It is also the deadline given by POTUS Trump for America’s deadline to Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei, As Haman planned great harm against the Jewish people in his day, so some podcasters and media pundits call for great harm to be inflicted against the Jewish state and any of their allies – even as these words are being written.

Here are four keys for effective intercession which stand out in the Scroll of Esther:

It’s time to stand up and be pro-active in the circles within which you move

It’s time to remember that those who curse or mock the Jewish people and their state are cursed

It’s time to stand with Jewish pro-active response against enemies seeking their destruction

Pray that some enemies of Jacob will grasp this window of opportunity for true repentance

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

   

Touching the apple of God’s eye at Ben-Gurion Airport

Echoes of Hitler at Ben-Gurion’s VIP Lounge

On Wednesday February 18 2026 the popular anti-Semitic right-wing podcaster Tucker Carlson flew a private jet to Ben-Gurion Airport. He didn’t enter Israel or meet with local Christian or Messianic leaders. Instead, he conducted a hasty ‘hatchet-job’ interview with US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, next to the exclusive Fattal VIP lounge. Carlson repeatedly cut off the Ambassador during the interview, not giving him the opportunity to respond to the rapid-fire anti-Semitic, anti-Israel and anti-Biblical questions being peppered at him. Within three hours Carlson boarded his plane and departed from the Promised Land. After he left Israel, he charged Israel with detaining his team and seizing their passports: “Men who identified themselves as airport security took our passports, hauled our executive producer into a side room, and the demanded to know what we discussed with Ambassador Huckabee . . .  It was bizarre. We’re now out of the country.”

Spokesmen for the US Embassy in Tel Aviv and the Israel Airports Authority denied both the reality and the truthfulness of Carlson’s claims. OliLondonTV posted footage of Carlson hugging an Airport staff member, and commented: “The latest incident has drawn a further spotlight on Tucker Carlson’s increasingly unhinged views, smears against the Middle East’s only democracy and his praise for countries like Russia and Qatar.”

King Solomon once commented: “A hot-tempered person stirs up strife” (Proverbs 15:18). The God of Israel notes how godly judges are to operate: “In a dispute they shall take their stand to judge. They shall judge it according to My ordinances. They shall also keep My laws and My statutes” (Ezekiel 44:24). Carlson certainly fits Solomon’s first description about a man who stirs up strife. And unfortunately, his misuse of the Scriptures reveals a stunning ineptitude in this department as well. The man is either ignorant, uninformed or deliberately malicious. His media persona when it comes to interviews about Jews, Israel and anti-Semitism is consistently arrogant, rude, whiney, boastful, and chock-full of blatant lies and disinformation.

I comment on these matters from my own professional history and perspective as a Messianic leader and theologian in North America, Israel and Russia – as a former member of the Theological Commission for the United Christian Council in Israel (UCCI), former associate editor of the theological journal MISHKAN (1986-93), ThM Dallas Theological Seminary (1985), BA in Jewish History (Hebrew University/McGill University (1979-81), and Israeli tour guide (1987-2010).

When anti-Semites charge

The arrow-like questions fired at breakneck speed toward Ambassador Huckabee reveal Carlson’s beliefs, perspectives and false accusation against the Jewish people, the Jewish state, and the Jewish Bible (see the 70-plus page transcript of his Huckabee interview):

“It is only Zion; no one cares for her!”

The God of Jacob strongly warned Balaam: “Do not go with [Moab and Balak]! You shall not curse the [Jewish] people, for they are blessed!” (Numbers 22:12). Eventually Balaam fell into line, declaring prophetically: “How am I to put a curse on him whom God has not put a curse? And how am I to curse him whom YHVH has not cursed?” (Numbers 23:8). The battle here is a spiritual one; Carlson and his fellow-travelers have fallen under a curse, according to YHVH’s own promise in Genesis 12:3.

Abraham’s God warns about the prophetic future of Israel’s enemies:

Tucker Carlson (a practical advocate of Replacement Theology) never even mentions what the Scriptures (95% written by Jews and 95% written about the Jewish people) speak prophetically about God’s heart for Israel and about His amazing prophetic plans of restoration and return for the sons and daughters of Jacob. His modus operandi is to disconnect the children of Israel from Genesis 15’s Abraham covenant, and then to blithely insist that all promises over the Jewish people “cannot be understood in a literal signification” (as anti-Jewish Church Father Origen wrote in (Origen, On First Principles, Book IV, 19-22; www.newadvent.org/fathers/04124.htm). Now all Jewish promises only apply to Gentile Christians. Carlson has sidestepped one of the main teachings of Scripture – the restoration of Israel.

In that sense his strategies are quite similar to those of the Deutsche Christen (a pro-Nazi Christian movement), who championed obedience to the Nazi government. Their movement gave birth to the fiercely anti-Semitic ‘Institute for the Study and Elimination of Jewish Influence on German Church Life’ (Instituts zur Erforschung jüdischen Einflusses auf das deutsche kirchliche Leben). This institute was headed by Walter Grundmann, later a Stasi collaborator. It denied Yeshua’s Jewishness and called for the removal of any Jewish elements from the Bible (like Genesis 15) and from the Christian faith.

Carlson has fallen into the demonic pitfall which Paul warns Gentile Christians about in Romans 11:17-25:

Carlson peppers his anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli barbs with repeated assertions: “I’m a Christian! I’m an American!” while he boasts arrogantly against the sons and daughters of Jacob. But he fails to reflect a biblical perspective or a godly heart toward God’s Chosen People.

A divisive agenda

Carlson’s poisonous and Hitler-like public record has caused Jonathan Tobin of Jewish News Syndicate to describe Carlson as “the most dangerous antisemite in American history,” and why the activist group ‘StopAntisemitism’ awarded its ‘Anti-Semite of the Year’ 2025 award to Carlson. For the record, the previous year’s ‘winner’ was Candace Owens.

Current polls reflect a rising anti-Semitic plank among America’s conservatives:

The gradual spread of anti-Semitic poison by these neo-Hitlerians is having a real effect on both the present and the future of American politics – especially on how it relates to the Jewish people and the Jewish state. The reality of Genesis 12:3 has never been so soberly pertinent: “I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse.” “For YHVH of armies says this: ‘After glory He has sent me against the nations that plunder you, for the one who touches you, touches the apple of His eye’” (Zechariah 2:8).

In his recent article ‘What’s the real point of Tucker Carlson’s obsession with Israel?,’ Jonathan Tobin states that Carlson’s underlying goal is to sabotage the Trump administration by driving a divisive wedge between his party and the support he receives from both Evangelicals and Israel-sympathetic Jews. “Polls have shown a steep decline in support for the Jewish state among Democrats and even among some Republicans, and especially among young people. [Yet] the vast majority of Republicans remain pro-Israel.” Carlson’s crass anti-Semitic and anti-Israel depth charges, says Tobin, “could hurt Republicans and eventually sink [Trump] in a general election.”

The water is beginning to boil

An old proverb mistakenly attributed to Mark Twain, but actually written down by Peter Senge, notes: “Like the frog that will sit in a pot of water and let itself be slowly boiled to death, we are very good at reacting to immediate danger to our survival, but we are very poor at recognizing gradual threats.” (Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline, Currency and Doubleday, New York, 1990).

The rise into anti-Semitic words and deeds, in anti-Israeli attacks and in anti-Zionist violence – these are a bellwether for anyone who has ears to hear. The ‘Day of Jacob’s Trouble’ is upon us. The spirit that energized Hitler is on the loose and, as Gandalf said, there is the sound of drums in the deep.

Just prior to WWII a Jewish Zionist leader named Ze’ev Jabotinsky repeatedly warned and shouted to Jewish people to get out of Europe.  The following is a translation from Yiddish of Jabotinsky’s touching and sad speech in Tisha B’Av, October 24, 1938, Warsaw, Poland.  It was his prophetic warning to his people, to the masses of his brothers and sisters:

How are Jewish people responding?

