War with Hezbollah

Emergency prayer request for Israel

July 12-26 2006

At approximately 9:05 am this morning the Islamist terror group Hezbollah opened up a massive katyusha rocket and mortar attack on Israel's northern farms in the western Galilee. Eight Israeli were injured according to initial reports.

Evidently the attack was a cover ruse to kidnap Israeli soldiers. Two IDF soldiers engaged in a routine Hummer patrol on the Israeli side close to the international border were kidnapped by Hezbollah during the attack. Within an hour Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV announced the kidnap, and within an hour later the Israel Defense Forces spokesman acknowledged the strong probability that a kidnap had occurred.

At this moment, Hezbollah mortars are falling on Israeli kibbutzim and moshavim. IDF jets have blown up a bridge in south Lebanon in an attempt to slow down the terrorists from fleeing deeper into Lebanon, and are shelling Hezbollah positions along the border in that area.

Victory celebrations are breaking out at this moment in towns throughout south Lebanon over the kidnapping.

This kidnapping comes in the wake of the kidnapping of Corporal Gilad Shalit two weeks ago, also within Israel's internationally recognized borders beside the Gaza Strip. That kidnapping prompted a re-entry of IDF forces into Gaza, as well as shelling of Kassam rocket launchers and targeted assassinations of Hamas terrorists and their commanders.

Hezbollah receives its military equipment and encouragement from Iran, and all weapons flow to Hezbollah through Syria. Both countries are involved in strategic advice, influence and support for Hezbollah. Hamas is headquartered in Damascus and also receives much military help from Iran, smuggled in through Egypt.

The IDF will probably respond by striking in three areas:

1. There are 13,000 long-range Hezbollah rockets on the border with Israel. These can reach Haifa, Tiberias and Hadera with fair accuracy. Chances are that the upset of the military status quo will force Israel to at least weaken and at most destroy Hezbollah's missile ability to hurt Israel. It is probable that a military incursion into Lebanon to destroy Hezbollah's infrastructure is in the offing.

2. It is highly likely that Lebanon will pay a price for not controlling its own sovereign territory and for allowing it to be used to attack Israel, a country which has pulled back to the internationally recognized border years ago. This might involve bombing of Lebanese infrastructure, power stations, etc.

3. It is pretty likely that Syria's support for Hezbollah and Hamas means that there may be IDF strikes into Syria generally, and on Damascus specifically.

PLEASE PRAY URGENTLY FOR THESE SOLDIERS AND FOR ISRAEL'S LEADERS

According to the Jewish calendar, the period beginning tonight marks the "Dire Straits" season, from the 17^th of Tammuz to the 9^th of Av. This is a season of increased danger for Israel. See our newsletter from February 21 2005 on www.davidstent.org for more information here. This is a period where watching and praying for Israel's safety is of heightened importance. Please stand with us in prayer for God's protection on Israel, for the return of these soldiers, and for God's hand to prevent a major war from breaking out before the time.

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Emergency prayer request for Israel – Day Two

July 13, 2006

This is a short report of details of today's fighting, followed by a brief analysis of the 'whys' and then specific prayer requests.

Last night (Wednesday July 12) was the first night of the "bein hameitzarim " or "dire straits" period (see www.davidstent.org under the "words" section, Feb 21 2005 newsletter), a period of extreme spiritual danger for Israel. This period lasts up to the 9^th of Av (Thursday August 3). It is a time of urgent heightened prayer for Israel and her survival.

Yesterday morning began with an attack across the international border by Hezbollah terrorists based out of Lebanon. A routine Israeli Humvee patrol was ambushed, 3 soldiers killed and 2 taken hostage into Lebanon. An Israeli tank involved in an attempted rescue attempt was blown up and the 4-person crew was killed. Another Israeli soldier was killed trying to rescue the tank crew.

During the day Israeli special forces entered Lebanon and IDF planes struck most bridges in south Lebanon, slowing down travel with the center and north of Lebanon – partly to impede the captors, partly to weaken the terrorist infrastructure. The Israeli operation has been given the name "Sahar Holem" or "Just Rewards".

Last night and this morning (Thursday) saw the beginning of a concerted rocket attack on Israel's northern sector. Over 100 Katyusha rockets have been fired at farms and towns in the Galilee, including Nahariya, Tzfat (Safed), Carmiel, Majd al-Kurum (an Arab Israeli town), Rosh Pina, and Mount Meron. These short-range katyushas (the RAD-1) killed one 40-year old lady and severely injured perhaps a dozen, while lightly injuring over 100 people.

IDF planes responded by bombing the Beirut airport, causing damage which takes approximately 48 hours to repair. This is a military warning to Lebanon that much greater damage can be done, but that Israel wants Lebanon as a sovereign state to immediately stop armed terrorists from planning and executing murderous cross-border attacks from the safety of Lebanese territory. Hezbollah does have members sitting in the Lebanese government, and its presence is tolerated and occasionally cheered in official Lebanese circles.

As well, IDF jets bombed world terrorism centers and training camps in the Baalbek valley (where CIA station chief William Buckley was once tortured to death over a 15 month period by Hezbollah-associated forces), where Syria has an active presence, and also hit portions of the Beirut-Damascus highway within :Lebanon, where Syria still has small bases of its own soldiers on Lebanese territory. IDF navy boats and jets have placed a total blockade on maritime and air approaches to Lebanon. This combined strategy is meant to prevent re-supply of arms from reaching Hezbollah from Syria and Iran either by land, sea or air.

During the afternoon, Israel announced that if Hezbollah employed its long-range Fajr katyusha rocket and attacked major Israeli cities (these katyushas are capable of hitting Haifa, Tiberias and Hadera), Israel would respond by bombing the Hezbollah headquarters in southern Beirut and by leveling major high-rises in Beirut. A few hours later Hezbollah announced that if Israel attacked southern Beirut or Beirut itself, Hezbollah would fire missiles against Haifa.

At 8:03 pm tonight (Thursday evening Israel time) Hezbollah fired 3 Fajr katyusha rockets on Haifa. With all the red lines that have been crossed in the past 40 hours, this is a major escalation. Consider the situation – a Shi'ite jihadi terrorist group is attacking civilian population centers in Israel, armed by Iran and supported by Syria. The IDF has declared that its deterrent capabilities must be preserved and that terrorist bands cannot hold Israel hostage nor its soldiers hostage.

It is assumed that strong Israel Air Force response will come tonight. Probable focus will be on the 13,000 katyusha rockets that Hezbollah has aimed at Israeli cities, at Hezbollah HQ in Beirut, and on other strategic targets in Lebanon. The IDF has been warning the population in those areas for the past 24 hours to move out temporarily.

Why now?

There are two probable reasons for the war now.

One is connected to the spiritual season we are in, the period of the "dire straits".

The other probably concerns Iran and what the Scriptures refer to as the Prince of Persia, the demonic principality that oversees and guides modern Iran's present government. Iran is interested in distracting the world from its determined efforts to manufacture nuclear weapons. Its leader Ahmedinejad has repeatedly declared his Shi'ite belief that Islam's Messiah-like figure is soon to appear, and that jihad against the West and Israel is the next item of business. Iran is probably attempting to distract the G-8 meeting in Germany from its own nefarious nuclear activities by activating its proxy Hezbollah.

This is also a time when Israel is prosecuting another terror war and hostage situation in the Gaza Strip. Iran and Hezbollah probably felt that Israel is also distracted and therefore could be weakened by opening up a second Islamist front against the Jewish state.

How to pray?

1. The decisive defeat of Fascist Germany and Imperial Japan at the conclusion of World War II led to a real period of peace. Only a decisive defeat of Hezbollah can lead to a real breathing space of quiet in the Near East. The pushing back of Hezbollah terrorist from the Israeli border and the destruction of their missile arsenal is an immediate need.

2. The release of captive Israeli soldiers could tone down the hostilities, though not solve the basic problems. Pray for the preservation of their lives and their speedy return to Israel.

3. Wisdom and divine strategies for Israel's military and governmental leaders. Pray by name for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, for Chief of Staff Dan Halutz and for Defense Minister Amir Peretz.

4. Protection for Israeli soldiers involved in the battle, and especially for those Messianic Jewish believers who are presently involved in the fighting. Protection for Israeli civilians from rocket attacks.

5. A revelation of Yeshua the Messiah for many in Israel. C.S. Lewis once said that God whispers in our pleasures and shouts in our pains. It is His megaphone to raise a deaf world. Pray that many ears will be opened to the sounds of salvation.

6. Pray for a minimal loss of life among those Lebanese who are innocent civilians. Pray for a revelation for them of Yeshua, as well as a revelation that the God of Israel is watching over and protecting His Jewish people.

7. Pray for God's hand on Syria and Iran, and for the Almighty God of Israel to foil and break the satanic schemes of the enemy.

Emergency prayer request for Israel – Day Four

July 15 2006

This is a short report of details of today's fighting, followed by a brief analysis, and then specific prayer requests.

Today (Saturday July 15) is the fourth day of the "bein hameitzarim" or "dire straits" period (see www.davidstent.org under the "words" section, Feb 21 2005 newsletter, also www.bobjones.org/articles/Basilisk%202002.htm), a period of extreme spiritual danger for Israel. This period lasts up to the 9^th of Av (Thursday August 3). It is a time of urgent heightened prayer for Israel and her survival.

Friday and today (Saturday) have seen increased escalation between Lebanese Hezbollah and Israel.

Over 761 katyusha rockets have been fired by Hezbollah into the northern sector of Israel over the past four days, striking, killing and wounding in a wide swath from Nahariya in the west to Hazor and Mahanayim in the east. Over 150 Israelis have been injured, more than 10 seriously. At least four civilians have been killed.

Israeli planes have carried than 1,000 sorties in Lebanon, enforcing a no-fly zone, impeding Hezbollah from resupplying its arsenal from Syrian and Iranian forces, and destroying Hezbollah command-and-control centers as well as rocket launchers. A naval and air blockade is in force. One goal of these strikes is to pressure the Lebanese government into taking responsibility for its own territory by closing down and disarming the Hezbollah terrorist bases in south Lebanon which are being used to attack Israel.

Thursday night saw Hezbollah fire two Fajr long-range katyusha rockets into Haifa, Friday saw Hezbollah fire over 100 rockets into Galilee, including at Safed (Zfat), Carmiel and Nahariya. Saturday (so far) has seen over 106 rockets hit Tiberias (for the first time ever, another red line crossed) in residential and hotel areas, Safed and many smaller towns and moshavim in the Galilee, including hits on the Israeli Arab Druze villages of Horfesh and El-Koush. Over 50 Israeli Jews and Arabs have been wounded today.

On Friday night Hezbollah forces led by Iranian military advisors fired a Chinese UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) loaded with explosives at an IDF missile boat off the coast of Beirut, killing between 2 and 4 crew members. The involvement of Iranian soldiers in this war is a serious escalation and matter of urgent prayer.

What next ?

Militarily, the order of battle is intensifying in increments.

Probably Hezbollah will increase long-range rocket attacks on major Israeli cities like Haifa (and its suburban oil refineries), Tiberias and even Hadera.

Intense Israeli bombings of Hezbollah targets and infrastructure in Lebanon would be next, followed by insertion of Special Forces by sea, air and land. A land incursion of divisional strength (20,000-30,000 Israeli troops) would probably come after that.

Hezbollah knows that it cannot defeat Israel militarily in a head-on confrontation. Hezbollah is counting on world pressure to stop Israel from crushing Hezbollah on the battlefield. EU, UN, G-8, Arab League and perhaps even US diplomatic pressures will increase, demanding an unconditional ceasefire. Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler led quickly to World War II. Appeasement of Hezbollah and the Islamic oil-producing world would lead to a further weakening of Israel and an intensification of World War III (see www.davidstent.org, "words", August 23 2005).

One of Hezbollah's short term goals is the release of their own terrorist prisoners in Israeli jails.

Hezbollah's long-term goal is very clear – the destruction of Israel and America. Hezbollah's philosophy is outlined in its "An Open Letter: The Hizballah Program" published February 16, 1985 in al-Safir newspaper (Beirut); under the paragraph entitled "The necessity for the destruction of Israel": "We see in Israel the vanguard of the United States in our Islamic world. It is the hated enemy that must be fought until the hated ones get what they deserve". And again, Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah declared at a public rally in Beirut in September 2002, "Regardless of how the world has changed after September 11, 'Death to America' will remain our reverberating and powerful slogan: Death to America!"

Hezbollah may also hope than Syria and Iran will join the battle against Israel, and that this would lead to the breakout of a global Islamic jihad against Israel and the West.

How to pray?

1. Pray for the safety and rescue/return of the 3 Israeli soldiers held hostage by Hamas (Gil'ad Shalit, 19 years old) and Hezbollah (Ehud Goldwasser, 31 years old; Eldad Regev, 26 years old) .

2. Hezbollah has traditionally turned to hostage taking, an old Middle Eastern strategy when the going gets tough. Pray for the safety and evacuation of 25,000 US citizens and other Westerners now in Beirut.

3. Sheikh Nasrallah declared yesterday that "we are going to an open war on Israel." Hezbollah has long-range terror capabilities. It has carried out kidnappings and torture of top CIA officials in the 1980's; Beirut suicide truck bombing in 1983 that killed 304 Americans and wounded 200; the hijacking of TWA flight 847 in Beirut; the 1992 bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires (29 killed); and the 1994 bombing of the Jewish community center in the same city (95 killed). Ask God to send His angels to foil and frustrate any satanic Hezbollah terror plots around the world.

4. The Islamic world has used an oil embargo against the West in order to punish it for standing with Israel. Pray that God would give Western leaders holy courage and divine strategies on how to deal with oil warfare.

5. Protection for Israeli soldiers involved in the battle, and especially for those Messianic Jewish believers who are presently involved in the fighting. Also pray for protection for Israeli civilians from rocket attacks.

Emergency prayer request for Israel – Day Five

July 16, 2006

This is a short report of details of today's fighting, followed by a brief analysis, and then specific prayer requests.

Today (Sunday July 16) is the fifth day of the "bein hameitzarim" or "dire straits" period (see www.davidstent.org under the "words" section, Feb 21 2005 newsletter, also www.bobjones.org/articles/Basilisk%202002.htm), a period of extreme spiritual danger for Israel. This period lasts up to the 9^th of Av (Thursday August 3). It is a time of urgent heightened prayer for Israel and her survival.

Each of the five days of war has seen increased escalation between Lebanese Hezbollah and Israel.

So far nearly 800 katyusha rockets have been fired into Israel. Over 500 Israelis have been wounded. Up until today 4 Israelis have been killed by the rockets.

Today (Sunday) has seen a rapid escalation. Close to 9:15 am five Fajr long-range Iranian built katyusha rockets were fired by Hezbollah at the Krayot Haifa industrial area. One hit a train repair warehouse, killing 8 and wounding 13. The explosive munitions on this rocket are stronger than all the other katyusha land attacks Israel has seen to this point. In this one attack today more Israelis have died than in the past four days.

Hezbollah immediately announced on its al-Manar TV station that Israel should not responded 'stupidly', otherwise Hezbollah threatened that it would begin to target Haifa's petrochemical refineries. This area is adjacent to Israel's third largest city, and many Israelis live directly beside these refineries.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert stated that this heavier rocket attack would have far-reaching ramifications on the northern border and for the entire area.

Over the past hour four developments have happened:

1. All Israelis living between Haifa and Tel Aviv have been warned to heighten awareness for the possibility of incoming Hezbollah missiles. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has concluded (based on the Chinese-made Iranian C-802 missile attack against its Saar-5 missile boat on Friday night) that Iran has transferred much technology and weaponry to Hezbollah. This would include the Zilzal missile with a range of 160 km, and other missiles with a range of up to 200 km. These missiles would put much of Israel's population on the coastal plain within range.

2. General Udi Adam of Israel's Northern Command has strongly suggested to all inhabitants of southern Lebanon to move northward toward Beirut immediately. The cut-off time on this warning is 1 pm Israeli-Lebanese time, a warning of 90 minutes total. The warning was broadcast by Arabic radio and by Arabic leaflets. Adam stated that since these people are human shields for Hezbollah's katyusha attacks, Israel is about to strike back and would prefer that non-combatants leave the area for their own safety. He stated that the IDF's target is Hezbollah and that they will make every effort not to hit Christian areas or the Lebanese Forces (which are primarily Maronite Christian). The area delineated includes Bint Jbeil and Nabatiya.

This effort to avoid civilian casualties is typical of IDF policies during war. Most of the katyusha rockets are hidden in living rooms and basements throughout southern Lebanon, as is Hezbollah's local command structure. General Adam's warning will cause an immediate flow of refugees toward Beirut, in the range of 200,000 to 300,000.

3. The IDF Home Command is forbidden local and foreign news media to give real-time specific locations of where katyusha rockets have fallen, in order to prevent Hezbollah gunners (who are monitoring Israeli and world TV) from adjusting their sights and honing in on targets. All merchant marine boats in Haifa harbor have been encouraged to lift anchor and move out into the Mediterranean.

4. Iran has threatened Israel not to attack Syria, warning that if Israel does this the consequences will be unimaginable. Syria has just announced that if they are attacked, they will respond harshly. Syria is armed with hundreds of North Korean Scud-C missiles, many of them having chemical warheads of VX and Sarin gas. Their accuracy is within 15 meters (50 feet) and they can hit Beersheva and possibly even Eilat. All Hezbollah weaponry and training is coming from Syria and Iran, including real-time military advisors on location.

What next ?

Hezbollah will increase long-range rocket attacks on major Israeli cities like Tiberias, Hadera, and possibly even Netanya and Tel Aviv.

It is highly likely that the petrochemical industries in the Krayot area of Haifa will be targeted and hit. This would create an environmental problem of large proportions, and would necessitate the evacuation of many civilians from the adjoining areas.

Intense Israeli bombings of Hezbollah targets and infrastructure in south Lebanon is next, accompanied by insertion of Special Forces by sea, air and land.

A huge amount of refugees will flow toward Beirut.

There is significant danger that Syria and Iran will try to join the battle against Israel, hoping that this would trigger a global Islamic jihad against Israel and the West.

How to pray?

1. Pray for God to deflect Hezbollah missiles away from their targets. This happened in the 1991 Gulf War and it can happen again as we pray.

2. Pray for the safety of all Israelis targeted by Hezbollah rockets and missiles.

3. Pray for a revelation of Yeshua as Messiah and atonement to many in Israel right now.

4. Pray for the protection of the many south Lebanese who are soon to become refugees.

5. Pray for those Hezbollah fighting against Israel to either be saved or to be totally crushed.

6. Protection for Israeli soldiers fighting, and especially for those Messianic Jewish believers presently involved in the war.

7. Pray for God to reveal and counter Syrian and Iranian strategies to the IDF generals, as He did in 2 Kings 6 in Elisha's day.

8. Ask the God of Israel to hook you up to His prayer request line – to download to you directly and in real time what needs to be prayed for. This is what Rees Howell experienced during WW II, in a time when there were no TVs, no cell phones and no internet.

Emergency prayer request for Israel – Day Seven

July 19 2006

This is a short report of details of today's fighting, followed by a brief analysis, and then specific prayer requests.

Today (Tuesday July 18) is the seventh day of the "bein hameitzarim" or "dire straits" period (see www.davidstent.org under the "words" section, Feb 21 2005 newsletter, also www.bobjones.org/articles/Basilisk%202002.htm), a period of extreme spiritual danger for Israel. This period lasts up to the 9^th of Av (Thursday August 3). It is a time of urgent heightened prayer for Israel and her survival.

Our last prayer request came out at noon Israeli time Sunday July 16. This report sums up the past 60 hours of the war.

1. One million Israelis are spending day and night in reinforced concrete safe rooms in the North of the country, a precaution against katyusha rocket attacks. This will probably continue until Hezbollah no longer has the ability to fire katyushas.

2. Residents of the coastal plain from Tel Aviv up to Haifa have been told that they need to stay close to buildings and be prepared to take shelter immediately upon hearing a 60-second warning by air raid siren.

3. Towns, villages, kibbutzim and moshavim continue to be hit on a daily, sometimes hourly basis. These include major towns like Haifa, Nahariya, Safed, Afula, Carmiel, Kiryat Shmonah, Tiberias, to Arab and Druze villages like Julis, Abu Snaan, Kafr Yasif, Sachnin and Deir al-Assad. On Monday night 70 communities were hit, while on Tuesday 125 katyushas were fired at Israel.

4. In Safed the major hospital and a chocolate factory were hit. Power outages occurred in Western Galilee when katyushas destroyed some electric pylons. In Haifa two floors of a residential apartment building were collapsed and 11 people were trapped, requiring IDF combat engineers to dig them out.

5. Nazareth and Capernaum, two sites made famous in the Gospels, have both been hit by katyushas.

6. 70 families in Carmiel are moving down to Gush Etzion (south of Jerusalem) for shelter while the katyusha attacks continue.

