Birth pangs in the midst of jihad

Fast-moving events are transfixing Israel this week. The bodies of three Jewish teenagers murdered by their Hamas kidnappers were discovered. Jihadi rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip have been smashing into Israeli kibbutzim and towns even as we go to press. Today Saudi Arabia announced that it has moved 30,000 soldiers to its border with Iraq, concerned about the jihadi onslaught rolling like thunder across Mesopotamian fields.

We are entering another season of ‘Bein hameitzarim’ (the period of the “Dire Straits’; see https://davidstent.com/a-perspective-on-disengagement-whats-lurking-in-the-fog/).

Hamas, The Muslim Brotherhood and Western pipe-dreams

The kidnapping of three Jewish teens nearly three weeks ago was carried out by a Hebron cell of Hamas terrorists, including Marwan Qawasmeh and Amer Abu Aisha (https://www.algemeiner.com/2014/07/01/the-murderous-qawasameh-tribe/). The Qawasmeh clan name has been connected for decades to Hamas-linked terror activities in the Hebron area.

The Hamas Hebron cell cleaves to the Hamas Charter, which allows for no acceptance of Israel, but rather its total annihilation by violent jihad (https://davidstent.com/hurtling-through-the-fog-of-war-a-messianic-perspective-on-the-new-hamastan/). Hamas is an Arabic acronym (HaMaS) for Harakat al-Muqawima al-Islamiyya, which means ‘The Islamic Resistance Movement.’

The Hamas Charter is copied from that of the Muslim Brotherhood – or Society of Muslim Brothers (Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin). “The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the wings of the Muslim Brothers (al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin) …the largest Islamic Movement in the modern era” (Hamas Charter, Article Two; in Raphael Israeli, “The Charter of Allah: The Platform of the Islamic Resistance Movement [Hamas]”, Y. Alexander and A. M. Foxman [eds.], The 1988-1989 Annual on Terrorism [Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1990], pp. 99-134; for the complete Charter text see www.acpr.org.il/resources/hamascharter.html).

The Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood have been more than forthright in their statements. However, some Westerners have obfuscated these clearly jihadi declarations and have attempted to alter their very violent features through political plastic surgery.

In June 2009 President Obama invited ten Muslim Brotherhood leaders (over then-ally and then-President Hosni Mubaraq’s strenuous objections) to his ‘New Beginnings’ speech at Islam’s “Oxford on the Nile,” the al-Azhar University founded in approximately 970 A.D. by the Fatimid dynasty.

Obama’s invitation led to the boosting of the Muslim Brotherhood’s (MB) international stature, the weakening of President Mubaraq’s standing within Egypt, the stirring up of MB jihadi revolution, and the overthrow of American ally Mubaraq and his replacement by a Muslim Brotherhood government. Today marks one year since the military counter-revolution of Egypt’s army, the jailing of Islamist MB leaders and the classification by the Egyptian government of the MB as a terrorist movement.

Metastasizing jihad

The Muslim Brotherhood initiated two assassination attempts against Egyptian leaders. On December 28, 1948 Egyptian Prime Minister, Mahmud Fahmi Nokrashi was gunned down by Brotherhood member Abdel Meguid Ahmed Hassan. On October 26, 1954 Muslim Brotherhood member Mohammed Abdel Latif attempted to assassinate President Gamel Abdel Nasser while Nasser was delivering a speech in Alexandria.

Over the years the Muslim Brotherhood metastasized into other Egyptian jihadi groups:

Western unbelief marries Western gullibility

American Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and New York Times Moscow bureau chief Walter Duranty wrote glowing articles praising Joseph Stalin in the 1920’s and 30’s – and all the while millions of Soviet citizens were being tortured, starved, jailed and shot.

Arthur Gelb, a veteran New York Times reporter and editor, stated in his memoir City Room, that during WWII Western media in general and the NYT in particular failed to adequately report on or put into perspective the Nazi intentions toward and slaughter of the Jewish people.

In a similar fashion Western post-Christians and secularists yawningly brush off Islamist declarations and actions, blithely dismissing jihadi threats from Tehran to Timbuktu, and from Gaziantep to Gaza. Since Western elites believe that the Bible is no longer intellectually defensible, they hypothesize that Islamists must feel the same way about the Quran and jihad. As a result, the elites’ ability to defend Western interests is effectively castrated, and they become unwitting apologists for jihad.

This is the world political scenario that has given birth of The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant or ISIL (in Arabic al-Dawlah al-Islāmīyah fī al-ʻIrāq wa-al-Shām or‎ Dāʻish) – a group spiritually connected with al Qa’eda, and having a common Muslim Brotherhood paternity. Western unbelief and gullibility has led to the slow collapse of linchpin US Middle East strategies.

Juggernauts in keffiyehs

A face-off is happening in the boxing arena known as the Middle East. Two Islamist juggernauts are both wearing keffiyehs – the traditional Middle Eastern headdress (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keffiyeh). In the green Shiite trunks is the Islamic Republic of Iran, while in the black Sunni trunks is the ISIL. It is a fight to the finish. The prize? Control of Islam, the honor of spearheading jihad, and geopolitical control of the world’s oil spigots.

In a recent article “Surviving Chaos: Israel needs to prepare for a wholesale breakdown of the Middle East” (www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2014/06/20/israel-needs-a-plan-to-deal-with-middle-east-chaos) Professor Louis René Beres of Purdue University states that “ongoing turmoil in the Middle East, especially in Iraq and Syria, signals potentially catastrophic regional transformations.”

Turkey and Qatar have been betting on the Muslim Brotherhood and ISIL, while Saudi Arabia and Jordan are beefing up defenses on their common borders with Iraq.

As the Middle East hiccups and bursts into flame, it is important to understand how Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood fit into this overall picture

Strange bedfellows

The leaderships of Egypt, Jordan, Israel, Saudi Arabia and the PLO all have something in common – they see the Muslim Brotherhood as an immediate threat to regional security.

All of these recognize that in each case the MB wants to overthrow current leadership and establish an Islamist dictatorship in its place. As a result, all are willing to work together for limited purposes, but quietly. It is not a matter of “kiss and tell,” but rather  “kiss and don’t tell.” There is temporary unity among these players regarding a cooperative effort to blunt the edge of Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Nevertheless, Saudi Arabia and the PLO (more commonly known today as the Palestinian Authority or PA) have no love for Israel and they are simultaneously supporting efforts to destroy the Jewish state.

The PA still adheres to the PLO National Charter or Covenant, which calls for unchangeable armed conflict between the Palestinians and Israel. (https://unispal.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/853668C3E95F8E068525785500565876). On this point, little separates the PA from Hamas, for the same spiritual network of Islamist and jihadi veins runs through the aortal arteries of all the players – Hamas, the PA, Iran, Saudi Arabia, etc., as well as through their source documents in the Quran and the Hadith.

The words of the ancient Jewish Psalmist still have substance in describing Middle East realities: “Woe is me, for I sojourn in Meshech, for I dwell among the tents of Kedar! Too long has my soul had its dwelling with those who hate peace. I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war” (Psalm 120:5-7).

Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad – the enemy of my enemy

There is a Middle-Eastern proverb, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” The enmity between Shi’ite and Sunni Islam goes back to the gnarled roots of the Muslim faith.

Shi’ite jihadi forces have been gradually uniting over the past decades, and right now a massive constellation of Shi’ite power is getting the international spotlight.

Iran and its Revolutionary Guards are subsidizing and arming:

It is also lending military expertise and funneling missiles to Gaza’s Sunni Islamic Jihad. In times past it has even supported Sunni Hamas, and surreptitious links may well be in the offing again.

During the forty days of Ramadan jihadi fervor rises to a boiling point, for it is considered especially meritorious to engage in jihadi attacks at this time (https://en.alukah.net/Thoughts_Knowledge/0/507/).

As Hamas and the Palestinian Authority vie for the hearts and minds of Palestinians, street violence and rioting against Israeli security forces is being encouraged. This weakens the PA’s influence in Judea and Samaria (the ‘West Bank’) and gains brownie points for Hamas, which is on the ropes both in Gaza and in the West Bank (www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/04/islamic-jihad-support-gaza-expense-hamas.html).

The Hamas kidnapping

On the evening of June 12, Amer Abu Aisha was seen by his parents dancing at a wedding in Hebron. He disappeared soon after, just a few hours before three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped at the Alon Shvut bus stop just north of Hebron (www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/07/01/the-men-israel-blames-for-the-deaths-of-israeli-teenagers-and-their-violent-family-history/).

According to the Israeli Shin Bet (equivalent to FBI), Marwan Qawasmeh and Abu Aisha obtained a Hyundai i35 with Israeli plates (stolen from Israel a few months earlier), dressed themselves in Jewish Orthodox clothing and were playing an Israeli radio program on the car stereo when they pulled up to the bus stop and offered the three teenagers a lift. As soon as the kids entered the car, they were beaten and threatened with pistols. Sixteen year old Gilad She’ar managed to call the police emergency line and whispered, “They have kidnapped me.” The call was recorded on the police hotline.

That tape was broadcast on Israeli television yesterday. On the recording one can hear the enraged terrorists yelling at the teenagers upon discovering the phone call, and then one can hear shots ringing out, and quickly fading groans. The terrorists then speak on the phone to their Hamas handler, announcing that “We are bringing you three!” They then are heard singing exultantly in Arabic, and the driver says to the shooter, “May Allah bless your hands!”

Within minutes of the kidnapping all three teenagers were dead. The terrorists transferred the bodies to another car, and burned the first car in a cave near Dura, southwest of Hebron.  They drove the bodies to a field owned by the Qawasmeh family northwest of Hebron near the Green Line, and buried the bodies in a hastily dug shallow grave. Then they disappeared.

For eighteen days the IDF, the Shin Bet, the Israeli Police and local Israeli hiking guides searched for the boys and the terrorists, discovering a sandal on Thursday June 26, eyeglasses on Sunday morning, and finally the bodies on Monday evening. Their joint funeral was a day of national mourning, attended by over 50,000.

Palestinian street response

When the Twin Towers were destroyed in an al Qa’eda terror attack on 9/11, Palestinians were photographed dancing for joy and handing out celebratory sweets in East Jerusalem, Ramallah, Nablus and in Lebanon.

In the same way, local Palestinians responded to the kidnapping of three Jewish teenagers with festive celebrations in many Arab towns like Bir Zeit (Ramallah area) and Gaza (www.jewishpress.com/news/arabs-celebrating-kidnapping-of-jewish-boys/2014/06/14/).

Within a short time, Palestinians across the West Bank began to use a new ‘three-finger salute’ – expressing joy that Hamas had kidnapped three Jews this time, whereas with Hamas’ kidnapping of Gilad Shalit there had only been one soldier in captivity.

Selfies by Palestinian children were posted on social media, and a spirit of joy seemed to fill large sections of the Palestinian street (see Ezekiel 36:5 for the phrase “wholehearted joy and scorn of soul”).

Rockets for dessert

With the discovery of the bodies, different jihadi groups in Gaza increased rocket fire into Israeli civilian population centers, including kibbutzim, villages and towns. Not that rocket attacks are new – as Noam Bedein of the Sderot Media Center notes, since the end of the IDF’s Operation Pillar of Defense (November 14-21, 2012) up to June 30, 2014, over 300 rocket or mortar attacks have been launched against southern Israel from Gaza (www.jpost.com/Opinion/Op-Ed-Contributors/Personal-encounters-with-a-ball-of-fire-in-Sderot-361313). But there has definitely been a marked and radical upswing in the past four days. Forty have been fired in the last 24 hours.

ü  Pray that the terrorist hands and weapons will be blunted and destroyed, and that jihadi forces will be vanquished

ü  Pray for the safety of Jewish people in the villages, towns and kibbutzim surrounding Gaza, including believers in Yeshua who live there

ü  Continued rocket attacks may lead to the necessity of a large-scale land incursion into Gaza. Pray for wisdom and God’s strategies for decision-makers.

Copycat kidnapping?

Over the past 24 hours, there has been a sobering new development – the kidnapping and murder of a 16-year old Arab teenager from Shu’afat, a suburb north of Jerusalem. Muhammad Hussein Abu Khdeir was seized by unknown assailants near his house at approximately 0300 hours Wednesday morning. His charred body was found a few hours later by police in the Jerusalem Forest (www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4537002,00.html).

The Israeli police sprang into action, and an intensive investigation is underway. An autopsy has just been completed. Within a day or two, more solid information should be available. The murder could have been carried out as a revenge killing by Jewish extremists.

The Talmud asks a question, “Whose blood is redder?” In other words, when innocent life is in question, there can be no justification for murder.

At the same time, it is instructive to note that world media is giving Abu Khdeir’s kidnapping much more press and sympathy than it did to that of the murdered Jewish teenagers. World media is drawing a twisted moral equivalence between what is standard behavior for Islamic terrorists, and what is rare and unusual behavior for Jewish people.

This is like positing a moral equivalence between firefighter and arsonist. Some call this ‘dancing on the blood of the victims.’ It is a disgrace for anyone to lend a hand to such arguments.

Israeli infighting

Over the past two weeks, some Israeli leftists opposed to Jews living in Judea and Samaria (these people do not accept the Hebraic prophetic vision of the restoration of the Jewish people to their land – if that land is in the West Bank) have verbally attacked Jews who live over the Green Line (in the West Bank) and have said that ‘settlers’ only have themselves to blame for being kidnapped. Even a few Israeli Messianic believers have recently come out expressing empathy for the Arab kidnap victim while remaining silent regarding the three Jewish teenagers murdered by Hamas.

