The now three-week old war between Israel and Hamas has intensified. IDF units have uncovered a series of massive underground tunnels from Gaza into southern Israel. It was through these tunnels that Islamic militants would enter into Israel with the express purposes of killing or kidnapping Israeli soldiers and/or civilians. Over thirty such tunnels have been found and destroyed, making one wonder just how many tunnels there are.
And still the rockets keep flying from Gaza into Israel, many flying deeper into the heart of Israel threatening Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. One rocket actually struck close to Haifa in the north of Israel. Fortunately Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile defense system has destroyed many of those rockets before they reached their intended targets. Because the threat is no longer just upon Sderot and the other Israeli towns that border Gaza, more Israelis are enthusiastic about what the IDF is doing during their incursion into Gaza. According to a recent Israeli poll, Prime Minister Netanyahu's approval rating is at an all-time high, even among those who are part of the opposition parties within Israel. Many Israelis have become impatient with their government not taking decisive action against Hamas. And now that it is doing something, there is applause and support. And the Prime Minister has stated that IDF troops will not leave Gaza until the tunnels are destroyed and the infrastructure within Gaza that support those rocket attacks has been severely crippled.
Western media has flooded Gaza with reporters and photo journalists. We have seen the images of children with shrapnel wounds. We have witnessed the anguish of a mother who has lost her child. We have seen the images of schools destroyed. Of course the reporters are quick to condemn Israel for these atrocities. Just this morning I was reading an article published by the IsraelInternationalNews.com website. "An Italian journalist who until Tuesday was embedded in Gaza has backed the IDF's account of a rocket strike on a school playground in central Gaza's Shati refugee camp on Monday. At least 10 people were killed in the attack - most of them children - and some sources claimed the death toll was as high as 30. Palestinian sources were quick to blame Israel, claiming that an Israeli fighter jet fired missiles directly at the playground and nearby hospital. Israel denied the accusations, saying that Hamas rockets aimed at Israel from the area misfired, and struck both the school and the hospital." That is what the world heard. But, the article continued, "But returning from a stint in Gaza, and safe from what he ominously referred to as potential 'Hamas retaliation,' Italian journalist Gabriele Barbati broke the media silence by tweeting the following message, confirming that Hamas terrorists rushed to cover up evidence of what was indeed errant rocket fire aimed at Israel. ...During the 23 days of Operation Protective Edge a handful of journalists have defied, purposefully or inadvertently, Hamas's restrictions on negative information from Gaza - only to backtrack soon after. Two cases in particular highlighted earlier this week. In one, Wall Street Journal reported Nick Casey tweeted evidence - and veiled criticism - over Hamas's leadership's use of Shifa Hospital in Gaza as a command center, shedding more light on the group's use of human shields. Hamas reacted furiously, and a Hamas-affiliated twitter account blacklisted him as a journalist 'who lies for Israel' - a potentially deadly accusation for anyone in Gaza, let a lone a foreigner. Shortly afterwards, the tweet was promptly removed by Casey." I quote from the concluding paragraph of the article: "The use of human shields by Gazan terrorist groups during the current conflict has been repeatedly documented. Both Hamas and Islamic Jihad have stored and fired rockets from within densely-populated civilian areas, making Israeli attempts to stop them without causing collateral damage near to impossible. To compound the problem, Hamas has openly encouraged civilians to act as human shields, glorifying their actions as heroism. Terrorists have also used hospitals and schools as command centers and military bases. On Tuesday, the United Nations Work and Relief Agency (UNWRA) admitted that it had discovered rockets stored in one of its schools for the third time." You won't hear that report on your nightly news.
One of the websites I view every day is www.jerusalemonline.com. It is a news source from Israel's Channel 2 news rooms. Recently they interviewed Mosab Yossef, better known to use as the Son of Hamas - by the way if you have not read his story, you need to do that - whose father was a pioneer leader in Hamas. During the interview, Yossef said, "Hamas teaches children to shed innocent blood. ... Hamas does not care about Palestinian lives, Israeli lives, or American lives. They do not care about their own lives. They see death as part of their ideology. It is an expression of faith. ... Hamas is looking for conquest and domination. ... Hamas is not looking for a compromise by living beside another country. Hamas mosques taught us that without the shedding of innocent blood in the name of the ideology, we cannot build an Islamic nation. They prepare us from age five. This is the ideology that Hamas feeds us."