7. In the Gaza Strip Kassam rocket attacks fired by Hamas and Fatah (PLO) continue, hitting kibbutzim in the western Negev as well as the Ashkelon industrial park.

Analysis of events

1. Hezbollah is increasing the deadliness of the type of rockets it is firing, and boosting the distance they are traveling into Israel's heartland. They began with the Iranian 122mm Arash, and have now added the Iranian-Syrian Fajr 5 (220 mm, 52 kg of explosives, plus steel pellets, with a range of 100 km).

2. It seems that Hezbollah is still holding some advanced Iranian weapons systems in reserve. It has not fired the Iranian 333 mm Shahin rockets with a range of 160-200 km, or the Zilzal-2 355 mm. rockets weighing 600kg. Nor have they used their SAM-7 anti-aircraft shoulder missiles (similar to the US Stinger) against Israeli jets. Hezbollah has fired its C-802 Chinese missile only once so far (against an Israeli missile boat) with help from the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, the Pasdaran.

The Arabic London-based newspaper al-Sharq al-Awsat quotes a senior Iranian army official that the Pasdaran has set up dozens of advanced rocket and missile bases in Lebanon and along the border of Israel. Between 1992 and 2006 Hezbollah received nearly 13,000 of these weapons from Iran, flown to Damascus and trucked into southern Lebanon (see Michael R. Gordon, NY Times, July 16, 2006). At present approximately 100 military advisors from Pasdaran are working with Hezbollah operating these weapons platforms. This is probably what Sheikh Nasrallah meant when he said that his forces will yet surprise Israel. Israeli military Intelligence (AMAN) says that Nasrallah hasn't yet pulled his strategic cards out of the hat yet.

3. Israel bombed one C-802 site yesterday. The missile was accidentally triggered and lifted off but exploded in mid-air. Its crash was filmed by the media, and Hezbollah TV inaccurately stated that the film clip showed an Israeli F-16 being shot down. Over the past few days this type of disinformation has surfaced on the Hezbollah and Palestinian side. Other examples include Hezbollah's assertion that only 4 of its fighters have been killed over the past week, and Fatah's declaration yesterday that it has kidnapped an Israeli Border Policeman (also false).

The Shahin, Zilzal and C-802 rocket systems can hit Tel Aviv. The IAF is continuing to target these Lebanese launch sites, most of which are hidden and camouflaged in Shi'ite residential areas. The IAF has stated that if Hezbollah rockets strike Haifa's petrochemical plants, it will consider bombing Lebanese power plants. In this way pressure is being brought to bear on the sovereign Lebanese government to stop Hezbollah from using Lebanese territory to attack Israel.

4. Last week Israel called up one reserve division, and today has issued call-up orders for 3 reserve battalions. This will free up regular troops now engaged in guarding and patrolling in Judea and Samaria, and will allow them to be sent to the North in preparation for possible limited ground incursions.

5. Iran's Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khameinei said on Sunday that "The US says Hezbollah must be disarmed. This will not happen". SKY TV noted on Sunday that Iran has sunk over $100 million into Hezbollah's arsenal. Syrian Information Minister Mohsen Bilal said that "any aggression against Syria will have a harsh and direct response not limited in time or means". Both comments indicate that Syria and Iran are afraid of losing their Hezbollah proxy mini-state, and are trying to preserve Nasrallah's regime as a military player in Lebanon.

Back on Sept. 27, 2002, NY Times journalist Michael R. Gordon stated that there is a fear "that Iran or Syria might encourage Hezbollah to stir up tensions along Israel's northern frontier to divert attention from Iraq and complicate the Bush administration's plans…" This is the same scenario now being played out, with Iran's 2006 nuclear program substituting for the Iraq invasion of 2002.

6. Nasrallah pre-recorded a poorly produced TV address on Sunday from his underground bunkers in the dahiya, the Shi'ite suburbs of South Beirut. Gone was the laughing sarcasm. His face was grayish and subdued. He spoke to Israelis, saying that Hezbollah has a faith deeper than that of Israel. He threatened to surprise the IDF "beyond Haifa and on the ground", probably referring to longer range missiles directed at civilian population centers, booby traps along likely Israeli invasion routes, and perhaps even chemical warheads or nuclear suitcase bombs. He stated that Allah has given the Arab and Islamic world a historic opportunity to defeat the USA and Israel, and that the Lebanese people's stand will lead to the salvation of the entire Islamic people. Hezbollah is the spearhead, he said, giving an example to the entire Islamic nation on how to fight the enemy with courage and defeat him. "Where are you, Arabs?" he asked, appealing for help in the jihad.

7. It has been reported numerous times today that Nasrallah's forces are firing on Shi'ite villagers trying to flee from Hezbollah-controlled villages northward toward Beirut. They are forcing these villagers to stay and act as human shields and potential casualties in the face of Israeli bombardments of rocket launchers and terrorist command and control centers.

How to pray?

1. Pray for God to frustrate the weapons used against Israel (see a similar promise in Isa.54:17 – "No weapon forged against you will prevail").

2. Pray for God to frustrate the wicked counsel of evil leaders in Hezbollah, Syria, Iran and world terror ("Devise your strategy, but it will be thwarted; propose your plan, but it will not stand, for God is with us" – Isa.8:10).

3. Protection for Israeli soldiers fighting, and especially for those Messianic Jewish believers presently involved in the war.

4. Pray for a revelation of Yeshua as Messiah and atonement to many in Israel right now.

Many believers are beginning to realize that God is again protecting His people. There have been over a thousand katyushas fired, and the death total from those rockets hovers near twenty. Continue to ask God for His defensive shield to cover His people Israel.

We thank you for your prayers for Israel, for Messianic believers and for our family. Our two oldest sons are soldiers in the IDF. Our oldest son is presently stationed in the Jerusalem area. Our second son will be traveling to the north tomorrow to work as a medic in one of the cities worst hit by katyushas. We ask for your prayers for his safety, protection and for opportunities to be a light in a difficult place.

Emergency prayer request for Israel – Day Nine

July 21 2006

This is a short report of details of today's fighting, followed by a brief analysis, and then specific prayer requests.

Today (Thursday July 20) is the ninth day of the "bein hameitzarim" or "dire straits" period (see www.davidstent.org under the "words" section, Feb 21 2005 newsletter, also www.bobjones.org/articles/Basilisk%202002.htm), a period of extreme spiritual danger for Israel. This period lasts up to the 9^th of Av (Thursday August 3). It is a time of urgent heightened prayer for Israel and her survival.

Our last prayer request came out just before midnight Israeli time Tuesday July 8. This report sums up the past 48 hours of the war.

1. Today 50 Hezbollah katyushas fell in Israel (yesterday 116 fell; 125 fell on Tuesday). There were 76 Israelis wounded by rocket fire today. Since the start of the war, 592 Israelis have been wounded by 261 rocket attacks. Another 600 rocket attacks landed without hitting people. So far 27 people have been killed (including soldiers).

2. In Nazareth a rocket fell a few hundred meters away from the biggest church building in the Middle East, the Church of the Annunciation. Two Israeli Muslim Arab brothers Muhammad (age 7) and Rabia (age 3) were killed. Their father justified Hezbollah's rocket attacks, saying that they are due to Israel not giving back territory to Hezbollah (though the UN has ruled that Israel is no longer occupying any Lebanese territory).

3. Focus today was on three elite reconnaissance groups (Paratroopers, Duvdevan [counter-terrorism special forces] and Maglan [LRRP laser-painting target recons who guide missiles to target]) who crossed into Lebanon to confront and remove Hezbollah terrorists and bunkers within one kilometer of the Israeli border at Aita e-Sha'ab and Maroun a-Ras. Each team suffered some casualties, 2 Maglan special ops were cut down (ages 20 and 21) as well as two other Israeli special ops. Fighting continues at this hour in at least two locations. Many Hezbollah forts and frontlines have been destroyed in the past 3 days abutting the border with Israel. These skirmishes are not a ground forces invasion, but a pinpoint insertion and extraction of special forces at this stage of combat.

4. Hezbollah is engaging in a tunnel and bunker strategy similar to that of the Viet Cong – mass networks of honeycombed warrens, passages and ammunition bunkers (some are 40 meters deep). In most cases bombings will not take out these sites, while katyusha long range rockets are stored and fired from them.

5. Attempted suicide bombers were intercepted in Jerusalem and Hod Hasharon (north of Tel Aviv). A huge upsurge in red alert warnings of terror attacks has caused Israel to close off the West Bank areas from the rest of Israel until Saturday night.

6. The IAF bombed the suspected HQ of Sheikh Nasrallah in the Burj al-Barajneh suburb of Beirut. Twelve F-16s each carrying 2 one ton bombs leveled the underground structure, but Nasrallah was uninjured. So far the Israel Air Force has flown 3,000 sorties, has hit 1,200 targets and today alone carried out 150 sorties.

7. In Beirut the blockade has been relaxed by Israel to allow tourists to depart and humanitarian aid to enter. Voices such as Maronite Christian leaders and Druze leader Walid Jumbalat have come out with carefully worded rebukes of Hezbollah. Jumbalat also revealed that a round table of most of Lebanon's leaders had recently agreed to disarm Hezbollah. But before this could be carried out, Hezbollah's attacks and kidnapping of Israeli soldiers froze that option.

Analysis of events

1. It is hard to come by accurate figures of the situation in Lebanon. A comparison of major media numbers and even official Lebanese government sources gives greatly differing figures. Examples: fatalities (216, 300, 350); wounded (600, 1,000); refugees (500,000 – 750,000). It is certain that number of Hezbollah terrorists killed is much higher than the 4 to 7 figure that they have offered.

2. Christiane Amanpour of CNN stated today that when there is a 10 to one casualty ratio between Lebanese and Israelis, something is wrong. There is a presupposition here that war is like a video game where casualties must be balanced for the sake of fairness. The term 'disproportionate' has been used by the UN and the EU, indicating that it is not 'balanced' for Israel to remove Hezbollah's forces which are entrenched in civilian areas. The assumption is that Israel should allow itself to keep enduring terrorism, and that continuing Israeli casualties are a preferable option to pushing Hezbollah out of southern Lebanon. It might be instructive to remember some divine mathematics in Leviticus 26:8, where God prophesies to Israel that "five of you will chase a hundred, and a hundred of you will chase ten thousand, and your enemies will fall by the sword before you". Though death in battle is not to be desired, war does happen; Israel is being attacked; and it is destroying its enemies. Let us pray for God's protection and salvation to visit all, and for the IDF to have even better accuracy.

3. Much of the world media is focusing on the suffering of tourists and injured civilians in Lebanon without explaining the context. Pictures of civilians casualties stir the heart and bring tears to our eyes. Yet the reasons behind Israel's determination to remove Hezbollah from attacking and killing Israelis must be kept in front of our vision during this time. The world ignored Israel's pleas for intervention, refused to get involved when Israelis were being slaughtered and did nothing to enforce UN resolution 1559 calling for Hezbollah's disarmament and disbanding. No IDF sorties would be happening tonight had Lebanon disarmed Hezbollah two years ago.

4. There are parallels between Hezbollah tunnels and Viet Cong tunnels, though there are some differences too. One big difference is that Israelis are defending their homes and families which are less than a kilometer away. That makes the battle more personal and the determination to win that much stronger for us Israelis.

5. There are parallels between Arafat's 'Fatah-land' terror colony in southern Lebanon between 1975-1982 and 'Hezbollah-stan' in today's Lebanon. For nearly 8 years Arafat terrorized Israel from southern Lebanon with katyusha rockets and cross-border terror attacks. His forces catalyzed the Lebanese civil war in which 100,000 Lebanese died. Today Hezbollah's maverick terror tactics are boomeranging on Lebanon and many lives are being lost again in order to crush this jihadi terror group. Israel invaded Lebanon in1982 to remove Arafat, and perhaps another land invasion may again happen.

6. There are parallels between the 1962 Cuban missile crisis and this war. The USSR was developing ICBMs to threaten the USA, but in the meantime began to preposition shorter-range nuclear missiles in Cuba, within striking range of America. Iran is using the same strategy using Hezbollah's missiles to attack America's friend Israel in order to distract the world from Iran's nuclear bomb program.

7. There are parallels between the London Blitz of 1940-41 and this war. Then Londoners were subjected to day and night attacks. They had to seek shelter in underground shelters. Hitler's goal was to destroy the will of ordinary people, but the British people's will did not crumble. When it came England's turn to counter-strike, the German people suffered a much more extensive bombing campaign, and the morale of the German people collapsed. Hezbollah can be compared to Nazi Germany, and the Israeli victims of the katyushas can be compared to the determined Londoners under the Blitz.

What next?

The war seems to be developing into three distinct stages.

The first stage has been primarily an air war, during which time Hezbollah infrastructure, weaponry, command and control centers, and resupply routes are being destroyed.

The second stage (which continues in tandem with the first) involves pinpoint insertions of special forces to locate ('paint') enemy forces and bunkers. These forces then call in pinpoint air attacks or accurate shelling.

The third stage will need to address the honeycombs and rat's nests of Hezbollah tunnels, warrens and bunkers. This will involve land combat by special land forces backed up by air support.

How to pray?

1. Pray for God's angels to continue to push off course the katyusha rockets being fired against Israel (see Isaiah 54:7)

2. Pray for safety for Israeli soldiers fighting, and especially for those Messianic Jewish believers presently involved in the war (see Psalm 91).

3. Pray that Israel would fulfill the promise of Leviticus 26:8, where one soldier will put a hundred enemies to flight, and five would chase 10,000.

4. Pray that Lebanon's leaders would come to the same understanding that the citizens of Abel Beth Maacah (right near the Lebanese border) did in 2 Samuel 20:13-22. Job gave them the choice of total destruction or handing over the head of Sheba ben Bichri the rebel.

5. Pray that Lebanon's leadership will move to end the suffering of its own people by working with Israel to change southern Lebanon from a terrorist nest into a good neighbour.

6. Pray for Israel's leadership to receive guidance from the God of Israel on how to prosecute this war with the minimum of suffering and death for both Israeli and Lebanese peoples, and to deal with Hezbollah according to Genesis 12:3.

7. Pray for the revelation of Yeshua and His salvation to come to many Israelis and Lebanese and even to some among Hezbollah at this crucial season.

We thank you for your prayers for Israel, for Messianic believers and for our family. Our two oldest sons are soldiers in the IDF. Our oldest son is presently stationed in the Jerusalem area. Our second son is working as a medic at one of the flash points on the Lebanese border. We ask for your prayers for his safety, protection and for opportunities to be a light in a difficult place. Also, we ask for a family of 6 believers in Kibbutz Nahal Oz (and all the kibbutz members as well), who are being shelled with Kassam rockets by Hamas terrorists from the Gaza Strip. Pray for physical safety, for encouragement and for many opportunities to witness of Yeshua's love and saving power

Emergency prayer request for Israel – Day Twelve

July 23 2006

This is a short report of details of today's fighting, followed by a brief analysis, and then specific prayer requests.

Today (Sunday July 23) is the twelfth day of the "bein hameitzarim" or "dire straits" period (see www.davidstent.org under the "words" section, Feb 21 2005 newsletter, also www.bobjones.org/articles/Basilisk%202002.htm), a period of extreme spiritual danger for Israel. This period lasts up to the evening of the onset of the 9^th of Av (Thursday evening August 3). It is a time of urgent heightened prayer for Israel and her survival.

Our last prayer request came out just after midnight Israeli time Friday July 21. This report sums up the past 56 hours of the war.

1. On Saturday 150 Hezbollah katyushas fell on 12 cities in Israel. Over 1,000 katyushas have been fired by Hezbollah over the past 11 days. Since the start of the war, 1,293 Israelis have been injured by rocket attacks, and 34 Israelis have been killed (including soldiers). Many Israelis from the North have ben living in unventilated bomb shelters for 10 days, and thousands have temporarily moved south to relatives or friends out of harm's way.

2. The south Lebanese villages of Maroun ar-Ras and Merwahin have been taken by Israeli special forces. Maroun ar-Ras was used by Hezbollah to direct katyusha fire against Israel, as its location on a high ridge overlooks both Israeli positions and Hezbollah's regional command and control town of Bint Jbeil. IDF forces will use this empty village to oversee the next stage, an attack on Bint Jbeil.

3. Large caches of katyushas and other weapons were discovered stashed in the mosques of these villages.

4. The IDF has warned all inhabitants of 13 Shi'ite villages in south Lebanon to move northward toward Beirut before the fighting engulfs their areas. Again, this is the third time Israel has warned these villages, in an effort to lessen civilian casualties. Hezbollah, however, has honeycombed these villages with bunkers and weapons, knowing that civilian casualties boost their terror efforts in world opinion.

5. On Saturday Hezbollah continued hitting civilian targets in Israel. For example, they fired over 54 katyushas onto the coastal city of Nahariya, and more than 28 on Kiryat Shmonah. The IDF, on the other hand, evacuated a 40 year old Lebanese woman wounded in Maroun ar-Ras (and her husband) to Israel for medical treatment.

6. Israel has taken more than twenty Hezbollah terrorists prisoner, and has recovered the bodies of 13 Hezbollah fighters, which could be used in a future swap for the two live Israeli soldiers kidnapped from Israeli territory 12 days ago.

7. In Beirut the blockade has been relaxed by Israel, and between 25,000 and 30,000 tourists have already left. That is 1/3 of the total projected number of tourists or dual nationals expected to depart. American, German, French Swedish, Russian and Sudanese are the majority of departing tourists. Humanitarian aid is also being allowed in by Israel

Analysis of events

1. Hezbollah's firing of katyushas has become less accurate and has somewhat diminished overall. This indicates some good military result from the IDF campaign, though the firing will only stop when ground forces wipe out the bunkers, tunnels and launchers. IDF Air Force Intelligence spokesman Ran Shmuel pointed out yesterday that the katyusha is not a decisive battlefield weapon. It is primarily a weapon of terror.

2. The use of mosques as bunkers reveals a military perspective very different than that of Western civilization. The cooperation between Islamist jihad-preaching mosques and Islamist jihadi terrorists is seen as natural in the Muslim world.

3. The call-up of Israeli reserves has been met with overwhelming response, something unusual in regular peacetime operations. This high response in wartime brings to mind Psalm 110:3 "amecha nedavot b'yom cheilecha" (Your people volunteer [or move into military formation] freely in the day of Your power [or army]". The prophecy here looks to a day when the reborn youth of Israel will rush (in military formation and in holiness) to carry out the revival will of their Father in Heaven, the God of Jacob.

4. It's important to remember the words of Genesis 12:3 in this war: "I will bless those who bless you, and the one who derides / belittles you I will curse". Hezbollah has been cursing, deriding and murdering Israelis for decades. This war is one of the God of Israel plumb lines – He is offending the minds of the nations in order to reveal their hearts (see Luke 2:34-35). Pray for your country and your fellow believers!

What next?

1. The IDF is pushing Hezbollah out of strongholds close to the Israeli border. This involves hand-to-hand combat by special forces, in order to clear the bunkers and tunnels of terrorists, katyusha rockets and launchers.

2. Expansion of this belt northward until Hezbollah no longer controls Lebanese territory within katyusha range of Israel.

3. Increasing EU, UN, Russian and Arab/Islamic pressure to force a ceasefire. This would leave Hezbollah able to attack Israel at will, and would not return the kidnapped Israeli soldiers. All root causes for renewed hostilities would remain.

4. Possible Hezbollah targeting of Haifa petrochemical refineries, and population centers further south up to Tel Aviv. Possible use of biological, chemical or primitive atomic warfare by Hezbollah.

How to pray?

1. Pray for God's angels to continue to push off course the katyusha rockets being fired against Israel (see Isaiah 54:7). Over 1,000 Hezbollah rockets have been fired. Over 600 of them have missed their targets.

2. Pray for safety for Israeli soldiers fighting, and especially for those Messianic Jewish believers presently involved in the war (see Psalm 91).

3. Pray for Israel's leadership to receive guidance from the God of Israel on how to prosecute this war with the minimum of suffering and death for both Israeli and Lebanese peoples, and to deal with Hezbollah according to Genesis 12:3.

4. Pray for the revelation of Yeshua and His salvation to come to many Israelis and Lebanese and even to some among Hezbollah at this crucial season.

A Messianic youth camp has just ended and many of these teeneagers are returning to bomb shelters in the north. We ask prayer for these kids and their families in the north, who are receiving daily katyusha attacks. Pray for physical safety for all, for encouragement and for many opportunities to witness of Yeshua's love and saving power

Emergency prayer request for Israel – Day Fifteen

July 26 2006

This is a short report of details of the last three days of fighting, followed by a brief analysis, and then specific prayer requests.

Today (Wednesday July 26) is the fifteenth day of the "bein hameitzarim" or "dire straits" period (see www.davidstent.org under the "words" section, Feb 21 2005 newsletter, also www.bobjones.org/articles/Basilisk%202002.htm), a period of extreme spiritual danger for Israel. This period lasts up to the evening of the onset of the 9^th of Av (Thursday evening August 3). It is a time of urgent heightened prayer for Israel and her survival.