The dynamics here of pointing the finger in accusation against our own people (see Isaiah 58:9; Deuteronomy 19:16; Zechariah 3:1; Galatians 5:15; Jeremiah 30:16) is something to be avoided at all costs, especially during this season of Dire Straits. There is no value in justifying the murderous actions of our enemies, any more than there is in justifying the rape of women or racist attacks.

Pray for the Jewish people, that we will not accuse one another but seek our God in brokenheartedness and repentance

Pray for our enemies, that God would grant them a spirit of repentance

Pray for the salvation of Israel, that we as a nation might step into our prophesied calling

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal) through: www.davidstent.org

Running with the footmen

The Middle East is in flames. Scenes reminiscent of a second Vietnam flicker on the TV screens of the world.  Jihadi forces that Israel has been combating for nearly a century are swarming like zombies over the walls and borders of Syria, Iraq and Jordan – colonial boundaries established by Britain and France at the close of World War One (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sykes%E2%80%93Picot_Agreement ).

Sunni jihad warriors, or mujahidin, (the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria or ISIS – a group spiritually connected with al Qa’eda; in Arabic al-Dawlah al-Islāmīyah fī al-ʻIrāq wa-al-Shām or‎ Dāʻish ) have demolished border checkpoints between Syria and Iraq, (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/22/isis-take-border-crossings-iraq-syria-jordan) and are poised at the gateways to Jordan. Their current leader is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and their clear goal is the establishment of a jihadi Caliphate across the entire Middle East as a prelude to conquering the world under the black jihadi banner of Mohammed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State_in_Iraq_and_the_Levant).

Shi’ite mujahidin, guided by their Iranian puppet-masters, are streaming into Iraq from both Iran (Iranian Revolutionary Guards) and Lebanon (Hezbollah). Shi’ite religious leader Sayyid Muqtada al-Sadr in Iraq is once again raising up the Mahdi army (Jaish al-Mahdi or JAM, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahdi_Army). Mahdi is a last days Shi’ite apocalyptic term referring to the Armageddon-like appearance of a Shi’ite messianic conqueror. This army originally spearheaded the first major Shi’ite armed confrontation against U.S.-led forces in Iraq, making use of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) which owed much of their technological sophistication to the Irish Republican Army’s expertise and Iranian production.

A time for war

“There is an appointed time for everything, and there is a time for every event under heaven. A time to kill…a time to throw stones …a time to tear apart…a time to hate…a time for war” (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8). In the Middle East this is a time for war.

This war plays Arab against Arab, Muslim against Muslim, jihadi against jihadi. The murder and violence has spilled over into Africa, where groups like Al-Qa'ida in the Islamic Maghreb (also known as AQIM or Tanẓīm al-Qā‘idah fī Bilād al-Maghrib al-Islāmī; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Qaeda_in_the_Islamic_Maghreb), Boko Haram (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boko_Haram), Al-Shabaab (also known as HSM or Ḥarakat ash-Shabāb al-Mujāhidīn; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Shabaab_(militant_group), and others are involved in mass kidnappings murders, bombing of churches and civilian targets, etc.

The jihadi theology that energizes these attacks is clearly stated in the source documents of Islam – in the Quran and the Hadith (Islamic religious authoritative traditions – see https://davidstent.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/a_perspective_on_islam.pdf). Those same writings call for jihad against the Jewish people and perpetual enmity between faithful Muslims and ‘Jewish unbelievers.’ Though these facts are considered not politically correct and are assiduously avoided by most Western politicians, they are abundantly clear to Middle Easterners, and are referenced by jihadists on a daily basis.

One recent example occurred on May 23, 2014 where the Hizb al-Tahrir terror group held a rally on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem beside the Dome of the Rock, calling for jihad against the Jewish state (https://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/4290.htm; https://www.memritv.org/clip/en/4290.htm).

The fifth column and the sixth pillar

During the Spanish Civil War in 1936, a Nationalist General Emilio Mola said that as his four columns of troops approached Madrid, a ‘fifth column’ of supporters inside the city would support him and undermine the Republican government from within. The term ‘fifth column’ became a byword for sedition and disloyalty. The term was used during the Cold War to describe sleeper cells of Communist spies in the USA or in British counter-intelligence.

Traditional Islam holds to five pillars (www.saudiembassy.net/about/country-information/Islam/five_pillars_of_Islam.aspx), though this classification is based not on the Quran but the Hadith. These essentials include:

Armed jihad is considered an essential obligation in the Quran and the Hadith, based on Mohammed’s original words.  https://wikiislam.net/wiki/Jihad_is_Compulsory_(Fard) .

Hamas and the sixth pillar of Islam

The jihadi group Hamas (Harakat al-Muqawima al-Islamiyya, or ‘The Islamic Resistance Movement’; see https://davidstent.com/hurtling-through-the-fog-of-war-a-messianic-perspective-on-the-new-hamastan/) is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood (Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin). Its covenantal constitution calls for the following jihad against Israel:

The marriage of Hamas and the PLO

The leadership of the PLO (Yasser Arafat’s terror group, now re-formed as the Palestinian Authority and al-Fatah, originally called Ḥarakat al-Taḥrīr al-Waṭanī al-Filasṭīnī) has joined with Hamas to create a new Palestinian unity government. Since Al-Fatah has continued to be involved in terrorism through its military wing al-Tanzim (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanzim; www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/fatah-tanzim.htm), both partners in this unholy matrimony are in fact committed to terrorism. The only difference is that Hamas is more forthright and truthful in its declarations.

“Do two men walk together unless they have made an appointment? Does a lion roar in the forest when he has no prey? Does a young lion growl from his den unless he has captured something? Does a bird fall into a trap on the ground when there is no bait in it? Does a trap spring up from the earth when it captures nothing at all?” (Amos 3:3-5).

Using the fig-leaf of the Palestinian Authority’s ‘peace partner’ reputation, Hamas is trying to leverage its new status to free itself from the chains of its pariah status as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (https://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/other/des/123085.htm).

“Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots? Then you also can do good who are accustomed to doing evil” (Jeremiah 13:23).

Matchmaker, matchmaker make me a match

Political leaders in the West immediately jumped over themselves in enthusiasm to recognize the hybrid hydra called the Palestinian unity government. Rather than seeing the subterfuge and calling it by name, they exerted pressure on Israel to “give peace a chance.” The words of the prophet Ezekiel come to mind:

“It is definitely because they have misled My people by saying, ‘Peace!’ when there is no peace. And when anyone builds a wall, behold, they plaster it over with whitewash; so tell those who plaster it over with whitewash, that it will fall. A flooding rain will come, and you, O hailstones, will fall; and a violent wind will break out. Behold, when the wall has fallen, will you not be asked, ‘Where is the plaster with which you plastered it?” Thus I will spend My wrath on the wall and on those who have plastered it over with whitewash; and I will say to you, ‘The wall is gone and its plasterers are gone, along with the prophets …who prophesy to Jerusalem, and who see visions of peace for her when there is no peace,’ declares YHVH God” (Ezekiel 13:10-12, 16)

A time to prepare for war

In the days of the prophet Jeremiah, God issued a warning and a rebuke to the political leaders of his day. “If you have run with footmen and they have tired you out, then how can you compete with horses?” (Jeremiah 12:5). Jeremiah basically was saying that warfare and spiritual pressure were about to increase in the Middle East, and that Israel’s leadership needed to realize this and prepare. Now is not the time for counterfeit peace processes or for compromising with jihadi murderers.

For the past two weeks the nation of Israel has been on lockdown. Three young teenagers who studied at Orthodox Jewish Bible schools were kidnapped by a Hamas gang working out of the Hebron area. Their names are Naftali Fraenkel (age 16, an American citizen), Gilad Sha’er (also 16) and Eyal Yifrach (19). They were seized while waiting at a bus stop where people often hitchhike, near Tekoa, the hometown of the prophet Amos.

Senior Hamas official Ismail al-Ashkar declared in an official statement to the Hamas weekly al-Risala (regarding the kidnapping of the three teenagers), “The kidnapping is a great honor we can neither confirm nor deny” (www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4533168,00.html).

Yet Hamas has made no secret about their previous kidnappings of Israelis:

Over the past two weeks 3,000 Israeli soldiers have put a cordon sanitaire around the Greater Hebron area, going house to house, basement to basement and well to well, literally leaving no stone unturned in their search for the three teenagers and the terror gang holding them hostage. There are dark concerns regarding the lives of these three kids. As well, radical elements within the Arab communities are inciting Molotov cocktail attacks and rioting against patrols of IDF soldiers.

As the enemy rages and as terror raises its ugly head again in Israel,

“For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not keep quiet, until her righteousness goes forth like brightness, and her salvation like a torch that is burning…On your walls, O Jerusalem, I have appointed watchmen. All day and all night they will never keep silent. You who remind the Lord, take no rest for yourselves, until He establishes and makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth” (Isaiah 62:1,6-7).

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal) through: www.davidstent.org

Rumble in Nineveh

This past week has seen the collapse of central U.S. strategies in the Middle East. Ayatollah Khomeini’s fateful plane ride from Paris to Tehran in 1979 generated a spiritual earthquake in the region. Current events in Iraq are a similar major shock.

The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS – a group spiritually connected with al Qa’eda) have taken over Iraq’s second largest city Mosul, as well as Tiqrit, Saddam Hussein’s ancestral town. They have stampeded over a half million mostly Muslim refugees who have fled from before the black flags of jihad, The jihadi convoys of captured American Humvees leave bloody trails of decapitated opponents in their wake. Nineveh, once ancient Assyria’s proud capitol city, has witnessed Christians fleeing for their lives and shari’a law being imposed with much savagery (https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/iraq-isis-crisis-medieval-sharia-law-imposed-millions-nineveh-province-1452401).

The ISIS now controls vast swaths of territory in both Syria and Iraq. Its goal is to establish a jihadi caliphate in both countries and then to spread al Qa’eda  influence further across the entire Middle East.

The U.S. invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan had different original goals originally – the establishment of a threefold cord – Western democracy, a solid economy and a pro-Western military power. This week all three of those pillars have shattered.

Rather than Iraq turning to Americans for military support, they have invited Iran’s top Shi’ite Major General Qassem Suleimani (the head of the Quds Force arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards) who touched down in Baghdad this week. His job – to help oversee the defense of Iraq’s Shi’ite government from the Sunni jihad forces of ISIS (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/14/iran-iraq-isis-fight-militants-nouri-maliki).

Iraq is shuddering in the gory throes of a religious and civil war, one which pits jihadi (Iran’s Shi’ites) against jihadi (al Qa’eda’s Sunnis). Western dreams of peace, prosperity and economic windfall have vanished like a desert scirocco. The 2003 military defeat of Saddam Hussein has fatefully led to this writhing Middle Eastern can of worms – one that threatens to engulf the entire region is flames.

Asleep at the wheel

Yet on Wednesday on this same week, just hours before this news broke, U.S. President Obama spoke to David Karp, CEO of Tumbler at a White House interview:

“And if there’s one message I want to deliver to young people like a Tumblr audience is, don’t get cynical. Guard against cynicism. I mean, the truth of the matter is that for all the challenges we face, all the problems that we have, if you had to be – if you had to choose any moment to be born in human history, not knowing what your position was going to be, who you were going to be, you’d choose this time. The world is less violent than it has ever been. It is healthier than it has ever been. It is more tolerant than it has ever been. It is better fed then it’s ever been. It is more educated than it’s ever been” (www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/06/11/obama_the_world_is_less_violent_than_it_has_ever_been.html).

One is reminded of the quiet observation of William Ralph Inge, former Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, “It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism, while the wolf remains of a different opinion.”

The Scriptures are full of references to being asleep while on duty. Jonah slept during the storm (Jonah 1:5), while the shepherds of Assyria (to whom Jonah was sent) were also lost in slumber (Nahum 3:18).

Israel’s leaders were sometimes caught snoring in the middle of crisis: “For the Lord has poured over you a spirit of deep sleep, He has shut your eyes, the prophets; And He has covered your heads, the seers” (Isaiah 29:10). “His watchmen are blind, all of them know nothing. All of them are mute dogs unable to bark, dreamers lying down, who love to slumber” (Isaiah 56:10).

Nahum and Nineveh

Though Assyria was once the world’s greatest superpower, a God’s-eye view shows that this mighty nation was being weighed in the balances and found wanting. The prophet Nahum pronounced judgment upon Nineveh and Assyria for ignoring Israel, and for weakening and harming His chosen Jewish people. In God’s foreign policy department dissing the Jews is a big no-no.

Nahum described Nineveh’s heart as prideful and boastful, and declared that even its military prowess would not protect Assyria when it violated God’s prophetic ways. The judgment of YHVH, the Day of the Lord, was on its way.

Today the nations of the world still “mock the words of God, despise His words and scoff at the prophetic message” (Jeremiah 28:8). This is especially true concerning scriptural teaching concerning the chosenness of the Jewish people, their restoration to their Promised land, and their salvation. God informs us that His prophetic word still has supreme relevance. The words of God are not only targeted at those who congregate within ‘holy buildings.’ They are also aimed at the hearts of the world’s political and religious leaders.

God’s prophetic perspectives on world events have been around for a long time – “from ancient times…(prophetic words have been directed) against many lands and against great kingdoms, regarding war and of calamity and of pestilence” (Jeremiah 28:8).

The Bible has great relevance to us in these challenging days. It offers us clarity, perspective and strategy – for individuals and governments. It is very important to wake up and take hold of what the word of God is saying about current events and those soon-coming down the turnpike.

When you gonna wake up?

Bob Dylan once said, “When you gonna wake up and strengthen the things that remain?” These words remind us of two scriptures:

“Wake up, and strengthen the things that remain, which were about to die; for I have not found your deeds completed in the sight of My God” (Revelation 3:2).

