Palestinians, Islam & Israel

We ought to fear God and not men.

Yasser Arafat

Many believers perhaps need to switch off TV for a few weeks,
open the Scriptures and read. Maybe then will we begin to acknowledge the
gravity of the David and Goliath scenario being re-enacted over the Holy Land.
Zechariah 14:2, the time of Jacobs trouble is exploding into life as God
prepares to deal with 'the world' for her treatment of Israel, and Israel
for forsaking the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

What some (myself included) view as the fulfilment of
end-times prophecy, others, like many religious organisations and Western
churches, view as: Israel the aggressor acting illegally and unlawfully,
refusing to give back what she has taken from the Palestinians -– all
this leading to many misconceptions about the people and conflict taking place
in the land of Israel -– or Palestine.

One must keep in mind that money drives the media, and that
war and oil are global mega-forces commanding the obedience of financial
institutions. So, as can be expected, whilst the world stands against global
terrorism, the double standard is very evident -– apparently killing Jews is
OK, terrorist acts which kill innocent people are alright in Israel, - after
all, they are the aggressors. UN Resolutions 242 and 338 state that Israel
must give back land (won from the true aggressors in 5 wars, over the
past five decades.) 97% of the land has been given back -– and this intifadah
(uprising) is Arafat's response to the 3% of land remaining.

The biggest terrorist organisation in the world, the PLO are
seen through media eyes as freedom fighters -– even 'victims' -– after
making very public statements like "The struggle with the Zionist enemy is not
a struggle about Israel's borders, but about Israel's existence." With
backing from the worlds most powerful religious organisations (as was the
situation in the Second World War), and the Global political powers that be, the
terrorists are getting away with cold blooded murder.

Jerusalem is indeed drawing world attention -– according to
the Prophet, one day all the people of the earth will be gathered together
against Jerusalem, a 'cup of trembling' Zechariah 12.

Confusion still exists as to who the Palestinians are. Bible
teacher Jacob Prasch states "From the time of the Canaanites to the present
day there has never been a Palestinian State. Indeed biblical Palestinians were
Greeks, not Arabs. As a theological term, Palestinian meant Jewish, not Islamic
(eg. E P Sanders classics "Christ and Palestinian Judaism", "Paul and
Palestinian Judaism") . As a geographical term it meant anyone living between
the Jordan and the Mediterranean with no reference to race or religion; Jews,
Arabs, Arminians, Christians, Muslims were all Palestinian if they lived in the
region. The original name of the Jewish Jerusalem Post newspaper was the
Palestinian Post and it was 30,000 Jewish soldiers who fought in the British
Palestinian Legion in world war 2. It was not until 1964 that the name
Palestinian was reinvented to describe Arabs who mainly settled in the British
Mandate illegally, prior to 1948. (Editors highlight)

Yasser Arafat for instance is not a Palestinian but an
Egyptian born in Cairo. Neither the Ottoman Turkish Muslims, the League of
Nations, the British or the United Nations saw a need for a Palestinian State
because as far as they were concerned, a Palestinian State already existed in
Jordan which King Hussein admitted in 1968 and Arafat admitted in 1971. Although
it is a Hashmite country, its population is 70% Palestinian Arab. When Arafat
tried to do to the Jordanians what he is now trying to do to the Israeli's,
the Jordanians massacred 18,000 Palestinians in 12 days in "Black September"
of 1970 as the Kuwaitis would carry out similar pogroms against the Palestinians
in 1990...From May of 1948 until June of 1967 when, in self defence against a
Soviet backed war machine, Israel was forced to invade the West Bank and Gaza,
the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem were all in the hands of Palestinian Arab
Muslims. If the Arab Muslim world really wants a second Palestinian State why
did they not create one when they had nearly twenty years to do so?... Indeed,
the so called Palestinian refugees in Lebanon were forced out of Jordan in Black
September they did not come from Israel as the myth maintains...

The reason of course so many born again Arab Christians
support Israel is because Israel is the only nation in the Middle East where the
lives and rights of Arab Christians are protected."