Our last prayer request came out just before noon Israeli time Sunday July 23. This report sums up the past 67 hours of the war.

1. On Monday more than 80 Hezbollah katyushas were fired against Israel, while on Tuesday over 100 Hezbollah katyushas fell on cities in Israel. According to updated IDF reports over 2,500 katyushas have been fired by Hezbollah over the past 15 days.

2. The Hezbollah 'capital' of south Lebanese, the village of Bint Jbeil, has been taken by a combination of Israeli special forces as well as Golani and Paratroops. Bint Jbeil was Hezbollah's regional command and control town of Bint Jbeil. Sheikh Nasrallah used that town to declare Hezbollah's 'victory over Israel' after the IDF's withdrawal from Lebanon on May 26 2000. Fighting continues around Kafr Aitroun, where some of Hezbollah's operation rooms, intelligence collection centers and news stations were situated.

3. On Sunday a 48 year old Israeli Arab carpenter, Habib Awad from the village of Ibelin was killed by a direct hit from a katyusha while working in his Haifa carpentry shop. Jewish Haifa resident Shimon Glicklich (60) was killed by katyusha shrapnel as he was driving beside Mount Carmel.

4. On Tuesday a 15 year old Israeli Arab girl Doa Abbas was killed in her living room when a Hezbollah missile crashed through the roof of her home in Mrar (a mixed Druze, Muslim and Christian village near Capernaum). More than 1,500 prisoners from Zalmon and Hermon penitentiaries nearby have been move to fortified facilities within the prisons as a result of this attack.

5. Three IAF Apache helicopters have crashed in the past week, with the loss of all pilots. Human error caused two Apaches to collide with each other, while the third copter had a mechanical failure from a significant height.

6. Nearly a million Israelis in the north have spent 14 days living in bomb shelters.

7. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice made a lightning visit to Lebanon and Israel. She did not pressure Israel to stop its war against Hezbollah, though she also expressed concern about the humanitarian crisis in Lebanon. "The goal of Hezbollah is to set the world aflame, and we will not let them succeed" she said. "Any peace is going to have to be based on enduring principles and not on temporary solutions".

8. Four U.N. observers were accidentally killed Tuesday when their observer outpost at el-Khiam was struck by an IAF bomb. Israel has expressed regret and opened an investigation, while Kofi Annan has declared that the attack was "apparently deliberate targeting". He said " I am shocked and deeply distressed by the apparently deliberate targeting by Israeli Defense Forces of a U.N. Observer post in southern Lebanon" Israel's Ambassador to the UN Dan Gillerman said in response, "I am shocked and deeply distressed by the hasty statement of the secretary-general, insinuating that Israel has deliberately targeted the U.N. post," he said. Gillerman pointed out that Israel was investigating the matter, and that Annan's statements were a rush to judgment.

Analysis of events

1. Hezbollah's firing of katyushas continues with deadly results. Though IDF air attacks have lessened low trajectory attacks, Hezbollah continues to fire short and medium range rockets. The pushing back of Hezbollah from the Israeli border is making it harder to fire these rockets, but at least half of Hezbollah's arsenal is intact. Iran continues to resupply Hezbollah through Syria, though IAF raids interdict some of these weapons.

2. Israeli, Jordanian and Egyptian military intelligence reveal that Iranian soldiers have been killed fighting with Hezbollah against Israel, and their bodies have been transported back to Iran for burial. Evidence continues to come in of direct Syrian and Iranian involvement in strategizing, assistance and military hardware supply.

3. Hezbollah has announced that it will be escalating its katyusha attacks to the area south of Haifa. These longer range katyusha rockets are located north of the Litani River and even north of Beirut. Such an escalation would enlarge the area that the Israel Air Force will need to bomb to destroy rocket launchers and make it more difficult for Hezbollah to fire them. It is likely that these longer range Iranian and Chinese rockets could reach the Tel Aviv area.

4. A comparison of casualty figures shows that over 400 Lebanese have died in air attacks, while over 40 Israelis have been killed either by katyusha rockets or in combat. Four points should be emphasized here:

- one, Hezbollah is trying for many more casualties. We thank God for the fact that many katyushas have missed their targets. Keep praying!

- two, Hezbollah is specifically targeting civilians, while Israel is strenuously trying to avoid civilian casualties. If the IAF had wanted to hit Lebanese civilians, the casualty rate would already be immensely higher.

- three, Hezbollah situates its bases in the heart of civilian populations, hiding behind them and using them as civilian shields. This is part of their military modus operandi. The U.N.Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland stated on Monday, "Hezbollah, stop this cowardly blending in among women and children … I hear there was a statement they were proud they had lost very few fighters, and that it was the civilians bearing the brunt of this. I don't think you want to be proud of having more children and women than armed men killed".

- four, the prophet Isaiah tells us that God has a foreign policy vis-à-vis the nations whereby He considers Israel to be His international priority (Isa.43:3-4 – "For I am YHVH, your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. I give Egypt for your ransom, Cush and Seba in your stead. Since you are precious and honored in My sight, and because I love you, I will give men in exchange for you, and people in exchange for your life"). He will hand over other nations as a ransom in the case of kidnappings, in order to spare the people whom He especially loves. Leviticus 26:8 puts the percentages at 20 to one, with Israel's victory on the battlefield being a sign of God's favor. We cry for all the human casualties, yet understand that war (which involves much suffering) is often waged to limit even more suffering in the long run (e.g., the Allied war against Nazi Germany).

What next?

1. Israel will continue to push Hezbollah northward, out of the area south of the Lebanese Litani River until Hezbollah no longer controls Lebanese territory from where short-range rocket fire can hit Israel.

2. Increasing EU, UN, Russian and Arab/Islamic pressure to force a ceasefire. This would leave Hezbollah able to attack Israel at will, and would not return the kidnapped Israeli soldiers. All root causes for renewed hostilities would remain.

3. Possible Hezbollah targeting of Haifa petrochemical refineries, and population centers further south up to Tel Aviv. Possible use of biological, chemical or primitive atomic warfare by Hezbollah.

How to pray?

1. Pray for God's angels to continue to push off course the katyusha rockets being fired against Israel (see Isaiah 54:7). Over 2,500 Hezbollah rockets have been fired. Many have missed their targets.

2. Pray for safety for Israeli soldiers fighting, and especially for those Messianic Jewish believers presently involved in the war (see Psalm 91).

4. Pray for the revelation of Yeshua and His salvation to come to many Israelis and Lebanese and even to some among Hezbollah at this crucial season.

We thank you for your prayers for Israel, for Messianic believers and for our family. Our two oldest sons are soldiers in the IDF. Our oldest son is being transferred to the border with Lebanon for possible service across the border. Our second son is serving as a medic at one of the flash points on the Lebanese border. We ask for your prayers for their safety, protection and for opportunities to be a light in a difficult place.

We will be traveling to North America to speak and minister in various congregations, and to attend Rachel's parents 50^th wedding anniversary. We will make every effort to continue sending out these prayer alerts while traveling. For breaking Israeli news, we suggest that you follow www.ynetnews.com, which gives minute by minute updates.

PLEASE PRAY URGENTLY FOR THESE MATTERS! THANKS SO MUCH FOR CARRYING THIS PRAYER BURDEN WITH US !

A Call To Get Back On The Walls of Jerusalem

The nation of Israel is undergoing a shaking of biblical proportions. Her strength has been sapped and her clear thinking has been muddled by a constant rain of body blows. These include terror attacks; the election of al-Qa’eda’s Islamist twin-sister Hamas in the Gaza elections; unswerving world pressure to establish an Islamist Arab Palestinian state within the God-given biblical borders of the Jewish homeland; and various attempts to de-legitimatize Israel’s very existence (see https://www.washtimes.com/functions/print.php?StoryID=20060621-085648-9557r).

The fog of war has meshed with the Stockholm Syndrome (see our February & March 2006 newsletters at www.davidstent.org), catalyzing an incredible about-face in Israel’s leaders. The government of Israel has adopted as policy some of our mortal foes’ goals – specifically, the step by step shrinking of Israel, while armed terror simultaneously presses toward its goal of destroying the Jewish state.

Israel’s leaders have responded to both global pressure and to the veiled threat of economic or political boycott by enacting and overseeing a unilateral retreat from Gaza in August 2005, and now are getting ready to carry out another retreat from portions of the mountains of Israel (see Ezek.34:13-14; 36:1-8; 37:22; 38:8; 39:17) – if PM Olmert’s plans succeed. Israel’s government seems to be in the process of fulfilling one of global jihad’s wildest dreams – the Jewish people handing over our own territory to our sworn enemies on a silver platter (see Psalm 83; Ezek.35, 36).

When the I.D.F. retreated from Gaza in August 2005, the vacuum it left was instantly filled by Islamist jihadi forces. Since then advanced weapons and millions of greenbacks have flooded into the Gaza Strip, while Islamist terror groups openly train for murderous attacks on Jewish civilians – all this on top of the ruins of bulldozed Israeli farms and homes. Global jihadi forces gleefully declare that Israel’s retreats in Lebanon and Gaza were the result of unceasing terror attacks. Iran’s Ahmedinejad, Hezbollah’s Nasrallah and Hamas’ Haniyeh proclaim that Israel is now on the retreat, and that continued steadfastness will soon lead to total victory – a Palestinian Islamist state with Jerusalem as its capital.

Many intercessors are grieved about all that has been described above and are distressed about the present policies of Israel’s government. One or two voices might look at the above situation and say something like, “It’s not an easy situation but we Israelis are doing the best that we can. The retreat is not necessarily a bad thing. Most people in Israel support what PM Sharon was doing and what PM Olmert is doing. Don’t criticize or second-guess or even voice disagreement with Israel’s leaders. Father knows best!”

Such words can have the unintended effect of chilling desperate intercession. Years ago the prophet Jeremiah was confronted by a similar situation. He explained, “They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious. ‘Peace, peace,’ they say, when there is no peace” (Jer.8:11)

Yet Jeremiah’s own response was far more emotional and black and white. “Since my people are crushed, I am crushed; I mourn, and horror grips me. Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then is there no healing for the wound of my people? Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my eyes a fountain of tears! I would weep day and night for the slain of my people” (Jer 8:21-9:1).

As Israel’s cabinet prepares for further retreats, whether big or small, what are believers to do? How can we all make sense of these traumatic days? How are we to pray? How can intercessors stand “on the walls of Jerusalem,” especially if the war trumpet’s blast is tentative (Isa. 62:6-7; 1 Cor.14:8)? And how can Gentile and Jewish believers express their prophetic and strategic concerns to the nation of Israel and to its leadership?

Quashing free debate

Years ago an American TV commercial asserted that “even your best friends won’t tell you” about bad breath. It is certainly true that friendships are tested when unpleasant situations get addressed. It is true that telling your neighbor about halitosis might ruin a friendship. But let’s keep matters in perspective. Sharing the gospel with friends could create even more social disturbances than that!

A few years ago, a prophetic friend of ours had a dream in which some tall black-clothed Orthodox Jews challenged her faith in Yeshua the Messiah. “What right do you, a Gentile and a woman, have to make such a declaration or even to hold these opinions?” they demanded, towering over her with much intimidation. Then all of sudden the radiance of Holy Spirit broke through the darkness and shined directly upon her face. In the dream the belligerent unbelief of these men was instantly transformed into a child-like curiosity as a result of the striking supernatural sign.

Defenders of Rabbinic Judaism sometimes try to quash debate about the Messiahship of Yeshua by intimidation, or by appealing to the rabbis’ superior knowledge, spirituality or stock. These tactics are simply an attempt to invalidate the individual’s right to even have an opinion. This strategy has often caused believers to shy away from communicating the gospel to Jewish people. For the black-clothed men in the dream, intimidation was their strategy, but muzzling the gospel was their ultimate goal.

Among secular Jews who love Israel, similar dynamics and tactics can occasionally be found. When Israelis Jews disagree with Diaspora Jews about Israeli government policies, the debate can get quite hot. An Israeli will often try to end the debate by delivering the following rebuke to his Diaspora counterpart, “You have no right to express your opinions or convictions on these matters unless you actually live in Israel.”

There may certainly be some merit to this argument, for Israeli Jews bear the brunt of wars and their government’s policies in a way that Diaspora Jews simply do not. But the attempt to shut down discussion or prohibit debate between Jews is not healthy for everyone concerned – especially if both sides in the debate truly care for the survival of Jewish people and the well-being of the State of Israel.

Silencing one’s friends

At a recent Christian Zionist conference, it was announced from the platform that unnamed powers-that-be in the Israeli government had just warned conference organizers against expressing any opposition to or disagreement with the disengagement/ realignment/ retreat policy of Prime Minister Olmert’s Kadima party.

It seems that some Israeli government representatives are saying, in ever so nuanced a manner, “Christian Zionists, we appreciate your material and political support. We want it and actively solicit it. We know that you love us because of what the Bible says. We ourselves may not believe the Bible, but we are happy for your support. But don’t take this Bible stuff too far. We don’t want to hear about what you feel the Bible says concerning the disengagement or Trojan Horse peace treaties! And of course, we certainly don’t want to hear about your Messiah Yeshua! Hush up, be silent or we may give you the cold shoulder. . .” Silence, some sage once declared, is golden. Are these demands for silence a sign that a new ‘golden age’ is upon us . . .

Even though some nameless Israeli government official may be exerting pressure on Christian Zionists to ‘stuff’ their concerns about disengagement, most Israelis have no problem expressing their own opinions about Olmert’s disengagement plan. And in spite of what one or two hopeful people might opine, according to the most recent poll by Ha’aretz-Dialog, 56 percent of Israelis oppose Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's convergence plan, and only 37 percent of Israelis support the plan, which calls for a massive unilateral withdrawal in the West Bank (Ha’aretz Fri., June 16, 2006).

When a government is unable to muster the people’s faith in the major plank of its electoral platform, standard political wisdom is that heads need to roll. It seems that Christian Zionist heads are an easier target than are the heads of Israel’s electorate.

What are the watchmen saying?

Intercessors are sensing a clear and present danger to Israel on the horizon. It is the nature of the prophetic to cry out and to warn. Even if some Israeli government ‘spin doctors’ or even one or two Messianic leaders in Israel insist that all is as well as could be under the circumstances, and that we “all just need to come along quietly” – we want to encourage the intercessors: your anguish of spirit is real, and the threats you see are all too real.

Do not be afraid! Your concerns for Israel are not a sign that you are either critics or arm-chair critics. Your support for Israel is hidden in God’s heart, is conditioned by His love, and that it flows from His throne. Your concern for Israel is biblically based.

Now is the moment when informed intercession is desperately needed. We need to have our antennas up, listening for the watchmen’s prophetic alarms, and we need to hear their warnings – not shut them down!

Let us remember that when Israel finds itself in a beleaguered situation facing a clear and present danger, only her true intercessory friends will cry out in anguish and ring out a warning. The need of the hour is for us to listen to the watchmen! (Ezek.33:1-10)

Isaiah declares that our Gentile friends who truly love us and choose what pleases the Lord will find their desperate prayers and heartfelt offerings accepted in God’s future house of prayer, for His house will be called a house of prayer for all nations (Isa.56:6-7). In the next breath he cautions Israel’s watchmen, exhorting them not to be blind or like hoarse dogs who have forgotten how to bark and warn of approaching judgment (v.10).

As Messianic believers we must make every effort not to silence the believers in the nations or to indoctrinate them, but to disciple them by leading them into mature discernment through the God-given exercise of their facilities (see Heb.5:14).

The season of dividing the Land

Any dividing up of the land of Israel throughout history has always been considered by the Bible to be a sign of judgment on Israel. Whether it is the EU, the Quartet, the G-8, the U.N., the U.S.A. or even an Israeli government that encourages the dividing up of the land of Israel, it is a tragedy. It compounds that tragedy when any nation, whether a friendly superpower or even the Jewish nation, encourages or participates in such actions.

It is true that the Scriptures teach that a temporary division of Jerusalem and of the land of Israel will be a brief last-days event directly before the return of Messiah Yeshua (Zech.14:1-2; Joel 3:1-2; etc.). But none of us wants to be found facilitating the division of the land of Israel or Jerusalem, or even acting as a defense attorney for forces (even Jewish forces!) who would carry out that retreat and the dividing up of the land.

The Bible states that those who curse Israel will themselves be found under the curse of Abraham’s covenant (Gen.12:3; Jer.30:15-16). Woe to the nation, organization, church or individual who lends a hand to God’s judgment of Israel, and to the division of the land (see Isa.10:5, 12; Matt.18:7).

The question at hand is biblical. It is not whether Israel’s leadership is making the best of all possible choices. The question we all need to ask is this: should any nation set their hand to tearing away portions of the land of Israel from Jewish control, and granting those portions to an Arab entity which actively seeks to destroy all Jewish people living in Israel? There is only one answer to that question which is consistent with the whole counsel of Scripture “No, we are not supposed to advocate for, to facilitate, to defend or help to establish such a state!”

As the world slowly moves in the direction of Joel 3:2 (the forced division of the land of Israel), intercessors need to quickly discern events and know how to pray about these life and death issues. The watchmen need to speak out – to men and to God.

How should we then pray?

Pray for Israel’s leaders, that the Lord God of Israel reveal Himself to them in His glory and holiness. Pray for their salvation and for open hearts to the revelation of Yeshua as their Messiah and the only Hope of the nation of Zion.

Pray that both Israel’s leaders and the whole nation of Israel will speedily wake up to the strategic dangers of handing over land to Islamist mortal enemies, who openly and boldly declare their goal of destroying the Jewish nation.

Pray that God’s angels will frustrate and stop all terror attacks against the Israeli nation, and that He would grant instead repentance and salvation to the terrorists.

Pray for the safety, discernment and accuracy of all those involved in local counter-terrorist work, in the Israeli army and security forces or as undercover workers in the Palestinian areas.

Pray that God will give Israel those leaders who have the faith and vision to believe Him for the security, victory and salvation of the Jewish nation (www.danielpipes.org/article/3667).

As believers mature in expressing their love and support for Israel, there will be increasing manifestations of discernment, boldness and sacrifice. Love for Israel will not come at the expense of shame about the gospel. Believers will also speak clearly to Jewish people in Israel and in the Diaspora about the seriousness of violating God's covenant regarding ownership and stewardship of the land, and about embracing a heart of thankfulness for possessing that land. Believers will speak the truth in love to Israel about threats to that nation's security, about giving in to ungodly international pressure and (when necessary) about making rash and injudicious security decisions. Believers will strengthen their support for Messianic Jews and for the work of the gospel among the Jewish people. Believers will clearly manifest God's heart and love not only for Israel God’s firstborn, but also for the Arab and Muslim world as well. Let that day come soon!

Thank you for laboring in prayer with us for Israel, the apple of God's eye. A reward is in sight, so let’s keep pushing forward! We bless you in the name of Messiah Yeshua.

Avner Boskey

Thank you for your love and support. Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971,

NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971

USA

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

“From Egypt to Stockholm”: A Messianic Perspective on Israel’s Elections

In two weeks, millions of Jewish people the world over will recite these words at the Passover seder “Once we were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt. But the Lord our God brought us out from there with a strong hand and an outstretched arm . . . to bring us in and give us the land that He promised on oath to our forefathers.” (Deut. 6:21, 23). The Exodus from Egypt was planned for a purpose – to plant the Jewish people forever in the land of Israel.

This miraculous deliverance triggered a spontaneous explosion of Jewish praise and thanksgiving:

“Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the Lord: ‘I will sing to the Lord, for He is highly exalted. The horse and its rider He has hurled into the sea. The Lord is my strength and my song; He has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise Him, my father’s God, and I will exalt Him’ . . . Then Miriam the prophetess, Aaron’s sister, took a tambourine in her hand, and all the women followed her, with tambourines and dancing” (Exod. 15:1-2, 20).

Forget me not!

Forty years later, as Moses’ Special Forces were getting ready to assault Jericho, he issued a warning to all Israel: don’t forget the mighty deeds God has done for you, and remember to keep your heart soft by continually thanking Him:

“When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land He has given you. Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your God, failing to observe His commands, His laws and His decrees that I am giving you this day. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery” (Deut. 8:10-14).

But human beings often forget the lessons of history. George Santayana once said, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it” (The Life of Reason, 1905). Psalm 78 sums up biblical history, showing that within a few years the majority of Jewish people forgot what God had done, did not remember His power, and were not loyal to His covenant. Jeremiah echoed the same lesson: “From the time your forefathers left Egypt until now, day after day, again and again I sent you My servants the prophets. But they did not listen to Me or pay attention” (Jer. 7:25-26).

Israel allowed her heart to become preoccupied with other matters and ignored what God had done. Her heart drifted away from intimacy with her Maker, and thanksgiving was directed to idols of wood and stone. The God of Israel needed to shake Israel back into reality with a severe mercy – a sobering wake-up call known as the Exile. God would temporarily scatter the Jewish people among the nations, and even bring them back into Egyptian slavery!

