Welcome to the Bible in the News.

The world has two sets of values, one for Israel and one for everyone else. This was made very clear in the British press by Actress Maureen Lipman who has publically stated she is dropping her support for the Labour party. In an opinion article in Standpoint Magazine entitled “Labour has Lost Me”, she stated:

Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse. Just when the anti-Semitism in France, Denmark, Norway, Hungary is mounting savagely, just when our cemeteries and synagogues and shops are once again under threat. Just when the virulence against a country defending itself, against 4,000 rockets and 32 tunnels inside its borders, as it has every right to do under the Geneva Convention, had been swept aside by the real pestilence of IS, in steps Mr Miliband to demand that the government recognise the state of Palestine alongside the state of Israel.

Lipman went on to state what the makeup of a future Arab state would look like, and pointed out the hypocrisy in the West’s position toward Israel:

Any future Palestinian state will be entirely free of Jews, of course. Yet the Jewish state is labelled "apartheid" with 1.7 million Arabs in residence and represented in parliament.

She also stated:

(1) It is a historical fact that the Arab states refused such  an offer in 1937, 1948, 2000 and 2008. They have yet to accept Israel's right to exist and their constitutions and broadcasts to this day extol its destruction.

(2) How can you recognise a state until its borders are decided?

(3) If you recognise a state you can officially arm that state. Already billions of pounds have been allotted to rebuild Gaza. Ha! Rebuild the tunnels and reequip the arsenal. Oh, how the propaganda has worked on these clever, concerned people again and again and again. If Hamas and Fatah cared one iota for the Palestinians, might they not have built schools and hospitals and streets for their people the first time the billions poured in and were converted into weaponry and hotel suites in Paris while citizens were used as human shields?

Her criticism of Mr. Miliband was very clear, but does make a valid point:

I'm an actress, Ed, and I am often commended for my timing. Frankly, my dear, yours sucks. The world is exploding around us. Isis is beheading our civilians while raping and pillaging across Syria and Iraq. Presidents Putin and Assad are playing such heavy-handed games that we don't know which rebel group to support. Hong Kong may be about to see a replay of Tiananmen. Islamist terrorism in every spot on the globe — and if one Jew had been responsible for any of those bombings, there would, I am afraid to say, have been another Kristallnacht. At this point in our history you choose to back these footling backbenchers in this ludicrous piece of propaganda?

The stinging criticism has a great a message that is worthy of consideration:

And tell me this, Mr Miliband, sir, where are the pictures of the civilian dead from the allied bombings over Iraq? On which front pages can I see them? The daily count of dead and maimed babies? The howling mothers and screaming old women we saw every day, five times a day, from Gaza? May I remind you that no one is tunneling into Dover or sending rockets into Coventry, yet we seem to have every right to bomb the living daylights out of Iraq. Again. Conclusion: one law for the Israelis, another law for the rest of the world. Plus ça change. (Translation: the more things change, the more they stay the same).

It is somewhat shocking that an actress has to be the one to point out the absolute hypocrisy of the West’s current position.

Her statement is interesting, “no one is tunneling into Dover or sending rockets into Coventry.”  Not at the moment, no.... but what if an Islamist gunman was to shoot a British Veteran soldier and then invade the British parliament?  That is what has happened in Canada this week. 

Islamist Attack in Canada

Reserve corporal Nathan Cirillo, recently returned from Afghanistan, was participating in the ceremonial guard at the National War Memorial in Ottawa, (Canada’s capital city), last Wednesday when a gunman shot him in the back before charging into the Canadian Parliament buildings where he was eventually shot and killed. Cirillo was shot by Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, a Canadian of Libyan decent who was a Catholic who converted to Islam in 2004.  The RCMP described Bibeau in a video he recorded prior to the attack:

“He was quite deliberate, he was quite lucid and he was quite purposeful in articulating the basis for his actions. They were in respect, broadly, to Canada's foreign policy and in respect of his religious beliefs.”

This attack came only two days after Canadian Forces Officer Patrice Vincent was killed while being run down by another radicalized Islamist, Martin Couture-Rouleau, who converted to Islam in 2013 and wanted to leave Canada and join ISIS.

Canada's Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, said both of these attacks were a

 "A grim reminder that Canada is not immune to the types of terrorist attacks we have seen elsewhere around the world.”

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said in a message to the country Wednesday evening:

“Let the be no misunderstanding. We will not be intimidated.”

He went on to reconfirm Canada's commitment:

“To work with our allies around the world and fight against the terrorist organizations who brutalize those in other countries with the hope of bringing their savagery to our shores. They will have no safe haven."

Harper classified both of the week's attacks as terrorism in his address to the House of Commons on October 23.

The whole nation watch as the funeral for Nathan Cirillo was held, lining bridges and highways as the hearse passed on its journey from Ottawa to Hamilton. Vincent’s funeral is to be held on Saturday.

The events of the last week have brought the “war on terror” inside the Canadian Parliament, quite literally. This serves to remind Canadians and the other "young lion" nations of Israel’s precarious position in the Middle East, being surrounded by extremist Islamic states and being threatened by Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran and ISIS.