Messiah Yeshua warns us that most of humanity – including Jewish humanity – will not adequately discern the current demonically-energized threats:

 The Jewish people are responding to these wildcat anti-Semitic threats in various ways:

As the twisted faces of anti-Semites fill the screens of the nightly news – Zohran Mamdani, Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, Marjorie Taylor Greene, the anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli ‘Squad’ in the US Congress, Hitler afficionado Nick Fuentes – we are witnessing the birth of a virulent and violent neo-Nazi American anti-Semitic wave.

How shall we then pray?

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

Declarations of peace and preparations for war

The events of the past few weeks have been climactic. There has been an international convergence of declarations of peace and the beating of the drums of war. Tehran, Washington DC and the VIP lounge of Israel’s Ben-Gurion Airport are the locations for these cinematographic shoots. The Jewish feast of Purim and the Islamic fast of Ramadan seem to be the ancient bookends for these martial strategies. The spirit of Haman is on the move, both in Persian preparations and in Western anti-Semitic arrogant boastings. The Middle East is on overdrive, and God’s chosen people are once again at the center of the maelstrom.

The Hebrew clock is ticking in Tehran

The Feast of Purim is nearly upon us, arriving on sundown Monday March 2, 2026. Celebrating the God of Israel’s sleight-of-hand triumph over Haman and his genocidal cohorts, this coming date is also auspiciously close to the deadline that President Trump set for the Islamic Republic of Iran’s leaders, after which the US would “have to take it a step further.” On February 19, 2026 Trump announced on Air Force One, just after the inaugural meeting of his ‘Board of Peace’ in Washington DC: “I would think that there would be enough time – 10, 15 days . . .  or it’s going to be unfortunate for them.” The Book of Esther explains how Haman (that powerful Persian official) threatened malice and mayhem on the Jewish people but instead brought destruction upon himself.

The Shi’ite mobs who have gathered in Iran over the years to burn American flags and to chant ‘Marg bar Âmrikâ’ (‘death to America’) and ‘Marg bar Esrâ'il’ (‘death to Israel’) reflect a genocidal and demonic anti-Semitism (as well as a pervasive anti-Christian poison) deeply rooted within jihadi Shi’ite Islam.

At this point in time, the entire Middle East is an explosive tinderbox. Gasoline fumes are everywhere. Iranian ballistic and hypersonic missiles, along with swarms of deadly drones, wait on standby. The largest gathering of American weaponry (bombers, fighter jets, aircraft carriers and destroyers) has been assembled and is surrounding the borders of what was once called ‘Persia.’ Israeli jets, SIGINT forces and anti-missile defenses are primed and ready. All these warriors are waiting for the go-ahead signal.

Dividing God’s Land between flatterers and thieves

As the pots of Middle Eastern war are coming to a fast boil, POTUS Trump convened a ‘Board of Peace’ meeting on February 19, 2026, gathering leaders of many nations at the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace in Washington DC. Twenty-seven members have signed on to that Board, including fifteen Arab/Islamic countries.

In preparation for the February 19 meeting, eight of these (Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, the United Arab Emirates) released a joint statement on January 21, 2026, reiterating their support for Trump’s efforts and reaffirming each country’s commitment aimed at “advancing a just and lasting peace grounded in the Palestinian right to self-determination and statehood.” Twelve of these 15 Islamic countries (80%) publicly affirmed their Islamist-based goal of dividing the Jewish state of Israel, or of even taking it over in its entirety. Only 2 of the 27 member countries present at that meeting (less than 8%) are on record as opposing the division of the Land of Israel. Watching the live feed of that gathering on February 19, 2026 felt like being a spectator at a ‘coming attractions’ presentation of Psalm 83,  Joel 3:1-2, or Zechariah 12:1-3.

 Considering that the God of Abraham considers Gaza to be part of Judah’s tribal inheritance in the Promised Land (Joshua 15:20,27) and an integral part of Israel’s irrevocable calling (Romans 11:28-29), it should be noted that nations stealing the Land of Israel from the Jewish people and dividing it up is something which the prophet Isaiah forcefully condemns (albeit in a different context):

President Trump addressed the leaders’ gathering for 47 minutes. Much of his speech involved distributing dollops of heavy-handed flattery to those leaders. Regrettably, he also focused on himself in an inordinate way – one not befitting an august leader of the free world:

King Solomon noted that “a flattering mouth works ruin” (Proverbs 26:28) and that the “one who rebukes a person will afterward find more favor than one who flatters with the tongue” (Proverbs 28:23).

Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar set the historical record straight in a few brief words during his own ‘Board of Peace’ comments:

It is to be assumed that Trump was not referring to King David’s taking of Jerusalem as the source of 3,000 years of Middle Eastern torture and suffering. Perhaps the leader of the free world should make sure that his speechwriters are more careful with the speeches they upload to the presidential teleprompter.

 

How shall we then pray?

Here are some guidelines on how to pray for President Trump (and for all other world leaders who weigh in on dividing the Land of Israel):

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

When world leaders play poker

Some of us believe that our leaders are either all good or all bad. In modern politics, it seems that ‘the enemy’ is always found ‘on the other side of the political aisle.’ We crown the leaders ‘on our side’ with golden crowns, but throw tomatoes and rocks at our political opponents. Yet James 3:8-10 reminds us that all human beings, politicians included, have a very challenging problem: “No one can tame the tongue; it is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people, who have been made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things should not be this way.” These radical problems beset both the Left and the Right, and everyone in between.

Even in Bible days, some leaders (even those who led mini-revivals) fell quite short of God’s character. Examples include Hezekiah (2 Kings 20:12-19), Josiah (2 Kings 35:20-24), and David (2 Samuel 11). A superpower leader like Nebuchadnezzar may have had divine secrets revealed to him (Daniel 2:28), yet he was still punished with temporary insanity due to his own pride and braggadocio (Daniel 4).

Today we often honor political or religious leaders blindly, having no sense of what God is about to do in the near future. We excuse narcissism and deceit, and tolerate boasting and arrogance, declaring that our inerrant leaders can do no wrong. But when we sell God short on His standards, we end up tolerating things that YHVH would never tolerate. Such dynamics are alive and well not only in the preserve of politics; they are also par for the course in the religious world, among some self-appointed apostles and prophets – men and women who may know little of the Word of God, and who don’t often clearly hear His voice. Little children (said the Apostle John in 1 John 5:21), guard your hearts from these types of idols!

Theological malignancies and counterfeit Christians

The media of the Western world occasionally shines its garish spotlight on some ‘Christian’ podcasters whose poisoned perspectives about Israel and the Jewish people are 100% counterfeit. Their viewpoints are infected at the very root with Replacement Theology.

On the opposite side of the woke aisle, a grotesque Marxist anti-Zionism has welded itself to fascist anti-Semitism and genocidal jihadi-jingoism, spewing out a river of hatred against the Jewish people. What is desperately needed here? A spiritual return to the biblical roots of Western Judeo-Christian philosophy and civilization, and a recovery of biblical keys and scriptural spectacles. First and foremost, a renewed revelation of the Jewish word of God and its continuing stress on YHVH’s priority love for the sons and daughters of Jacob.

How superpowers think

The past two hundred years present many historical examples of how superpowers reason – what motivates them, what issues they focus on and what values they ignore. The Middle East has watched as a stream of superpowers like the UK, the US and the USSR have waded in to claim oil, strategic territory and arms markets – from Algeria to Arabia, and from India to Iran. The focus of these empires has been financial, involving control of colonized markets and free access to their waterways.