“The Lord will send you back in ships to Egypt on a journey I said you should never make again. There you will offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but no one will buy you” (Deut. 28:68).

The Return from Exile

Yet Israel’s faithful God did not hold onto His anger forever. The judgment of two exiles (Assyria/Babylon and Rome) would surely come on the Jewish people. But God promised to rescue them (not once, but twice!) and to restore them back to their own land two times (Isa.11:11-12), purifying a remnant to serve Him (see Ezek. 20).

We are witnessing the prophesied return of Israel to their Promised Land in our day. Though the majority of the Jewish people are not yet ‘home,’ we recognize that a process of return is going on, and we cooperate with God, praying for its soon completion.

Spiritually speaking, the majority of the Jewish people are not yet ‘home’ either – they have not yet come to Messiah Yeshua in repentance. But we also recognize that God is stirring Israel and moving her quickly toward that day of national salvation. Part of the evidence for this is the significant growth of the Messianic Jewish movement. And so we pray for Israel to receive a revelation of Yeshua, we share the message of His atoning death and resurrection with our Jewish friends, and we stand with the nation of Israel to protect her from her many enemies.

Let’s take a moment to consider something serious. If the Jewish people were exiled for specific sins against God, have they nationally repented for those sins? What were the reasons for the Exile? Have those root rebellions been decisively dealt with? Or are those transgressions still something that need to be dealt with in our day once and for all? Does the Return to Zion that we are seeing in our day mean that all is forgiven, or is there still a day of reckoning for Israel in the near future?

Root canal work

God declared that the Jewish people would go into exile and captivity because they had ignored Him and cast Him behind their backs (1 Ki.14:9). Time and again it was prophesied that Israel would go into exile because of the sins of the majority, their unfaithfulness (Ezek. 39:23-27) and their unwillingness to hear from God.

The majority of the Jewish people in the land at that time were guilty of these sins, yet Jeremiah adds that the same spiritual condition applied to Jewish people in the Diaspora as well: “For they have not listened to My words … words that I sent to them again and again by My servants the prophets. And you exiles have not listened either, declares the Lord” (Jer. 29:19).

Part of the sins involved wanting to be like all the other nations of the world (1 Sam 8; Ezek. 20:32 ff), rebelling against the dynastic House of David and His anointed (1 Ki.12:16-19), creating false traditions which are unable to save (Jer. 2:13), and rejecting the Messiah sent to rescue us (Zech.12:10). We as a nation must repent for these sins before we can fully inherit all the great and precious promises the Lord has given us.

Shaking is part of the Return

When Ezekiel received his ‘Zionist’ vision – a picture of the full return of the Jewish people to the land of Israel, God told him that this return would happen not because the Jewish people have repented, or had become worthy of redemption. The Return to Zion will be “for My holy name’s sake, which you have profaned among the nations” (Ezek.36:22).

We believers rejoice in this Return. At the same time we want to zoom in on the details of what God is doing in Israel today in the light of the prophetic word. We are not thrown into disbelief by Israel’s sin, because both the Scriptures and our personal experience clearly reveal that all people have sinned (Rom. 3:23). In this regard Israel is not better or worse than any other nation (Deut. 7:7-8). God chose Israel because He is madly in love with her, and has sealed that love with many unshakeable covenants (see Rom. 9:4; Jer. 29:10-11). He plans to purify her, bless her and set her as a signet ring on His own hand in the sight of all nations. But before the exaltation comes the shaking.

Jacob’s Trouble

Many different prophecies describe how at the end of days God will win back the heart of His people and wean them away from false gods. In each case there is pressure applied to Israel. In each situation there is pain. In every scenario there is shaking.

This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: Write in a book all the words I have spoken to you. The days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will bring My people Israel and Judah back from captivity and restore them to the land I gave their forefathers to possess, says the Lord”. These are the words the Lord spoke concerning Israel and Judah: “This is what the Lord says: Cries of fear are heard – terror, not peace. Ask and see: Can a man bear children? Then why do I see every strong man with his hands on his stomach like a woman in labor, every face turned deathly pale? How awful that day will be! None will be like it. It will be a time of trouble for Jacob, but he will be saved out of it” (Jer. 30:1-7).

All who love Israel must face this quandary. We want healing, blessing and protection for the Jewish people and for their Promised Land. Yet at the same time we humbly acknowledge that, as Hosea 5:15 confesses, Israel will only turn back to God’s face through “narrowness” – through hard times and pressures. Who can maintain a spiritual balance here? Some prophetic voices speak judgment over Israel but their eyes are strangely dry, and their voices harshly metallic. How can we pray for Israel according to God’s word and yet preserve the tender compassions of God’s heart for Israel (Isa.63:9)?

Conflicts on the outside, fears within (2 Cor.7:5)

Right now Israel is getting squeezed. We are surrounded by a hostile Islamic sea of 500 million people who pray for our defeat and destruction 5 times a day. We have local and foreign jihadi terrorist groups (including al-Qa’eda) always probing for a chink in our armor. Censures and threats are daily occurrences at the UN and EU. Boycotts from the Arab and Muslim world influence Western trading partners. Iran has come out of the closet and is preparing a nuclear holocaust for our country. Even the Mayor of London is getting in on the action.

As emphasized in recent books by John Loftus and Robert Baer, the multinational oil companies see Israel as a threat to the unrestricted flow of Islamic oil, while Western intelligence agencies and state departments move in tandem to weaken Israel’s deterrent capabilities and sap its fighting spirit. These combined international pressures have caused many Israelis to lose hope and vision. We think back to the Holocaust, when Jewish safety was in question and Jewish survival was at a premium. Israel does not want to repeat the past, as Santayana warned. What are we to do?

God offends the mind to reveal the heart

God has chosen to begin the process of Israel’s restoration with one very important element missing – Israel’s repentance. This lack of national repentance has offended many people – Jews and Gentiles, believers and secular people. The ultra-Orthodox wing of Judaism has at times rejected and even opposed the Return to Zion. How could God bless a secular leadership, they ask. They are convinced that God will not lead us back to Zion until we repent and become ultra-Orthodox. As a result the ultra-Orthodox tend to belittle or reject the Return to Zion.

A similar dynamic might apply to those few Messianic Jews who support or rationalize giving back parts of the land of Israel now under Israeli control (to ‘disengage’ or to ‘converge’ are the popular terms). Since Israel has not fully repented, they say, perhaps we don’t have the right to hold onto those territories. There must first be a spiritual revival, it is suggested, and only then will it be kosher for those areas to return to us. Again, in this case (like with the ultra-Orthodox) there is perhaps a reticence to recognize that God’s sovereign hand was intimately involved in the retaking of Judea, Samaria, the Golan and the Gaza Strip.

So let’s ask the question: why has God chosen to begin the Return to Zion while Israel is in unbelief? Why did He choose to give us ever-increasing portions of the Promised Land through military victory? God seems to be carrying out this process in reverse order! Though we may never fully understand His strategy in doing things this way at this time, nevertheless, we do recognize that He is at work, and we humbly bow before Him, rejoicing in His good gifts.

Thankfulness and fuzzy thinking

The Apostle Paul once wrote a letter to believers in Rome, describing how humanity has distanced itself from God. He pointed out that when mankind stopped thanking God or acknowledging His mighty acts of deliverance, their own perceptions became darkened and their strategies became futile. “For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened” (Rom.1:21).

When Israel stopped thanking God and recognizing His hand, the result was the judgment of Exile. When a modern generation turns its back on God, when it spurns His gifts as burdensome, a judgment process of darkening and futility kicks into gear. This can be true for Americans when prayer is removed from school or when abortion is legalized. Darkening and futility begin to make their presence felt throughout the land. That is when patriotic intercessors must leap onto the barricades of prayer to hold back darkness, and to pray for repentance and revival.

Tomorrow, if Israelis elect a leader who openly calls for unilaterally retreating from parts of our God-given land, this would be a sobering expression of lack of thankfulness to God for the gracious victories that God has granted us in 1948 and 1967. This is one of the main issues in tomorrow’s elections. Will Israel acquiesce to world pressure by electing a government which will disengage from and abandon its God-given land? What will happen to our country and our people if we take this serious step backward?

Pray for the leaders of Israel, that God would grant them a revelation of His hand and heart, and that they would not make decisions based on the fear of man but would take decisions based on the fear of God and the word of God.

The Stockholm Syndrome

In August 1973 a branch of the Swedish Kreditbanken in Norrmalmstorg, Stockholm was robbed. The bank robbers held bank employees hostage for 6 days, during which time the victims became emotionally attached to their captors. After they were released they continued to defend the motives and actions of the bank robbers, and at least one woman got engaged to her former captor. Swedish criminologist and psychologist Nils Bejerot coined the term ‘Stockholm Syndrome’ to describe this puzzling phenomenon, where the hostage actually buys in to the oppressor’s or captor’s perspective, and then finds his own soul overwhelmed by his captors’ lies.

Certain conditions can trigger this syndrome, including a perceived threat to one’s personal survival; perceived inability to escape; isolation from perspectives other than that of the captor; and small kindness from the captor within a context of terror. The Stockholm Syndrome should be understood first and foremost as a survival mechanism for cornered victims.

Typical behavior of those suffering from this syndrome includes focusing on the abuser’s positive side and denying his violence; seeing the abuser as only a victim; believing that one deserves the abuser’s violence; hating that part of ones’ self which the abuser said caused the attack.

The Stockholm Syndrome has specific significance for Israelis in the Middle East. Nearly a hundred years of Islamic Arab war, hostilities and terrorism have triggered Stockholm Syndrome attitudes within many Israeli hearts: we have begun to defend our enemies, to ignore their murderous goals and to blame ourselves for their hateful attacks. The world has encouraged our syndrome through slanted media and through political and economic pressure.

As a result many in Israel have bought into an attitude of accepting the necessity of retreat from portions of our ancestral homeland, of needing to shrink Israel’s borders in order to be accepted in the Middle East, of hiding behind anti-terror walls, and of ‘shutting ourselves in and hoping for the best’ in the words of a recent article in The Economist (March 23 2006). Two of the three main parties in Israel’s upcoming elections state that retreating from and surrendering our land to our mortal enemies offers us the best chance for peace.

Part of what Israel is voting on tomorrow is this: did God bring us out of Egypt in order to bring us in to our Promised Land, or have we been removed from Egypt only to be ‘abandoned in Stockholm’?

What will it take for Israel to recognize that God is still the God of the Exodus? What will it take for us to rend our hearts in repentance and then open our hearts in thanksgiving? As Israel goes to the polls tomorrow, pray for God to pour out a spirit of grace and mourning, repentance and revelation upon His beloved Jewish people.

“If My people would but listen to Me, if Israel would follow My ways, how quickly would I subdue their enemies and turn My hand against their foes! Those who hate YHWH would cringe before Him, and their punishment would last forever. But you would be fed with the finest of wheat; with honey from the rock I would satisfy you” (Ps 81:13-16).

The Last Word is God’s

At the end of the day we know that God will have His way with Israel. The entire land of Israel will be ours – no more disengagements, convergences or ‘land for peace’ processes – and the nations who are now pushing for a Palestinian state will be utterly vanquished.

“In that day, declares YHWH of Armies, I will break the yoke off their necks and will tear off their bonds; no longer will foreigners enslave them. Instead, they will serve YHWH their God and David their king, whom I will raise up for them. So do not fear, Jacob My servant! Do not be dismayed, Israel, declares YHWH. I will surely save you out of a distant place, and your descendants from the land of their exile. Jacob will again have peace and security, and no one will make him afraid. I am with you and will save you,’ declares YHWH. Though I completely destroy all the nations among which I scatter you, I will not completely destroy you. I will discipline you but only with justice; I will not let you go entirely unpunished” (Jer 30:8-11).

Thank you for laboring in prayer with us for Israel, the apple of God’s eye. These days are pregnant with significance. Your prayers do make a difference. Keep on keepin’ on!

We bless you in the name of Messiah Yeshua, the Lord of Armies and the Prince of Peace,

Avner Boskey

Thanks for your love and support. 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

Hurtling Through The Fog of War: A Messianic Perspective On The New Hamastan

Events in Israel are speeding up. Prime Minister Sharon’s debilitating strokes (Dec 19 & Jan 4) leave him comatose on the seventh floor of Jerusalem’s Hadassah Hospital, his fledgling Kadima party temporarily floundering without their father figure and prime electoral attraction. Hamas’ election victory over Arafat’s followers (Jan 26) has jihadi terrorists poised to take full control over the West Bank and Gaza. Violent clashes between rock-throwing settler youth and billy-clubbing riot police at Amona near biblical Bethel (Feb.1) crossed red lines of violence in Israel, leaving trails of Jewish blood on the road to approaching civil war.

Each one of these events is in itself shocking, destabilizing and foreboding. The speed at which all these events are occurring barely leaves time for Israelis to catch their breath. It is hard to discern meaning or pattern in the whirlpool of nightly news. This confusing pace of events can be described in modern terms as ‘the fog of war’ – confusion on the frontlines, confusion in the headlines.

Prussian General von Clausewitz is popularly credited with the origin of ‘the fog of war’ concept: “Fog can prevent the enemy from being seen in time, a gun firing when it should, a report from reaching the commanding officer.” (Carl von Clausewitz, On War, Princeton University Press, 1976, p. 120).

When a commander lacks clear battlefield information, he has difficulty determining facts amid the chaos of conflict. Confusion results, mistakes are made and casualties occur, including ‘friendly fire’ deaths in which soldiers accidentally kill comrades. Guessing at a battlefield enemy’s intentions and strengths results in a military situation known today as VUCA – volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity. These words accurately describe the present situation in Israel!

But only when one sees through the fog clearly and reads one’s enemy’s movements accurately can there be strategic and on time response. This is also a requirement for spiritual warfare. As World War III presses forward – the war between radical Islam and the West – (see www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=4718 where former CIA Director James Woolsey uses similar terms), we need to pause and take stock. What new battle formations are being drawn up in the fog?

In recent newsletters we have used biblical scales to weigh both Sharon’s strategies and actions, as well as the dangers of unilateral disengagement and the pressure of the nations on Israel to divest itself from parts of its God-given land.

The focus of this newsletter is on Hamas. Who are they? What are their goals and strategies? How can we pray wisely and strategically about them and about these matters?

Sheikh Azzam and the origins of Hamas

The Arabic word Hamas can mean zeal, enthusiasm, fire, ardor, fervor or fanaticism. Used as an Arabic acronym HaMaS is the short form of Harakat al-Muqawima al-Islamiyya, which means ‘The Islamic Resistance Movement’.

Sheikh Abdullah Yusuf Azzam is considered the spiritual founder of Hamas and the “historical leader of Hamas” (see Phil Hirschkorn, Rohan Gunaratna, Ed Blanche, and Stefan Leader, “Blowback,” Jane’s Intelligence Review, August 1, 2001). Born in Silat al-Hartiyeh north of Jenin in 1941, he studied Islamic Law (Sharia) at Damascus University’s Sharia College and at Cairo’s Al-Azhar University. He devoted his life to worldwide Islamic jihad, and his slogan was “Jihad and the rifle alone: no negotiations, no conferences and no dialogues” (www.religioscope.com/info/doc/jihad/azzam_caravan_1_foreword.htm). In the mid-1970’s he lectured at King Abdul-Aziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where one of his students was Osama Bin Laden. He moved to Pakistan, becoming one of the top figures in the Afghani jihad against the Russians in Afghanistan. His jihad activities during these years received heavy funding from Saudi Arabia.

From 1984 he was joined in Pakistan by Bin Laden working in MAK (Arab Jihad Warriors’ Service Bureau, or Makhtab al-Khidamat lil Mujahidin al-Arab), a pre-Al-Qa’ida organization. He eventually quarreled with Bin Laden (and his new co-worker Ayman Al-Zawahiri) over whether jihad’s immediate priority should be international or Afghani, and whether jihad should also be waged against Saudi Arabia and Egypt. In the late 1980’s Azzam worked with Islamic Jihad and then helped solidify Hamas, before he was killed in Peshawar by a car bomb in November 1989. Bin Laden and Al-Zawahiri were rumored to have been linked to this event. Nevertheless, Azzam’s jihadi writings and activism gave much support, encouragement and direction to those who would later found Hamas.

Muslim Brotherhood origins of Hamas

Hamas was established in 1987 or 1988, and its charter proclaims that “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 www.acpr.org.il/resources/hamascharter.html and 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). Since Hamas sees itself as a wing of the Muslim Brotherhood, let’s turn our attention to al-Ikhwan as well.

The Muslim Brotherhood, or Society of Muslim Brothers (Jama’at al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin) was founded in Egypt by Hassan al-Banna, a school teacher. Its original purpose was to unite Muslims against British domination through a return to an Islamic or Sharia state. After the British departed from Egypt, al-Ikhwan proclaimed that it could not compromise with modern secular Arab societies and military dictatorships. Egypt and Algeria, even Saudi Arabia were less than purely Islamic in the Brotherhood’s eyes. From the Brotherhood perspective most Arab and Islamic states are evil and need to be overthrown. Only strict Islamic rule and the re-establishment of the Muslim Caliphate or khilafah is ultimately acceptable.

The Brotherhood attempted to overthrow Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1954. Their revolution failed, and many members were jailed in Egyptians concentration camps and severely tortured. Sayyad Qutb, a main Brotherhood theologian, was imprisoned, tortured and later executed in 1966. Qutb’s brother moved to Saudi Arabia and later became the mentor of Ayman al-Zawahiri. Eventually al-Zawahiri would become Bin Laden’s deputy.

During the 1930’s and 1940’s the Muslim Brotherhood had links with the Nazis, including Himmler’s man in Jerusalem Haj Amin al-Husseini. It first established a Gaza cell, and in May 1946 set up a Jerusalem cell in the Sheikh Jarrakh neighborhood. Yasser Arafat joined the Egyptian Brotherhood in 1952. Brotherhood members in East Jerusalem established a shadow organization in 1953 called Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami (Islamic Party of Liberation; www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/hizb-ut-tahrir.htm) which today is a worldwide terror organization.

In the late 1970’s Brotherhood members established Egyptian Islamic Jihad (Al-Jihad al-Islami; also called the Islamic Jihad or the Jihad Group) led by Ayman al-Zawahiri, and Jamaat al-Islamiyya or al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya (The Islamic Group) led by the blind Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman. Rahman is now serving a life sentence in Florence Colorado for his role in directing the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1983, as well as for thwarted plans to bomb NY tunnels and bridges as well as FBI and UN headquarters. Both organizations’ primary goals are to overthrow the Egyptian Government, to replace it with an Islamic state, and to attack American and Israeli interests in Egypt and abroad.

Ayman al-Zawahiri was jailed in Egypt for his part in planning and carrying out President Anwar al-Sadat’s 1981 assassination. He was later released and went on to become Bin Laden’s deputy in al-Qa’ida. Muhammad Atef followed al-Zawahiri and was involved with him in planning and executing the 1998 attacks on U.S. embassies in East Africa and the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon

Even before Hamas came into existence, its spiritual parent the Muslim Brotherhood was already leaving a bloody trail of destruction across the Middle East. The al-Ikhwan remain a force to be reckoned with.

The Gaza Strip – Hamas’ womb

Using the same strategy as al-Banna had in Egypt, Brotherhood members banded together in Gaza to establish an Islamic group that would propagate a return to strict Islam. In 1973 Sheikh Ahmed Yassin established Mujama, a welfare charity. Israeli officials encouraged this group, hoping that it might weaken the PLO terrorists’ hold on Palestinian society. Thirty years down the road, that hope as unfortunately come true, though few in Israel foresaw or would have rejoiced in this day.

In the early 1980’s Yassin’s Mujama began to stockpile weapons in preparation for jihad activities. In 1984 Sheikh Yassin was arrested by Israel for conducting jihad activities against Israel, but was released as part of a prisoner exchange in 1985. At the outbreak of the first Arab civilian revolt or intifada in December 1987, seven Gazan Islamists gathered secretly and founded Hamas. They drew up a charter which declared loyalty to al-Banna’s Muslim Brotherhood, to Sayyad Qutb’s definition of jihad, and to the Qur’an’s and the Hadith’s vision of Israel’s subjugation and destruction.

In 1989 Yassin was re-arrested for ordering the kidnapping and murder of Israeli soldiers. In October 1997 he was released from jail – King Hussein of Jordan’s precondition for freeing a captured Mossad hit-team. That team was in Amman attempting to assassinate Khaled Mashal, head of Hamas. Hamas was using Jordanian territory to plan and carry out attacks on Israel, while King Hussein was simultaneously paying lip service to a peace treaty with Israel. Out of jail again, Yassin returned to spearheading Hamas terrorist operations until he was killed in a targeted Israeli helicopter attack in March 2004.

Hamas Election Victory

On January 26 2006 Hamas’s Change and Reform party scored a surprising victory over Yasser Arafat’s Al-Fatah (formerly called PLO). Winning 74 out of 132 seats (42.9 % of the vote), it soundly defeated al-Fatah’s 45 seats. Were one to add the Hamas candidates running as independents, then the Hamas percentage would be a total of 80 seats, or 60.6 % of voter turnout.