Issues relating to justice and human rights are invariably
proclaimed by Church leaders who believe they are standing up for righteousness.
"...We must ask, does this include justice for the Christians who are flogged,
hung and beheaded in Saudi Arabia, which funds the constructions of mosques all
over the world but will not allow one Church to be built in Saudi Arabia? Does
it include justice for Berbers of North Afirca, whose Christian forbearers were
murdered and whose nations have been disgracefully occupied by Arab Muslims for
the last 12 centuries with these indigenous people relegated to the status of
third rate human beings? Does it include justice for the 2.1 million Christians
murdered by fundamentalist Muslims in Sudan alone? Does it include justice for
the abducted Christian women forced to undergo ritual clitorectomy in Indonesia?
Denmark has 4% Muslim population but Muslims constitute 40% of people of people
on the dole and are the majority of Denmark's convicted rapists with the
majority of victims Danish. This phenomena of raping infidel women, as the
headlines show, has now arrived in Australia. If Israel did not exist would we
still have sharia in Northern Nigeria with Christians as the victims.

We would also have Chechnya, the Balkans, the Sudan, the
Islamic apartheid of Malaysia, Lockerbie -– Scotland, the Twin Towers in New
York, the bombing of India's Parliament, the assassination of Robert Kennedy,
the Bradford riots, Islamic riots in Australia, and tens of thousands of
barbarians rioting in the streets of London demanding the murder of a British
citizen, Salman Rushdie, for writing a book.

Indeed if there was no such nation as Israel we would still
be facing the same problem, "fundamentalist Islam and its Jihad crusade
against democracy and Judeo-Christian civilisation." There are three times as
many conflicts in today's world involving Islam as there are all of the other
religious people groups put together, and Evangelical Christians are too often
the chief and most hated of their victims.

Two weeks before September 11^th of last year,
Arafat PLA radio station broadcast a call for suicide attacks not only against
Israel and America, but against Britain. His corrupt regime has pilfered the
international aid given to help his own people and when offered a State on fair
and reasonable terms he declined it, instead calling for 1 million martyrs to
die in the Jihad...

After Oslo II Arafat had two years to stop the fundamentalist
Muslims and refused, forcing the Israelis to re-enter the West Bank. The minute
the Muslims got the land back they again used it to attack Israel just as they
did prior to 1967. Arafat knows that King Abdullah of Jordan, Bashir Jemayiel,
and Anwar Sudat were all assassinated for trying to make peace with the Jews in
contradiction to the teaching of the Koran. Mohammed said "the last day will
not come until a tree says to a Muslim there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and
murder him." Islamic Jihad Hamas, Hizbollah and the Al Aqsa Brigade all claim
that once they get a Palestinian State they will simply use it as a base to
continue the Jihad against Israel and the Crusaders (Crusaders is the derogatory
Islamic slang for Christians). The resounding battle cry of Arafat's followers
is "first the Saturday people, then the Sunday people" i.e: first we kill
the Jews, then we kill the Christians...

Can a Maori occupy New Zealand? Can an Apache occupy Arizona?
How then can a Jew occupy Hebron, Jericho, or Bethlehem? I do not question the
right of Pakeha to live peacefully in New Zealand and they do not question the
right of an Arab to live peacefully on the West Bank, but by definition an
indigenous people cannot occupy their ancestral homeland. There has never been a
Palestinian State, but archaeology, history and the Bible prove that there has
been a Jewish one. A Jew can no more occupy Biblical Israel than a Maori can
occupy Rotorua or an Aboriginal can occupy Alice Springs.

At this very moment, within spitting distance of Darwin
Australia, there are 200,000 Christian refugees in East Timor with nearly 25,000
murdered by fundamentalist Muslims in a Jihad. In the Philippines there are
55,000 dead Christians courtesy of the Jihad of Abu Sayef..."

What can we do from the West? We can learn God's Word. We
can pray -– and we can know what to pray if we spend time in God's
Word, meditating on it and believing it. What is the purpose of prophecy?
God never does anything without providing a warning - it certainly keeps Gods
people on their knees, 'watching' and waiting. It motivates by joy and
anticipation, not fear and gloom. It keeps evangelism in focus, with a clear
knowledge that time is indeed short -– we're heading for home, but we're
not there yet!

The line dividing those believers watching for the second
coming of Christ Jesus the Messiah, and those who through acceptance of their
particular denominational teaching, are focused on setting up Christ's Kingdom
here on earth, is becoming much clearer. No elitism either way - we believe that
Jesus died on the cross and paid the price for our sins, by His precious blood.
What we believe of course will determine how we choose to live...Pilgrims
passing through OR Kings and Priests setting up a Kingdom here. What do you
believe....?