Spiritual and biblical issues have not been the prime motivators for these empires, though some evangelicals have attempted to draw attention to spiritual perspectives. Christian in name, these superpowers have looked at the Middle East as a significant key – not to world revival but to imperial profits. Modern apostate and pseudo-Christian perspectives like those of Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens have sapped biblical motivations from a fading evangelical world, running roughshod over God’s heart, God’s perspectives and God’s plans for the restoration of His Jewish people to their Jewish homeland. Spiritual apostasy has clouded the vision of the West, while an oily film has blinded clear Christian thinking about loving and defending Zion. Who is willing today to publicly stand with Jacob when the room of political discourse is overflowing with Nazis and jihadis? 

Playing international poker with the Promised Land

The Book of Joshua 15:20,47 declares that the inheritance of the tribe of the sons of Judah includes Ashdod, Gaza and its towns and villages, “as far as the Brook of Egypt and the Great [Mediterranean] Sea.” The territory of Gaza is part of the Promised Land which God bequeathed to the Jewish people for eternity. It is part of the irrevocable gifts and calling of Israel, according to Romans 11:28-29. Whether the real estate is located in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria or Gaza, none of it has been handed over by YHVH to any other nation to own or manage. No other country – not the Edomites of Jordan and Ramallah, not the Hittites of the former caliphate of Turkey (see Joshua 1:4), not the sons of Ham in today’s Arab Republic of Egypt (see Psalm 105:23) nor the United States of America – no one can step in to claim that the God of Jacob has given them the right to oversee Gaza or determine its fate. Unfortunately, what is currently happening as POTUS Trump’s 20-point plan (the ‘Board of Peace’) gets off the ground, flies in the face of God’s biblically-expressed intentions.

Israel’s doyen of military reporters Ron Ben -Yishai notes on January 26, 2026:

On Saturday, January 17, 2026 Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu publicly objected to certain aspects of Trump’s plan – America’s insistence that Turkey and Qatar (both prime supporters of Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood jihadi terror groups) will be an integral part of the Gaza Executive Board, and have a decisive say in determining the future of Gaza. Israel’s government responded by announcing that “the composition of the Gaza Executive Board, which is subordinate to the Board of Peace, was not coordinated with Israel and runs contrary to its policy.” 

A high-ranking State Department official anonymously responded to Israel’s publicly aired disagreement that same day on the Axios outlet, lashing out at PM Netanyahu:

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, Chairman of the Religious Zionist Party (HaTzionut HaDatit or National Union-Tkuma), posted on X later that Saturday night, January 17, 2026:

Violating the borders of Israel on behalf of Egypt, Turkey, Qatar and Hamas

Just recently. the US, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey unilaterally decided to open the physical gates between Egypt and the Hamas-controlled areas of Gaza. This has undercut one of the main goals of Israel’s recent war – to remove the jihadi terror group Hamas’ claws from controlling Gaza. The US announced this decision during the signing ceremony for POTUS Trump’s Board of Peace conference in Davos, Switzerland, according to an unnamed Arab diplomat and an unnamed US official who spoke off the record on Friday January 23, 2026. Friday’s anonymous comments from both the unnamed US official and the anonymous Arab diplomat gloated publicly that this re-opening was “imposed” on Israel – without the Jewish state’s agreement.

The diplomats said that those countries mediating the Gaza ceasefire — the US, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey — all recognized that Israel wasn’t going to agree on its own to reopen the border gate between Egypt and Gaza. So these mediators decided (without Israel’s agreement) to publicly announce Rafah’s unilateral reopening this week during the signing ceremony for the Board of Peace ceremonies in Davos. The crossing between Egypt and Gaza is to be operated by officers from the European Union Border Assistance Mission, along with uniformed members of the Palestinian Authority’s mukhabarat (intelligence service). 

The high-ranking though unnamed US State Department official emphasized: “This is our show, not [Israel’s] show . . . We are going to continue moving . . . We are not going to argue with [Netanyahu] . . .  and we will keep moving forward with our plan. He can’t really go against us.”

Not only has the US given significant authority over what happens in Gaza to Turkey and Qatar – who happen to also be Hamas’ main bankrollers and weapons suppliers. The US State Department is controlling, enabling and facilitating jihadi involvement in that process. The same American hands that are helping to arm Israel, sending bombers and fighter planes to neutralize Iranian moves, are also aiding in re-establishing Hamas and the PLO as a mortal jihadi threat to the Jewish state. Sweet and bitter waters are indeed flowing from the same spring, and Western nations are once again playing international poker, with the jackpot being the divvying-up of the Land of Israel.

Ignoring Turkish and Qatari wickedness as long as a healthy profit can be made

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 path. Death on the path of allah [death while carrying out jihad] is our supreme aspiration.  allah is greater! allah is greater!”).

The ideology behind the 9/11 attacks against America comes straight from the brains of the Muslim Brotherhood – MB founder Hassan al-Banna and MB chief ideologue Sayyid Qutb. In 2005, a former Kuwaiti Minister of Information, Dr. Ahmad al-Rabi', wrote in the Saudi-owned Asharq al-Awsat newspaper: “The beginnings of all the religious terrorism that we are witnessing today were in the Muslim Brotherhood’s ideology . . . All those who worked with bin Laden and al-Qaeda went out under the mandate of the Muslim Brotherhood.”

On November 24, 2025 POTUS Trump passed Executive Order EO 14362 – “Designation of Certain Muslim Brotherhood Chapters as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Specially Designated Global Terrorists.” This Presidential Document does not actually designate the entire Muslim Brotherhood (MB) as a terrorist organization, but only certain chapters or sub-divisions (Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan) of this worldwide jihadi organization – leaving the vast majority of that terror organization still ‘kosher’ in the eyes of the US State Department.

Trump’s Executive Order comes after an Act sponsored by Texas Senator Ted Cruz on July 16, 2025 “Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act”. Cruz's Act (which he had previously attempted to pass in 2015, 2017, 2020 and 2021) which was a more comprehensive Act, totally banning the Muslim Brotherhood (text here).

In some countries, the entire Muslim Brotherhood organization (and not just three sub-groups) has already been labeled and outlawed as a terrorist organization. These steps have been taken by Florida and Texas, as well as by Austria, Bahrain, Egypt, France, Kazakhstan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, the United Arab Emirates and Uzbekistan.

The countries of Turkey and Qatar are the two main bankrollers and supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), both in the past and in the present as well. Over the years they have also sponsored terror groups like the Taliban, al-Qa’eda, al-Nusra, and the HTS (currently morphed into the party of Syria’s President al-Julani).

Qatar is not only the main bank-roller of Hamas and HTS; it is also home to the US Army’s CENTCOM (Central Command) and the location of al-Udeid (the largest USAF airbase outside of America). Qatar is seen as a significant ally of the USA, and it has recently donated a Boeing 747 for POTUS Trump’s use. Qatar is connected by deep economic ties to Trump’s family. For decades, Qatar has used the Brotherhood as a means to project influence across the Middle East, even providing Hamas with its headquarters and funding.

Turkey (or as it now calls itself ‘Türkiye’) is also intensively involved with MB and Hamas, creating and supporting resilient networks which directly oppose US counterterrorism priorities. Türkiye is both a NATO ally and a patron of Islamist networks. It plays both sides of the field.

Turkey, Armenia and Hitler

As the Ottoman Empire began its slow slide into disintegration, a Turkish revolutionary group rose up between 1889 and 1926 – the Ottoman Committee of Union and Progress (CUP; in Turkish, İttihad ve Terakki Cemiyeti). Their foremost faction was the ‘Young Turks’ (Jön Türkler). In the Spring of 1914 the CUP caused at least 300,000 Greeks to flee across the Aegean Sea to Greece. The stated goal here was to achieve Türk Yurdu – the Turkification of Anatolia and the transformation of the Ottoman Empire into a homogeneous Turkish nation-state. Between 1914 and 1918 the Ottoman Empire under the CUP was also involved in the massacre and deportation of over one million Armenians.