“But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light, for everything that becomes visible is light. For this reason it says, ‘Awake, sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Messiah will shine on you.’ Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil. So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is” (Ephesians 5:13-17).

Yeshua said to His disciples “Why are you sleeping? Get up and pray that you may not enter into temptation” (Luke 22:46).

As the enemy rages in Iraq, Syria and Iran, and as terror raises its ugly head again in Israel,

“On your walls, O Jerusalem, I have appointed watchmen. All day and all night they will never keep silent. You who remind the Lord, take no rest for yourselves, until He establishes and makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth” (Isaiah 62:6).

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal) through: www.davidstent.org

Blood moons and prophetic confusion

The prophetic significance of the four lunar eclipses occurring on Jewish biblical feast days in 2014-15 has become a recent focus on the internet and even a best seller on Amazon. A few voices are suggesting that the so-called ‘blood moons’ are a portent of earth-shaking prophetic significance regarding the Jewish people.

The first of these ‘tetrads’ (a grouping of four – in this case, four lunar eclipses) kicks off on the first night of Passover next week. Here are some reflections on this subject.

How many tetrads?

Though only four specific eclipses are the main focus of these discussions, there are actually hundreds of examples of these tetrads available, and nearly all of them are passed over in silence by the advocates of the current ‘blood moon’ teaching, since 99% of these do not even come close to any major events in Jewish history.

Which major events in Jewish history are marked by ‘blood moons’?

Jewish history has seen many tragedies and victories. Haman’s potential campaign of Persian genocide, the destructions of the First and Second Temples, the defeat of the Syrian Greeks by the Maccabees, Bogdan Chmelniecki’s massacres of Ukrainian Jews, the Holocaust – these were all events of great magnitude. None had blood moon authentication or warning.

The three events currently being focused on in most of the ‘blood moons’ discussion concern –

-- the Jewish aspects of the Inquisition (beginning in 1478 in Spain, and 1536 in Portugal, and continuing until 1821-26) with emphasis on the exile of Spanish Jewry in 1492,

-- the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948,

-- the liberation of Jerusalem during the Six-Day War in 1967.

Why these three events are chosen seems clear: they are the only major Jewish events that fall somewhat close to lunar tetrads.

Are these ‘blood moons’ really connected to any major events in Jewish history?

The lunar tetrads in question actually appeared after the events described – between ten months and sixteen years later! Therefore these ‘blood moons’ were not warnings at all but, as it were, ‘prophecies after the fact.’

The advocates of the current ‘blood moons’ teaching use special pleading in arguing why a lunar eclipse in 1949 is actually connected to 1948, or why a ‘blood moon’ in 1494 is connected to 1492, etc.

Mystical misunderstanding concerning the biblical Jewish calendar

The only calendar given by YHVH is what is commonly called the Jewish calendar; “YHVH spoke again to Moses, saying, ‘Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, YHVH’s appointed times which you shall proclaim as holy convocations – My appointed times are these’” (Leviticus 23:1-2).  The telling of time was based on the lunar calendar (Number 29:6), and one feast (Trumpets) falls on the new moon while Passover and Tabernacles falls on or close to the full moon (“Blow the trumpet at the new moon, at the full moon, on our feast day. For it is a statute for Israel, an ordinance of the God of Jacob”; Psalm 81:3-4)

So it is not surprising that a full moon might occur on a Jewish feast day. Nevertheless, the overwhelming majority of lunar eclipses do not fall on Jewish feast days and have nothing to do with significant events in Jewish history. Once one inserts these facts into the discussion, there is nearly no more need for intelligent discussion on the matter.

Are these ‘blood moons’ connected with a fulfilment of Joel’s prophecy?

The prophetic passages dealing with the moon turning to blood are Isaiah 13:9-11; 24:21-23; Ezekiel 32:1-10; Joel 2:10-12, 28-32; 3:12-17; Matthew 24:29-30; Acts 2:12-21; Revelation 6:12-16. One of these is specific to a localized judgment on Egypt, but the rest of the contexts deal with the final events on Planet Earth immediately preceding the return of Messiah Yeshua.

The context in these passages involves:

-- An international time of severe judgment known as “The Day of the Lord”

-- The darkening of sun, moon and stars – a simultaneous total blackout or gray-out

-- The moon turning as red as blood

-- A full multinational anti-Jewish military invasion of Israel

-- Worldwide earthquakes of unprecedented magnitude

Next week’s miniscule pinkish-orange discoloration of the moon falls way short of the stunning biblical context described in these scriptural texts.

 Is this truly a sign to Israel if the ‘blood moons’ are not visible in Israel?

According to NASA the lunar tetrads will not be visible over the skies of Jerusalem. So how then could these possibly be a sign to Israel?

One wag once said, “A specialist is someone fifty miles away from home.”

A fly in the ointment

One of the individuals associated with the ‘blood moon’ theory has had many of his teachings recorded and broadcast on public media. For some years he has denied that Yeshua ever claimed to be the Messiah; therefore the Jewish leadership of Yeshua’s day never rejected His Messiahship (he claimed). He also is on public record as stating that the Jewish people already have a covenant with God, and therefore do not need to accept the Messiah that Christians preach.

“Dead flies make a perfumer’s oil stink. So a little foolishness is weightier than wisdom and honor.” (Ecclesiastes 10:1)

Biblical perspectives on the moon

The Scriptures have some helpful things to say about heavenly signs and even about the moon,

“Then God said, ‘Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth;’  and it was so. God made the two great lights, the greater light to govern the day, and the lesser light to govern the night; He made the stars also. God placed them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to govern the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness; and God saw that it was good. There was evening and there was morning, a fourth day” (Genesis 1:14-19).

“He made the moon to mark the seasons, and the sun knows when to go down” (Psalm 104:19).

God’s sovereign creative power and order is seen in the created heavens: “Yours is the day, Yours also is the night; You have prepared the light and the sun. You have established all the boundaries of the earth. You have made summer and winter.” (Psalm 74:16-17).

The existence and procession of the moon through the skies is a spiritual sign that the nations recognize: “They who dwell in the ends of the earth stand in awe of Your signs. You make the dawn and the sunset shout for joy” (Psalm 65:8).

The phases of the moon are a nearly incredible expression of His power and glory: “He covers the face of the full moon, spreading his clouds over it … How faint the whisper we hear of him! Who then can understand the thunder of his power?” (Job 26:9-14).

The constancy of rhythm of the moon is seen as a prophetic reflection of God’s covenant faithfulness to David and to his dynasty: “I will not take My love from him, nor will I ever betray My faithfulness. I will not violate My covenant or alter what My lips have uttered. Once for all, I have sworn by My holiness – and I will not lie to David – that his line will continue forever and his throne endure before me like the sun. It will be established forever like the moon, the faithful witness in the sky” (Psalm 89:33-37).

The moon is not only a stopwatch marking out God’s time and His order; it is the basis of the biblical calendar and an expression of God’s majesty. It is a sign in the heavens that causes us all to wonder.

Some in the world are wondering about what the ‘blood moons’ may mean this Passover. They do not mean a fulfilment of Joel, nor do they specifically portend powerful eschatological events concerning the Jewish people. About those the Bible already has a huge amount to say.

Finger-pointing and prophecy

An ancient Chinese sage once spoke a parable concerning the dynamics of apprehending truth. He noted that when someone points at an object with his finger, people tend to focus on the finger before they focus on the object in question. Some even develop an obsessive focus on the finger and do not benefit from learning what the finger itself is pointing at.

In the same way, unbalanced emphasis on the ‘blood moon’ teaching could end up skewing important biblical focuses – for instance, the amazing process of restoration of Israel to their Promised Land and their Messiah; the rising violent opposition  of the nations to the Jewish people, their restoration and their God; the final harvest of the nations; the coming judgment of God and the return of David’s Greater Son the King of the Jews.

As we enter into the Passover season, let any fears we may have about cataclysmic blood moons subside, and let us wait on God for Him to reveal His mighty hand and outstretched forearm – even as did Moses and the Sons of Israel on the shores of the Red Sea,

For further background I encourage you to listen to Chris White’s helpful 12 minute link on YouTube at https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=--kA2-5z2zI&sns=fb

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal) through: www.davidstent.org

Drowning with Pharaoh’s army

As Passover quickly approaches, Jewish homes are filled with preparation – removing leaven, buying matzot and holiday food, girding up for the festive onslaught of guests. Visions of films like The Ten Commandments and Prince of Egypt dance through the heads of many Jewish boys and girls, while others dread the thought of having to gulp down more gefilte fish and horseradish.

The old spiritual “O Mary don’t you weep” (www.lyrics.net/lyric/18506566) recalls the nail biting moment when the cream of Pharaoh’s army got buried in the roiling waters of the Red Sea (In Exodus 15:4 the Hebrew word yam suf is used – the Reed Sea). This climactic moment made a deep impression on the prophet Isaiah. In his biblical scroll he describes waters at least twelve times – both to prophesy God’s future judgments on Israel’s enemies, as well as to declare how YHVH will use the splitting of the seas to accomplish mighty works of deliverance for His Jewish people.

Pressure on Israel continues to increase from the nations. This includes –

It would be beneficial to chew on Isaiah’s words at this season in the Spirit.

Sky of blue and sea of green

In ancient days the sea was a symbol of anarchy, spiritual evil and rebellion against God’s created order, a place where potentially mortal danger lurked. Isaiah even connects the satanic dragon’s (Revelation 12:9) home base with the sea: “In that day YHVH will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent with His fierce and great and mighty sword – even Leviathan the twisted serpent. And He will kill the dragon who is in the sea” (Isaiah 27:1).

Those who are wicked and rebel against God and His ways are described as muck and slime on a raging sea, “But the wicked are like the tossing sea, for it cannot be quiet, and its waters toss up refuse and mud. There is no peace, says my God, for the wicked” (Isaiah 57:19-20).

The raging of the nations against the God of Israel is prophetically contrasted to the waves of an uncontrolled sea storm, “Alas, the uproar of many peoples who roar like the roaring of the seas, and the rumbling of nations who rush on like the rumbling of mighty waters! The nations rumble on like the rumbling of many waters, but He will rebuke them and they will flee far away, and be chased like chaff in the mountains before the wind, or like whirling dust before a gale” (Isaiah 17:12-13; also Psalm 65:7).

Stir it up

The God of Israel, YHVH, is the Creator of all, and all is subject to Him – including the seemingly uncontrollable sea (Revelation 10:6). When God established His divine order over this planet, He established divine boundaries and creative order. “Should you not fear me? declares YHVH. Should you not tremble in My presence? I made the sand a boundary for the sea, an everlasting barrier it cannot cross. The waves may roll, but they cannot prevail. They may roar, but they cannot cross it” (Jeremiah 5:22; also Job 38:8-11; Psalm 93:3-4; Proverbs 8:29).

Yet God not only absolutely controls the seas and the raging nations; He also stirs them up for His own strategic purposes at His own calibrated times. “For I am YHVH your God, who stirs up the sea and its waves roar (YHVH of armies is His name). I have put My words in your mouth and have covered you with the shadow of My hand, to establish the heavens, to found the earth, and to say to Zion, ‘You are My people.’” (Isaiah 51:15).

Daniel’s prophetic dream says much the same thing: “I was looking in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea. And four great beasts were coming up from the sea, different from one another” (Daniel 7:2-3). God uses His angelic messengers to stir up the nations and to even raise up beastly superpowers to wreak havoc on the earth.

Out of the sea comes the anti-Messiah of the superpowers, commonly known as the beast. “And the dragon stood on the sand of the seashore. Then I saw a beast coming up out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads, and on his horns were ten diadems, and on his heads were blasphemous names. And the beast which I saw was like a leopard, and his feet were like those of a bear, and his mouth like the mouth of a lion. And the dragon gave him his power and his throne and great authority” (Revelation 13:1-2).

Put your hand in the hand of the Man who stills the waters

When evil powers (whether Assyrian, Babylonian or modern) rise up to destroy God’s chosen people and lay waste their land, the Sovereign Lord prophesies that He will dry up their rebellion and anarchy, even as He dried up the Red Sea in the days of Moses and Pharaoh (Isaiah 63:11-13):

“Therefore thus says YHVH of armies, O My people who dwell in Zion, do not fear the Assyrian who strikes you with the rod and lifts up his staff against you, the way Egypt did. For in a very little while My indignation against you will be spent and My anger will be directed to their destruction. YHVH of armies will arouse a scourge against him like the slaughter of Midian at the rock of Orev; and His staff will be over the sea and He will lift it up the way He did in Egypt” (Isaiah 10:24-26).

“I YHVH am the Maker of all things, stretching out the heavens by Myself and spreading out the earth all alone, … confirming the word of His servant and performing the purpose of His messengers. It is I who says of Jerusalem, ‘She shall be inhabited!’ and of the cities of Judah, ‘They shall be built.’ And I will raise up her ruins again. It is I who says to the depth of the sea, ‘Be dried up!’ and I will make your rivers dry… (ed. It is I who) declares of Jerusalem, ‘She will be built,’ and of the Temple, ‘Your foundation will be laid.’” (Isaiah 44:24-28; also Isaiah 50:2).

The Second Exodus

The God of Jacob’s deliverance from Pharaoh was not only one of the most powerful events in history. It is also a prophetic paradigm of how YHVH will deliver the Jewish people from the hatred of Satan, the cruelty of the nations and the indifference of slumbering believers. A Second Exodus for Israel, one even greater than the first, is yet in store and is fast approaching. It will also involve mighty miracles and earth-shaking deliverances.