So while British politicians are throwing their hat in the ring with Islamist extremists like Hamas who run the Gaza strip, Canada is under attack from rogue elements radicalized by the same ideology. How long will it be before the West wakes up?

Israel Sounds the Trumpet

Netanyahu has been begging the world to wake up, and smell the Iranian coffee. ISIS is a huge threat in the Middle East, but Iran is a greater one, both motivated by the same radical Islam as Hamas and Hezbollah. Consider Netanyahu’s comments to the UN this last September, as reported by the Wall Street Journal:

“Iran’s nuclear weapons capability must be fully dismantled,” Mr. Netanyahu said. “To defeat ISIS and leave Iran as a threshold nuclear power is to win the battle and lose the war.” “When it comes to their ultimate goals Hamas is ISIS and ISIS is Hamas,” Mr. Netanyahu said.

This goes back to his statements from 2012 when Netanyahu addressed Obama:

 …I think that, as you said, when Americans look around the Middle East today, they see one reliable, stable, faithful ally of the United States, and that’s the democracy of Israel.

Americans know that Israel and the United States share common values, that we defend common interests, that we face common enemies.  Iran’s leaders know that, too.  For them, you’re the Great Satan, we’re the Little Satan.  For them, we are you and you’re us.  And you know something, Mr. President — at least on this last point, I think they’re right.  We are you, and you are us.  We’re together.  So if there’s one thing that stands out clearly in the Middle East today, it’s that Israel and America stand together.

Yet constantly today, Israel is being forced to stand alone, abandoned by allies such as Britain with the recent vote to recognize a Palestinian State. America’s role in frustrating Israel’s attempts to defend itself are also seen.    

Some European states, not surprisingly, are going further. Sweden voted to recognize Palestine as an official state on Thursday of this week.

How are we to understand these events? We must turn to the scriptures to see the picture painted by the divinely inspired prophets.  

The Role of the Merchants of Tarshish and the Young Lions

Bringing the Jews back to the land

The scriptures paint a clear picture of how things line up in the time of the end, (which is rapidly approaching us). The book of Isaiah points a picture of Gentile nations assisting in the return of the Jews to the land of Israel:

“Thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles, and set up my standard to the people: and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders. And kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers: they shall bow down to thee with their face toward the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet; and thou shalt know that I am the LORD: for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me.” (Isaiah 49:22–23)

It is later that Isaiah identifies these Gentile nations with the Tarshish forces who would bring the Jews back to the land and begin the process of rebuilding:

“Surely the isles shall wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish first, to bring thy sons from far, their silver and their gold with them, unto the name of the LORD thy God, and to the Holy One of Israel, because he hath glorified thee. And the sons of strangers shall build up thy walls, and their kings shall minister unto thee: for in my wrath I smote thee, but in my favour have I had mercy on thee.” (Isaiah 60:9–10)

The mercantile “Tarshish” and “young lion” powers, identified with Britain (see the Bible Magazine Volume 26 #1 (http://www.biblemagazine.com/images/pdficonsmall.gif) and Volume 26 #4 (http://www.biblemagazine.com/magazine/vol-26/v26i4mag.pdf) both downloadable from the Bible Magazine Site). It is historically established fact that the British, New Zealand and Australian forces pushed the Ottoman Turks out of Palestine to make way for the Jewish state that formed their since. Hence the words of Ezekiel 38 describing the nation of Israel in the last days:

“After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land that is brought back from the sword, and is gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.” (Ezekiel 38:8)

 Standing with Israel in the Time of the End

The powers of Britain, the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and others are to be found in opposition to the nations who come against Israel, and will have formed an alliance with Sheba and Dedan (the area of modern Saudi Arabia and Yemen):

“Sheba, and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish, with all the young lions thereof, shall say unto thee, Art thou come to take a spoil? hast thou gathered thy company to take a prey? to carry away silver and gold, to take away cattle and goods, to take a great spoil?” (Ezekiel 38:13)

Here the Tarshish powers stand in opposition to the Gogian Confederacy that comes from the uttermost parts of the north and is comprised of nations spanning from France across Europe to Russia.

The book of Daniel paints a picture of a Northern and a Southern Confederacy struggling for control of the holy land:

“And at the time of the end shall the king of the south push at him: and the king of the north shall come against him like a whirlwind, with chariots, and with horsemen, and with many ships; and he shall enter into the countries, and shall overflow and pass over. He shall enter also into the glorious land, and many countries shall be overthrown: but these shall escape out of his hand, even Edom, and Moab, and the chief of the children of Ammon.” (Daniel 11:40–41)

The Southern Confederacy create a defensive line that incorporates modern day Jordan, but they are unable to rescue Israel from the hands of the Northern invader, that job will be reserved for divine intervention.