At the orders of Ottoman Young Turk leader Talaat Pasha, an estimated 800,000 to 1.2 million Armenians were sent on death marches to the Syrian Desert in 1915 and 1916. Driven onward by Turkish paramilitary escorts, the deportees were deprived of food and water and subjected to robbery, rape, torture, crucifixion and massacres. Armenian survivors were dispersed into concentration camps. In 1916, another wave of massacres was ordered, leaving about 200,000 deportees alive from the original 1.2 million. Around 100,000 to 200,000 Armenian women and children were forcibly converted to Islam and absorbed into Muslim households at that time.

The Armenian genocide at the hands of the Turkish nation enabled the creation of an ethnonationalist state, the modern Republic of Turkey. The Turkish government today justifies the deportation and genocide of these Armenians as a legitimate action, and Turkey refuses to classify it as genocide. As of 2025, at least 34 countries have recognized the massacre of Armenians as genocide.

On August 22, 1939 (23 years after the Armenian genocide) Nazi leader Adolf Hitler addressed his chief Wehrmacht military commanders at his Obersalzberg home, a week before Germany invaded Poland. Within a day or two, American journalist Louis P. Lochner was handed the verbatim German text of Hitler’s speech, most probably by Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, chief of Abwehr (German Intelligence). Lochner contacted an American diplomat, but that man refused to pass on the text of Hitler’s briefing to Washington. British diplomat George Ogilvie-Forbes, however, transmitted the document to Whitehall on August 25, 1939.

Hitler’s comments revealed sobering conclusions: a Western world which had been prepared to ignore Turkey’s mass-murder and to condone the genocidal destruction of the Armenians in 1914, would no doubt not get too concerned about other upcoming mass murders – like those of the Polish nation or the Jewish people:

Iraq, ISIS and Syria

The Western world has for the most part a short attention span. Few remember Saddam Hussein’s chemical warfare attack on Iraqi Kurdish civilians in the residential areas of Halabja on March 16, 1988. A mixture of mustard gas and nerve gas (Tabun, Sarin and VX) was dropped on civilian Kurds there, the largest chemical weapons attack on civilians in human history. At least 5,000 people were killed, and up to 10,000 were injured. At first, the US government and its intelligence agencies suggested that Kurdish civilians had not been deliberately targeted, and attempted to place responsibility for the attack on Iran. The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office issued a briefing paper concluding that Iraq shouldn’t be taken to task for the chemical warfare attacks: “We believe it better to maintain a dialogue with others if we want to influence their actions. Punitive measures such as unilateral sanctions would not be effective in changing Iraq’s behavior over chemical weapons, and would damage British interests to no avail.”

The shifting sands of the Middle East have recently served to conceal another atrocity – the genocidal acts of Da’esh (ISIS/ ISIL/ the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant [ad-Dawla al-Islāmiyya fī l-ʿIrāq wa-sh-Shām]). This is the jihadi terrorist army which swept across Iraq and Syria from 1994 to the present. This organization committed war crimes against humanity, including systematic genocidal rape and sexual violence against males and females; mass killings of prisoners of war, murders of Christians, Yazidis, Shabaks, Turkmens and other Sunnis and their burial in mass graves; summary executions and decapitations; public floggings and politically motivated assassinations; human sacrifices; sexual enslavement and trafficking of over 6,800 Yazidi women and children; forced conversion to Islam of thousands of Yazidi boys and their subsequent forced drafting into ISIS jihadi terror gangs etc.

A minimum of 25,645 Iraqis were murdered by ISIS between 2014 and 2016. Over 400,000 Yazidis were forced to flee to Turkey and to Iraqi Kurdistan barely ten years ago; 55,000 Yazidis fled to the nearby Sinjar Mountains, where many died (like the Armenians in the 1910’s) from dehydration and starvation. ISIS is still alive and well in Syria (here and here), Iraq, Turkey (here and here) and the Sinai Peninsula. Has the human race undergone any deep moral changes since the Armenian genocide?

Recent events in Syria (see my December 12, 2024 newsletter https://davidstent.org/dividing-the-baby-part-two-of-three/) include the rise of a new Islamist leader who used to head Syrian al-Qa’eda and ISIS. Abu Mohammad al-Julani was once listed by the US State Department as a ‘Specially Designated Global Terrorist,’ with a $10 million reward for information leading to his capture. In 2018 al-Julani announced on CNN that his jihadi goal is to overthrow Syria. Now he has become the darling of the West, fêted by the leaders of the US, France, UK and the European Union. On June 30, 2025 POTUS Trump revoked all sanctions against Syria as part of this new international acceptance of al-Julani (Executive Order 14312). The Syrian mutation of ‘Bin Laden’ has now been christened ‘a peace-maker’ by the cataract-beset leaders of the West.

But the Syrian leopard has not changed his spots, and has proved himself to be “an adept player of geopolitical chess.” Since his ‘ascension to the throne,’ he has directed his ISIS and al-Qa’eda compatriots to carry out massacres of Syria’s Alawites (minimum 1,500 in March 2025; here, here and here), Christians, Druze (here, here and here) and Kurds (here, here, here and here) – while the West blinks anxiously and averts its eyes at the over 3,400 casualties (3,666 in another official report).

The recent videotaped slaughter of Alawites and Druze, showing al-Julani’s bearded jihadi warriors slitting Alawite and Druze throats while chanting the Islamic takbir (allāhu ʾakbar – the Islamist declaration of Allah’s supremacy); the videotaped torture, rape and murder of women from all these these communities (even as late as mid-January 2026); the abandonment by the West of former allies who fought al Qa’eda and ISIS and sacrificed many casualties on the battlefield, to bloodthirsty jihadis – all these events have created a huge sense of betrayal in the Middle East about Western allies in general and American allies in particular.

Steve Emerson, founder of the Investigative Project on Terrorism, explains on his January 26, 2026 podcast:

Iranian genocide

The Islamic Republic of Iran has been waging war with the West – specifically against America and Israel (though Saudi Arabia is not far from being a top priority as well) – since its bloody inception in the Shi’ite Iranian Revolution (January 6 1978 to February 11 1979). Some veterans of the CIA (like Robert Baer, author of ‘The Devil We Know: Dealing with the New Iranian Superpower’) argue that America must become Iran’s stalwart ally and turn a cold shoulder to Israel. So far, it seems that the current US Administration does not fully line up on Baer’s side of the line of scrimmage.

The nation of Iran is at this point under the iron Islamist boot of a cruel and violent Shi’ite tyranny. The Muslim despots of Tehran and Qom believe that they are on the cutting edge of worldwide Islamist revolution – one which will lead to an international Shi’ite dictatorship. Anyone, even if it be their own citizens, who opposes those goals is considered expendable. In the past three weeks over 36,500 Iranian citizens (and possibly upwards of 60,000 – see here and here) have been murdered by Shi’ite security forces in just two days, January 8-9, 2026, and in just one geographical area alone – the historic bazaar in Rasht, Iran. Over 300,000 other Iranians have been wounded by government thugs, many blinded for life by close shotgun fire. A similar number of Iranian civilians have been dragged out of hospital beds and shot to death, dispatched by a bullet to the forehead. A genocidal massacre is occurring in Persia, and the whole world is watching. Will this evil empire be taken down before it destroys its own people and overwhelms the Middle East?

Appeasement versus victory

At present, most Western leaders have adopted a response toward jihadi forces which could be classified as 'appeasement.' Rather than exhibiting strength and determination which presses through to a forceful victory, Western diplomats have pleaded for ‘process’ and crisis-management, of the 'need' to work toward a temporary holding pattern, of suggesting that violent jihadis choose the path of disarmament instead of ‘the path of jihad.’ Winston Churchill’s famous dictum of January 20, 1940, given on the BBC when he was First Lord of the British Admiralty, is worth remembering: “Each one hopes that if he feeds the crocodile enough, the crocodile will eat him last. All of them hope that the storm will pass before their turn comes to be devoured!”