“Awake, awake! Put on strength, O Arm of YHVH! Awake as in the days of old, the generations of long ago. Was it not You who cut Rahab in pieces, who pierced the dragon? Was it not You who dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep – who made the depths of the sea a pathway for the redeemed to cross over? So the ransomed of YHVH will return and come with joyful shouting to Zion, and everlasting joy will be on their heads. They will obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing will flee away.” (Isaiah 51:9-11).

“Then it will happen on that day that YHVH will again recover the second time with His hand the remnant of His people, who will remain – from Assyria, Egypt, Pathros, Cush, Elam, Shinar, Hamath, and from the islands of the sea. And He will lift up a standard for the nations and assemble the banished ones of Israel, and will gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth … And YHVH will utterly destroy the tongue of the Sea of Egypt. And He will wave His hand over the River with His scorching wind. And He will strike it into seven streams and make men walk over dry-shod. And there will be a highway from Assyria for the remnant of His people who will be left, just as there was for Israel in the day that they came up out of the land of Egypt” (Isaiah 11:11-15).

Don’t look back

“Thus says YHVH who makes a way through the sea and a path through the mighty waters, who brings forth the chariot and the horse, the army and the mighty man – they will lie down together and not rise again; they have been quenched and extinguished like a wick – Do not call to mind the former things, or ponder things of the past. Behold, I will do something new. Now it will spring forth. Will you not be aware of it? I will even make a roadway in the wilderness, rivers in the desert. The beasts of the field will glorify Me, the jackals and the ostriches – because I have given waters in the wilderness and rivers in the desert to give drink to My chosen people. The people whom I formed for Myself will declare My praise” (Isaiah 43:16-21).

Now you sea it, now you don’t

After the entire Jewish nation returns to its land (Ezekiel 39:28-29), Messiah Yeshua will rule over them and over all the nations for a thousand years, sitting on the Throne of David (Amos 9:11) in Jerusalem. At the conclusion of the Messianic age, mankind will then enter into the eternal order (the time of the New Jerusalem), where all rebellion ceases. Interestingly, the prophet tells us that in that day there will no longer be rebel nations and there will no longer exist a churning and thrashing sea. “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea” (Revelation 21:1).

In light of all these amazing promises, let us pray:

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal) through: www.davidstent.org

Mourning at Megiddo

Mourning at Megiddo

In ancient times, the death of a Jewish leader brought on intense national mourning. Jeremiah describes it, “Focus in and call for the professional mourning women, that they may arrive. And send out for the skilled wailing women, that they may come … Yet listen, O women, to the word of YHVH, and let your ears grasp the utterance of His mouth. And instruct your daughter how to wail, and let a woman teach her neighbor how to lament. For death has ascended and entered our windows, and has come into our palaces…” (Jeremiah 9:17, 20-21).

Another famous example of ancient Jewish mourning over the death of a beloved national leader is when King Saul and his son Jonathan died at the Battle of the Slopes of Gilboa. David penned a heart-rending lament and commanded that the people of Judah be taught this “Lament of the Bow.” The mourning song closes with the well-known words “How the mighty warriors have fallen” (2 Samuel 1:17-27).

Jeremiah’s lament

Josiah, the Boy King, was the grandson of Judah’s most evil King Manasseh. Crowned over the House of David at the tender age of eight, “he did the right thing in the eyes of YHVH, and walked in the ways of his father David; He didn’t turn away to the right or to the left” (2 Chronicles 34:1-2). He purged Jerusalem of gross idolatry and brought in a major spiritual revival through celebrating a restored national Passover: “There has never been a Passover celebrated like this in Israel from the days of Samuel the prophet. And even all the Kings of Israel never celebrated a Passover like that…” (2 Chronicles 35:18).

Yet thirteen years after this revival, King Josiah was tragically killed at the Battle of the Valley of Megiddo. He had refused to believe that YHVH had spoken to Pharaoh Neco, and that the God of Israel had directly commanded this Egyptian king to fight the Assyrians at Carchemish. Josiah was mortally wounded by an Egyptian arrow, taken by military chariot to Jerusalem, and expired in the City of David.

“And all Judah and Jerusalem mourned over Josiah. And Jeremiah gave a public lament over Josiah. And even unto this day all the singing men and singing women recount Josiah in their lamentations. And they established it as a tradition for Israel and indeed, they are written in the Book of Laments” (2 Chronicles 35:25).

Mourning for David’s Greater Son

In the Book of Zechariah, there is an ancient prophecy describing how the nation of Israel will come to the heart-rending realization that they have spurned their own Messiah: “And I will pour out on the Dynasty of David and on those dwelling in Jerusalem, the spirit of favor and supplications. And the will gaze steadfastly on Me, the One they thrust through, and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and grieve bitterly for Him as one grieves bitterly for a firstborn. In that day the mourning in Jerusalem will greatly increase, as the mourning that occurred at Hadad Rimmon in the Valley of Megiddo” (Zechariah 12:10-11).

Josiah was a beloved and brave king, and the people’s grief over his untimely death was unfeigned. The intensity of the Jewish people’s mourning over the death of their beloved leader at Megiddo is used prophetically as a type of how all Israel will mourn when we receive a revelation of who Yeshua is, and what our part was in the national rejection of His Messiahship.

Hezekiah’s last stand

Josiah’s grandfather was King Hezekiah, another son of David mightily used in revival, battle and worship. Hezekiah cleansed the land of the evil unleashed by his own father Ahaz, and re-established the equivalent of night-and-day worship in Jerusalem’s Temple (2 Chronicles 29:25-30). “He did the right thing in the eyes of YHVH, just like all that his own father David had done” (verse 2). “So Hezekiah did these things throughout Judah and did the good, the right and the true thing before YHVH his God. Concerning the work of building the House of God, and in regards to the Teaching (of Moses) and the commandments, every work that he began – to seek his God – with all his heart he worked and he prospered” (2 Chronicles 31:20-21).

Yet the Lord was peering into the recesses of Hezekiah’s heart. God humbled him for his pride and lack of a thankful heart – regarding both military deliverance and physical healing (2 Chronicles 32:24-26). When Hezekiah did repent, however, YHVH healed him and added fifteen years to his life (Isaiah 38:1-6).

Those latter years of Hezekiah proved to be a gift which turned into a trap for the nation of Israel. Isaiah 39 tells us that Hezekiah’s pride tempted him into boasting to Babylonian envoys about his wealth, power and military ability. To whom much is given, much is required. God expected much from Hezekiah son of David, and judged him much more strongly due to his position, power and privilege (Deuteronomy 17:16-17).

God sent Isaiah to Hezekiah with a prophetic message of  judgment and exile for David’s dynasty and David’s people. “Hear the word of YHVH of armies: Behold the days are coming when all that is in your House, and all that your forefathers have amassed up to this very day, shall be carried away to Babylon. Nothing will be left behind, says YHVH. And from among your sons who have will come out of you and be born to you, they will take them away, and they will become eunuchs in the palace of Babylon’s king” (Isaiah 39:5-7).

The heart of a king

There was a divine oversight in this whole process. “And so, regarding the ambassadors from Babylon’s princes, who they sent to (Hezekiah) to investigate the amazing things which were in the land, God departed from him, in order to test him, so that He would know all that was in his heart” (2 Chronicles 32:31). The God of Israel was looking for a holiness and purity in Hezekiah’s heart, a dependence on YHVH and a heart of humble thankfulness for God’s deliverances. Instead, He found a leader trusting in his own strength, abilities and resources.

Hezekiah’s response to this sizzling prophetic word was surprising: “So Hezekiah said to Isaiah, ‘The word of YHVH which you uttered is good,’ he said, ‘for there will be peace and security in my days’” (Isaiah 39:8).

It is somewhat chilling to see this aspect of Hezekiah’s heart revealed. National judgment had just been prophesied over his kingdom, his people, his land and his own children. Yet his first response was that ‘all is cool’ – because Hezekiah himself would not live to see any of it. Evidently this reveals that something was lacking in Hezekiah’s response; he was shut down, detached and self focused. His vision was short-term. “Après moi, le déluge” – “After me comes the Flood,” as was said in the days of Louis XV of France.

A Lion has fallen

Ariel Sharon, Israel’s eleventh Prime Minister, passed away on Shabbat January 11, 2014 at Sheba Medical Center in Tel Aviv. He had been in a vegetative state for just over eight years, having been felled by two successive strokes during the Hanukkah season in December 2005.

Sharon lived through some of the most momentous events preceding the birth of the State of Israel. He was wounded in battle during the War of Independence. He later became the leader and groundbreaker for Israel’s original special operations forces teams. He was a brilliant commander and general, snatching victory from the jaws of defeat in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. His bold and aggressive military strategies are studied to this day in war colleges around the world.

Sharon was uncompromising in his battle against anti-Israel terror, whether in the 1950’s with his legendary Unit 101, in 1970 in the Gaza Strip with Sayeret Shaked, in his prosecution of the Lebanese War against the PLO in 1982, and in Operation Defensive Shield (March-April 2002) in response to jihadi Islamist terror attacks on Israeli citizens. His construction of an anti-terrorist fence drastically reduced Israeli civilian casualties. It was Sharon who chased Arafat out of his terrorist rat’s nest in Beirut in 1982 and then cornered him in Ramallah’s Muqata’ah  in 2002.

Sharon was known as “the bulldozer”, because his aggressive focus and terrier-like demeanor guaranteed that he would not cease and desist until his goals were accomplished. Sharon was one of the outstanding shepherds of the mighty prophetic aliyah of Jews from the former USSR (see Jeremiah 16:14-15) in the late 1980’s and 1990’s. He was the catalyst for the movement to repopulate the hills of Judea and Samaria with reborn Jewish settlements (see also Jeremiah 31:1-5) as well as its most influential advocate. In 2005 Sharon was voted in as the eighth greatest Israeli of all time in a Ynet poll.

Sharon’s scars

Four events cast a measure of somber shadow on Sharon’s life, reputation and achievements.

His occasional refusal to follow army orders when he felt that he had a better grasp of military facts on the ground.

His allowing Lebanese Christian Phalange forces into Palestinian refugee camps a few days after Syrian and Palestinian forces assassinated the Christian Maronite President-Elect Bachir Gemayal. Phalangists massacred hundreds of Palestinians – both civilians and terrorists – in a typical Middle Eastern cycle of revenge. Though Sharon was blamed for instigating this massacre, in a libel trial against Time magazine he was cleared of direct involvement or awareness of events. In the Arab world, however, Sharon is still typecast as the “butcher of Beirut.”

His connection to three serious allegations of corruption and bribery during his time in office as Prime Minister, none of which was ever unequivocally proven.

His 2005 Disengagement – the unilateral removal of all Jewish farms, towns and kibbutzim from the Gaza Strip along with a full military withdrawal from that area.

This last point – the Disengagement from Gaza and from four Jewish settlements in northern Samaria – requires some greater elucidation.

Sharon had been the primary political advocate of Jewish resettlement in Judea and Samaria, the area where the twelve Jewish tribes lived in Bible days (known today outside of Israel as the West Bank). His political declarations during the election campaign prior to the Disengagement were bold and clear – he would never withdraw from Gaza or the West Bank. His electorate could rest assured that the Gazan Jewish town of Netzarim was as safe and secure as was Tel Aviv – never to be abandoned.

Yet Sharon’s last major act as Prime Minister was to push through with the Disengagement. His long-term supporters were shocked and pained, and felt betrayed. His own Likud political party overruled Sharon, so he promptly abandoned the party he had helped found and started another party (Kadima) which today only has two seats. What caused Sharon to make such an unusual about-face, to abandon his decades-long political supporters, and to turn his back on farms and towns that he had helped plant?

Israeli political commentators opine that much of the sudden change was due both to American and European political pressure, and to a realization that Israel’s leftist politicos and media would be willing to cast a blind eye at Sharon’s corruption charges in exchange for a radical swing leftward on the PM’s part. Indeed, one top commentator referred to the necessity for the leftist media to treat Sharon with the same care that Orthodox Jews give to the fragile pitam (or top protuberance) of the etrog/citron on the Feast of Tabernacles – as long as the Disengagement continued…

Pat Robertson of CBN came to Israel in December 2004 and pleaded publically with Sharon not to move ahead with the Disengagement. For this he was mocked in Israel’s media.

The Disengagement went ahead. Great divisions of heart (see Judges 5:15-16) broke out among Israelis. Huge demonstrations were ignored by the government. Non-violent civil disobedience was met with mass arrests. Many Jewish soldiers seriously considered disobeying orders (as Sharon had once done) rather than evict Jewish settlers from Jewish farms and towns. The nation was transfixed with its heart in its throat. Two of our sons were serving in the Gaza area with the IDF during that time.

Within one year of the Disengagement, the results became depressingly clear. Israeli farmers in Gaza had left hothouses with infrastructure as they disengaged, hoping that new and peaceful Gazan industries could be established. These were hacked to pieces by joyous mobs. Abandoned synagogues were desecrated and burned. The Muslim Brotherhood jihadi terror group Hamas came to power in a one-time election, and proceeded to torture and murder former PLO members. Within a short time Islamist mortars, rockets and missiles began to rain down on Israel. Over 10,000 such attacks occurred after Sharon’s stroke, and for eight years as he lay quietly in a hospital ward.

Netzarim had been abandoned. What would then be the fate of Tel Aviv or Jerusalem?

The Scriptures prophesy Messiah’s judgment on the nations which divide Jerusalem and the Promised Land (see Zechariah 14:1-2; Joel 3:1-2; etc.). At present, nearly every nation on this planet supports the division of Jerusalem and the Land of Israel. Some superpowers are actively pressing for shrinking Israel’s borders even more, calling this a peace process and a two-state solution. Few world leaders understand what they are touching, and what the ramifications are of opposing both the promises of the God of Israel, and of counteracting the restoration of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel.