Fatah’s Abu Mazen was very hesitant about having elections at this time, knowing that his party would lose badly. But the U.S. exerted pressure, insisting that these elections be carried out. But democratic elections in the Middle East don’t mean that Muslim voters will reject the path of Bin Laden. Free democratic elections in the Middle East would result in an overwhelming sweep for jihadi forces – with sobering ramifications for Western petroleum consumption. Like Hamas, Hitler came to power through the democratic process. And like Hamas, Hitler was in no way committed to democracy.

For years Arafat had developed the fine art of speaking to Western governments with hypocrisy and duplicity, declaring his commitment to the peace process in English while funding and organizing terror attacks in Arabic. Hamas, however, is open and unashamed about its commitment to terrorism and to the destruction of the Jewish state. This puts Western governments in a pickle: how will they continue to proclaim that they are fighting a war against world terror, while bankrolling huge infusions of fungible humanitarian aid to Hamas-led Palestinian organizations?

Over the past week some Western leaders have set specific conditions that Hamas must fulfill for ‘business as usual’ to continue. “‘I made the position of this government very clear,’ Bush said. ‘Hamas must renounce its desire to destroy Israel, it must recognize Israel’s right to exist and it must get rid of the armed wing of its party,’ he said” (Jerusalem Post, Thursday Feb 2 2006, p.6). But have these well-meaning leaders ever read the Hamas Charter written in 1988? This charter reveals a jihadi organization no different that Osama Bin Laden’s al-Qa’eda. Hamas does not ‘have’ an armed wing. It is an armed wing!

We assume that Western leaders don’t feel the need to bargain with al-Qa’eda or set conditions for peace talks with them. This is because the West is involved in a determined fight to reduce al-Qa’eda’s abilities and to eliminate its leadership. As you read the following excerpts from the Hamas Charter (1988), consider anew how the West should respond to ‘Hamastan,’ the new Palestinian Hamas terrorist state.

Hamas Charter’s Views on Jihad

“The Platform of The Islamic Resistance Movement (ed., Hamas): Israel will rise and will remain erect until Islam eliminates it as it had eliminated its predecessors.

“The Islamic Resistance Movement…join(s) its hands with those of all Jihad fighters for the purpose of liberating Palestine … Our struggle against the Jews is extremely wide-ranging and grave…until the enemies are defeated and Allah’s victory prevails” (Introduction).

“The Islamic Resistance Movement…has raised the banner of Jihad in the face of the oppressors in order to extricate the country and the people from the (oppressors’) desecration, filth and evil” (Article #3).

“The Islamic Resistance Movement…strives to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine” (Article #6).

“Hamas has been looking forward to implement Allah’s promise whatever time it might take. The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: ‘The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him! This will not apply to the Gharqad, which is a Jewish tree’ (cited by Bukhari and Muslim)” (Article #7).

“Allah is its goal, the Prophet its model, the Qur’an its Constitution, Jihad its path and death for the case of Allah its most sublime belief (ed. this is also the slogan of the Muslim Brotherhood)” (Article #8 - The Slogan of the Hamas).

“Nothing is loftier or deeper in nationalism than waging Jihad against the enemy and confronting him when he sets foot on the land of the Muslims. And this becomes an individual duty binding on every Muslim man and woman” (Article #12).

“In order to face the usurpation of Palestine by the Jews, we have no escape from raising the banner of Jihad ... We must imprint on the minds of generations of Muslims that the Palestinian problem is a religious one, to be dealt with on this premise. ‘I swear by that who holds in His Hands the Soul of Muhammad! I indeed wish to go to war for the sake of Allah! I will assault and kill, assault and kill, assault and kill’ (told by Bukhari and Muslim) ” (Article #15).

“The Muslim women have a no lesser role than that of men in the war of liberation; they manufacture men” (Article #17).

“The women in the house…carry out the most important duty of educating their sons to observe…the duty of Jihad awaiting them” (Article #18).

“The Arab states surrounding Israel are required to open their borders to the Jihad fighters … The other Arab and Islamic states are required, at the very least, to facilitate the movement of the Jihad fighters from and to them ... Israel, by virtue of its being Jewish and of having a Jewish population, defies Islam and the Muslims” (Article #28).

“Men of letters, members of the intelligentsia, media people, preachers, teachers and educators and all different sectors in the Arab and Islamic world, are all called upon to play their role and to carry out their duty in view of the wickedness of the Zionist invasion … Jihad means not only carrying arms and denigrating the enemies. Uttering positive words, writing good articles and useful books, and lending support and assistance, all that too is Jihad in the path of Allah” (Article #30).

“We have no escape from pooling together all the forces and energies to face this despicable Nazi-Tatar (ed. Jewish) invasion. Otherwise we shall witness the loss of (our) countries, the uprooting of their inhabitants, the spreading of corruption on earth and the destruction of all religious values …Within the circle of the conflict with world Zionism, the Hamas regards itself the spearhead and the avant-garde … (M)ore steps need to be taken by the Arab and Islamic peoples and Islamic associations throughout the Arab and Islamic world in order to make possible the next round with the Jews, the merchants of war” (Article #32).

“The Prophet…points out to that fact in his noble hadith in which he implored his venerable Companion, Ma’adh ibn Jabl, saying: ‘O Ma’adh, Allah is going to grant you victory over Syria after me, from Al-Arish to the Euphrates …Those of you who chose to dwell in one of the plains of Syria or Palestine will be in a state of Jihad to the Day of Resurrection.’… This is the only way to liberation … Only iron can blunt iron, only the true faith of Islam can vanquish their false and falsified faith. Faith can only be fought by faith” (Article #34).

Hamas Charter’s Views on the Peace Process and Religious Tolerance

“The Islamic Resistance Movement (ed., Hamas) draws its guidelines from Islam” (Article #1).

“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” (Article #2).

“The Movement(‘s)…time dimension extends back as far as the birth of the Islamic Message and of the Righteous Ancestor. Its ultimate goal is Islam, the Prophet its model, the Qur’an its Constitution” (Article #5).

“The reinstitution of the Muslim state” (Article #9 - Motives and Objectives).

“The land of Palestine has been an Islamic Waqf (ed. irrevocably Islamic land, never to be owned again by non-Muslims) throughout the generations and until the Day of Resurrection. No one can renounce it or part of it, or abandon it or part of it. No Arab country nor the aggregate of all Arab countries, and no Arab King or President…has that right … This is the status (of the land) in Islamic Shari’a, and it is similar to all lands conquered by Islam by force ... Any demarche in violation of this law of Islam, with regard to Palestine, is baseless” (Article #11).

“(Peace) initiatives, the so-called peaceful solutions, and the international conferences to resolve the Palestinian problem, are all contrary to the beliefs of the Islamic Resistance Movement … From time to time a clamoring is voiced to hold an International Conference in search for a solution to the problem … The Islamic Resistance Movement…does not believe that those conferences are capable of responding to demands, or of restoring rights or doing justice to the oppressed . . . Those conferences are no more than a means to appoint the nonbelievers as arbitrators in the lands of Islam ... There is no solution to the Palestinian problem except by Jihad. The initiatives, proposals and International Conferences are but a waste of time, an exercise in futility” (Article #13).

“Israel, by virtue of its being Jewish and of having a Jewish population, defies Islam and the Muslims” (Article #28).

“Hamas is a humane movement, which cares for human rights and is committed to the tolerance inherent in Islam as regards attitudes towards other religions. It is only hostile to those who…frustrate its efforts. Under the shadow of Islam it is possible for the members of the three religions: Islam, Christianity and Judaism to coexist in safety and security … The members of other religions must desist from struggling against Islam over sovereignty in this region” (Article #31).

Hamas Charter’s Views on Israel and the Jewish People

“The Platform of The Islamic Resistance Movement: Israel will rise and will remain erect until Islam eliminates it as it had eliminated its predecessors” (ed., emphases mine, and following).

“Our struggle against the Jews is extremely wide-ranging and grave…reinforced by successive battalions from the multifarious Arab and Islamic world, until the enemies are defeated and Allah’s victory prevails” (Introduction).

“The Islamic Resistance Movement…has raised the banner of Jihad in the face of the oppressors in order to extricate the country and the people from the (oppressors’) desecration, filth and evil” (Article #3).

“The enemies (ed. the Jewish people)…make consistent efforts by way of publicity and movies, curricula of education and culture, using as their intermediaries their craftsmen who are part of the various Zionist Organizations which take on all sorts of names and shapes such as: the Freemasons, Rotary Clubs, gangs of spies and the like. All of them are nests of saboteurs and sabotage. When Islam will retake possession of (the means to) guide the life (of Muslims), it will wipe out those organizations which are the enemy of humanity and Islam” (Article #17).

“The Nazism of the Jews…make(s) war against people’s livelihood, plunder their moneys and threaten their honor. In their horrible actions they mistreat people like the most horrendous war criminals” (Article #20).

“The enemies have been scheming for a long time,…accumulate(ing) a huge and influential material wealth which they put to the service of implementing their dream. This wealth (permitted them to) take over control of the world media such as news agencies, the press, publication houses, broadcasting and the like … They stood behind the French and the Communist Revolutions and behind most of the revolutions we hear about here and there. They also used the money to establish clandestine organizations which are spreading around the world, in order to destroy societies and carry out Zionist interests. Such organizations are: the Freemasons, Rotary Clubs, Lions Clubs, B’nai B’rith and the like. All of them are destructive spying organizations. As regards local and world wars, …they stood behind World War I, so as to wipe out the Islamic Caliphate … They obtained the Balfour Declaration and established the League of Nations in order to rule the world by means of that organization. They also stood behind World War II …They inspired the establishment of the United Nations and the Security…in order to rule the world by their intermediary. There was no war that broke out anywhere without their fingerprints on it: The forces of Imperialism in both the Capitalist West and the Communist East support the enemy with all their might, in material and human terms, taking turns between themselves. When Islam appears, all the forces of Unbelief unite to confront it, because the Community of Unbelief is one” (Article #20).

“The Zionist invasion is a mischievous one…pursu(ing) all despicable and repulsive means to fulfill its desires. It relies to a great extent, for its meddling and spying activities, on the clandestine organizations which it has established, such as the Freemasons, Rotary Clubs, Lions, and other spying associations. All those secret organizations, some which are overt, act for the interests of Zionism and under its directions, strive to demolish societies, to destroy values, to wreck answerableness, to totter virtues and to wipe out Islam. It stands behind the diffusion of drugs and toxics of all kinds in order to facilitate its control and expansion” (Article #28).

“World Zionism and Imperialist forces have been attempting, with smart moves and considered planning, to push the Arab countries, one after another, out of the circle of conflict with Zionism, in order, ultimately, to isolate the Palestinian People . . . Egypt has already been cast out of the conflict, to a very great extent through the treacherous Camp David Accords … For Zionist scheming has no end, and after Palestine they will covet expansion from the Nile to the Euphrates. Only when they have completed digesting the area on which they will have laid their hand, they will look forward to more expansion, etc. Their scheme has been laid out in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion…” (Article #32).

(Editor’s note: On the Jan. 29 2006 CNN program Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar said that Israel must change its flag. “Israel must remove the two blue stripes from its national flag. The stripes on the flag are symbols of occupation. They signify Israel’s borders stretching from the River Euphrates to the River Nile.” Israel’s national flag, which features a blue Star of David set between two blue stripes, was designed to look like a traditional Jewish tallit prayer shawl which has blue or black stripes. Hamas’ paranoid perspectives would be funny if the stakes were not so serious! https://blog.camera.org/archives/2006/01/cnn_broadcasts_hamas_consiracy.html)

(Editor’s note: ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’ is an anti-Semitic Russian forgery, exhaustively disproved, which accuses the Jewish people of dominating the world through both Communism and Capitalism. The work surfaces in Neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic writings. Hamas uses the terms Jews and Zionists interchangeably. The Protocols predates Zionism, so Hamas’ use of it reveals the virulent nature of the organization’s hatred for the Jewish people.)

“Leaving the circle of conflict with Israel is a major act of treason and it will bring curse on its perpetrators.”

(Editor’s note: These words are chilling in light of the 1981 assassination of President Sadat by Muslim Brotherhood-linked forces. This above sentence threatens all Arab leaders who might consider making peace with Israel).

Hamas Charter’s Views on Christians, Missionaries and the West

“There is no escape from introducing fundamental changes in educational curricula in order to cleanse them from all vestiges of the ideological invasion which has been brought about by orientalists and missionaries ... That invasion had begun overtaking this area following the defeat of the Crusader armies … The Crusaders had understood that they had no way to vanquish the Muslims unless they prepared the grounds for that with an ideological invasion which would confuse the thinking of Muslims, revile their heritage, discredit their ideals, to be followed by a military invasion ... Imperialism has been instrumental in boosting the ideological invasion and deepening its roots, and it is still pursuing this goal. All this had paved the way to the loss of Palestine. We must imprint on the minds of generations of Muslims that the Palestinian problem is a religious one, to be dealt with on this premise. ’I swear by that who holds in His Hands the Soul of Muhammad! I indeed wish to go to war for the sake of Allah! I will assault and kill, assault and kill, assault and kill’ (told by Bukhari and Muslim)” (Article #15).

“The enemies have been scheming for a long time … The forces of Imperialism in both the Capitalist West and the Communist East support the enemy with all their might, in material and human terms, taking turns between themselves. When Islam appears, all the forces of Unbelief unite to confront it, because the Community of Unbelief is one” (Article #22).

“Palestine is the navel of earth, the convergence of continents, the object of greed for the greedy, since the dawn of history... Multitudes of Crusades descended on it, carrying their faith with them and waving their Cross … This is the only way to liberation … Only iron can blunt iron, only the true faith of Islam can vanquish their false and falsified faith. Faith can only be fought by faith” (Article #34).

“The current Zionist invasion had been preceded by a Crusader invasion from the West; and another one, the Tatars, from the East. And exactly as the Muslims had faced those invasions and planned their removal and defeat, they are able to face the Zionist invasion and defeat it” (Article #35).

A Terrorism Expert’s View of Hamas

Dr. Neil Livingstone, a former counter-terrorism consultant to the National Security Council, is a terrorism expert who has authored nine books on terrorism (including Inside the PLO; The Cult of Counterterrorism; The War Against Terrorism; America the Vulnerable: The Threat of Chemical/Biological Warfare; Fighting Back: Winning the War Against Terrorism) is chairman and CEO of Global Options, Inc., a Washington-based security firm, and a member of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers.

He describes Hamas as “a very dangerous terrorist group,” “an Islamist organization, very radical, that believes in the replacement of Israel by a Palestinian state …a religiously based radical Islamist state. And it has made its voice heard very loudly through acts of terrorism and through various political channels ever since 1988.” (www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/july-dec01/hamas_12-4.html)

Hamas’s View of the Disengagment Process

Hamas has concluded that its terror campaign has caused Israel to withdraw from Gaza, just as Hezbollah believes that its terror campaign drove Israel out of southern Lebanon.

Back in July 2005 senior Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip Dr. Mahmoud al-Zaher declared, “History has proven that the rockets…have forced Israel to withdraw from the Gaza Strip, and they will end the occupation in the future. It’s the resistance and not the negotiations that brought about the end of the occupation” (“Hamas says rockets, not talks, brought pullout decision”, Khaled Abu Toameh, JP, Tues July 19 2005, p.3). Hamas “is planning to hold a huge victory celebration after Israel completes its withdrawal from Gush Katif … The movement is hoping to utilize the parades to convey the message that the Gaza Strip withdrawal is a direct result of the group’s military triumph over Israel” (“Terror group purchases 30,000 uniforms ahead of planned post-pullout celebrations”, Ronny Shaked, Ynet.com, Fri July 8 2005).

Hamas also believes that its victory in the January 2006 elections is another step on the road to a total Israeli withdrawal from all of ‘occupied Palestine’. It views the physical collapse of Sharon and the violent clashes between Jews at Amona as proof that Israel is in retreat, on the run and at the point of collapse, and that more unilateral disengagements are on the way. Hamas will therefore push even harder for its goal of Israel’s destruction. Hama’s present leader in Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh, declared on January 26 2006 after the election victory that the Islamic group will “complete the liberation of other parts of Palestine” (www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3207101,00.html).

With this perspective it is saddening to note that senior IDF officers are no longer talking “about a second disengagement as a far-off possibility. In Amona, they were already making predictions about the next evacuation – even though the ‘where’ and the ‘when’ have yet to be specified.” (JP, ‘Sticks and stones’ by Yaakov Katz, Friday Feb. 3 2006, p.13).

Prepare for the long haul

Hamas’ victory will lead to a strengthening of the Palestinian jihadi movement, as well as to an increase in terrorism. The former Israeli chief of intelligence, General Zeevi-Farkash, recently warned the Israeli cabinet that we could soon see “Hamastan in Gaza and Fatahstan in Judea and Samaria” (Jan. 30, 2006 in Ha’aretz). Israel’s Chief of Staff, Dan Halutz, warned of another potential round of terrorism and violence: “We casually waived principles such as monitoring borders,” he said. “Gaza, and this is not a forecast but reality, has become Hamastan, Hizbullahstan and al-Qaidastan” (ibid.).

Many Israelis are trying to think the unthinkable – to visualize Hamas as a peace partner and a gentle neighbor, now that it has taken the reigns of power into its own hands. A detailed reading of Hamas’ charter shows that it is likelier for a leopard to change its spots than for Hamas to abandon its violent Muslim Brotherhood ideology. “Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard its spots? Neither can you do good who are accustomed to doing evil!” (Jeremiah 13:23). The Deputy Head of Hamas’ political bureau Moussa Abu Marzouk agrees with Jeremiah, noting that “Hamas changes neither its skin nor its principles and it will deal with the West on this basis.” (JP Thurs Feb 2 2006, p.6)

It is instructive to listen the advice of Ephraim Halevi, former head of the Mossad, (Israel’s equivalent to the C.I.A.) in his article “Rules of conflict for a world war” (JP, Fri July 8 2005). Halevi now heads the Center for Strategic and Policy Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

”We are in the throes of a world war, raging over the entire globe and characterized by the absence of lines of conflict and an easily identifiable enemy. There are sometimes long pauses between one attack and another, consequently creating the wrong impression that the battle is all over, or at least in the process of being won ... With the passage of time, our memories fade and we return to our daily lives, forgetting that the war is still raging out there and more strikes are sure to follow. It cannot be said that…we can see its conclusion. We are in for the long haul and we must brace ourselves for more that will follow. The ‘Great Wars’ of the 20th century lasted less than this war has already lasted, and the end is nowhere in sight ... International cooperation…cannot replace the requirement that each and every country effectively declare itself at war with international Islamist terror ... This war is already one of the longest in modern times; as things appear now, it is destined to be part of our daily lives for many years to come”.

Prayer Points

As we pray for Israel and the Middle East, let us remember the following prayer points:

1. Pray for wisdom and discernment for the leaders of Israel and the USA. (Psa.72:1; Prov.1:1) Pray for revelation to them about Hamas’ goals, strategies and tactics. Pray for their patience and for resolve in dealing decisively and accurately with terrorist attacks and terrorist movements.

2. Pray for success and victory for counter-terrorist forces in Israel, America and around the world. (Psa.139:19-22) These brave men and women are our defenders and protectors. Pray that their lives will be guarded and that they will know God’s deliverance in every way.

3. Pray for Israel to come to salvation in Yeshua, and for God to speak loudly and directly to our hearts even in our pain. (Hos.5:14-15)

4. Pray for the raising up of God’s mighty last days’ army of Messianic Jewish prophets and apostles. (Ezek.37:10)

5. Pray for the leadership of Hamas to receive a revelation of Yeshua as the Lion of Judah and the only Savior of the world. (Psa.83:16; Mic.7:16-17; Ezek.36:2-5) Pray for a spirit of repentance to be poured out on these men, and that they would cease their demonically inspired murderous attacks on the apple of His eye, Israel.

We bless you in the name of Messiah Yeshua, the Lord of Armies and the Prince of Peace,

Avner Boskey

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Sharon, the Hebrew bulldozer

The nation of Israel is in shock. The Jewish citizens of Israel are in a spiritual state of post-traumatic stress disorder. The past thirteen years of life-threatening events – false peace processes, horrendous terror attacks, and low-intensity urban war – have rained down like body blows on us. The result is a national numbness, a lackadaisical attitude. Many Israelis are half-hearted and afraid to hope. The coming elections are greeted with cynicism and lack of enthusiasm. Few believe that there are chances for real peace between the Muslim/Arab world and the Jewish people. Terrorism has not succeeded in destroying the Jewish state, but its cumulative effects have eroded a clear national vision.