How shall we then pray?

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

   

Where is the promise of His coming?

One of the last prophetic warnings given to us by Shimon Képha (in English ‘Simon Peter’) is a caution to be on guard about cynicism at the End of the Age. The context he describes here is the Last Days – the period just before Messiah Yeshua returns:

Today the media screens of the world are alive with the sound of mockers. Everywhere one turns, one is confronted with scoffers – who scorn biblical values, monogamous families and sexual purity; who present jihadi Islam as a viable alternative while vilifying the God of the Bible and His Chosen People Israel. Flash-in-the-pan talking heads like Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens pour out a steady stream of ridicule against Jacob. Anti-Semitism is increasing across the globe, and these pundits of poison are demonized catalysts and enablers of this process. The birth pangs of Messiah are upon us.

In December 2025 the AMFEST (AmericaFest) held its four-day annual convention at the Phoenix Convention Center, hosted by Turning Point USA, a conservative youth organization. It featured prominent Republican speakers, media personalities, and political figures – big names from conservative streams like Make America Great Again, including Vice President JD Vance (the keynote speaker on Sunday December 21, 2025) and Erika Kirk (who was headlining the event). The convention focuses on conservative policy, culture, and future political strategies. Its motto is “Faith, freedom and American values.”

One of the prominent speakers was US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. She spoke cogently about Islamism as a significant threat to Western society in general, and to American society in particular:

Naming names in the anti-Semitic pantheon

Ben Shapiro is an American conservative political commentator, media host, and attorney. He is editor emeritus for The Daily Wire, which he co-founded in 2015, and also hosts The Ben Shapiro Show, a daily political podcast and live radio show. Shapiro was asked to deliver a speech on December 19, 2025 at the TPUSA AmFest conference. His courageous address focused on the threat to the Republican conservative movement coming from influential right-wing anti-Semitic commentators like Carlson and Owens:

Shapiro specifically targeted Tucker Carlson for giving a generous platform to white nationalist, anti-Semitic and pro-Hitler Nick Fuentes:

The night before, on December 18, 2025, Shapiro addressed the Heritage Foundation, a leading American right-wing think tank, accusing Tucker Carlson of repeatedly advancing anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. Shapiro cited Carlson’s constant criticism of Israel, his suggestion of “nefarious Israeli influence in American government,” and his hostility toward Christian Zionists. Shapiro also panned Carlson for frequently platforming figures with extremist or anti-Semitic records, including;

“None of this comports with traditional American values,” Shapiro declared. This moment is a test of the conservative movement’s credibility: “Conservatism means something. And if we refuse to stand for it and defend it, it will disappear.”

Which anti-Semite is the ‘Anti-Semite of the Year’?

An American watchdog organization www.stopantisemitism.org “holds antisemites accountable and creates consequences for their bigoted actions by exposing the threat that they present.” They present a yearly ‘award’ – ‘Anti-Semite of the Year’ – “a distinct dishonor is reserved for the most bigoted and hateful individual” who has fostered anti-Jewish attacks over the past calendar year. Previous ‘winners’ have included US Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (2019); campus pro-Hamas activist Nerdeen Kiswani (2020); Chairman of the Board of Directors for Ben & Jerry’s Anuradha Mittal (2021);  rapper and fashion mogul Kanye West (2022); US Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (2023); podcaster Candace Owens (2024 and here); and podcaster Tucker Carlson (2025).

Carlson, this year’s recipient, has been accurately tagged as an anti-Semite for some time now:

Here is a video of Mr. Carlson from December 26, 2025, attacking the Jewish state and its defenders: ‘Tucker Carlson: Israel Is Not An Ally, It's A Liability.’

For those who have an intercessory calling to pray for the sons and daughters of Jacob, the words of Isaiah 62:1,6-7 echo in our hearts:

Our prayers at this time for the Jewish people’s protection have specific relevance in light of these anti-Semitic conspiracies described above. The God of Jacob’s promise is also our guideline in intercession: “No weapon that is formed against you will succeed. And you will condemn every tongue that accuses you in judgment. This is the heritage of the servants of YHVH, and their vindication is from Me, declares YHVH” (Isaiah 54:17).

Where are the promises of full national salvation for the Jewish people?

Where are the promise of full restoration of the borders of the Promised Land?

Where is the promise of full restoration of the Davidic throne and dynasty in Jerusalem?

Where is the promise of worldwide honor for the Jewish people and for their homeland?

 

How shall we then pray?

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

   

Broccoli and blessings

The 41st president of the United States, George H. W. Bush once commented at a news conference on March 22, 1990: “I do not like broccoli. And I haven’t liked it since I was a little kid. And my mother made me eat it. Now I’m president of the United States. And I’m not gonna eat any more broccoli!”

A Hebrew maxim states, “L’ta’am vare’ach ein l’hitvake’ach!” (‘Regarding taste and smell, there really is no debate!”  English historian William Camden stated in 1605: “All the proofe of a pudding, is in the eating.” So POTUS Bush evidently did have the right to express his strong aversion to the green vegetable he had been forced to eat as a child – even if turns out that broccoli is good for you . . .

How the U.S. Vice-President evaluates the problem of anti-Semitism

On December 16, 2025, U.S. Vice President JD Vance responded on X to an article by Jewish commentator Yair Rosenberg, ‘What J.D. Vance – and many others – miss about American anti-Semitism.’ Rosenberg stated that “the research collectively suggests that America is becoming more anti-Semitic because its young people are becoming more anti-Semitic. This finding flies in the face of the folk wisdom that prejudice is the province of the old and will die out with them.”

Vance’s rejoinder was an attack on Rosenberg’s professionalism. Writing on X, he stated: “Mainstream journalism is just profoundly uninteresting and lame, consumed by its own pieties . . .   These guys … all lack curiosity and introspection.” To get a different take on the matter, read Rod Dreher’s cutting-edge article of November 11, 2025.

Rosenberg responded to Vance’s words: “Many liberals are more comfortable calling out conservative anti-Semitism, and Vance appears most comfortable focusing on anti-Jewish sentiments among immigrants, while sidestepping the same problem on the American right … Anti-Semitism predates our present political and religious divides. Before there were capitalists, Communists, Republicans, Democrats, or even Christians or Muslims, there was anti-Jewish prejudice. Which means that although such bigotry is expressed by all of these communities, it has roots in more fundamental forces. The effort to identify and understand these forces is what drew me to  … investigate how anti-Semitism operates as a conspiracy theory that appeals to actors across the political and religious spectrum.”

Is ‘not liking Israel’ like ‘not liking broccoli’?

An Israel-bashing white nationalist who uses antisemitic tropes (Sarah Stock) and lists herself on X with a cross and the phrase ‘Christ is king,’ responded to Vance with an anti-Israeli barb: “Actually White conservative zoomers don’t really like Israel anymore either, JD.”

Vance then responded by moving positively in Sarah Stock’s direction, stating: “I would say there’s a difference between not liking Israel (or disagreeing with a given Israeli policy) and anti-Semitism.” The Vice-President is back-pedaling here, stating that not liking Israel is an acceptable position, and such a stance should not be classified as anti-Semitism.  Vance is clarifying that he does not define anti-Israel sentiment as necessarily anti-Semitic.

The VP’s position is quite different from conservative spokesmen like Charlie Kirk and Senator Ted Cruz, who spoke with great clarity about the dual threats of anti-Semitism and anti-Israel activism, and warned that this poison is now manifesting among Republicans. Vance’s recent shift from a pro-Israel spin to a position which resonates more sympathetically with young anti-Israel Republicans may of course be politically motivated. Unfortunately this PC pandering feeds a growing anti-Jewish sentiment on the right side of America’s political world (which has dropped from 78% sympathy for Israel to 64%).