Secretary of State Henry Kissinger once expressed the USA’s clear strategy regarding Israel in a declassified State Department document, describing his Paris meeting on December 17, 1975 with Sadun Hammadi, Iraqi Minister of Foreign Affairs (www.gwu.edu/%7Ensarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB193/HAK-12-17-75.pdf). Kissinger communicated U.S. policy, “We can’t negotiate about the existence of Israel but we can reduce its size to historical proportions … So I think in ten to fifteen years Israel will be like Lebanon – struggling for existence, with no influence in the Arab world.”

Even as Hezekiah and Josiah started well, were initially greatly used of God, and in the beginning shepherded the Davidic dynasty and the Jewish people with integrity, their latter-day actions led to drastic and negative results, whether personally or for the welfare of the entire Jewish people.

Pray for Ariel Sharon’s family at this time – especially his sons Omri and Gil’ad and their families – for comfort, healing, revelation and visitation.

Pray for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing combined international pressure to cease resettling the Promised Land, to establish a Palestinian state in that land, and to empower terror forces in that area as well. Pray for clarity, revelation and the kind of courage Ariel Sharon once had.

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal) through: www.davidstent.org

Does anybody really know what time it is?

In the late Sixties the rock group Chicago recorded a lovely jazz-swing hit. The song asks if people are truly aware of what is happening in the world around them: “As I was walking down the street one day, being pushed and shoved by people trying to beat the clock…People runnin’ everywhere, don’t know where to go, don’t know where I am, can’t see past the next step, don’t have time to think past the last mile, have no time to look around, just run around… Does anybody really know what time it is? Does anybody really care?” (“Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?” Robert Lamm, © 1969 Warner/Chappell Music, Inc.).

Tribal wisdom

Three thousand years ago there was a Jewish tribe which was able to answer Chicago’s question in the positive – the tribe of Issachar. Issachar was Jacob’s ninth son and Leah’s fifth child (Genesis 30:17-18). His tribal territory includes the Jezreel Valley and the foothills of Mount Carmel, the Hill of Moreh and Mount Tabor, the area north of modern Jenin and the southwestern shore of the Lake of Galilee (Joshua 19:17-23; 17:10-11).

Issachar was one of the ten northern tribes. Though they had followed King Saul, after his inglorious death they took the initiative and catalyzed Israel into crowning David king over the entire Jewish people in 1 Chronicles 12:32: “The sons of Issachar were men who were skilled in understanding the times, and they had knowledge of what Israel should do” (see verses 38-40). To put it simply, the leaders of Issachar had spiritual discernment.  They recognized that God was establishing David’s covenant (2 Samuel 7) and they had the courage to advocate for the physical changes that would bring promise to fulfillment. They knew what time it was. They really cared. And they acted accordingly.

A time to plant

Two thousand six hundred years ago YHVH spoke through the prophet Jeremiah about how to spiritually discern the times, how to draw the right physical conclusions. Israel had been sent into Babylonian Exile and was languishing beside the willows of the Euphrates. Some false ‘positive confession’ prophets were attempting to stampede the exiles into a premature return to Jerusalem.

Now these are the words of the letter which Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the rest of the elders of the exile, the priests, the prophets and all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon…saying,

 “Thus says YHVH of armies, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them; and plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and become the fathers of sons and daughters, and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, that they may bear sons and daughters; and multiply there and do not decrease. Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf; for in its welfare you will have welfare. For thus says YHVH of armies, the God of Israel: Do not let your prophets who are in your midst and your diviners deceive you, and do not listen to the dreams which they dream. For they prophesy falsely to you in My name; I have not sent them, declares YHVH” (Jeremiah 29:1-9).

  • Jeremiah reminded the Jewish people that the Exile was not merely the work of men or the result of super-power machinations. It was a direct work of the God of Israel – God’s judgment on His beloved but mostly disobedient people.

The Jewish exiles of Jeremiah’s day had been torn from the bosom of the land of Israel and they intensely desired to return home. Jeremiah’s word caused their hearts to screech to a grinding halt. YHVH was causing His people to come to terms with a divinely mandated Dispersion (Galut). This was quite a challenge. Little did the Exiles to Babylon realize that their national exile would last over 2,500 years. There would be a lot of praying for the welfare of the nations into which Israel had been scattered.

A time to uproot what is planted (Ecclesiastes 3:2)

“For thus says YHVH: When seventy years have been completed for Babylon, I will visit you and fulfill My good word to you, to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans that I have for you, declares YHVH, plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares YHVH, and I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, declares YHVH, and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile” (Jeremiah 29:10-14).

Jeremiah expected the house building and garden planting in Babylon to last a maximum of seventy years. But seventy turned into 700, and then nearly four times 700. The exiled Jewish people were getting accustomed to the Galut. Their roots went deep into the soils of their host countries – from Assyria and Babylon (modern Iraq) to Morocco, Spain and Germany, and from Poland to Russia. Daily Hebrew language gave way to Aramaic, and then made way for Arabic, Ladino, Yiddish and English. Israeli patterns of life diminished while rabbinic traditions multiplied. Soon the Restoration to Zion became more a confession of eschatological faith than an activist hope.

  • Today the majority of the Jewish people are content to build houses, plant gardens and seek the welfare of the cities of their exile – rather than prepare for a return to Zion. A ‘three hour tour’ has turned into an Exile lasting nearly three millennia.

Discerning the times

Over the past 150 years something most unusual has been happening. The God of Israel has been uprooting His people from the Exile and regathering them to their prophetic homeland. Amidst pogroms and revolutions, World Wars and Holocaust, the Jewish people have continued to stream back to the land promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Neither Nazism, Communism nor jihadi Islamism have managed to stop this prophetic resettlement of the Land of Israel. Western attempts at establishing a false and ultimately destructive peace through dividing the land must also be seen in this light.

Yet the majority of the planet’s Jewish population have not yet voted with their feet and returned to Zion, especially from the West. Jeremiah’s admonition to build in Babylon has become a mantra for most of Jacob’s sons and daughters. The blasé comforts of the Exile have dulled the palate of God’s prophetic people (Psalm 105:8-15).

Trembling and seeking

The prophesied return of the Jewish people to their Promised Land is occurring in spite of international opposition, and in spite of Israel’s soporific state. The prophet Hosea declared that this Return to Zion would be accompanied by events which would make Jacob’s children tremble.

  • For the sons of Israel will remain for many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar and without ephod or household idols. Afterward the sons of Israel will return and seek YHVH their God and David their king; and they will come trembling to YHVH and to His goodness in the last days (Hosea 3:4-5)
  • For I will be like a lion to Ephraim and like a young lion to the house of Judah. I, even I, will tear to pieces and go away. I will carry away, and there will be none to deliver. I will go away and return to My place until they acknowledge their guilt and seek My face. In their affliction they will earnestly seek Me (Hosea 5:14-15)

When men will not take guidance from divine carrots, sometimes the Hound of Heaven is forced to bring sticks into play. The State of Israel’s impassioned appeals to world Jewry to make aliyah (immigrate to Israel) have not been as successful as was hoped. The war cry of anti-Jewish Last Days’ hunters (Jeremiah 16:16-21) will catalyze an even greater return.

Today’s super-powers are giving the Islamic Republic of Iran enough wiggle room to fashion weapons of mass destruction against Israel (Isaiah 54:17). The Jewish state may justifiably need to take preemptive measures – actions which would probably trigger increased world hatred against Israel. Were Iranian Islamist forces then to activate a few well-placed acts of terror against Western targets, an international wave of anti-Semitism would flood the planet. Western Jews would be forced to seek physical refuge in the Land of promise, to cry out to the God of Israel, and to turn in repentance to Yeshua the Messiah, Son of David.

These are the days in which we live. Nam qui intelligit – oremus (Those who understand – let us be about the business of prayer)!

  • Pray for the salvation of Jewish people worldwide (Romans 11:25-29)
  • Pray for God’s protection over the Jewish state and people from all weapons formed against her (Isaiah 54:17)
  • Pray for the return of Jacob’s scattered flock to their ancient pasture (Ezekiel 34:11-16)

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

The Hanukkah Turkey

The United States of America is about to experience an unusual event – the Jewish Festival of Hanukkah and American Thanksgiving fall on the same day this year. Though this may not be the most significant world event this month (try the collapse of Western and UN resolve in the P5+1 accord with Iran), it does give pause for thought – a time to reflect on the historical and spiritual roots of both holidays, and to apply these lessons in our fast-paced modern world.

Steamroller Blues

Once upon a time there was a huge superpower known as Hellas. Today it is called Greece. In the days of Alexander the Great this empire held sway from Macedonia to Libya, and from Samarkand to Persepolis. But the Hellenistic Empire eventually fell on hard times. Its Pax Hellenica crumbled as the empire broke into four separate kingdoms. As usual the Jewish people found themselves buffeted by international power-politics. Barely one hundred years earlier the Persian Empire (modern-day Iran) had crumbled before Greece, and now Rome was waiting in the wings for its “15 minutes of fame.”

The people of Jacob did not fit easily into this neo-pagan world. They persisted in worshiping an invisible God named YHVH, insisting that all other gods were idols. They believed that their Holy Book (the Hebrew Scriptures) was breathed out from the very lungs of God, and that the Jewish people had a priority covenant with the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. They held to their divine traditions like the Sabbath day and circumcision, and abstained from certain delicacies and certain ways of slaughtering animals for food. They were a separate, different people, fulfilling Balaam’s prophecy of being a “people who dwells alone and which is not counted as being one of the rest of the nations” (Number 23:9).

Alexander’s dream of one world culture could conceive of no place for such a stubborn people, a nation who refused to bow the knee to assimilation. The proponents of one world government saw the people of Israel only as a source of trouble – as a fly in the ointment of world peace. Alexander’s eventual successor Antiochus IV of Syria (see Daniel 11:28-35) made a significant attempt to break the Jewish people’s attachment to their covenants (Romans 9:3-5), their God and their land. His abominations went as far as desecrating the Temple Mount, pouring swine’s blood on the altar and establishing the worship of a Syrian demon Baal Shamayim in the courts of Zerubbabel’s Temple (see Zechariah 4:8-14). 

“Not long after this the king sent an Athenian senator to force the Jews to abandon the customs of their ancestors and live no longer by the laws of God; also to profane the Temple in Jerusalem and dedicate it to Olympian Zeus … A man could not keep the Sabbath or celebrate the traditional feasts, nor even admit that he was a Jew… A decree was issued … obliging Jews to partake of (pagan) sacrifices, and put to death those who would not consent to adopt the customs of the Greeks... Two (Jewish) women who were arrested for having circumcised their children were publicly paraded about the city with their babies hanging at their breasts and then thrown down from the top of the city wall” (Second Maccabees 6:1-10).

Revival and the sword of the Lord

A descendant of Aaron, Matisyahu by name, catalyzed a revolt against Hellenistic religious coercion and persecution. His five sons John, Simon, Judah (the Maccabee), Eliezer and Jonathan led an ultimately successful guerilla campaign against the Syrian-based Greeks, driving them out of Judea and rededicating the Jerusalem Second Temple. One biblical verse prophesies Maccabean victories (“The people who know their God will display strength and take action” – Daniel 11:32). Another verse depicts the sufferings and setbacks that these sons of Aaron would endure (“Those who have insight among the people will give understanding to the many; yet they will fall by the sword and by flame, by captivity and by plunder for many days” – Daniel 11:33).

False restoration of David’s tent

Unfortunately the Maccabean revival was short lived. The priests who led it gradually became ambitious, and eventually began to call themselves kings and royalty, even though that honor was biblically reserved for the House and Dynasty of David son of Jesse (Jeremiah 33:25-26).  The new Maccabean kings quickly became a force for assimilation and Hellenization, embracing the very things that their fathers had fought against tooth and nail.  Eventually the Maccabean dynasty would face opposition by those who loved the Hebrew Bible, the Pharisees before the time of Yeshua.

In later years Rabbinic writers of history tried to downplay Maccabean exploits and military victories. The eight festive days of light originally celebrated by the Maccabees was actually a ‘behind schedule’ enactment of the Feast of Tabernacles/Sukkot. In those days Sukkot involved a flaming torch procession in Jerusalem (Josephus, Antiquities, Book XII). The Rabbinic historiographers added a fanciful legend to their propagandistic history books, describing a fantastic story about eight miraculous days of oil – something that no one who had lived at that time knew anything about. The Rabbinic focus on a miracle which never happened eventually won the day, succeeding in taking the primary focus off the Maccabees. Today Hanukkah is known more for the ersatz miracle than for the original faithfulness of the militant Maccabees – more for the candelabrum than the combat.

Thanksgiving is a Jewish holiday?

The Pilgrims were a Scripture-drenched people who saw their own destiny as parallel to that of the Jewish people. “No Christian community in history identified more with the People of the Book than did the early settlers of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, who believed their own lives to be a literal reenactment of the biblical drama of the Hebrew nation. They themselves were the children of Israel; America was their Promised Land; the Atlantic Ocean their Red Sea; the Kings of England were the Egyptian pharaohs; the American Indians the Canaanites (or the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel); the pact of the Plymouth Rock was God's holy Covenant; and the ordinances by which they lived were the Divine Law. . . [They] saw themselves as instruments of Divine Providence, a people chosen to build their new commonwealth on the Covenant entered into at Mount Sinai” (Gabriel Sivan, The Bible and Civilization, 1973, p. 236).

The first Pilgrim governor William Bradford proclaimed the first Thanksgiving celebration in November 1620, reciting verses from Psalm 107. The first Thanksgiving dinner was held nearly a year later, between September and November, 1621, and mentioned by Edward Winslow in a letter a few weeks after the fact (www.pilgrimhallmuseum.org/pdf/TG_What_Happened_in_1621.pdf).