In August 1965 Bob Dylan released his classic song “Like A Rolling Stone”. The chorus insistently repeats, “How does it feel to be on your own, with no direction home?” This question could be asked of Israel today. Many recent events in Israel have created a sense of purposelessness and no clear direction. One of these events is Prime Minister Sharon’s total reversal of his original election platform (by which he had won a landslide victory) and his abandonment of long held strategic military perspectives. A US parallel would be if President Ronald Reagan had publicly embraced communism and then had left the Republican Party to join Ralph Nader, while insisting on remaining in office as Commander-in-Chief!

Other recent shocks include Sharon’s forcing through the traumatic disengagement from Gaza and Northern Samaria without public debate or referendum – an event with serious strategic consequences for Israel; the intensification of the Islamic jihadi terror campaign after the withdrawal from Gaza; Iran's nuclear preparations to attack Israel, and the Iranian president's Holocaust denial and vows to destroy Israel. The water pot in which the Israeli frog is swimming is definitely getting hotter, to paraphrase Mark Twain’s memorable adage.

Two famous Israeli leaders, David Ben-Gurion and Menahem Begin, would be turning in their graves if they could only hear what many Israeli politicians are currently suggesting. Two of the three main parties running in the upcoming elections are advocating more unconditional withdrawals, including a re-division of Jerusalem – while admitting that the Arabs in Judea and Samaria are continuing to support and perpetrate terrorism. A recent poll showed 49% of Israelis supporting the division of Jerusalem, while 49% are opposed to this step.

What has caused such a radical collapse of the national will? Why are some basic, mainstay Zionist convictions crumbling like tea biscuits in hot liquid? As Bob Dylan once commented regarding last days events, “Trees that’ve stood for a thousand years suddenly will fall” (“Man of Peace”, © 1983 Special Rider Music).

Musical Chairs in the Knesset

PM Sharon (who just hours ago experienced a minor stroke) recently parachuted out of his own Likud Party and founded a new one called ‘Kadima” (Hebrew for ‘forward!’). Other top Likud politicians followed him, abandoning decades-long party affiliation. Six of these aspiring ministers have criminal charges pending against them. One even orchestrated events so that his ship-jumping occurred on the very same day when the Attorney General recommended bringing criminal charges against him.

Two weeks ago one candidate for the Likud chairmanship, the present Minister of Defense Shaul Mofaz attacked Sharon’s Kadima policies and sent out 128,000 letters to Likud voters affirming his own commitment to stay with the Likud no matter what. A few days later, as his party faithful were opening his letter in their mail, he changed political horses in mid-stream, bolting to Sharon’s new party. Kadima spinmeisters then leaked gossip to the Israeli press that Mofaz would now be punished for having attacked Sharon the week before – if Sharon wins the election he will not be given the portfolio of the Defense Ministry! (Note a similar dynamic in 1 Ki.1:7, 49). In today’s Israeli political world, long-time party loyalties are cynically jettisoned and clear public commitments are casually switched.

A report on Israel Radio this morning indicated that PM Sharon’s son Omri, chief hatchet-man for Kadima and recently convicted of money-laundering charges, is pressuring Likud acquaintances still in the Likud hierarchy to act as a fifth column within the Likud movement and vote against Benyamin Netanyahu – in order to help Kadima weaken and squash the Likud in the coming elections!

Other such shenanigans characterize all the other major parties, and Israelis are reacting with cynicism, disbelief and anger. A new bumper sticker declares in blue and white Israeli colors, “Politicians, I hate you!” A Holocaust survivor in our community who spent over three years in Auschwitz told us a few days ago that all of the politicians currently campaigning are prostitutes. These words bring to mind the words of the prophet Micah, whose description of ancient Israeli politics could well describe some of the present goings on.

“What misery is mine! . . . The godly have been swept from the land; not one upright man remains. All men lie in wait to shed blood; each hunts his brother with a net. Both hands are skilled in doing evil: the ruler demands gifts, the judge accepts bribes, the powerful dictate what they desire – they all conspire together. The best of them is like a briar, the most upright worse than a thorn hedge . . . Now is the time of their confusion. Do not trust a neighbor; put no confidence in a friend. Even with her who lies in your embrace be careful of your words. For a son treats his father contemptuously, a daughter rises up against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law – a man’s enemies are the members of his own household” (Micah 7:1-6).

Micah, however, sees his own corrupted situation though eyes of faith. He knows that God will redeem Israel from her less than righteous leaders and will put her military and political enemies to flight. In our day, as in Micah’s, we need to hang on, to intercede for God to fulfill His promises, and to take a stand for righteousness.

“But as for me, I watch expectantly for YHVH, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me. Do not gloat over me, my enemy! Though I have fallen, I will rise. Though I sit in darkness, YHVH will be my light. I will bear the indignation of YHVH because I have sinned against Him, until He pleads my case and executes justice for me. He will bring me out into the light; I will see His righteousness. . . The day for building your walls will come, the day for extending your boundaries” (Micah 7:7-9, 11).

The Hebrew Bulldozer

In the 1880’s a ‘bull-dose’ was a new American phrase referring to a large and efficient dose of any sort of medicine or punishment. To ‘bull-dose’ someone meant giving him a severe dose of medicine, a whipping or coercion, or to intimidate at gunpoint. By 1886 a bulldozer referred to a large-caliber pistol or the person who wielded it. Eventually bulldozing came to mean to use force to overcome any obstacle. Today the most famous armored bulldozer is the Israel Defense Force’s D-9, used for detonating explosive charges and demolishing terrorists’ structures while absorbing enemy fire.

Israel’s most famous bulldozer, however, is PM Arik Sharon. He is known throughout the world as ‘the Bulldozer’: “Bulldozer Sharon wins” (The Sunday Times August 21 2005); “The Bulldozer Flattens Likud” (Der Spiegel Nov 21 2005); “Israeli ‘Bulldozer’ Sharon smashes new path” (Reuters, Nov 21, 2005). Sharon’s dogged determination to “do it my way” and accomplish his own strategies, whether military or political, are the stuff of legend as well as of much controversy in Israel. Years ago PM Begin once was quoted as saying that he would never allow Sharon to become Minister of Defense, “lest he surround my office with tanks!”

Sharon’s bulldozing has led to Israeli military victories (anti-terrorist reprisal raids in the 1950’s - 1970’s; brilliant tank operations in the 1967 and 1973 wars) as well as to heated controversy (the Gidi and Mitla casualties; disobedience to orders when he felt his own strategy was better; issues related to the Sabra and Shatilla massacres, etc.). In 1982 Sharon was accused of misleading Prime Minister Begin’s entire cabinet about the military strategy and goals of Operation Peace for Galilee. Sharon’s record is one of supreme self-confidence, dogged determination, excellent strategy and hiding his own hand of poker cards.

In this he is similar to an ancient Jewish Chief of Staff, Joab son of Zeruiah. King David owed many of his brilliant military victories to Joab. Yet at the same time he felt bullied by him and was horrified by some of his unrighteous machinations: “And today, though I am the anointed king, I am weak, and these sons of Zeruiah are too strong for me. May YHVH repay the evildoer (ed., Joab) according to his evil deeds!” (2 Sam.3:39; see also1 Ki.2:1-6).

Sharon is a ruler who does what is right in his own eyes. He has learned to bring very few people into his confidence. The writer of Proverbs notes that “all the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but YHVH weighs the spirits” (Proverbs 16:2). And again he notes that “every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but YHVH sifts the hearts. To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to YHVH than sacrifice. A high look, and a proud heart, and the plowing of the wicked, is sin” (Proverbs 21:2-4).

It is strategically important to pray for Prime Minister Sharon (1 Tim.2:2-4). We will perhaps never fully understand the spiritual and political pressures he is dealing with (Eph.6:12). The demonic powers of wickedness in high places are trying to influence Sharon and to sway him with counterfeit counsel, even as Gríma Wormtongue (Saruman’s agent) tried to blind and weaken King Théoden of Rohan in J.R.R Tolkein’s The Two Towers. Pray that the God of the Armies of Israel will grant a liberating revelation to PM Sharon and show him the heart-strategies of the God of Jacob.

“We have heard with our ears, O God; our fathers have told us what You did in their days, in days long ago. With Your hand You drove out the nations and planted our fathers; You crushed the peoples and made our fathers flourish. It was not by their sword that they won the land, nor did their arm bring them victory; it was Your right hand, Your arm, and the light of Your face, for You loved them. You are my King and my God, who decrees victories for Jacob. Through You we push back our enemies; through Your name we trample our foes. I do not trust in my bow, my sword does not bring me victory; but You give us victory over our enemies, You put our adversaries to shame. In God we make our boast all day long, and we will praise Your name forever. Selah” (Ps 44:1-8)

God’s perspective on ‘land for peace’ accords

Nearly 3,500 years ago YHVH spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai and severely warned him about cutting a covenant (entering into a treaty obligation) with any of the tribes then living in the land of Canaan. God’s perspective was that as long as these Canaanites were not spiritually submitted to the God of Israel, they would bring spiritual confusion and deception to the people of Israel. This would lead to a false peace, a counterfeit coexistence, to the breaking down of God’s walls of protection over Israel, and finally to military invasion of the land of Israel and exile for the Jewish people.

“Then God said, ‘Behold, I am going to make a covenant with you. Before all your people I will perform miracles never before done in all the earth nor among any of the nations. All the people among whom you live will see the working of YHVH, for it is a fearful thing that I am going to perform with you. Obey what I command you today: behold, I am going to drive out the Amorite before you, and the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Hivite and the Jebusite. Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land into which you are going, or it will become a snare in your midst. But rather, you are to tear down their altars and smash their sacred pillars and cut down their Asherah poles. Do not worship any other god, for YHVH, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God. Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land’” (Exodus 34:10-15)

Today’s leaders of Israel for the most part do not shape their military and political strategies based on the Hebrew Scriptures. Today’s ‘kings’ in Israel (the politicians) try to do what seems best to them in light of pressing circumstances and superpower pressures. Once again we find ourselves living in a time similar to the days of the Judges, when it was said with regret, “In those days there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes” (Judges 17:6). Pray for Israel’s leadership, that the God of Israel and His scriptural strategies will guide and encourage them in all the difficult and challenging decisions that need to be made.

Hosea’s Latter-Day nightmare

Hosea prophesied to the northern tribes of Israel during the mid-700’s BC. He pleaded with them to turn back to the Living God, and declared that exile to Assyria would soon shake Israel to her foundations. He proclaimed that the Jewish people would go into a long exile, losing godly government (the Davidic kings) and holy worship (the Temple in Jerusalem) – even seeing the destruction of their false worship centers in Dan and Bethel. “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” (Hosea 3:4).

Nevertheless, Hosea held out a prophetic word of hope and vision. At the end of the age, when the Jewish people realize that all other possibilities of achieving godly government and holy worship in our own strength are exhausted, we will turn back to the Messianic Davidic dynasty, and will come with trembling repentance to YHVH our God: “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 3:5).

What is happening right now in Israel is the tail end, the latter part of this process. The Jewish people’s faith in the wisdom, courage, strength and honesty of their leaders is being severely shaken. This hurts, and it causes a sense of no direction, no purpose and no vision. As the writer of Proverbs once said (29:18), “Without a prophetic vision, the people mourn as if at approaching death” (my paraphrased translation).

But according to Hosea, this process is about to morph into the spiritual return of Israel to their God and their Davidic monarchy. Pray for the people of Israel, that God would turn our hearts back to Him. Pray that we would seek Him and Yeshua His Messiah, turning away from any arm of flesh – any dependence on any other country, including our own – and back to full dependence on YHVH alone.

A Christmas Prayer

As debate rises in the USA about whether it is acceptable to wish people a ‘Merry Christmas’, we wish you a Merry Christmas, a blessed Messiahmas, and a Happy Hannukah for good measure! We also remember the prophetic blessing that Z’charya (Zechariah) spoke over his son Yochanan (John the Baptist) at his brit milah (Hebrew for circumcision). Zechariah thanked the God of Israel that, when the Messiah Son of David would come, then we Jewish people would be delivered from all our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us. As we consider the amazing birth of Yeshua our Immanuel, let us pray together that the God of Israel would confound and frustrate all the enemies of the Jewish people, and that He would deliver us from their hands, their guns and bombs, and their weapons of mass destruction. Even so, come Lord Yeshua!

“His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, ‘Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited us and accomplished redemption for His people. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the House of David His servant (as He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from long ago) salvation from our enemies, and from the hand of all who hate us; to show mercy toward our fathers, and to remember His holy covenant (the oath which He swore to Abraham our father); to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before Him all our days . . . to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace’ ” (Luke 1:67-75).

In Messiah Yeshua, the Lord of Armies and the Prince of Peace,

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

When the Earth Experiences Your Judgments (Isa.26:9-11)

As we move closer to the return of Israel’s Messiah, our planet is beginning to show signs of stress (Isa.25). Yeshua prophesied that local and global wars, earthquakes and roaring of the waves would be another sign indicating His soon return (Matt.25:6-8; Luke 24:25-28). The recent events in New Orleans and the GulfCoast have shaken everyone whose heart is still able to feel pain (see Matt.24:12).

What is the role of the prophetic in such heart-breaking circumstances? When apocalyptic scenarios become last night’s television news, how can a word from the God of Jacob equip, encourage and edify the Body of Messiah? Does God anything to do with catastrophes that shake the earth? To be more direct, does God have something to say about the catastrophes that are now shaking the earth, and which will soon increase in intensity and severity? At the heart of the matter is the question: does God want to communicate and is He really communicating what He is doing on the earth today to men and women touched by the spirit of prophecy?

These questions are very important. We are thankful that there is opportunity to consider them, as well as opportunity to help bring a measure of balance and clarity regarding the ministry of the prophetic – for all believers in general, and to believers who love Israel and honor her calling and destiny in particular.

Offending the mind, revealing the heart

It has been said: “God offends the mind to reveal the heart.” Simeon, a righteous and aged Jewish man, took the baby Yeshua in his arms and prophesied, “Behold, this Child is appointed for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and for a sign to be opposed – to the end that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed” (Luke 2:34-35). God brings events into our own lives and into the life of the world which offend our minds. Natural catastrophes are definitely one of those events. One of the side-effects of those catastrophes is to reveal the thoughts of our hearts.

The Apostle Paul agrees, adding that one of the purposes of the prophetic is to reveal the secrets of men’s hearts, and sometimes even to reveal those secrets publicly. He explains that if, when believers are gathered, “all prophesy, and an unbeliever or an ungifted man enters, he is convicted by all, his is called to account by all; the secrets of his heart are disclosed. And so he will fall on his face and worship God, declaring that God is certainly among you” (1 Cor.14:24-25).

Though it sometimes brings glory to God for Him to conceal a matter (see Prov.25:2), there are many other times when He delights in revealing His will and His purpose: “Hear the word that YHVH has spoken… O sons of Israel ... Surely YHVH the Lord does nothing unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets. A lion has roared; who will not fear? YHVH the Lord has spoken; who will not prophesy?” (Amos 3:1, 7-8).

One of the core values of the prophetic is to communicate the heart of God to a people who are thirsty and hungry. “Behold, the days are coming, declares YHVH God, when I will send a famine on the land. Not a famine for bread or a thirst for water, but rather for hearing the words of YHVH. People will stagger from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east. They will go to and fro to seek the word of YHVH – but they will not find it!” (Amos 8:11-12).

Now more than ever it is imperative that the word of God be heard. But it will not be heard unless it is boldly preached. “How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? How will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things’” (Rom.10:14-15).

Why catastrophic judgments?

God does not wish “for anyone to perish, but for all to come to repentance” (2 Pet.3:9). Yet natural catastrophes cause people to perish. Why then does God allow or even catalyze such judgments?

When God shines His light on darkness, a power encounter erupts between two kingdoms. The end result is clear: Light triumphs over darkness. “The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness does not overwhelm it” (John 1:5). Note that John is using ‘battle terminology,’ words of warfare. When darkness in a society takes hold and rises to a certain level, God has often brought the ‘severe mercy’ of natural catastrophes or other judgments to bear. His judgments are a response to evil. They are catalyzed by evil. His judgments also expose evil and destroy evil. The clearest example of such a judgment on an international scale is Noah, who alone escaped the Flood, along with his immediate family.

Yet it is painfully true that innocent bystanders are sometimes caught in the crossfire when such a ‘battle royal’ breaks out. When God judged the nation of Judah, people like Jeremiah and Daniel suffered persecution, imprisonment and exile. Army people use the impersonal military term ‘collateral damage’ in such cases. The sad truth is that when a nation is judged, innocent people often suffer. We will look at one biblical aspect of this dynamic later.

Part of the prophetic calling of all believers is ‘to let our little light shine,’ to expose darkness by shining what light we have on localized sources of darkness. Of course, that little light is none other than Yeshua, the Light of the World who dwells within us (see John 9:5; Matt.5:14). “Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them . . . All things become visible when they are exposed by the light…” (Eph.5:11,13).

One judgment, two different responses

Not everyone wants to have ‘that little light’ shining on him. One of the reasons Ahab King of Israel did not want to inquire of YHVH through the prophet Micaiah ben Imlah was because the prophet “does not prophesy good concerning me, but evil” (1 Kings 22:8). Ahab tried to explain away what the prophet was saying by turning the tables on him – suggesting that Micaiah had both a bad attitude and a judgmental spirit. Rather than Ahab humbly accepting that his own sins had brought judgment down, Ahab tried to charge the prophet with presumption, and accused him of not speaking from God but rather from malice. The rest of the chapter plays out the sad ending of this dramatic event.

Actually, the Scriptures do not blush when describing the judgments of God. The Bible also notes that very few people are going to learn what God wants to communicate through His judgments. Over 2,700 years ago the prophet Isaiah explained, “When the earth experiences Your judgments, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness” (Isa.26:9b). Natural catastrophes are meant to draw men’s attention to consider what is on God’s mind and heart. Some men and women hear His voice roaring ‘out of the storm’ and above its din: “Then YHVH answered Job out of the storm and said, ‘Now gird up your loins like a man. I will ask you and you will instruct Me. Will you really annul My judgment? Will you condemn Me that you may be justified? Or do you have an arm like God, and can you thunder with a voice like His?”(Job 40:6-9)

Isaiah continues his message in the next verse, adding that the wicked just don’t get it. They do not see the hand of God in His judgments. Though the power and kingliness of the God of Israel is revealed through natural disasters, the wicked man refuses both to recognize God’s hand of judgment and to turn toward the Light. “Though the wicked is shown favor, he does not learn righteousness. He deals unjustly in the land of uprightness and does not perceive the majesty of YHVH” (Isa. 26:10).

History reveals that this pattern is part of God’s dealings with mankind. The Lord reveals His mighty arm and His holy nature through catastrophic judgments. This offends the minds of mankind and reveals the thoughts of everyone’s hearts. In the end most people don’t understand what God is doing. But those who do understand are described as men and women who are learning God’s lessons about righteousness.

It is worth meditating on these matters in the light of John 16:8, where Yeshua describes the ministry of the Holy Spirit: “And He, when He comes, will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.” The whole world is indeed sinful and in need of redemption. The whole world also stands under God’s judgment. But repentance is the key which is “knockin’ on heaven’s door” and it will open up the floodgates of rescue and safety.

Faulty Towers and Unrepentant Hearts

Throughout the ages Jewish prophets echoed certain themes, including the guilt of the Israel and the world, and the need of personal repentance. When Messiah Yeshua taught in Jerusalem, He also reiterated the same point. “Do you suppose that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them, were worse culprits than all the men who live in Jerusalem? I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish” (Luke 13:4-5).

Yeshua was not saying that no one was allowed to know why the tower fell. Nor was He saying that the 18 men killed in its collapse were guiltless. He Himself ended His teaching with a prophetic and time-sensitive warning of soon-coming judgment to the entire Jewish nation (Luke 13:6-9).

Yeshua stated that there was plenty of guilt to go around – the 18 were guilty, but so were the majority of Jerusalem’s inhabitants. Yeshua linked the tower’s casualties with judgment on sin. And He did not consider such a link simplistic or primitive, for He was speaking in the name of His omniscient Father, the God of glory whose voice thunders over the many waters (see Psa.29:3-4). The main point of Yeshua’s teaching was an exhortation to His listeners not to think that they were more righteous than those being judged. As Paul said, “For all have sinned …” (Rom.3:23).

What Yeshua wanted His hearers to understand is that, even though catastrophic events are due to sin, they are meant to be a tool in God’s hands to shock all of us into repentance. If we do not recognize that God’s hand is somehow in the catastrophic event, we will not humble our hearts and soften our spirits before the God of Israel. We will not learn what He wants us to learn. We will not move into repentance. We will move against the prophetic spirit of God.

Judgment and the King

The connection between sin and judgment is part of a biblical worldview. The awareness that God will punish sins even in the ‘here and now’ is supposed to motivate us to bow low before His footstool in the fear of God (see Isa.11:1-5). But the Bible also teaches us that it is not always the individual who is directly in the crosshairs when God’s judgments roll like thunder across a nation. Sometimes God brings judgment on a people due to the sins of their leadership.