Inna Vernikov, a City Council Republican Jewish lawmaker who represents a south Brooklyn district with a large Russian Jewish population, did not attend the New York Young Republican Club’s annual gala in the US on Saturday December 13, 2025 whose guest list included white nationalists and antisemitic conspiracy theorists. On Sunday December 14, 2025, Vernikov posted on X about the Republicans’ growing antisemitism problem:

It is common knowledge that the Democratic/leftist wing of the US body politic is already captive to similar (but leftist) anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish drum bangers like NYC’s incoming mayor Mamdani, the Squad (and here) and Bernie Sanders.

Cruzing with Tucker

On Tuesday June 17, 2025 Tucker Carlson interviewed Senator Ted Cruz on his podcast. The heated exchange focused to a large extent on Carlson’s negative obsession with Israel. Cruz expressed his belief that God’s calling on the Jewish people is irrevocable; that whoever blesses the Jewish people will be blessed, while whosoever curses the Jewish people (which includes cursing their state) will be cursed:

During that podcast, Tucker Carlson mocked Cruz for not being able to quote chapter and verse on that passage. The relevant quote, by the way, found in at least three biblical passages, including Genesis 12:3 (referring to Abraham and to his physical descendants), Genesis 27:29 (referring to Isaac) and Numbers 24:9 (which states that the promise applies to the entire Jewish people). Carlson then states off-handedly that he thinks the passage in question is in Genesis 16, but he is incorrect here.  Tucker then sarcastically disses Cruz for expressing his own theological understanding: “You’re a senator and now you’re throwing out theology. And I am a Christian and I am allowed to weigh in on this!” Tucker is trying to score some cheap debating points, but does not seem to understand that calling himself a Christian does not mean that his ‘weighing in” on this or any other issue has either biblical basis or truth-based validity. When Cruz says that “most people understand that line in Genesis to refer to the Jewish people, God’s chosen people,” Tucker responds: “That’s not what it says.” This flippant response shows that Carlson adheres to Replacement Theology, denying that the gifts and calling which God has given to the Jewish people (see Romans 11:28-29) are still valid today. Carlson’s theology is an anti-Semitic one, based on centuries of theological contempt on the part of ‘the Church Fathers’ for God’s chosen people.

The Hebrew of Genesis 12:3 decisively solves this argument between Carlson and Cruz. Let’s look at it now.

A promise is forever, and so are God’s gifts

The God of Jacob covenanted to Abraham three unconditional things (see Romans 11:28-29):  

Though most English Bibles use the verb ‘curse’ twice in Genesis 12:3 (as in ‘cursed is the one who curses you’), there are actually two very different Hebrew verbs used here. The first verb, qalal, has the following range of meanings:

The second verb arar refers to the process of binding someone with a curse or an enchantment, and is used when invoking the name of God that He might cause the curse to work (cf., Lexicon In Veteris Testamenti Libros, ‘Arar,’ ‘Qalal,’ pp.89-90, ed. L. Kohler, W. Baumgartner, Leiden, E.J. Brill 1958, p. 840).

God is stating that each individual (the Hebrew verb used here is in the singular – ‘whoever makes light of you’) will be weighed based on his own heart-attitude to Jacob’s descendants. If someone scorns, makes light, is contemptuous toward, or doesn’t like the Jewish people or their state, he will be faced with God’s strong disapproval – indeed, YHVH’s curse. YHVH is clearly declaring that one’s attitude to the Jewish people is not like one’s attitude to broccoli, à la President Bush. He is pronouncing that a person who does not like Israel comes under a spiritual curse. From this perspective, Vice-President Vance’s flippant statement about those who do not like Israel – the God of Jacob sees such attitudes in a far less tolerant way.

Jeremiah sums the matter up with his prophetic declaration:

When podcasters like Tucker Carlson sarcastically shower contempt on the Jewish people, on the Jewish land, and on those watchmen on the walls who defend the Jewish people – they are bringing on themselves the curse of Abraham’s covenant.  Their poison needs to be discerned from afar and whole-heartedly rejected. Believers in the God of Jacob need to pray:

Lifting the veil of darkness off of the Body of Messiah

In the same way as a veil has been placed upon some Jewish eyes (see 2 Corinthians 3:14-16) regarding a difficulty in recognizing the Messiahship of Yeshua, so in our day a veil of judgment has been placed upon many Gentile eyes (see Romans 11:18-25) regarding God’s priority love and covenant faithfulness to the Jewish people:

Paul prophesied long ago that even believers from among the nations of the world would sooner or later manifest arrogance (Romans 11:18), conceit (Romans 11:20), ignorance (Romans 11:25) and lack of awareness (Romans 11 :25) concerning the calling of the Jewish people and God’s heart for them.

The blowback of Replacement Theology has Last Days ramifications

Those who scorn the Jewish people, who scorn the restoration of the Jewish state, end up scorning the heart and strategies of the God of Jacob. They also end up coming under the influence of malign spiritual forces which seek the destruction of the Hebrew nation.

The shifting of America in our day from a strong position of standing with Israel to a cooling of heart regarding the people of Jacob and the Jewish state; the rise of anti-Semitic attacks on a daily basis across the USA, Europe and Australia – all these reveal that one’s theological beliefs about the sons and daughters of Jacob affect not only the destiny of individuals (as per Genesis 12:3) but also the destiny of all nations concerned.

 

How shall we then pray?

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

When Santa visited Israel

I was fourteen years old. The crunch of fresh snow followed my footsteps as I walked home at dusk through the Montreal suburb of Notre Dame de Grace. Tall and dark-green Fraser firs stood to attention, decked out with twinkling blue-red-green Christmas lights. Every door that I passed sported a large green wreath sprinkled with red holly berries. And small plastic manger scenes of a very non-Jewish-looking Holy Family glowed warmly with electric lights.  I could nearly hear the sound of snow falling. This Jewish kid loved Christmas.

A year later, I was playing piano in a dance band at Christmas parties and dances. Santa, joie de vivre, crowded shopping malls vibrating with saxophone-flavored Christmas muzak, and the huge glass window panes of the department store Christmas train display – all these still thrilled me, even though by now I was listening to the Beatles.  Yes, I loved Christmas cheer the way many U.S. citizens love Mom, apple pie and America. But like so many Jewish people, I didn’t really have the faintest idea of what Christmas is all about.

Only after I had a life-changing personal encounter with the Messiah of Israel did I begin to grasp the reason for the season. Christmas is all about the prophesied birth of the Jewish Messiah, and His coming down to earth – to Israel – in order to die on a Roman cross as a Yom Kippur atonement for His own Jewish people (Romans 1:16) and for all the world as well (John 3:16). The best Christmas gift of all is Yeshua – He paid the penalty for our sins and He can wash away all our rebellious ways.

Christmas and Hanukkah are nearly cousins in the popular eye. Both holidays are fêted as festivals of lights. Both are connected to the Winter solstice. Both involve the giving of gifts. Both have tasty foods. And both have customs which are partly biblical and partly traditional. To paraphrase the words of Tevye the milkman from ‘Fiddler on the Roof,’ much of these holiday celebrations can be summed up in one word: “Tradition!”

Make Christmas joyously Jewish again

For most Jewish people, Christmas is a beautifully celebrated holiday, but it is definitely not seen as a Jewish one. It is viewed as a foreign holiday, a Gentile celebration, which seems to take place in a far-away and non-Jewish Bethlehem. Yet Messianic believers delight in echoing the angelic declaration about the birth of a Jewish King:

And here is a worthy challenge: how to restore the Jewishness of the Jewish Messiah – for the Jewish people and for the whole Body of Messiah – and how to rejoice in His birth, while simultaneously understanding the context into which He was born, and how the original First Century believers perceived that event.