In the kingdom age it will be the Kings of Tarshish that bow the knee to the Messiah as he establishes rule in Jerusalem:

“The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents: the kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts. Yea, all kings shall fall down before him: all nations shall serve him.” (Psalm 72:10–11)

The Confidence of Bible Believers in ages past:

Bible students reading these scriptures were confident that God intended Britain and the young lions to perform at task

T

John Thomas writing in 1848.

here is, then, a partial and primary restoration of Jews before the manifestation, which is to serve as the nucleus, or basis, of future operations in the restoration of the rest of the tribes after he has appeared in the kingdom. The pre-adventual colonization of Palestine will be on purely political principles; and the Jewish colonists will return in unbelief of the Messiahship of Jesus, and of the truth as it is in him. They will emigrate thither as agriculturists and traders, in the hope of ultimately establishing their commonwealth, but more immediately of getting rich in silver and gold by commerce with India, and in cattle and goods by their industry at home under the efficient protection of the British power. (John Thomas, Elpis Israel, 1848)

Reading the scriptures, John Thomas was confident that Britain would be the tool God would use to bring about his plan. He continued:

I know not whether the men, who at present contrive the foreign policy of Britain, entertain the idea of assuming the sovereignty of the Holy Land, and of promoting its colonization by the Jews; their present intentions, however, are of no importance one way or the other, because they will be compelled, by events soon to happen, to do what, under existing circumstances, heaven and earth combined could not move them to attempt.… The finger of God has indicated a course to be pursued by Britain which cannot be evaded, and which her counsellors will not only be willing, but eager, to adopt when the crisis comes upon them.

The decree has long since gone forth which calls upon the Lion of Tarshish to protect the Jews. Upwards of a thousand years before the British were a nation, the prophet addresses them as the power which at “evening-tide” should interest themselves in behalf of Israel. (John Thomas, Elpis Israel, 1848)

What is remarkable about Thomas’ prediction is that it happened some 70 years after he wrote it when General Allenby led the British coalition into Jerusalem in 1917. However, Britain’s interests were its own, as Thomas also predicted:

As I have said elsewhere, the Lion-power will not interest itself in behalf of the subjects of God’s kingdom, from pure generosity, piety towards God, or love of Israel; but upon the principles which actuate all the governments of the world—upon those, namely, of the lust of dominion, self-preservation, and self-aggrandizement.

Britain interested itself in the plight of the Jews as long as it pleased itself. Toward the end of the Second World War, Jewish-homeland supporting prime minister Winston Churchill was ejected from office and replaced by Clement Attlee with the anti-Semitic Earnest Bevin as the Foreign Secretary. At the time it seemed as though the Jewish plight had suffered a supreme setback, but in the providence of God is provided the impetus for Israel to stand up as a nation by itself, throwing off the cloak of English colonization. Had Churchill remained in office things might have been very different. He did return, but by then the independent State of Israel had been born, choosing the name demanded by the prophet Ezekiel when he described the invasion of the land in the latter days:

“So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.” (Ezekiel 39:7)

The Finger of God Today

Today we see a different picture. America is semi-hostile to Israel and has pulled out of the Middle East, not wanting to put “boots on the ground” according to President Obama. The result of this, has been a reluctant cooperation, boarding on an alliance (albeit unspoken) between Saudi Arabia and Israel against the Iranian threat.

However, whatever advances in the divine scheme are moved ahead during Britain and America’s stubborn resistance against the course God has indicated they will take in the time of the end, the Angels are at work. Consider the statement of the Angel Gabriel who was working behind the scenes in Daniel’s day:

“But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me one and twenty days: but, lo, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me; and I remained there with the kings of Persia.” (Daniel 10:13)

So the angels have their work cut out for them in directing world events, and ruling in the kingdom of men, sometimes with opposition from those they are directing behind the scenes. 

The Bible predicts “boots on the ground” in the time of the end and physical presence of Britain, America and the other young lions at the time of the end. Interestingly, the Washington Times reported of  Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina:

“
There is no way I can see to fix the problem in Iraq and Syria without American ground troops,” he said on CNN. “You need boots on the ground, and these are human beings with hopes and dreams.”

Mr. Graham said it will take more than the 4,000 troops to complete the mission of defeating the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL. He also said it will take too long to make progress against the terrorist group if American troops are not involved on the ground, and that the group will only get stronger during that time.

“The job of the commander in chief is the protect the country,” he said. “I think most Americans understand that if we don’t defeat ISIL [The Islamic State], if they survive our best shot, we are not as safe.”

So we see the sting of ISIS and radical Islam reaching into the heart of Canada, we contemplate what will it take to bring the Mother Lion, and the other young lions back into line with the divine objective. It has happened before on 9-11 in America, in Britain via the London bus bombings, for Australia with the Bali bombings in Indonesia.

The West has to realize there is a principle that was laid down long before America became a nation:

“And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.” (Genesis 12:3)

Those who lift up their hand against God’s people to curse them, will be cursed. God will bring about his purpose. What will compel these nations to act? Only God knows, in the mean time we continue to watch the Bible in the News.

This has been Jonathan Bowen joining you.