A few Jewish people have been reticent about celebrating the holiday (www.jewishideasdaily.com/1011/features/thanksgiving-a-jewish-holiday-after-all), while most are quite happy to do so (www.huffingtonpost.com/arnold-m-eisen/the-pilgrim-family_b_1098297.html). Most researchers agree that the biblically Jewish worldview and patterns of thanksgiving to God are reflected in this most ancient of European-American holidays. The closest biblical parallel is to Tabernacles (Sukkot). In that sense the Puritans attempted to model Thanksgiving after the Jewish Harvest Festival of Thanksgiving.

Faithfulness to the God of the Scriptures

Both Hanukkah and Thanksgiving are celebrations of God’s goodness and provision. Both have at their root the worship of the Lord God of Israel. Both remember God’s provision in difficult circumstances. Both praise God for His faithfulness.

As America digs in to platters of overflowing food on groaning tables, as football fans gaze upon their color TVs, and as Jewish people across the world light candles, play with spinning tops and eat traditional oil-fried foods, let us also remember that those who would destroy Israel still exist; that the war against the Jewish people continues; and that ancient demonic forces like the Prince of Persia (Daniel 10:13, 20) still strive “to destroy, kill and annihilate all the Jews” (Esther 3:13). Though the Western world may not be quick to discern these matters, “those who know their God” will intercede for Jacob’s welfare, and they will reach out for the protection and salvation of Zion (Isaiah 62)!

  1. Pray for the salvation of many Jewish people during this Hanukkah season 
  2. Pray for God’s protection over the Jewish state from all weapons formed against her (Isaiah 54:17)
  3. Pray for revelation from Heaven for the leaders of the West who have signed off on a new “Munich Agreement” with Iran (see “Munich on 44th street” at https://davidstent.com/munich-on-44th-street/) 

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal) through:www.davidstent.org

Munich on 44th Street

The German philosopher Hegel once remarked that great historical patterns seem to appear in human history twice, in a repeating configuration. Karl Marx added that, though great historical patterns may appear twice, they appear first as tragedy, and the second time as farce (www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/18th-brumaire). Marx’s take on human history was tinged with great cynicism, and he was not speaking from a perspective of biblical hope, forgiveness or redemption.

Yet historians love re-occurring patterns, especially those which may give birth to dissertations or even to scholarly dreams. Biblical history speaks of repeated forty-year cycles in the Book of Judges, and Jerusalem’s Temple was destroyed twice – on exactly the same day (the Ninth of Av) – though approximately 656 years lay between the two events.

Recently, the historical event known as the Munich Agreement of 1938 has been referenced by world leaders. In October 2001 former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon created a diplomatic firestorm by referring to Munich, while U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry noted in September 2013 that America is being faced with “a Munich moment.” Historical patterns surrounding Munich seem to be casting a shadow on current Middle Eastern events.

Let’s refresh our memory with a quick look at Munich’s original 1938 context, and then Sharon’s and Kerry’s allusions to Munich.

“Our enemies are little worms. I saw them at Munich”

Hitler’s vision of world conquest began with a push to create a Greater Germany (Großdeutsches Reich). This began with the annexation (Anschluss) of Austria on March 12, 1938, one day after the successful Nazi coup d'état in Vienna. Rogers and Hammerstein built their box-office hit The Sound of Music around these events.

Hitler’s next step involved the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia. His preference was straight military conquest, and he gave orders that a military invasion should begin by October 1, 1938. This caused his top generals much trepidation. They believed that an armed assault on Czechoslovakia would lead to immediate hostilities with Britain, France and possibly the Soviet Union. The generals felt that Germany was not ready for such a conflict. At that time the German Wehrmacht had only 31 active divisions and 7 reserve divisions, while France had over 100 divisions and the Czechs had 45.  On August 4 Nazi Chief of General Staff General Ludwig Beck presented a super-secret strategic analysis to Germany’s top military brass, urging a cancellation of Hitler’s plan.

When no definitive action was taken, Beck resigned and soon began to conspire against Hitler with General Franz Halder (Chief of the Supreme High Command of the General Staff OKH), Admiral Wilhelm Canaris (Chief of German Intelligence Abwehr), Graf von Helldorf (Chief of Police, Berlin), and Ulrich von Hassell (former Ambassador to the Kingdom of Italy). Their plot foresaw the arrest and likely liquidation of Hitler were he to issue concrete invasion orders.

The generals’ plan counted on British and French willingness both to confront Hitler and to defend Czechoslovakia. The conspirators sent secret agents to British PM Chamberlain letting him in on their plans and encouraging England and France to maintain an openly aggressive stance toward Hitler. Incredibly, Chamberlain believed that negotiations with Hitler could avoid a World War. His impression was that Hitler could turn out to be a man of peace. “In spite of the hardness and ruthlessness I thought I saw in his face, I got the impression that here was a man who could be relied upon when he had given his word.”

At meetings with Hitler on September 15th (Berchtesgaden, Bavaria), 22nd (Rheinhotel Dreesen, Bad Godesberg) and 29th (the brand new Nazi building Führerbau, Munich), Chamberlain was manipulated and bullied into finally abandoning England’s Czechoslovak ally to the tender mercies of the Nazi juggernaut. The representatives of Czechoslovakia were not allowed to take part in any negotiations due to Hitler’s refusal to allow their participation. Up to that point the Czechs had refused to bow to any form of diplomatic surgery, preferring to trust in their small though well-trained army and in their political alliances with France and the Soviet Union.

The Munich Agreement was signed at 01:30 on September 30, 1938 by Hitler, British PM Sir Neville Chamberlain, Italian Fascist PM Benito Mussolini and French PM Édouard Daladier. This Quartet’s meeting was known as the Four-Power Conference. It sanctioned the immediate Nazi invasion and annexation of Czech Sudetenland. A few hours after having signed away Czechoslovakia, Chamberlain took a light nap, arose and asked Hitler to sign a peace treaty between the United Kingdom and Germany. Hitler happily agreed. The German High Command’s plot to stop Hitler was shelved, and Europe tumbled slowly into the abyss.

Within two months of the Munich Agreement, Hitler had moved on to another essential aspect of his “millennial vision” – the Holocaust, Nazism’s attempt to destroy the Jewish people worldwide. It began on November 9, 1938 as Reichskristallnacht. The Night of Broken Glass. The Nazi Reich instigated pogrom attacks on Jewish businesses, synagogues and Jewish community institutions throughout Germany and Austria (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kristallnacht). Over 90 Jewish people were murdered, 30,000 Jews were imprisoned in concentration camps (of which over 2,000 died), over 7,000 Jewish businesses destroyed and over 1,000 synagogues burned. A collective fine of one billion Reichsmarks was imposed on the Jewish communities of those countries. This was the opening bell of a satanic strategy aimed at annihilating Jacob’s seed from Planet Earth.

But Hitler no longer had any fear that the West would oppose his genocidal plans. His comments about Chamberlain and Daladier were telling on this point: “I did not think it possible that Czechoslovakia would be virtually served up to me on a plate by her friends." Even more telling was Hitler’s conclusion, “Our enemies are little worms. I saw them at Munich” (“Unsere Gegner sind kleine Würmchen. Ich sah sie in München” – www.ns-archiv.de/krieg/1939/22-08-1939.php). In March 1939 Hitler invaded and conquered the rest of Czechoslovakia.

Peace above all things

Back in England, Chamberlain stood in front of Number 10 Downing Street, London on September 30, 1938 and proclaimed:

“We, the German Fuhrer and Chancellor, and the British Prime Minister, have had a further meeting today and are agreed in recognizing that the question of Anglo-German relations is of the first importance for our two countries and for Europe. We regard the agreement signed last night … as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again … We are determined to continue our efforts to remove possible sources of difference, and thus to contribute to assure the peace of Europe. My good friends, for the second time in our history, a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honor. I believe it is ‘peace for our time.’ And now I recommend you to go home and sleep quietly in your beds.”

Immediately after the signing of the Munich Agreement, many voices praised Chamberlain. The British newspaper The Observer declared on October 2, 1938:

Suggestions to honour Mr. Chamberlain in some tangible form for his great services to peace continue to be made in many parts of Europe. The French nation is now concentrating on how it can repay ‘the first artisan of peace.’ Numerous proposals for renaming streets, starting funds and erecting statues are contained in the French press, and Le Figaro states that the British prime minister should be immediately invited to Paris so that all can acclaim him. One paper suggests starting a fund so that monuments and statues might be erected to the ‘saviour of modern Europe’  in every capital in the world. Strasbourg has overnight renamed streets: the Avenue de la Paix is now the Avenue Neville Chamberlain.

The assertion that Mr. Chamberlain should receive the Nobel peace prize, says the Stockholm Tidningen [newspaper], is warmly supported in all quarters in Sweden and Norway, and England. Mahmond Pasha, the prime minister of Egypt, has telegraphed Mr. Chamberlain the thanks of the Egyptian government and people for averting war. The telegram concludes: “Your name will go down in history as a statesman who saved civilisation from destruction.”

On Monday October 3, 1938 PM Chamberlain addressed the House of Commons in London and declared,

“I say in the name of this House and of the people of this country that Czechoslovakia has earned our admiration and respect for her restraint, for her dignity, for her magnificent discipline in face of such a trial as few nations have ever been called upon to meet…It is my hope and my belief, that under the new system of guarantees, the new Czechoslovakia will find a greater security than she has ever enjoyed in the past.”

“In our relations with other countries everything depends upon there being sincerity and good will on both sides.  I believe that there is sincerity and good will on both sides of this declaration.  That is why to me its significance goes far beyond its actual words … No doubt I shall have plenty of critics who will say that I am guilty of facile optimism, and that I should disbelieve every word that is uttered by rulers of other great States in Europe … We have only laid the foundations of peace.”

On October 5, 1938 MP Winston Churchill spoke boldly in the House of Commons against the Munich Agreement, calling it “a total, unmitigated defeat.”

“I will, therefore, begin by saying the most unpopular and most unwelcome thing. I will begin by saying what everybody would like to ignore or forget but which I must nevertheless be stated, namely, that we have sustained a total and unmitigated defeat … We are in the presence of a disaster of the first magnitude which has befallen Great Britain and France. Do not let us blind ourselves to that...The system of alliances in Central Europe upon which France has relied for her safety has been swept away, and I can see no means by which it can be reconstituted… I do not grudge our loyal, brave people … the natural, spontaneous outburst of joy and relief when they learned that the hard ordeal would no longer be required of them at the moment; but they should know the truth. They should know that … we have sustained a defeat without a war, the consequences of which will travel far with us along our road; they should know that we have passed an awful milestone in our history, when the whole equilibrium of Europe has been deranged, and that the terrible words have for the time being been pronounced against the Western democracies: ‘Thou are weighed in the balance and found wanting.’ And do not suppose that this is the end. This is only the beginning of the reckoning. This is only the first sip, the first foretaste of a bitter cup which will be proffered to us year by year unless by a supreme recovery of moral health and martial vigour, we arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden time.”

The majority of British public opinion at the time wanted to appease Hitler. They were prepared to abandon a democratic Czechoslovakia as the price for avoiding international conflict and destruction.

To paraphrase Caiaphas in John 11:50, “it is expedient for you that one man die for the people, and that the whole nation not perish.”

Trusting your enemies

One of the main differences between those who supported the Munich Agreement and those who opposed it had to do with trust. Was Hitler a man of peace, a man whose word could be trusted? Was he bent on conquering Europe and establishing a totalitarian dictatorship there? Or was Hitler only interested in self-determination for his own people and in righting historic wrongs?  Would he be satisfied with the fruits of diplomacy, and then would he agree to disarm and agree to peaceful cooperation? Were his calls for destruction of the Jewish people merely politicking and meant only for ‘internal consumption’?

Only when the blitzkrieg against Poland began on September 1, 1939, did the unpalatable truth become unavoidably clear. Churchill and his comrades – those once ridiculed as warmongers – were belatedly seen as prophets who had tried to mobilize a generation of soporific cowards.

“Israel will not be Czechoslovakia”

On Friday October 5, 2001 Israeli PM Ariel Sharon gave an evening press conference where he said:

“We can rely only on ourselves…Today Israel suffered another murderous Palestinian terrorist attack which took a heavy toll. All of our efforts to reach a cease-fire have been torpedoed by the Palestinians. Fire did not cease, not even for one day. We are currently in the midst of a complex and difficult diplomatic campaign. I turn to the Western democracies, first and foremost the leader of the free world, the United States. Do not repeat the dreadful mistake of 1938, when the enlightened democracies of Europe decided to sacrifice Czechoslovakia for the sake of a temporary, convenient solution. Don’t try to appease the Arabs at our expense. We will not accept this. Israel will not be Czechoslovakia. Israel will fight terror.”

In a blunt response on October 6, White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said: “The President believes that these remarks are unacceptable. Israel could have no better or stronger friend that the United States and no better friend than President Bush.”

Nahum Barnea, commentator in Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel’s country's largest newspaper, added, “This was an unfortunate statement, historically mistaken, politically damaging, factually incorrect, and it deepens the sense of threat and strangulation that Israelis feel. It weakens us and insults our friends.”

Why Sharon’s strongly worded declaration? What were the events that shaped the immediate context of Sharon’s words?