Jewish birthdays

Most people are not aware that in Bible days the Jewish people did not celebrate birthdays. Indeed, the Old Testament makes no positive statement about the celebration of birthdays.  The Encyclopedia Judaica speaks plainly: “The celebration of birthdays is unknown in traditional Jewish ritual” (EJ vol. iv, p. 1054).  This perspective is most likely rooted in Ecclesiastes 7:1: “A good name is better than good oil, and the day of one’s death is better than the day of one’s birth.”

Only in two places does the Bible refer to birthdays. In both cases pagan rulers brought death to someone on a birthday:

Early Christian birthdays

Early Christians did not celebrate birthdays, as the following quotes reveal. Early Christian theologian Origen of Alexandria (early 200’s A.D. and not really a friend of the Jewish people) explains:

The translator of the Vulgate Latin Bible Jerome (ca. 400 AD) agrees with Origen in his Commentary on Matthew 2.14.6: “We have found that no other people observed their birthdays except Herod and Pharaoh.”  

Flavius Josephus the Jewish historian (ca. 95 AD) communicates a similar perspective in his Against Apion 2:26 over 100 years before Origen, though the official reason given is to prevent drunkenness: “No indeed, the Torah does not permit us to make festivals at the births of our children, and thereby afford occasion of drinking to excess.”

Roman birthdays – not a kosher party

Modern birthdays are a source of joy and delight: cakes, gifts, singing and feasting. But part of the reason that the Church’s original leaders were opposed to Roman birthday celebrations, was because strong demonic and idolatrous elements lay at the core of those ancient ceremonies. An awareness of these spiritual realities was very clear to the Church Fathers; today, most of us are not aware of these ancient and pagan roots.

In Kathryn Argetsinger’s scholarly article ‘Birthday Rituals: Friends and Patrons in Roman Poetry and Cult in Classical Antiquity’ (pp. 175-193), she comments: “The birthday in the Roman mindset was much closer to a cultic religious celebration than it is today, predominantly because each person had a genius (a tutelary spirit) that they sacrificed to on their day of birth. This deity protected an individual for the year, and thus there was a re-up of that protection annually through the performance of a sacrifice. Birthday parties were a key mix of religion and friendship, where sacrifices were made, incense was burned, ritual cakes were made and eaten, and white robes were worn.” Argetsinger adds: “Such birthday celebrations, whether of family members, personal friends, or patrons take place in that crucial sphere where Roman social relations and Roman religious practice intersect, and demonstrate how difficult it is to understand either in isolation from the other.” A Roman birthday (dies natalis) was a deeply religious event, involving the worship of one’s personal guardian spirit (or personal ‘daimon’/’daemon’ called a ‘Genius’). This guardian angel (an intermediary divine spirit between gods and humans) would be propitiated though sacrifices, incense, wine libations, anointing and wreathing a statue of one’s Genius, the dedication and eating of oat cakes, making vows (vota) and prayers for the protection of the ‘birthday boy or girl’ in the coming year.

The Roman grammarian Censorinus (ca. 238 AD) unpacks the term ‘genius’:

Saint Augustine of Hippo in The City of God (8.14) declared that believers in Messiah Yeshua should have nothing to do with such beliefs and celebrations. Traditional Roman households possessed at least one shrine with the images of the household’s penates (deities), genius and other favored idols. Their statues were placed at table during family meals and banquets. They were divine witnesses at important family occasions, such as marriages, births, and adoptions, and their shrines provided a religious hub for social and family life.

Sextus Pompeius Festus in his lexicon ‘De verborum significatione’ (late 180’s AD) stated: “The Genius is the son of gods and the father of humans, from whom humans are born. And for that reason, he is called my Genius, because he begat (genuit) me.”

A Roman birthday involved worship of demons and thanksgiving to them. Many of our modern birthday traditions are based on these Roman foundations, minus the demonic worship. An accurate appreciation of how ancient Jews and Christians  understood birthday celebrations is foundational as we consider what their perspective regarding the birthday of Messiah Yeshua.

The silence of the Fathers

There is no mention at all by early Christian writers from the first and second century, such as Irenaeus (c. 130–200 AD) or Tertullian (c. 160–225 AD), of birthday celebrations. Origen of Alexandria (c. 165–264 AD) actually mocks Roman celebrations of birthdays, dismissing them as pagan practices. And no celebration of Yeshua’s birth can be found at this time among believers.

In non-canonical apocryphal writings from the Second Century AD (such as the Gospel of Thomas and the Proto-Evangelium of James), there is no recounting of the date of Yeshua’s birth  or its celebration, though reference is made to arcane bits of information like the names of Yeshua’s grandparents or to supposed details of His education.

These historical facts about ancient biblical culture should come as no surprise.  Messiah Yeshua, the son of David, was a Jew who lived a Jewish lifestyle, and it should be remembered that it was Romans and not Jews who celebrated birthdays. For Gentile (and Jewish) believers in Yeshua, the clearly idolatrous and demonic nature of Roman birthday celebrations made the concept of celebrating the birthday of Messiah an unthinkable idea.

The First Noel

Just after December 31, AD 192, an Egyptian Christian theologian Clement of Alexandria wrote in his Stromata (Greek for ‘miscellanies’ or ‘patchwork’) about the possible birth dates of Messiah Yeshua. His record is the first indisputable historical reference of theologians attempting to determine Yeshua’s birthday – and it came nearly two hundred years after the fact.

According to Clement, several different days had been proposed by various Christian streams, but Clement didn’t mention December 25 as being one of those days:

There was no discussion or agreement among believers for nearly 200 years after the Resurrection as to when Messiah Yeshua was born, and no trend toward celebrating that event.

Changing days and choosing dates

Roman Emperor Constantine the Great made a legal ruling on March 7, 321 AD, that the Roman day of rest would be Sunday: “All judges and the common people of the city and all the offices of the arts shall rest on the venerable day of the sun.” (Codex Justinianeus 3.12.2). The Hebrew and biblical day of rest, the Sabbath, was not a subject of discussion at that time, nor had it been legally recognized by Rome. Within a very short time, a theological and anti-Jewish teaching sprouted in the Catholic Church that the seventh day of Genesis 2:1-3 was no longer biblically valid, and that Sabbath-keeping was morally reprehensible and sinful.

One of the descriptions in Daniel’s prophecy concerning the ruler of the coming Fourth Kingdom (known today as the anti-Messiah) is that “he will speak against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One, and he will intend to make alterations in times and in law” (Daniel 7:25). Constantine’s decision to choose Sunday made alterations in the law – the Torah – of God, and it has left a 1,700 year-old stain on the garment of the Body of Messiah – one which has served to foster Replacement Theology as well anti-Semitic theology and legislation.

The earliest reliable Roman mention of the date of December 25 as Yeshua’ birthday comes from the Philocalian Calendar – ‘the Chronography of 354’ – created for a wealthy Roman Christian named Valentinus by the calligrapher and illustrator Furius Dionysius Filocalus.

A section of this Chronography commemorates the dates when martyrs were laid to rest and where significant dates related to them are remembered(‘The Disposition of Martyrs’). In Part 12 and Line 1, the Latin reads: “VIII kal. Ian. natus Christus in Betleem Iudeae” – “On the eighth day before the kalends of January [i.e., December 25] the birth of Christ in Bethlehem of Judea.”

