Israel, Iran, and the Rising Storm
This blog was written on November 7, 2023
In the past two weeks, we have been slapped in the face, reminded of an abiding, irrational hatred lying below the surface of the façade we’ve crafted of an advanced and inclusive culture. I’m talking about antisemitism, the hatred of the Jewish people.
On the morning of October 7, Hamas—a terrorist organization that has taken over the political apparatus of the Palestinian territory of Gaza—staged a massive terrorist attack against Israel. Innocent Jewish citizens of Israel were murdered, tortured, raped, kidnapped, and assaulted by mercinaries of an organization that has written into its mission statement, “the extermination of Israel and all Jewish people.” Where did this kind of hatred come from?
It’s a deeper, more insidious hatred than can be produced by mere political rancor. It transcends some dispute over land. This hatred is ancient and spiritual.
Long before Israel was formally recognized as a nation again in 1948, the hatred of Jews was alive and well. It was showcased most demonstrably, not in the Middle East, but in Western Europe in the twentieth century. Germany’s Third Reich wrestled with the “Jewish problem” and initiated the genocidal Final Solution, responsible for the horrendous murder of 6.5 million Jews in just a few short years. Was this over land? They had none.
The Jewish people have been persecuted by every empire that has arisen in the last three millenia, including Egyptian, Babylonian, Persian, Assyrian, Greco, Ottoman, and even the Holy Roman Empires. The Jewish people have been under assault and almost exterminated more times than any other ethnic group in human history. It defies logic and rationality. The only explanation for such persecution against a people is a hatred that originates in the unseen, spiritual realm.
At the center of this hatred is Iran, an Islamic republic ruled under the iron Koran of its mullahs and its supreme leader, the Ayatolla Khamenei. We are seeing the embodiment of the ancient hatred found in Iran’s cultural zeitgeist from millennia ago. In the Old Testament’s record of Esther, we see a figure arise who manipulates the king of Persia into signing off on the first attempt at a holocaust of the Jewish people in the empire. Haman—described as “the enemy of the Jews” (Esther 3:10)—was filled with rage toward the Jewish people. He wanted to wipe out the hundreds of thousands of them living in the exile of Persia. This same hatred, like a dormant virus, has been resuscitated in modern-day Persia. Iran is considered the largest sponsor of terror in the world and, without a doubt, is behind the support, training, and arming of Hamas in Gaza as well as Hezbollah in Lebanon. Ironically, Iran is also the epicenter of the fastest growing church in the world. Muslims by the thousands are coming to faith in Jesus Christ and, simultaneously, becoming lovers and intercessors for the Jewish people.
The shocking reality is that the ancient hatred of the Jews is not isolated to a faraway nation in the Middle East, but it has now taken residency in our own Western culture, both here in America as well as Europe. Over the past few weeks, we have seen a massive shift from international sympathy to massive protests in major cities like London, Amsterdam, Paris, Madrid, and New York for the Palestinian cause. The chant, “From the river to the sea, Palestine shall be free,” is a call for the extermination of the Jewish people of Israel and the destruction of the nation of Israel.
Politicians in Washington DC are refusing to condemn the brutal and horrific actions of Hamas. Professors on major universities are singling out Jewish students, requiring them to stand in the corner of the classroom in shame. Protests have been allowed on college campuses, sparked by Palestinian groups that are sponsors for Hamas and other jihadi groups. Businesses have had the Star of David spraypainted on their doors and windows, reminiscent of 1930s Germany. The global community of nations are now talking to Israel about a “proportionality of response” and putting pressure on them for a cease-fire. This is the epitome of irrationality.
Now is not the time to be indifferent toward what is happening in Israel because the next stop for this “jihad express” is a terminal stop near you. These are times of urgency and sobriety in which we must wake up and see what is happening to our Western culture as well as the true signs of prophetic fulfillment taking place all around us. For those who see the Bible as the inspired Word of God, we must grapple with the fact Scripture states unequivocally that, at the end of this present age, all eyes globally are going to be focused upon this small and seemingly insignificant piece of land called Israel and, more specifically, Jerusalem. This should arouse us from our sleep since Israel returning en masse to the land has only occurred in this generation since being prophesied thousands of years ago. Rather than be mere observers of these events, we should be motivated by them to be intercessors for Israel, the Jewish people, and those trapped in a culture of hatred in the Middle East. We need to pray for them, support them, and remain silent no more, speaking out for our Jewish friends.
For those who are standing outside the Christian faith, world history is at a tipping point. Events of the day seem spiraling toward what can only be described as an apocalypse. What we are seeing take place around the world may be beyond our control, but there is One who superintends and has promised to return and bring peace. His name is Jesus. The future will increasingly center around Jerusalem and the Jewish people with whom the God of the Bible has established an everlasting covenant. The Bible foretells a time when all nations will surround Jerusalem and the global community will have a controversy with the Jewish people. What will you do when that happens? What will you do to stand against the ancient scourge of antisemitism?
