Some bright spark (okay, got it now, it was a former Dutch cabinet minister, not just your garden-variety bright spark) last week suggested a unique solution
to bring about peace in the Middle East.
Ready? Okay, here it is: Force Israel’s entire population to move to the United States.
Ready? Okay, here it is: Force Israel’s entire population to move to the United States.
Leave aside all the other current mid-east hotspots, the “Arab
Spring” that turned out to be an Islamic Spring, ISIS, U.S. failure to change
hearts and minds on the ground in Iraq and so on, and let’s suppose Herman
Heinsbroek’s idea has a hope in Hades of actually bringing about lasting peace
in Palestine.
Tell me: How do you go about “forcing” a nuclear, militarily well-defended fellow democracy to do anything?
Mr. Heinsbroek is not even demonstrably anti-Israel in his
politics. I think he genuinely believes such a solution would be best for
everyone.
But those of us who study Bible prophecy will have
difficulty seeing how such a thing could happen. It seems unlikely to me, not
just because I can’t see such a proposal gaining widespread support in Israel
or the U.S., and not just because Jew-hatred is a globe- and millennia-spanning
force that will never burn itself out until the last Jew is dead, but because Bible
prophecy locates the descendants of Israel’s original twelve tribes on the same
patch of earth near the Dead Sea that they currently occupy.
I suppose it’s faintly possible that the Lord’s return might
be centuries away rather than days, weeks or decades, in which case perhaps there
could be a temporary mass exodus followed by yet another miraculous return to
the Promised Land of the nation once referred to as “God’s people”.
I just really, really doubt it.
The World’s Biggest Problem
Interestingly, despite all turmoil that currently exists
between Arab nations, Heinsbroek correctly identifies opposition to Israel’s
existence as the biggest problem the civilized world needs to address. He’s not
wrong, but it seems unlikely to me that the U.S., United Nations or any other
body representing one or more foreign interests can ever broker the sort of
peace arrangement the world is seeking, regardless of its terms or duration.
Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei agrees with Mr. Heinsbroek, at least so far as the Islamic world is concerned. He called Israel a “cancerous tumor” and insisted, “Many of the Islamic world’s problems come from the existence of the sham Zionist regime”. Unpromising, if peace is the goal.
No, for Israel, things are going to get worse before they get better.
The Prophetic View
Jeremiah prophesied about a coming invasion of Israel. The
one he saw coming out of the north took place a few thousand years ago, and
this is what it looked like:
“For I heard a cry as of a woman in labor, anguish as of one giving birth to her first child, the cry of the daughter of Zion gasping for breath, stretching out her hands, ‘Woe is me! I am fainting before murderers.’ ”
Today, the enemy is every bit as implacable and its intent is not
merely to acquire territory or dispossess a nation. And as in Jeremiah’s day,
no cozying up to the aggressors will produce the desired result:
“And you, O desolate one, what do you mean that you dress in scarlet, that you adorn yourself with ornaments of gold, that you enlarge your eyes with paint? In vain you beautify yourself. Your lovers despise you; they seek your life.”
Jews have gotten by living in foreign territory for thousands of years with a combination of a good instinct about when to duck their heads,
a propensity for working their way into positions of influence and most
importantly, I suspect, the occasional and providential intervention of Heaven
into world affairs. But one day soon their suitors and enablers will seek their lives just as avidly as those of Jeremiah’s time. Mr. Heinsbroek’s proposal, I believe, is only one in a coming string of proposals that will all meet with rejection from Israel until, ultimately, mounting frustration, racism, religious hatred, realpolitik, cowardice, impotence, allegiances, need for oil or some other motive will drive every government on earth to line itself up against Jerusalem.
Probably a lot of people, yours included, have had that idea, why not give them Rhode Island, or the Crimea in Russia? It just goes to show that territory will always be important to nations since not one would voluntarily cease any territory. A friend of mine once said that he thought Israel's primary role in history currently is to act as the caretaker of the old testament. Who else would otherwise? It is dreadful though that the human tendency for scapegoating again rears its ugly head in Germany and Europe in the form of anti-Semitism.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, here is my vote: I think there will always be nations that will come to the defense of Israel
Our own Prime Minister has stepped up to the plate for Israel more than once. But I can assure you, it cost him votes and may lose him the next election. His stand is not popular in Canada.
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