Point one – Barely a month before Sharon’s statement, President George W. Bush decided to abandon traditional diplomatic positions vis-à-vis Israel due to Saudi Arabian pressure. His decision was to unilaterally push for the establishment of a Palestinian state. Bush’s declaration was fine-tuned and completed on September 10, 2001 in consultation with Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar bin Sultan. It was to be announced by Colin Powell at the UN General Assembly on September 19, 2001 (www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2002/02/10/saudi-leaders-anger-revealed-shaky-ties/a570bab2-c7c4-4111-b9bc-c03a3cab5ce2/). Due to the al Qa’eda attacks on 9/11 (where 15 of the 19 jihadi terrorists were Saudi nationals), Bush’s declaration was postponed (https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1646921.stm). Eventually the President announced it himself at a Rose Garden address on June 24, 2002 (https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2002/06/20020624-3.html). Israel was feeling the ground moving underneath her feet, and saw that U.S. policy was beginning to attune itself more closely with that of Saudi Arabia – at Israel’s expense. “There is a moment when you discover things are being done behind your back," said Sharon. "I decided, this far and no more.”

Point two which weighed heavily on Sharon was the post- 9/11 White House’s determination to block Israel from participating in a coalition of nations fighting terror – even though Israel had been and still is one of the main targets of jihadi Islamist attack. This decision (similar to the U.S. decision in Desert Storm 1990-91) was taken in order to make it more palatable for Arab and Islamic countries who hated Israel and sought its destruction, to willingly join in a half-hearted pursuit of Islamist terrorists. Some State Department officials were already stressing the difference between ‘a necessary fight against global terror’ (terror which causes Western casualties) and something else called ‘local terror’ (terror which only causes Israeli Jewish casualties). Israel was clearly seeing that the U.S. was edging away from standing with Israel in its own fight against terrorists – the same terrorists who were attacking the West!

Point three was a spate of Palestinian terror attacks that occurred that very week. On Tuesday October 2 two Palestinian terrorists attacked Elei Sinai, a Jewish farming community in the Gaza Strip, killing two and wounding fifteen. A sniper attacked in Hebron in front of Abraham’s Tomb, wounding two Israeli women, while an Israeli motorist was shot and killed while driving on the Ramot road near Jerusalem.

On Thursday October 4 the Palestinian Authority issued a condemnation of the terror attack at Elei Sinai. And yet, a few hours later a Palestinian terrorist dressed in an Israeli Army uniform and sporting a red paratrooper’s beret entered Afula’s Central Bus Station and fired his M-16 at civilians, killing three and wounding 13. Sharon pointed out, “After all that, Arafat is praised by the whole world for deigning to issue a condemnation. That is completely out of line.”

That same day there was also the unexplainable shooting down over Ukrainian airspace of a civilian aircraft with 78 passengers which had just departed from Tel Aviv (www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/1359353/Ukraine-admits-it-shot-down-Russian-airliner.html).

Germany’s Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer spoke with Sharon that Thursday and lavishly praised Syria President Bashar al-Assad as being truly committed to regional peace. “I spoke with Bashar Assad. He told me that Syria has always been against terror. You have no idea how touched I was, hearing such things from the Syrian president.”  Fischer then moved on to his main point, blithely stating that Israel would have to speedily make concessions for peace.  “You have to make concessions to the Palestinians. These concessions may be painful for your generation, but they will guarantee a better future for the next generations.”

Sharon saw the writing on the wall. America was brushing off Israel as an embarrassment. It was trying to curry Arab favor by giving Israel the cold shoulder. All this would involve a sea-change in diplomatic Middle East strategies. Terrorist groups were quick to take advantage of this new dynamic, and Israel was being ordered by the West to sit tight, allow its citizens to be murdered and continue without breaking step in the ‘march of death’ known internationally as “the peace process” or “making sacrifices for peace.” This was PM Sharon’s context when he referred to the Munich dynamic of Czechoslovakia in 1938 (www.commentarymagazine.com/2013/06/27/benny-morriss-czechoslovakia-analogy).

 “Our Munich moment”

On Friday September 6, 2013 U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry spoke in Paris, recalling Munich in his remarks about Western intervention in the Syrian crisis. Kerry compared Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to Saddam Hussein and Adolf Hitler. He reminded his listeners of the 1938 Munich Agreement, which had handed over part of Czechoslovakia to Nazi Germany. “This is really our Munich moment. This is our chance to join together and to pursue accountability over appeasement. The United States …cannot be silent spectators to this slaughter. This is not the time to allow a dictator unfettered use of some of the most heinous weapons on Earth” (www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2013/09/213938.htm).

Secretary of State Kerry was drawing a parallel between European hesitation in opposing Hitler in 1938, and Western hesitation in opposing Syrian use of chemical warfare in 2013. There are some similarities here, but also some glaring differences between these two situations. While Nazi leaders such as Adolf Eichmann’s SS assistant Alois Brunner once took shelter in Assad’s Syria, today the prime movers among the rebel Syrian factions today are al-Qa’eda affiliates who massacre Christians and Shi’ites. In the original Munich Agreement, it was clear that the Czechs were innocent victims and the Nazis were evil warmongers. In modern Syria, most of the main players are dressed in shades of black and gray. At this point the U.S. has chosen a diplomatic cooperation with Russia, hopefully believing that Assad will hand over his chemical weapons arsenal. Time will tell toward what sort of Munich moment this strategy will lead.

Munich at the United Nations

The recent address by Hassan Rouhani (President of the Islamic Republic of Iran) at the United Nations has raised the specter of Munich-style appeasement once again.

The representative of a radical jihadi Shi’ite Islamist dictatorship – which has publically declared (as did Hitler) its intention to annihilate the Jewish state – greeted the world body with smiles, talked about inaugurating direct flights between Teheran and JFK, and spoke of peaceful nuclear intentions. European leaders fell over each other with unconcealed enthusiasm, suggesting that the UN authorize continuing nuclear development in Iran “for peaceful purposes” while Western leaders insisted that they needed to “give peace a chance”; perhaps Rouhani was representing a newer, gentler Iran.

Bibi at the United Nations

Israel’s Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu also addressed the UN General Assembly a few days after Rouhani. At the conclusion of his address he emphasized a point that would have made Czechoslovakia and Ariel Sharon proud: “Ladies and gentlemen, Israel will never acquiesce to nuclear arms in the hands of a rogue regime that repeatedly promises to wipe us off the map. Against such a threat, Israel will have no choice but to defend itself.  I want there to be no confusion on this point. Israel will not allow Iran to get nuclear weapons. If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone. Yet, in standing alone, Israel will know that we will be defending many, many others” (www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/1.550012).

One day after PM Netanyahu warned the U.N. General Assembly on October 1 that Iran is only months away from having the capability to build nuclear weapons, the U.N. member states elected Iran on October 2 to serve as the rapporteur of the U.N. First Committee on Disarmament and Internal Security. This puts Iran in charge of officially reporting on all of the committee’s proceedings and actions. This committee is chaired by Libya, while Iran currently serves as chair of the Non-Aligned Movement, the largest bloc of nations at the U.N.

Iran’s website crows that “the UN General Assembly members … chose Iran to prove ineffectiveness of the row stirred up by the Zionist prime minister … The recent vote…is a clear indicative of the world community trust in Iran’s efforts in the course of disarmament and a practical response to the groundless allegations of the spurious Zionist regime” (ed. sic.; https://english.irib.ir/analysis/commentaries/item/118203-iran-appointed-as-r).  Former Pentagon advisor Michael Rubin dryly noted, “I’m just surprised that the UN never got around to hiring Michael Jackson to work in its daycare center. This seems about as good an idea” (https://freebeacon.com/united-nations-picks-iran-to-serve-on-disarmament-committee).

An appeaser, in the words of Churchill, is one who feeds the crocodile while hoping it will eat him last. As this modern Haman is being given the benefit of the doubt at the United Nations General Assembly on the banks of the East River, we who pray for the restoration of the Jewish people realize that intercession is of the essence here.

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

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal) through: www.davidstent.org

“Render unto Caesar” – Seismic shifts in post-Nazi Europe

There are between seven and eight major tectonic plates within the bowels of this planet. Held in place by the sustaining power of God, their slightest movement blasts volcanoes into being, throws jagged mountains into the skies, and spins out shuddering earthquakes. The Jewish people’s state strategically sits between two major plates – the African Plate and the Eurasian Plate – a land bridge between Europe, Asia and Africa. Some call this area a minor plate, the Arabian. In God’s sight, this is not a minor plate but the very center of the world (Ezekiel 5:5; 38:12).

In the same way as seismic shifts occur when plates realign, so tectonic shifts in the spirit occur when Continental powers realign. Europe has been experiencing physical temblors over the past few year and a half – Sofia, Bulgaria 5.6; Ierápetra, Greece, 5.8; Pirgos near Crete, 6.2; Mormanno (5.5), Medolla (5.8) and Emilia (6.0), all in Italy; near Tromsø Norway (6.2). But certain legal decisions recently taken regarding the Jewish people have led to a realigning of unseen plates – a seismic spiritual shift in the foundations of the European Union.

Outlawing Abraham’s seed

These European shifts have occurred in response to God’s promises over Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. These shifts directly oppose YHVH’s redemptive strategies for world salvation, the judgment of the human race and the restoration of Israel. They strike at the heart of the covenant that God cut in Genesis 12, 15 and 17 with Abraham, the father of all those who have saving faith (Romans 4:16-17). Specifically, the European Union as a group (and individual nations within it) are attempting to reject or make illegal the three divinely established connections between the Jewish people and the Abrahamic Covenant:

The strategic catalyst for these specific efforts is found in the spiritual realm, though of course the ‘genteel’ authors of these legislations are primarily secular or New Age. The fallen angel who tried to get Balaam to prophesy curses over the Jewish people is the same one who seems to be succeeding in bringing Europe under the spiritual ban, and into cursing the seed of Jacob.

A cut below average

There is a move afoot, one with strong momentum, to ban Jewish people from circumcising their male babies in obedience to Genesis 17.

Sweden’s Parliament passed a law in allowing only persons certified by the National Board of Health to circumcise infants, requiring a medical doctor or an anesthesia nurse to accompany the circumciser, and insisting that anesthetic  be administered prior to the operation. Both Swedish Jews and Muslims objected to the law. The World Jewish Congress called this law “the first legal restriction on Jewish religious practice in Europe since the Nazi era.” Those opposed to Jewish circumcision responded, claiming that non-medical circumcision is in violation of the United Nation's Declaration of the Rights of the Child.

Norway’s Senterpartiet (2012) proposed a ban on circumcision on males under the age of eighteen.

Finland has had an ambivalent response about male religious circumcision. In 2008, the Finnish government was considering a new law to legalize circumcision if the practitioner is a doctor and if the child consents. Yet in December 2011, Helsinki District Court stated that the Supreme Court's decision does not mean that circumcision is legal for any non-medical reasons. The court referred to the Convention on Human rights and Biomedicine of the Council of Europe (ratified in Finland in 2010).

Germany has moved back and forth on the subject, with a Cologne regional appellate court ruling in May 2012 that religious circumcision of male children amounts to bodily injury, and is a criminal offense in the area under its jurisdiction. The court applied human rights provisions of the Basic Law, a section of the Civil Code, and some sections of the Criminal Code to non-therapeutic circumcision of male children, in order to come to its ruling.

Roman Catholic Archbishop of Aachen, Heinrich Mussinghoff, said that the ruling was “very surprising” (www.gatestoneinstitute.org/3217/circumcision-germany-austria-switzerland). Hans Ulrich Anke, president of the Church Office of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD), said the ruling should be appealed since it didn't “sufficiently” consider the religious significance of the rite (www.ekd.de/english/ekd_press_releases-4792.html). Steffen Seibert, spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel stated that Jewish and Muslim communities will be free to practice circumcision responsibly, and the government would find a way around the local ban in Cologne. The spokesman stated “For everyone in the government it is absolutely clear that we want to have Jewish and Muslim religious life in Germany. Circumcision carried out in a responsible manner must be possible in this country without punishment.”

In July 2012, a group of rabbis, imams, and others said that they view the ruling against circumcision “an affront on our basic religious and human rights.” The joint statement was signed by leaders of groups including Germany’s Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs, the Islamic Center Brussels, the Rabbinical Centre of Europe, the European Jewish Parliament and the European Jewish Association, who met with members of European Parliament from Germany, Finland, Belgium, Italy, and Poland. Meanwhile, the Jewish Hospital of Berlin suspended the practice of male circumcision.

On 19 July 2012, a joint resolution of the CDU/CSU, SPD and FDP factions in the Bundestag requesting the executive branch to draft a law permitting circumcision of boys to be performed without unnecessary pain in accordance with best medical practice carried with a broad majority. The New York Times reported that the German Medical Association “condemned the ruling for potentially putting children at risk by taking the procedure out of the hands of doctors, but it also warned surgeons not to perform circumcisions for religious reasons until legal clarity was established.” The ruling was supported by Deutsche Kinderhilfe, a German child rights organization, which asked for a two-year moratorium to discuss the issue and pointed out that religious circumcision may contravene the Convention on the Rights of the Child (Article 24.3: “States Parties shall take all effective and appropriate measures with a view to abolishing traditional practices prejudicial to the health of children”).

On 12 December 2012, following a series of hearings and consultations, the Bundestag adopted the proposed law explicitly permitting non-therapeutic circumcision to be performed under certain conditions; it is now §1631(d) in the German Civil Code. The vote tally was 434 ayes, 100 noes, and 46 abstentions.

England allows religious circumcision. Yet there are voices being raised which state that “circumcision has long existed as a procedure in need of a justification. We conclude that it is ethically inappropriate to subject children—male or female—to the acknowledged risks of circumcision and contend that there is no compelling legal authority for the common view that male circumcision is lawful” (www.cirp.org/library/legal/UKlaw/fox-thomson2005; www.cirp.org/library/legal/price/#n18).