“I dreamed I saw Saint Augustine”

The Berber Saint Augustine of Hippo (354-430 AD) puts the matter of Yeshua’s birth date to rest for the Western Church in his volume ‘On the Trinity’ (4.5):

The Last Days restoration of YHVH’s feasts

Paul the Apostle calls his Gentile brothers and sisters to take care in handling the Jewish people, their calling and their gifts: “In relation to God’s choice [the Jewish people] are beloved on account of the fathers, for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable” (Romans 11:28-29). He repeatedly warns the non-Jewish part of Messiah’s body about this, using four powerful verbs:

The non-Jewish wing of Messiah’s body has largely brushed aside the Jewish priority focus of God’s word, God’s Jewish calendar and God’s Jewish people, substituting in their stead Replacement Theology, Gentile extra-biblical holidays and and a priority focus on Gentile Last Days triumphalism. But the God of Jacob swears on His holy name that these ‘boastings against the branches’ will one day be set right:

Freedom to celebrate as we look forward to Restoration of the biblical feasts

History and Scripture show us that Christmas is not a biblically commanded celebration, nor is the date of Messiah Yeshua’s birth known with certainty. Yet Christmas is a holiday that brings much joy to many believers around the world. At the same time, modern celebrations of Christmas tend to conceal more than reveal both Yeshua’s Jewish identity and the priority calling on the Jewish people (as per Romans 1:16, Romans 3:1-2 and Romans 9:1-5).

Paul tells us that “one person values one day over another . . . Each person must be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day, observes it for the Lord” (Romans 14:4-6). As we consider the multi-faceted aspects of the celebration of Messiah's birthday, let's remember Paul's words: it was for freedom that Messiah has set us free. As we are called to freedom, let us serve one another through love!

How should we then pray?

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

In all their afflictions, He was afflicted

Anti-Semitism is alive and well and living in – Paris, London, Belgium, Sweden and Milano. It is wildcatting on the university campuses of Columbia, NYU, Yale, Emerson, Emory, MIT, Tufts, Harvard, USC, UCLA, UTA, Oregon, McGill, and Australia (Monash U and U of Sydney). Primary anti-Israel and anti-Jewish organizers include Students for Justice in Palestine, Young Democratic Socialists of America, Palestinian Youth Movement, Jewish Voice for Peace, IfNotNow, etc. Major PR activist work has been sponsored over the years by the Muslim Brotherhood (based in Qatar), as well as through MB’s worldwide media outlet al-Jazeera (also based in Qatar).

On the First Night of Hanukkah

On Sunday evening December 14, 2025, over 1,000 Jewish people were gathered at Australia’s most famous beach – Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia – for a Chabad-sponsored candle-lighting ceremony – ‘Chanukah by the Sea’ – on the First Night of Hanukkah. This eight-day Hebrew holiday is 2,000 years old, and Daniel the prophet spoke of it 2,500 years ago in Daniel 11:31-32. The eight days of Hanukkah and the  Twelve Days of Christmas have certain festive similarities.

At 6:47 PM local time the shooting began.  Two Muslims – a father and a son – began point-blank firing with hunting rifles into the crowd of Jewish people assembled on Bondi Beach.

Over a ten minute period, they fired over 50 shots into the 1,000+ crowd, murdering 15 people including:

Over 38 people were wounded, including two police officers (one, a retired cop Peter Meagher).

A witness told the investigators, “They were shooting continuously, and nobody fired back. People were frozen. Police officers were at Bondi Beach and did not react for at least 20 minutes, even as the terrorists kept shooting and reloading their weapons.”

“Not an immediate threat”

A 50 year-old Muslim Pakistani immigrant who worked as a fruit seller and lived in Sydney’s Bonnyrigg suburb, Sajid Akram (‘Akram’ means ‘generous’ or ‘noble’ in Arabic; ‘Sajid’ means ‘one who bows down in worship’) had first arrived in Australia in 1998 on a student visa, gradually obtaining a resident visa in 2001. His 24 year-old Australian-born son Naveed, was an unemployed bricklayer. He studied Quran at Al-Murad Institute of Heckenberg, New South Wales and, according to the suspected gunman’s Facebook page, he also studied at Hamdard University in Islamabad, Pakistan.

Naveed was investigated by security authorities for six months in 2019 regarding ties to ISIS. He was close to an ISIS cell led by Isaac al-Matari, the group’s head in Australia. Al-Matari is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence. Mike Burgess, director-general of ASIO, Australia’s domestic intelligence agency, confirmed that Naveed was “known to us, but not in an immediate-threat perspective.” According to Australia’s ABC outlet, father and son pledged allegiance to the ISIS terror group. An official from Australia’s Joint Counter Terrorism Team told ABC that an ISIS flag was found in the Akrams' car, along with IEDs in another car linked to the Akrams.

This jihadi terror attack came about a month after Israel’s Mossad notified Australian intelligence about Iranian-backed “terror infrastructure” already in Australia, planning to carry attacks on Jewish targets. According to the Mossad, the senior commander of Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps-Quds Force Sardar Ammar has been intensifying efforts to attack Jewish and Israeli sites around the world since the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel. On August 26, 2025, Australia blamed Iran for overseeing two 2024 arson attacks – at the Adass Israel Synagogue in Melbourne and at Lewis’ Continental Kitchen (a kosher deli) in Sydney. Canberra expelled Iran’s ambassador at that time, and listed the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terror organization.

According to Australia’s highest-rated show 7News, in the months before this terror attack, Naveed Akram and his father Sajid practiced extensively at Cecil Park’s government-run Sydney International Shooting Centre.

Before orchestrating the mass shooting at Bondi Beach, both shooters spent a month in the Philippines, one of the world’s top extremist hotspots. As per multiple police sources, Sajid Akram and his son Naveed Akram had visited the Southeast Asian country together, without any other family members. Both of them returned to Australia just weeks before they opened fire on the Jewish gathering of roughly 1,000 people. The Islamic State East Asia, a branch of the ISIS terror group, is a proscribed terrorist group in Australia since 2017. “While there are no known links between ISEA and Australia, there have previously been links between Australians and terrorist groups in the Philippines,” a briefing document reads. Police sources told The Daily Telegraph: “There’s areas down there that are very dangerous… [with] training camps and the like. It has become a well trodden path for Islamic State through South East Asia and into the Philippines ever since 2019.”

A rabbi’s plea

Just weeks ago, Chabad Rabbi Eli Schlanger had written a letter to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, urging him to support Israel: “As a rabbi in Sydney, I beg you not to betray the Jewish people and not God Himself. Jews have been torn from their land again and again by leaders who are now remembered with contempt in the pages of history. You have an opportunity to stand on the side of truth and justice. I congratulate you in advance for the courage to do what is right and stand firm against this act of heresy.”

The anti-Semitic kettle has been boiling for some time

Anti-Semitism is raising its head all across the globe. Many avert their gaze from this, justifying the oldest hatred with new-fangled terminology: “It’s not anti-Jewish – just anti-Zionist.” Considering that over 90% of all Jews are Zionists, such special pleading is obscene.

Here are five recent articles which have been shining a spotlight on the Frankenstein’s monster morphing in Australia:

He who hates God, hates His people

Anti-Semitism is metastasizing – not only in the Middle East and in Europe, but also in North America. This is sobering, even depressing – but it should not be surprising. Revelation 12  informs us that Satan has a priority focus on destroying the people who gave birth to the Messiah, and his Last Days attacks on the sons and daughters of Jacob will bring the mighty response of the Archangel Michael, who stands guard over the Jewish people and carries ‘the Jewish portfolio’ in the kingdom of God (Daniel 10:13;10:21; 12:1; Jude 9).

Here are some Scripture passages which give context and encouragement as we stand firm and fight the good fight:

 

The hunting season is open

Many years ago, the God of Jacob spoke to the prophet Jeremiah about a Last Days ‘hunting season’ coming upon the world, directed against the Jewish people: “Behold, I am going to send for many fishermen,” declares YHVH, “and they will fish for them. And afterward I will send for many hunters, and they will hunt them from every mountain and every hill and from the clefts of the rocks” (Jeremiah 16:16). The dragon of Revelation 12 attempts to close in on his hoped-for Jewish prey.

 

How shall we then pray?

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

To donate online visit: http://www.davidstent.org/give

   

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