One such example is found in 2 Samuel 24 and I Chronicles 21. God was angry with Israel for some sins which are not directly described in context. He allowed Satan to influence David into taking a census. Even a rough and tumble soldier like Joab discerned that David’s census was contrary to God’s own heart. Perhaps this is connected to Deut.17:16-20 where the Davidic king is called to base his “State Department” policy on strict obedience to the covenants and not to lean on his own wisdom and power. Or perhaps it ties in with Deut.8:10-20, wherein Israel is warned against ‘trusting in chariots’ – depending on its own strength to save it, instead of following the promises and heeding the warnings of God’s covenants.

Since YHVH had given David much, He would now hold him responsible for much. God’s judgment on David would be most severe (see Rom.2:4-11; Amos 3:2; Isa.40:2). Through the words of the prophet Gad, God gave David three choices of judgment – three years of famine, three months of military invasion, or three days of plague. David chose the shortest possible judgment, declaring that it is better to fall directly into God’s hand of judgment than into that of Israel’s surrounding neighbors!

The prophesied plague sent from YHVH fell on Israel, and 70,000 men died within only a few days. This judgment was accepted by David as coming from the hand of the Lord. He humbled his heart. He did not reject the prophetic word. And he wept.

“Then David lifted up his eyes and saw the angel of YHVH standing between earth and heaven, with his drawn sword in his hand, stretched out over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders, covered with sackcloth, fell on their faces. David said to God, ‘Is it not I who commanded to count the people? Indeed, I am the one who has sinned and done very wickedly, but these sheep, what have they done? O YHVH my God, please let Your hand be against me and my father’s household, but not against Your people that they should be plagued’… Then David built an altar … and he called to YHVH, and He answered him with fire from heaven on the altar of burnt offering. YHVH commanded the angel, and he put his sword back in its sheath” (1 Chron.21:16-17, 26-27).

The biblical principle here is that judgment on a nation can be due to the sins of the country’s leadership. This scenario actually happened with David, a man after God’s own heart, and with Israel, God’s chosen people. The principle was commemorated in the Bible, a record of God’s dealings for all time. Today the same dynamic may play itself out in your country, or in any country.

When God brings judgment on a nation for the sins of its leadership, our 21^st century minds may get offended. Please don’t get offended! Press on through to the other side. The God of Jacob is testing our hearts and revealing our thoughts. He is calling us to repentance and to acknowledge our nation’s sin.

When any nation’s leadership actively campaigns and brings pressure to bear to shrink Israel’s borders, this is a national sin. These actions eventually bring national judgment (see Joel 3:1-2), and this sin requires national and identificational repentance.

When Israel sins before God, He may even reveal His displeasure by temporarily trimming away land from her (see Judges 2). Even so, the nations which threaten and pressure Israel into shrinking her own land borders will also be judged. When Israel gives in to such pressures, this is a sin on Israel’s part (see Isa.26:13). This sin requires Israel’s national and identificational repentance.

Do Not Prophesy at Bethel!

In the year 755 BC (approximately) a gentleman farmer from Tekoa in the Kingdom of Judah had a visitation from YHVH. He was told to cross the borders of his nation and to move into enemy territory, there to deliver a word of judgment to the King of the breakaway Kingdom of Israel – Jeroboam the Second.

Amos’ message of judgment upset the powers that be. Specifically it upset Amaziah the priest of Bethel. No wonder, for it was not the first time that a pesky Judean prophet had upset Bethel’s priests. In the year 930 BC Jeroboam the First, King of Israel had “made priests of all the high places from among all the people. Any who would, he ordained to be priests of the high places. This event became sin to the House of Jeroboam, even to blot it out and destroy it from off the face of the earth” (1 Kings 13:33-34). In I Kings 14 a nameless Judean prophet brought a prophecy of future judgment to Jeroboam the First. Now, 180 years later Amos (another prophet from Judah) was coming into hostile territory (to Bethel of Israel) with the same word of judgment, this time for Jeroboam the Second, King of Israel.

Amaziah the priest sent a message from Bethel (one of the centers of false worship) to King Jeroboam the Second, King of Israel who was probably at Samaria, his capital city. Amaziah complained that Amos was preaching judgment, that nobody in Israel wanted to hear what he was prophesying, and that Amos had no right to speak, since he was not from the Kingdom of Israel but from a foreign country – from Judah. He then barked out an order to Amos the Judean, “Go, you seer. Flee away to the land of Judah and there eat bread and there do your prophesying. But no longer prophesy at Bethel, for it is a sanctuary of the king and a royal residence” (Amos 7:12-13).

Amos’ response was twofold. He answered with quiet sarcasm, saying that he actually was not a professional prophet nor in any way connected with the prophetic guilds, the schools of the prophets. His specialty, he explained, was harvesting figs and shepherding sheep. Nevertheless, God took Amos from following after the sheep (as He had done with David as well) and sent him with a prophetic word to the people of Israel in the Northern Kingdom.

Amos, Jonah and Joel are biblical examples of how God will sometimes cross national boundaries to bring a word of repentance, a warning of judgment or even a prophetic explanation of judgments in process. Sometimes God used Judeans to speak to Israelites, Israelites to speak to Assyrians, or even Messianic Jews to speak to Romans and Greeks. Jeremiah and Isaiah were used to prophesy to all the major superpowers of their time, as well as to all the surrounding hostile Arab nations. The moral of the story is, “When God wants to ‘prophesy in Bethel,’ better just let Him do it!”

When silence is dangerous

As the Jewish sometimes-prophet Bob Dylan has remarked in his remarkable voice, “The times, they are a’ changin’”. The God of the Old Testament is the God of storms and earthquakes (see Habakkuk 3). And His handiwork is beginning to show up as the lead story on the nightly news. The God of the Exodus is incrementally revealing His mighty arm at present. Part of the reason He is doing this is buried in the pages of the Hebrew Prophets. He is letting the superpowers of the world know that He is “exceedingly jealous for Jerusalem and Zion” and that He is “very angry with the nations who are at ease; for while I was only a little angry (at Israel), they furthered the disaster” (Zech.1:14-15).

The God of Israel wants the superpowers of the world to have a revelatory experience – to experience that “he who touches (Israel) touches the apple of His eye” (Zech.2:8). YHVH wants the nations to know that any person or nation who says “It’s only Zion; no one cares for her!” (Jer.30:16-17) is in danger of having himself, his family and his own land plundered, devoured and exiled – curse for curse, just like the superpowers in times past (and present!) have allowed these things to happen (or even encouraged them) in regard to the Jewish people and their land.

As events barrel forward, God’s eyes are roaming to and fro throughout the earth, looking to strongly support those whose hearts are completely His (as King Asa said in 2 Chron.16:9). Now is the time to seek God’s face and to dedicate ourselves afresh for His service and His kingdom. Now is the time, as Isaiah says (see Isa.58:1), to cry out loudly and not hold back, raising our voices like a shofar and declaring to the House of Jacob (and to all the families of the earth) their sins.

Now is not the time to be afraid of what governments may say, or of what financial supporters of one’s ministry might say. Judgment is certainly not a nice or easy message to bring. But it is part of the whole counsel of God. And as we move into a season of God revealing His holy arm in the sight of all nations, we will need to be able ambassadors of Messiah, not hemming and hawing, not embarrassed or ashamed of what our Master is doing (see 2 Cor.5:20).

“If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it. For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels” (Luke 9:23-26).

“What is truth?” (Pontius Pilate in John 18:38)

Today there are bona fide believers who are certain that God either cannot or will not communicate directly with mankind. But as God’s voice begins to thunder out more loudly across the world, many of these dear men and women will soon realize that the God of the New Testament is also the God of the Old Testament and, to paraphrase Francis Schaeffer, this God “is here, and He is not silent,”.

But there is a cost to speaking truth. Pilate questioned Yeshua about truth one Friday morning and warned Him to be careful. But it was actually Pontius who would soon learn the cost of sidestepping the Truth. The truth costs, and standing for God is going to cost us. As God’s message gets better understood, many people will harden their heart to it as did Pharaoh. At that time it will cost people more to open their mouths and speak God’s heart. That cost may entail being sniped at from the world or even from fellow believers. It may result in imprisonment, torture or death. But assuredly, saints, these days are coming. At the same time remember – we will also stand before kings and rulers, proclaiming His heart with boldness and great courage! As the song says, “These are the days of Elijah!”

Now is the time to count the cost. Now is the time to get ready. Now is the time to commit ourselves to Micaiah’s declaration in 1 Kings 22:13-14: “Then the messenger who went to summon Micaiah spoke to him saying, ‘Behold now, the words of the prophets are uniformly favorable to the king. Please let your word be like the word of one of them, and speak favorably. But Micaiah said, “As YHVH lives, what YHVH says to me, that I will speak.”

Jeremiah warns us, “If you have run with footmen and they have tired you out, then how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in a land of peace, how will you manage in the jungle of the Jordan river?” (Jer.12:5). Now is time to gird up our loins and make ready.

The choice is now upon us: either be prophetic or be politically correct. Either fear God or fear man. Please God or please man. And be aware – the cost of gasoline is not the only thing that has recently gone up in price. The cost that believers will have to pay for friendship with the world has just now gone up as well (see James 4:4).

* * *

As the world begins to shake, let us press into Him – to hear His heartbeat, and to get marching orders and clear prophetic direction for the challenges and battles that lie ahead.

In Messiah Yeshua, the Lord of Armies,

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

A Mother in Israel's Perspective on the Disengagement

From a mother in Israel: A personal view of August 2005 events

Shalom friends,

Greetings in Yeshua from Israel. Thank you for your letters of encouragement. It is heartening to know that people are standing with Israel in these times. It is deeply encouraging to hear that the Lord continues to call believers from many nations to pray and weep for Israel, that she may know the Lord. Thank you for standing with Israel. Thank you for standing with us through your prayers, support and love.

Last week Avner's letter "THE WORLD HAS ENTERED INTO THE TIME OF DIVIDING UP THE LAND OF ISRAEL" went out. Today I want to communicate with you about what is happening in Israel, and how it relates to what we have all prayed about and considered over many years. Israel's withdrawal from Gaza and Northern Samaria may soon fade from the center stage of the world's consciousness. It may even fade from many believers’ awareness around the world. Yet we have all entered into a new season. The world has crossed a line in the sand. Business will not be as usual any more.

By way of background

Avner and I have been married for 26 years and have lived in Israel for much of that time. We are watchmen in this land. I am writing to you from that vantage point – with a sense of grief and yet also with a sense of alertness in my spirit. Part of our calling is to keep Israel before you for the purpose of prayer, and to help you be prepared for things to come.

We have four sons: Daniel (21), David (19), Asaph (15) and Elisha (14). Our two oldest sons serve in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and have been inside of and next to Gaza for the last three weeks. David has also been in Northern Samaria for the last week. We thank the Lord that neither of them was directly involved in physically removing Jewish citizens from their homes. Yet like most soldiers who have participated in the withdrawal, their hearts have been sobered and torn. We ourselves have grieved and wept with this nation, and having walked through these days with sons who have been directly involved in these events, we have a perspective which is “close at hand.”

I want to open my heart and communicate what I see the Lord doing through all of this. First, let me give you some background about my own life. I was born in 1957. I was raised in a believing family in the USA by non-Jewish parents who love the Word of God and Israel. They taught me in childhood that God loves Israel and He will redeem her. I trusted the Lord for salvation at age seven. I remember very clearly the events of the Six Day War in 1967, and can still recapture the sense of awe I felt at the age of ten (in my own home and in much of the larger Christian community) when Israel regained Jerusalem and much of her ancient homeland.

I knew as a young child that the Lord had called me to join my life to His purposes for Israel. I became a student of Jewish people, Jewish culture and Israel. Through the ministry of Jewish believers in Yeshua, I dedicated my life to the Lord at age 16. I knew that redeemed Israel holds the key of blessing for all nations and I devoted my life to seeing this purpose become reality. As a teenager I devoured the prophetic scriptures related to Israel and read often from the Major and Minor Prophets. I loved Romans 9-11. Those words that I love so much have also become the words of songs I have written, and the basis for my life.

In the early 1970's, I remember a secular high school teacher saying that by the year 2000 international terrorism would become a major force with which the world would reckon. This has indeed become a reality. Terrorism fueled by jihadi Islam affects the whole world and has hit Israel endlessly over the last century. These attacks have increased over the last decades. Ever since I was a teen, I heard the enemies of Israel say repeatedly that their goal would be to "divide and conquer" the land of Israel. Today, more than ever before, Israel is an ideologically divided nation.

I also knew that Israel would yet face an unprecedented time of trouble that would lead to the salvation of the nation (Jeremiah 30:7, Zechariah 13:8-9).

What are the issues?

The Lord is at work, getting ready to accomplish final redemption both for Israel and for the called-out ones from among the nations. In these last days the Lord is preparing for Himself a bride made up of both Jewish and Gentile believers. He is calling born-again believers in Yeshua to stand with the Jewish people now as well as in times of tribulation to come. Though most of the Jewish people in the world and in Israel are still in unbelief, the remnant of the Jewish nation is destined for salvation (Romans 11:26). The Lord will work through believers in the nations to reach the Jewish people who are being saved. May the Lord give us the grace, love and wisdom to rise to the occasion.

God works with individuals and He works with nations. The land of Israel is God's specific playing field, the arena wherein He deals with Israel. Through the grid of this land, He also deals with nations both near and far. I see events happening on three levels – on an international level, with Israel as a nation, and with individual Israelis.

The International Arena

Worldwide terrorism is causing a dulling of the senses; it is causing love to grow cold (Matthew 24:12). Repeated trauma closes the heart. Self-protection is a natural human survival mechanism. Terrorism is already causing much of the world to distance itself from Israel. It is making the hearts of many nations grow chilly toward Israel. As terrorism increases, nations will make decisions based on what they deem best for themselves. Many nations will find it politically incorrect to stand with Israel, and will call "Zion an outcast, for whom no one cares" (Jeremiah 30:17). Because of terrorism, right now the international community is putting enormous pressure on Israel to shrink her borders. Even though it may make perfect sense to the leaders of the world to determine Israel's borders according to their own wisdom, God is very clear that He will judge the nations that "have divided up My land" (Joel 3:3; Deuteronomy 32:8-9). This process is leading to the time when God "will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle" (Joel 3:2, Zechariah 14:2).

God is not very "politically correct" and He has chosen Israel to fulfill His purposes. Likewise, He is very specific about sin and judgment, salvation and eternal reward. Much of His word speaks specifically about His plans and feelings regarding Israel. He has spoken clearly about how believers are to relate to Israel. He will use the Jewish people and the land of Israel as a dividing line, a plumbline, in the world and in the church. We will have to choose. Yeshua will divide His true followers from the rest of the world, including from the apostate church (Matthew 25:40). He is calling His own children to move in step with both His Holy Spirit and His end-time purposes as outlined in His word – and not to march to the beat of the political drums sounding in the nations in which they live. G.K. Chesterton once said that "the one who marries the spirit of the age will soon find himself a widower." We are called to an eternal, timeless destiny, and not to join ourselves to the spirit of the age. God is calling the redeemed of the nations to stand with Israel (Isaiah 62:1-7). God wants us to train our senses to discern good and evil (Hebrews 5:14). He wants us to stay alert and passionate toward Him, His people and His purposes. Staying alert and passionate brings rewards.

The Arena of the Land of Israel

Israel is God's signpost to the whole world. What happens in Israel eventually affects the whole world. Recently a voice in the Israeli media said "all of Israel is Gush Katif" (Gush Katif is the main part of Gaza from which Israeli Jews have just been expelled). In other words, the fate of Gush Katif will become the fate of Israel. We would add, “that what is now the fate of Israel will become the fate of the whole world.” The upheaval and terror that have been Gush Katif’s portion and Israel’s portion are now becoming the world’s portion as well.

Israel, even though she is not fully aware of the fact, is on the front lines in the fight against Islamic terror. Right now Israel is caving in to the relentless pressure. Terrorism against Israel has been rewarded. Terrorist forces in the Islamic and Arab world are crowing gleefully over Israel's August 2005 withdrawal from Gaza and part of Northern Samaria. They have rightfully concluded that terrorism works and they are now setting their sights on the rest of the land of Israel.

When Jews are forcibly removed from their homes – at any time, for any reason, in any land, by any force – it is a sign, and not a good sign. It is a wake-up call that more trouble is coming – not only to Jews but to others as well. History has repeatedly shown this to be true. How much more should we be alert, since in this case something unprecedented has taken place – Jews have removed Jews from their own land.

There are dynamics in the present-day nation of Israel that are strikingly similar to dynamics in the land of Israel 2,000 years ago. The Jews living in that time were divided about politics, spiritual issues, who should be in authority and what is truth. Even among Yeshua's twelve disciples a variety of opinions were held. Matthew the tax collector and Simon the Zealot represent two extremes – opposing views similar to those held in Israel today. There are also parallels between the international forces pressuring Israel today (on the one hand) and the influence of ancient Rome in the time of Yeshua (on the other). In Israel every stripe of opinion is held regarding how to relate to these external forces, what to do with the land, who should be in authority, and how to continue to exist as a nation. The evacuation of Jews from Gaza has caused a sharpening of these issues in every Israeli heart. God is shaking up His nation in a massive way.

The Arena of the Jewish Heart

The events of the last two weeks have torn the nation and the hearts of many in the nation. Here is one example of thousands: Moshe Karadi, Israel Police Commissioner, spoke of how hard it was on his officers to fulfill their task. "If you asked the police, maybe half would support the settlers, but we don't ask them. Our government has decided and we will do this task …" (NYTimes, August 18, 2005). One significant result of these traumatic events (which has characterized nearly every section of Israeli society) is tears. Both religious and secular Israelis, the political left and right, settlers, soldiers and police, Messianic Jewish believers and the man on the street, those against and those in favor of the withdrawal, have wept. God often uses tragedy and events which mystify and stun us to get to deep issues in our hearts. These events have been tragic for the settlers in Gaza. They have also caused distress for those who were required to carry out the expulsion, and the result has often been tears. Tears are often evidence of the softening of the heart and can provide an opening for more of the Holy Spirit's activity. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted (Psalm 34:18).

Right now the nation is still in shock from what has happened and is struggling to regroup. We do not even get a chance to catch our breath, for in the last week mortars and rockets have continued to fall in the far north, the southern port of Eilat and the western Negev, and Jews have been stabbed and murdered in Jerusalem and Hebron. Today a suicide bomber seriously wounded two in Beersheva. Israelis are used to constant trauma and stress. They know how to quickly bring daily life back to some semblance of normalcy. But it remains to be seen what the long-term effects of the events of August 2005 will be on the nation and on individuals. Meir Indor, director of the Terror Victims Association spoke of the Gaza withdrawal causing "aftershock here that will become a tsunami" (Jerusalem Post, August 23, 2005). Through the pain, God is certainly working to draw Israel's attention to Himself.

God desires truth in the innermost being (Psalm 51:6). He has promised that Yeshua, the Son of David, will rule and reign over the nation of Israel as their King. He has promised that Yeshua will rule and reign in the hearts of individual Jewish people. He has promised to take from them a heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 11:19). He has promised that all Israel will know Him (Jeremiah 31:31-34).

How should believers pray?

The prophet Joel declares, “Let the priests, the Lord's ministers, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say 'spare Your people, O Lord, and do not make your inheritance a reproach'” (Joel 2:17). Paul says, “Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for them is for their salvation” (Romans 10:1). The Lord is calling believers to stand in the gap for Israel's salvation, both physically and spiritually. Pray that Jewish hearts will be soft and open to the pursuit and persuasion of the Lover of Israel.

What are we doing?

For the last eight years we have lived in Omer, a town a few kilometers outside of modern Beersheva and adjacent to biblical Beersheva (dwelling place of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob). The Lord called us to help birth a community of worship and intercession, creative arts and prophetic activity. In the last few years the Lord has expanded this community by sending a number of wonderful friends. We hold worship and prayer gatherings three times a week. One of our primary purposes is to call out to God on behalf of Israel, to stand in the place of repentance for Israel's sin and to ask the Lord to reveal Himself to Israel. By God's grace we are preparing a net of safety for those who will be saved.

The Lord has sent a number of worshippers and musicians to our area and we are enjoying the resulting synergy. Pray that the Lord’s anointing will be sweet and irresistible and that the stream will turn into a river of life for many.

Avner and I are also involved in caring for and helping a number of believers in our area. We continue to lead worship around the country. We share the hope of Yeshua’s redemption and His soon return with Israelis around us. Our home continues to be a place of hospitality and ministry to many from Israel and the nations. By God’s grace we continue to raise our sons for Him. We and some of those gathering with us are living by faith. We continue to seek the Lord’s provision to supply for and expand this ministry.

Once again, we want you to know how much you mean to us. Thanks for standing with us financially and in prayer.

In Messiah Yeshua’s love,

Rachel Boskey (for Avner, Daniel, David, Asaph and Elisha)

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:

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Katrina and Gaza: is God speaking in New Orleans?