The Maccabees redux

Barely seventy years after the Nazi war machine was grinding the Jewish people of Europe into powder, strident voices among the nations of Europe are again calling for making Jewish identity and existence illegal in Europe. One hundred and seventy years before the birth of Yeshua, the Greek Seleucid empire attempted a similar strategy spearheaded by Antiochus Epiphanes. This involved making the possession of the Bible illegal, making Sabbath observance illegal, and opening the Jewish people up to pagan and idolatrous worship and lifestyle. One of the most important of these anti-Jewish legal rulings was making circumcision illegal:

Then the king wrote to his whole kingdom that all should be one people, and that all should give up their particular customs. All the Gentiles accepted the command of the king. Many even from Israel gladly adopted his religion; they sacrificed to idols and profaned the Sabbath. And the king sent letters by messengers to Jerusalem and the towns of Judah; he directed them to follow customs strange to the land, to forbid burnt-offerings and sacrifices and drink-offerings in the sanctuary, to profane Sabbaths and festivals, to defile the sanctuary and the priests, to build altars and sacred precincts and shrines for idols, to sacrifice swine and other unclean animals, and to leave their sons uncircumcised. They were to make themselves abominable by everything unclean and profane, so that they would forget the law and change all the ordinances. He added, ‘And whoever does not obey the command of the king shall die’ (1 Maccabees 1: 41-50)

In such words he wrote to his whole kingdom. He appointed inspectors over all the people and commanded the towns of Judah to offer sacrifice, town by town. Many of the people, everyone who forsook the law, joined them, and they did evil in the land; they drove Israel into hiding in every place of refuge they had. Now on the fifteenth day of Kislev, in the one hundred and forty-fifth year, they erected a desolating sacrilege on the altar of burnt-offering. They also built altars in the surrounding towns of Judah, and offered incense at the doors of the houses and in the streets. The books of the law that they found they tore to pieces and burned with fire. Anyone found possessing the book of the covenant, or anyone who adhered to the law, was condemned to death by decree of the king. They kept using violence against Israel, against those who were found month after month in the towns. On the twenty-fifth day of the month they offered sacrifice on the altar that was on top of the altar of burnt-offering. In accordance with the decree, they put to death the women who had their children circumcised, and their families and those who circumcised them; and they hung the infants from their mothers’ necks. But many in Israel stood firm and were resolved in their hearts not to eat unclean food. They chose to die rather than to be defiled by food or to profane the holy covenant; and they did die” (1 Maccabees 1: 51-63); https://bible.oremus.org/?passage=1+maccabees+2:46-2:46&version=nrsvae).

“This land ain’t your land”

The God of Israel has invested a lot of time and care in prophesying about the Jewish people’s restoration to their Promised Land, a Last Days event (e.g., Isaiah 11:11; 56:4-8; 59:15-20; 60-62; etc.; Jeremiah 30:18-31:38). He describes in detail machinations of the nations to impede, block, hobble and otherwise destroy this restoration, as well as the ultimate futility in trying to do so (Psalm 2; 83; Jeremiah 30:16; Isaiah 41:11; 60:14; Ezekiel 34; 36; Joel 3:1-2; Zechariah 14:1-2; etc.).

Yet it is with a perversity of spirit that that noble leaders and power brokers of Europe are moving their countries to the lip of the abyss. Even though the God of Israel says that He established the borders of Europe based on His priority relationship with the Jewish people (Deuteronomy 32:8-10), and that Messiah Yeshua will severely judge the nations based on their dividing up of the Land of Israel (Joel 3:1-3), the European Union is high-handedly violating God’s international principles and prophetic warnings.

On June 30 2013 the EU voted on “Guidelines on the eligibility of Israeli entities and their activities in the territories occupied by Israel since 1967 for grants, prizes and financial instruments funded by the EU from 2014 onwards” (https://unispal.un.org/unispal.nsf/47d4e277b48d9d3685256ddc00612265/88584262a0a0e3e485257bad00441464?OpenDocument). Though these guidelines mean to limit financial support to Israel, they actually go further than that. They declare that Israeli institutions and settlement over the Green Line (Judea and Samaria, or the West Bank) are illegal, and that Jews living there are personae non gratae, but that Arabs who live there are the recognized and rightful heirs.

Under “Section A; General Issues” the EU states (and I quote):

The European Union has now gone on the record in a major international forum. It refuses to discern or recognize YHVH’s hand in restoring the Jewish people to their sovereign land, but it financially blesses the PLO (arch-terrorist Arafat’s inheritance) and the PA (led by the Mahmoud Abbas aka Abu Mazen, the funder of the Munich Olympics massacres, who received his Holocaust-denying Ph.D. from Moscow’s Patrice Lumumba University; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Side:_The_Secret_Relationship_Between_Nazism_and_Zionism; www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=2531).

“Thus says YHVH, Restrain your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears. For your work will be rewarded, declares YHVH, and they will return from the land of the enemy. There is hope for your future, declares YHVH, and your children will return to their own borders” (Jeremiah 31:16-17).

Stranger in a strange land

Though the EU does not clearly state it in its “Guidelines” preamble, it assumes that Israel’s control of the ‘territories’ is both illegal and immoral. No such barrier exists to Arab Palestinian settlement in those territories, according to their belief.

It would be helpful to ask if Jewish settlement in the Land of Israel is indeed illegal according to international law.

The first legal document concerning the legality of Jewish settlement in the Promised Land is the San Remo Resolution, held in the Italian town of San Remo on April 25, 1920. The Supreme Council of the Principal Allied Powers (England, France, Italy) with representatives from Japan, Greece and Belgium (the USA had observer status) decided that the Middle East would be split up into three different mandates. France would administer the Syria mandate (Lebanon and Syria), while England would oversee the Mesopotamia mandate (Iraq, Arabia) and the Palestine mandate.

The Arabs were seen as primarily dwelling in the territories of the first two mandates, while Palestine was seen as becoming primarily a Jewish state. The Resolution states that “the Mandatory will be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on November 8, 1917, by the British Government, and adopted by the other Allied Powers, in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people” (www.cfr.org/israel/san-remo-resolution/p15248).

These concepts and phraseology were taken from the Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917 (www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/ForeignPolicy/Peace/Guide/pages/The%20Balfour%20Declaration.aspx). These words were now incorporated into a League of Nations resolution, and therefore they were clothed in the authority of international law (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Remo_conference; www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijS8mFP4I1A#at=39).

International legal expert Jacques Gauthier of Toronto stated at the 90th anniversary celebrations of the Resolution, that the San Remo Conference was a “key defining moment in history.” The Jewish claim was recognized by the world’s powers (adopted by the League of Nations, and signed by 51 countries) – that the Jewish people are recognized by the Great Powers as a people worthy of self-determination, that the Jewish historical connection with the Land known as Palestine was recognized, and that they had a right to re-establish and reconstitute their Jewish historical rights in that Land. Great Britain further swore that they would “use their best endeavours to facilitate” a Jewish national home in Palestine.

Chaim Weizmann, president of the Zionist Organization and later the first President of the State of Israel, called San Remo the “most momentous political event in the whole history of our movement, and it is, perhaps, no exaggeration to say in the whole history of our people since the Exile.” British Foreign Secretary Lord Curzon called the San Remo Resolution the “Magna Carta of the Zionists.”

The San Remo Resolution did not determine precise boundaries at that time. They were to later “be determined by the Principal Allied Powers,” and were not finalized until the Treaty of Sèvres (August 10, 1920; Section VII, Art 94-97) and then finally confirmed by the Council of the League of Nations on 24 July 1922.

The Israel mandate in Palestine

The British Palestine Mandate came about after discussions by the League of Nations at the Conference of London (February 12-24, 1920; https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/palmanda.asp).

Article 6 of the Palestine Mandate states, “The Administration of Palestine, while ensuring that the rights and position of other sections of the population are not prejudiced, shall facilitate Jewish immigration under suitable conditions and shall encourage, in co-operation with the Jewish agency referred to in Article 4, close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes” (emphases mine).

This Article declares that not only should Jews settle on all the Land (including the West Bank), but that it should be “close settlement” – highly populated and burgeoning with returning Israelites. Reference is even made to the permissibility of using State lands and waste or unused land for specific settlement.

The Levy Report

In July 2012, the Israeli Government’s Commission to Examine the Status of Building in Judea and Samaria issued its findings. The Levy Report was headed by former Supreme Court Justice Edmond Levy, and included international law expert and former Foreign Ministry legal adviser Alan Baker as well as former Tel Aviv District Court Judge Tchia Shapira. The commission’s task was to “examine the situation of building in Judea and Samaria and to advise the Israeli government accordingly, and to that end had to determine the legal nature of Israel’s presence in the area. Nothing more, nothing less. No hidden political agenda.”

Based on such legal documents as the original League of Nations Mandate for Palestine and Article 80 of the United Nations charter (which preserved the application of the League of Nations Mandate’s stipulations), the commission found that the establishment of Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria is consistent with international law (www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/The-Levy-Report-A-vital-beginning).

An excellent article has been written by Melanie Phillips, a British op-ed journalist and truth talker – “The baseless hatred of the EU towards Israel” (www.melaniephillips.com/the-baseless-hatred-of-the-eu-towards-israel).

The recent declarations by Secretary of State John Kerry calling Israeli settlements illegal are without foundation. “Like outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Kerry supports Israel and understands its needs, but is a staunch opposer of the settlement enterprise” (“John Kerry: Supports pro-Israel laws, opposes settlements,” Yitzhak Ben-Horin, Jerusalem Post, December 22, 2012).

The basis for what the world calls the ‘peace negotiations’ is a false presumption that Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria are illegal and must be uprooted. In a recent article “Livni to meet Kerry amid settlement freeze rumors” (Tovah Lazaroff, Khaled Abu Toameh, Jerusalem Post, May 18, 2013):

“Chief Palestinian Liberation Organization negotiator Saeb Erekat said that he had not been informed of any moves to curb settlement construction. ‘We have not been notified of any changes to Israel’s colonial plans, including ongoing construction in dozens of Israeli settlements in the Occupied State of Palestine, including in and around our occupied capital east Jerusalem,’ Erekat said. Nabil Abu Rdaineh, a spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, responded cautiously to the reports. ‘A freeze in settlement construction within the 1967 borders and especially Jerusalem are the basis of starting any genuine and serious negotiations,’ he said. ‘We must hear Israel state this policy officially.’”

Outlawing Jewish food in Poland

In the 1940’s Poland was chosen by the Nazi Reich as the main location for murdering the Jewish people. By the end of WWII approximately six million had been massacred, half of that number in Poland. The re-establishment of normal Jewish life in Poland after the Holocaust has been a challenging task, but recently even that task has encountered some severe road bumps.

In 2012 the Polish constitutional court outlawed kosher abbatoirs (where kosher meat is slaughtered), and in July 2013 the Polish Sejm (Parliament) overturned a government-backed bill that would have allowed kosher meat to be produced in Poland (“Polish parliament rejects kosher slaughter,” Reuters, July 13, 2013). The bill’s defeat was a political setback for Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, after 38 deputies from his own party crossed the floor to the opposition to defeat the bill (www.jta.org/2013/07/16/news-opinion/world/ban-on-kosher-slaughter-stirs-unease-among-polish-jews).

“Populism, superstition and political interests won out,” said Piotr Kadlcik, who heads the Union of Jewish Communities of Poland. “It looks like we've made a full circle and are heading back to what happened in Poland and Germany in the 1930s” (www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4404308,00.html).

At present, kosher slaughter of animals is illegal in five European countries – Poland, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway and Iceland. Holland is radically moving in that direction, and the matter is being avidly discussed in Britain.

A pointed editorial from Germany’s English version Algemeiner Journal is worth reading, “Outlawing Kosher Meat and Europe’s Profound Semite-Loathing” (www.algemeiner.com/2013/02/12/outlawing-kosher-meat-and-europe%E2%80%99s-profound-semite-loathing/).

As it was in the days of Antiochus Epiphanes, Israel was forced to eat non-kosher meat. Today Europe is fast becoming a continent which tells Jews what to eat and where to live.

Earthquakes in Basel

On October 18, 1356 the most significant seismological event in Central Europe’s recorded history occurred – a massive earthquake in Basel, which may have been as strong as 7.1 on the Richter scale (https://gji.oxfordjournals.org/content/178/1/351.full). A conservative estimate is that at least 300 died in the quake. The town of Basel was totally destroyed (https://support.rms.com/publications/BaselReport_650year_retrospective.pdf).

Basel is a city that has had a history of interaction with the Jewish people. In the 1200’s Jews lived in Basel and Zurich. They helped the Catholic bishops to purchase the Kleinbasel suburb and to construct the Middle Bridge over the Rhine in 1225. Yet in 1348-1349, goaded by demonic fears that Jews were both poisoning the wells and causing the Black Plague, six to seven hundred of the town’s Jewish population were forced into a wooden house on an island on the Rhine and were burned to death. Their children were forcibly baptized. But after the earthquake Jewish people were allowed to return to Basel and help in its rebuilding. Nevertheless, in 1397 they were banished from Basel “for 200 years.”

We have some dear friends in Switzerland who believe that there was a connection between the murder of Basel’s Jews and the earthquake – the judgment of God came upon a European city which despised, rejected and murdered its Jewish citizens, even making their very presence in Basel illegal.

Render unto Caesar – no more, no less

Messiah Yeshua challenged His generation to render to Caesar what belongs to Caesar – in that discussion, it was taxes (Matthew 22:21). The principle He taught applied to more than taxes, as the Apostles explain, “But Peter and John answered and said to them, ‘Whether it is right in the sight of God to give heed to you rather than to God, you be the judge; for we cannot stop speaking about what we have seen and heard’” (Acts 4:19-20).

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the 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

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