Anti-Semitism has exploded around the world. Massive demonstrations in France, Germany, England, and here in the United States. As reported in The Washington Examiner on July 26, "A Facebook page calling for the death of Israeli Jews does not violate the social network's 'community standards,' according to multiple messages sent by Facebook in response to user complaints. The page in question is named 'Death to zionst baby killer Israeli jews. The page, which spells "Zionist" incorrectly, features an image of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a vampire with blood dripping down his chin as he feasts on a child. It was started on July 25." Then yesterday, Facebook removed that page. "A Facebook spokesman confirmed to FoxNews.com Tuesday that the page had been taken down, saying, 'We've removed this page for violating our Community Standards. Although the page was previously reported, it was mistakenly allowed to stay on Facebook. We removed the page as soon as we were made aware of this error. We apologize for the inconvenience.'" Let's see - multiple messages over the course of five days before this offensive page was removed? At first it didn't violate our community standards, and then it did? I wonder how quickly such a page denigrating gays or Muslims or other minorities would have been removed? But it was only Jews - open game for everyone to shoot at these days.
Friends, the news about the Facebook page really alarmed me. Over the years I have read many books detailing those years preceding World War II and particularly the Holocaust. I have seen the images from the attacks upon Jewish businesses and homes during Kristelnacht. I have read those editorials in German papers that encouraged people to lash out at their Jewish neighbors, even to reporting them to authorities. America did nothing in the 1930's as Nazism and anti-Semitism grew across Germany. And those early reports about death camps was viewed as fabrications and distortions. No one rallied to the defense of the Jews, except of hundreds of individuals and families who secretly hid Jews from their persecutors - often becoming persecuted themselves. What will America do today with this rising tide of Anti-Semitism around the globe? Our government, since the declaration by President Truman in 1948 supporting Israel's Independence, has gone on record of supporting Israel - although at times that support has not been as forthcoming as it should have been. (I just finished reading a fascinating book that I highly recommend - Steven Pressfield's newest book, "The Lion's Gate" which is the story of Israel's Six-Day War in 1967. I learned that our government refused to offer any aid to Israel as it prepared for the war they knew was inevitable with Nasser's Egypt and her allies.)
Before leaving the subject of Israel, I want to point you to two powerful articles found at the Middle East Forum website. The first is by Raymond Ibrahim and is titled, "New Islamic Caliphate Declares Jihad on ... Muslims." You can find it at the following web address:
www.medforum.org/4754/new-islamic-caliphate-declares-jihad-on-muslims.
The second article was written by David P. Goldman and is titled, "The One-State Solution Is on Our Doorstep." You can find it at the following web address: www.meforum.org/4753/Israel-one-state-solution. Both these articles are very enlightening.
One final note, a positive one, about Israel. I share an article by Tova Dvorin, published on July 28 on the IsraelInternationalNews.com website. "The Temple Institute, an organization in Jerusalem which works toward the rebuilding of the Third Temple, began a revolutionary campaign on Sunday to literally rebuild the Third Temple - through the power of crowdfunding. Headlined under the title, 'Don't make history. Make the future, Build the Third Temple,' the indiegogo campaign promises that this generation of children is ready to see the center of Jewish worship rebuilt, once and for all. ... Now is the time for one of its most ambitious projects yet: completing architectural plans for the actual construction, fusing ancient texts and modern technology, the campaign's description states, 'While strictly adhering to the religious requirements set forth in Biblical texts, the Third Temple will also be equipped with every modern amenity: full computerization, underground parking, temperature control, elevators, docks for public transportation, wheelchair access, and much more. The Temple Institute has engaged an architect to map out as practically as possible the modern Third Temple's construction." Many of you have visited the Temple Institute with me during our tours to Israel. It has been exciting to see the progress in the completion of the articles for temple worship. In the midst of war, many in Israel are still pointing toward their future. And the Bible does strongly declare that this Third Temple will be rebuilt in Jerusalem. Just another indication that the End will soon be at hand and the trumpet will sound.
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