“This is what YHVH says, who gives the sun to be a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars to be a light by night, who stirs up the sea, so that its waves roar; YHVH of Armies is His name” (Jer.31:35)

The past two weeks have seen Israel withdraw from Gaza as a result of (among other things) American policy and pressure. In previous newsletters we have quoted US State Department and Presidential statements to that effect.

The rushing onset of Hurricane Katrina is shocking and ominous. Check out www.stratfor.com’s breaking article “The Geopolitics of Katrina” for the potential strategic damage that could be caused to the US and global economy and petroleum industry as a result of this hurricane. The Port of Southern Louisiana is the USA’s largest port and the fifth largest in the world in terms of tonnage. It is America’s key port for grain export. Approximately 25% of U.S. produced crude oil comes from the Gulf of Mexico.

Consider Bill Koenig’s web site www.watch.org and his book “Eye to Eye – Facing the Consequences of Dividing Israel” which charts the uncanny connection between USA attempts to pressure Israel into shrinking its borders, and nearly simultaneous natural disasters in America.

We ask you to consider God’s hand in present events. Genesis 12:3 is a prophetic promise that says that God will curse the one who speaks curses Israel.

What happens in Israel affects the rest of the world, and how any country treats Israel has a lot to do with how God treats that country. We are praying, deeply concerned and grieved about the onset of Katrina.

Here are some appalling parallels that need to be considered as we all pray into this situation.

Recent comments over the past hours on the FOX NEWS Channel eerily parallel what has just happened in Gaza. One commentator referred to the inhabitants of New Orleans and said, “It must be an emotional experience to walk away from their houses and not know if they will be able to live in them again.” That is exactly what has transpired here this past week for Gaza’s Jewish population.

Another commentator said that most of all the wooden structures in New Orleans will be destroyed. Nearly all of the structures in Gaza’s Jewish communities and farms have been destroyed.

Ivor Van Heeden, deputy director of Louisiana State University’s Hurricane Center, recently said on FOX that there is a high probability that the hurricane will loosen many of the coffins in New Orleans and that corpses will be loosened and moved from their resting places. One of the three top items on Israel’s news tonight was the forced removal of Jewish graves from the Gaza Strip and the transportation of the corpses for reburial in other parts of Israel.

Whereas Gaza was placed under a state of emergency as its 8,000 residents were evacuated, now New Orleans has been given orders for a mandatory evacuation of nearly 500,000 people.

Whereas many Israeli Jews from Gaza are in temporary refugee camps and tent cities, there is talk of up to one million refugees needing to be settled in temporary camps in the Louisiana and Mississippi area.

It seems that the US and Israel are joined together this week by some measure of tragedy. We grieve for this, and especially for the apparent links between these two events.

Pray for America’s leadership, that their spiritual eyes and ears may be attentive to the God of Israel who stirs up the waves so that they roar. Let us not shut our ears if He is speaking. And let us handle with respect the people whom He has chosen as the apple of His eye.

Avner Boskey

www.davidstent.org

The world has entered into the time of dividing up the Land of Israel

Our last newsletter (sent out in early August) sought to clarify the real strategic, democratic and biblical issues surrounding the Israeli government’s evacuation and retreat from Gaza and Northern Samaria. The goal was to correct misinformation about events in Israel, and to present more accurate information from an Israeli, Hebrew and Messianic perspective about facts on the ground.

This present newsletter asks the question – what is the prophetic import of events going on in Israel today?

Signs and weathermen

An ancient Indian proverb cautions care when using one’s finger to point something out. A passing onlooker may end up focusing on the finger, and may totally miss the object to which one was pointing!

In Matthew 16:1-3 Yeshua warns that it is possible to be aware of current events while at the same time to totally miss what these events are prophetically pointing to. Even a weatherman can miss the significance of a coming storm! “When it’s evening, you declare that tomorrow will be good weather, because the sky is reddish. And in the morning you announce that there will be nasty weather today, because the sky is red and overcast . . . You know how to discern tomorrow’s weather, but you don’t know how to discern the signs of the times”.

What significance should be drawn about the disengagement from Gaza and Northern Samaria? Is the lesson to be learned simply a call to good citizenship, that Israel’s citizens should obey their Prime Minister without question – as it were, a unique Israeli exercise in upholding the democratic form of government? Or is the disengagement a prophetic wake up call to Israel and the nations – a decisive prophetic line in the sand which has now been crossed, with international and eternal consequences?

The prophet Samson ended up “eyeless in Gaza.” It is our prayer that, with Israel’s recent departure from Gaza, the eyes of the prophets and the eyes of the Jewish people who are all called to be prophets would be opened more clearly and that we would all prophesy with even greater accuracy and devotion to Yeshua (see Psalm 105:15; Num.11:29)!

A retreat by any other name

The forced evacuation of Jewish Israelis from Gaza and parts of Northern Samaria is the first and only case in Jewish history of Jews uprooting other Jews from their homes and synagogues, and then destroying those buildings – all in order to hand over portions of their divinely promised land to enemy forces (the uprooting of Yamit under Ariel Sharon’s supervision in 1982 and its handover to Egypt probably should also be included). It is also the first case of the Israeli army retreating from terrorist forces. And it is actually the third time in the modern era that Israel has abandoned territory promised by God to Israel. In 1956 Israel abandoned Gaza due to US and Russian threats (It was later retaken by Israel in June 1967). On July 1 1994 Israel’s Yitzhak Rabin handed over Jericho to Yasser Arafat, an event shepherded and promoted by former President Bill Clinton. Today Sharon’s unilateral retreat has been euphemistically called a “disengagement.” But even in Hebrew, a retreat is still a retreat.

Frozen snapshots

This past week Israeli TV has broadcasted non-stop live and on-site, covering all aspects of the evacuation. Israelis have been bombarded with a marathon of sound bites and “eye bites” – Jews removing other Jews from their homes, farms and synagogues. The pictures, especially footage of bulldozed homes, have broken the hearts of many Israelis, while others have responded to the tragic evacuations with cold sneers and derision. While some Israeli hearts are responding to this tragedy with tenderness, other hearts are hardening and refuse to hear their brother’s cry rising up out of Gaza’s soil.

Some modern Israelis find it embarrassing and difficult to relate to the sufferings, exiles and pogroms that have characterized Jewish history among the nations. They don’t want to think of their people as having been victimized, and so they avert their eyes and their hearts when forced to consider such issues. It may be shocking for some to discover that certain Israelis cannot or will not see the parallels between the suffering of Gaza’s Jews and the suffering of the Jewish people in Europe and the Arab world. Nevertheless it is heartening to know that many other Jews are finding tears on their cheeks and softening occurring in their hearts. Please pray that God will have His way with many Israeli hearts, tenderizing them and causing them to seek for Messiah Yeshua’s face amidst the pain.

Here are some fleeting descriptions of scenes that flashed across Israeli TV screens this week.

Jewish children in Gaza

A small tot steps outside his house, unaware that his parents are about to be removed, and shyly hands out tiny cookies to the soldiers waiting to enter. A three-year old riding out of his home on the broad shoulders of an IDF officer asks with a big smile, “Are we going out for a fun ride?” Another three-year old girl runs over to an IDF commander (who has just explained to her parents that they are about to be evacuated) and gives him a big kiss and an even bigger smile. A small class of eight-year old boys chants Psalm 130 as soldiers wait to evacuate them from their schoolroom (“Out of the depths I cry to You, O Lord! Hear my voice!”)

Grown men crying in Gaza

As the army and police announce to Morag resident Yuval Unterman that he need to evacuate his home, he quietly rips his shirt (a sign of Jewish religious mourning) and stands wordless in front of the soldiers. As the shammash (synagogue attendant) opens the Netzarim synagogue ark where the Torah scrolls are housed (in order to remove them and evacuate them as well), he staggers and buries his face in his hands, shaking with sobs. Tekoa Rabbi Menahem Fruman, known for his heart-to-heart dialogue with neighbouring Arab communities near Bethlehem, tenderly removes a Torah scroll from the Neve Dekalim synagogue, his long wispy white beard wrapped around the scroll, crying. He walks slowly out of the synagogue, his face creased with agonized tears. A Holocaust survivor, dressed in his original prison camp uniform, kisses soldiers who have come to evacuate him, and leaves his home weeping.

Soldiers showing incredible restraint and kindness in Gaza

One of Israel’s most respected and decorated soldiers, Colonel Erez Tzukerman, commander of the famed Golani Brigade, quietly listens as a Gaza resident (a former soldier under his command) weeps and shakes at the fact that his commander and brother-in-arms is evacuating him from his own home. Erez nods his head in understanding, does not react or defend himself as he is yelled at, and then embraces the soldier as they cry together.

A 25-year old commander quietly listens to the Fitusi family explain all the terrorism they have endured, read aloud a letter that the six-year old daughter has written to be read to the soldiers, and then slowly walks out the door to prepare for the family’s evacuation. A five-year old boy comes over to him. The commander crouches to talk with him, kisses him on the head and ask quietly, “Do you hate me?”

IDF Southern Command General Dan Harel and Southern District Police Chief Commander Uri Bar-Lev openly weep in different Gaza synagogues as their own forces get ready to evacuate the buildings of praying Jews. Soldiers carrying a “hilltop youth” out of a yeshiva in Homesh, Northern Samaria lay him down gently on the ground and then hug him. He gets up and runs over to the Torah scroll being evacuated and kisses it, weeping. A young woman soldier who has just evacuated a family from their home goes behind a bus (where she can be alone) and begins to groan and wail deeply over what she has just seen.

One soldier told me that he wandered around one of the abandoned towns after the evacuation and saw over a hundred hungry abandoned dogs and cats; empty houses ghost-like in their stillness, with chocolate milk still on kitchen counters, freshly made bread barely taken out of open ovens, food still on the tables, half-empty fridges – as if the Rapture had just taken place.

The lives of those evacuated have been severely shaken. Many have left homes that up to four generations have lived in. For many, their communities were all that they have ever experienced. They are now for the most part living in temporary housing or crowded into hotel rooms, awaiting the outcome of slow government bureaucratic processes.

Pray that God will use the pain to point this people’s hearts to Himself. Pray for their resettlement to the east of the Gaza Strip, and for the daunting physical needs involved. Pray for the soldiers who have taken the brunt of evacuating Gaza’s Jews. Pray that God will speak to them in their hearts and use the residual pain to open their hearts to him, to ask questions that only He can and will answer.

A pre-bar mitzvah prophecy

Back to the Israeli television broadcasts this week: In the living room of one of the families about to be evacuated, the father asked his oldest son if he had anything he would like to tell the commander evacuating him. The boy quietly opened his Bible to Amos 9:13-15 and chanted in sing-song Hebrew the ancient words of the prophecy. As we watched in our own living room, tears streamed down our cheeks. Hear the words of the prophet:

“Behold, the days are coming, declares YHVH, that the plowman will overtake the one who is reaping, and he who treads out the grapes will overtake the one who is sowing seed. And the mountains will drip sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt. And I will bring back My people Israel from captivity, and they shall rebuild the destroyed cities and inhabit them. And they will plant vineyards and drink the wine, and will eat the fruit of those vineyards. And I will plant (Israel) upon their own land and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given to them, says YHVH, your God”.

This pre-bar mitzvah boy prophesied a mouthful. God is in the process of bringing His people Israel back to their promised land of Israel. Over the past 150 years the Jewish people have been rebuilding destroyed cities and have even planted new towns in the pristine desert sands (as in the case of Gaza’s communities). As this river of restoration flows (the Hebrew word for restoration is tikkun), as the process expands, more Jews return, more destroyed towns are rebuilt, and the Jewish people once again finds itself at home in its own land.

Bumps in the ‘restoration road’

But there are bumps in the restoration road. This happens in every struggle and in every process of taking back from the enemy what had been stolen. Opposition and attack sometimes briefly slow down the process. The evacuation of Gaza and four villages in Northern Samaria is one such bump in the road. This is a setback and a cause for grief and mourning. The fact that Jews have been used to inflict this on other Jews is also a tragic surprise.

But the evacuation of Gaza is not the reversal of the process of restoration. It is a grievous road bump on the way. As Michael Freund said recently. “This is hardly the first setback we have suffered on our long and sometimes torturous return to Zion, and it is almost certainly not the last” (“Jewish Gaza will be rebuilt”, Jerusalem Post, Wed. August 17, 2005, p.14).

The Jewish people will never again be decisively exiled from their land, as one or two embittered and disgruntled Messianic preachers have been arguing for. Though there is definitely a sifting and a purification coming for the nation of Israel, it will not entail the full exile of Israel nor the full evacuation of Jerusalem (see Zech.14:2b). The return of the Jewish dry bones in Ezekiel 37 is described by God Himself as occurring in unbelief. But God is not caught off guard by this spiritual fact. Indeed, He is the One who is causing the people of Israel to return to the borders of the promised land – including to the Gaza Strip.

It is important to remember that the process of restoration cannot be smoothly charted as if it were part of some American engineering manual, even a Messianic Jewish engineering manual! The process of restoration is not easily condensed into an efficient and scientific linear equation, a four-color flow chart or an intricate time-line. Such a computerized approach to the restoration process is probably more Hellenistic than Jewish, more fatalistic than prophetic, more mechanistic than mystical.

God is a multi-tasker

The truth is that God is capable of doing more than one thing at a time and, in fact, God works in precisely such a multi-faceted way. He has determined to bring His people back to the land of Israel even in unbelief, to establish them in their land even in unbelief, and to cause them to grow into an amazing and world-perplexing people even in unbelief.

All that is lacking for Israel is the breath, the Ruach, the Spirit of God. When YHVH pours out His Ruach of grace and supplications (Zechariah 12:10), we the people of Israel will mourn, we will repent, we will embrace our Messiah Yeshua, we will come alive as a mighty army (Ezekiel 37:10) and we will move under God’s feet as His divine threshing sledge bringing judgment and blessing to the nations (Isaiah 41:15; the Hebrew word for this sledge is morag, one of the names of the evacuated Gaza communities)

God’s process of restoration is cyclical – He brings His people back to the same land from which they were originally exiled and evacuated. He is moving simultaneously to establish physical restoration and spiritual restoration in the bodies and spirits of the same Jewish people who once rebelled against Moses’ authority and David’s dynasty. God’s river of restoration continues to flow over the Jewish people and into their hearts, even though there are occasional eddies, side pools and backwaters. And God will use the pain and the agony created by this evacuation to open Jewish hearts to His own heart, and to bring Israeli hearts into a right relationship with His own heart.

The exile and public agony of Gaza’s Jews has sadly occurred, but this momentary light affliction has not stopped the process of Jewish restoration to and in the land of Israel. It has not reversed the flow of the river of restoration. Indeed, it has opened the door to one of the last days’ most significant prophecies regarding the restoration of Israel and the judgment of the nations.

Three Big Prophetic Events

Two momentous prophetic events have occurred in the last 25 years.

According to Bob Jones, a prophetic brother, World War Three began on October 6 1981 with the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar al-Sadat by Islamic jihadi forces (led by Ayman Zawahiri, now Osama Bin Laden’s second-in-command). This rise of an armed and fanatic army of Islamic world jihad indicates that world jihad will figure prominently in the coming battles of WWIII.

On September 11 2001 another prophetic brother James Goll was told by the Lord to turn on his TV immediately. As he watched planes crash into the World Trade Center, God told him that “the time of the hunters” had begun. This term refers to Jeremiah 16:16-18, a prophecy of a worldwide season of anti-Semitic persecution which will purify the Jewish nation as well as fully bring them back to their ancestral homeland of Israel. This prophetic word re-emphasizes that growing world-wide anti-Jewish persecution will now be linked to anti-Israel strategies and Islamic jihadi terrorism.

The third event, the time of dividing up the land of Israel, is kicking into high gear in front of our eyes, and it is the evacuation of Gaza which has proved to be the alarm bell. A little bit of background is necessary here.

The Arab and Islamic world has been actively trying to wipe out the Jewish State of Israel since the late 1940’s. The PLO has made the destruction of Israel its organizational strategy since its inception in 1964, whether by direct armed attack or by ‘the plan of stages’ – whittling off pieces of Israel through diplomacy, until direct military attack can be decisive. The nations of the world, and in particular the USA, have also been advocating a political process which would divide up the biblical land of Israel. The organization known as the Quartet (composed of the USA, the European Union, the UN and Russia; see www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2003/20062.htm) has been pushing since 2003 for what it has euphemistically labeled “a performance-based and goal-driven roadmap, with clear phases, timelines, target dates, and benchmarks aiming at … a permanent two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict”.

Since unimpeded access to Islamic oil is essential for Western economies, and since oil access is also connected with progress on dividing the land of Israel, it has become a clear policy goal of oil multinationals, Saudi Arabia, and allies in the US State Department and C.I.A., to push for strategies to make this dream a reality. Two books which throw light on these strategies are: “The Secret War Against The Jews: How Western Intelligence Betrayed the Jewish People" by John Loftus and Mark Aarons (www.john-loftus.com) and “Sleeping With the Devil: How Washington Sold Our Soul for Saudi Crude” by former C.I.A. Middle East case officer Robert Baer. Loftus and Baer are commentators for the FOX Channel.

It is to be assumed that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has already run into these international and strategic hardball pressures. There is place for much compassion here. What would you do if you were Israel’s PM, you did not believe the Scriptures and you needed to simultaneously fend off US pressure, terrorist attacks and impending legal action against yourself (possibly) and your own children (certainly) for illegal campaign funding?

It seems that Sharon hoped that he could gain world sympathy by a unilateral disengagement while simultaneously freezing world pressure against further withdrawals. But US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice recently popped that balloon on August 18 2005 in a NY Times article with Joel Brinkley and Steven R. Weisman. She “offered sympathy for the Israeli settlers who are being removed from their homes in Gaza but also made it clear that she expected Israel and the Palestinians to take further steps in short order toward the creation of a Palestinian state. ‘Everyone empathizes with what the Israelis are facing,’ Ms. Rice said in an interview. But she added, ‘It cannot be Gaza only.’”

In a recent TV interview here in Israel, former Consul General of Israel in New York Alon Pinkas stated that, with the evacuation from Gaza, “the US has seen the victory of its 38 year old policy”. American Rice and Israeli Pinkas dovetail in agreeing that the evacuation of Gaza was a long standing US policy goal, and that the continuing division of the biblical land of Israel is an ongoing US strategic goal.

So the evacuation from Gaza is not taking place in a vacuum. At this point, with the exile of the Jewish remnant from the Gaza Strip and from parts of Northern Samaria, the world has now entered into the period which can be called “the time of the dividing up the land of Israel.” The first fruits have been seen globally on television this past week. It is unfortunate that the US is one of the prime movers in this dividing process.

This season will involve intensified world focus on and preoccupation with forcing Israel to retreat from other portions of the biblical heartland. It will involve political, economic and military pressure. Two decades ago an internationally respected prophetic brother prophesied that the USA would face another oil embargo when a man named Abdullah would become King over Saudi Arabia. Abdullah acceded to the Saudi throne on August 3 2005. The economic pressures against Israel will also include oil embargoes against the USA and other countries – Islamic oil weapons crafted to weaken connections between those countries and the state of Israel.

We have been warning about the immediacy of this biblical scenario for nearly 12 years. What is sobering is that in the first round of this battle, Israel has been pressured into evacuating portions of its own lands..

What will eventually develop according to the Scriptures:

There will be concerted effort on the part of enemy Arab nations to occupy all of the land of Israel and to destroy the Jewish state. The enemy will be characterized by murderous spite, derision and hate-filled joy (Ezekiel 36).

All of the nations mentioned in this future pan-Arab attack described in Psalm 83 are presently Islamic. Look for a jihadi Islamic context in this future war against the Jewish state.

Based on Ezek.38-39 this coming jihadi invasion of Israel will be decisively defeated.

The nations of the world will continue to attempt to divide the land of Israel and will finally use military force to achieve this goal. This will result in severe judgment on those nations and the return of Messiah Yeshua (Joel 3:1-3).

In pursuit of the above strategy the nations will invade Israel and divide Jerusalem, expelling or evacuating Jews from East Jerusalem while allowing them to remain in West Jerusalem. This evacuation will directly catalyze the return of Messiah Yeshua (Zech.14:12-3).

In light of these biblical scenarios, we encourage you to keep God’s strategies and prophetic plans close to your heart. We encourage you to pray for your country – that it would bless and protect Israel and the Jewish people, and not turn against them. We encourage you to intercede for Israel’s protection and salvation. We encourage you to reach out to Jewish people around you and to share the good news of their Messiah Yeshua’s life, atoning death and amazing resurrection with your Jewish friends and acquaintances. We encourage you to prepare for the coming wave of anti-Jewish persecution, terror and future holocaust. How will you be able to save Jewish lives and protect them as they return to their promised land?

Thanks for reading these words and for chewing on them. We bless you and thank you for your friendship, prayers and support. They mean a lot to us!

In Yeshua, Israel’s Messiah and the Light of the world!

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