The Secret of Israel

 

Israel seems to be a secret to the remainder of the world. That becomes obvious when you listen to the idiotic ideas coming from so many when referring what they believe is Israel. We have read of and heard some claiming that Israel wants to establish a “Greater Israel” by expanding her borders. We have covered this claim before explaining that the term “Greater Israel” simply refers to the times of Kings David and Solomon. They will infer that Israel is supremacist, started the conflict and numerous other ways of saying that Israel is the bully. Actually, the Ottomans started it when they joined with the Austrian-Hungarian Empire and Germany against the Allied Powers during World War I. Just for the record, they lost and the world decided to end these empires which were considered the aggressors, thus the Austrian-Hungarian Empire was divided up and the Balkan nations were born along with the rest of Eastern Europe, Germany found their borders slimmed at the edges and the Ottoman Empire was carved up with the separate parts placed into Mandates with the presumed intention of making them into little democracies with some effort. Another large idea of the age was the reestablishing of originalist nations returning areas to their original rulers such as Finland, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Poland, Hungary, Latvia and Lithuania which dotted the new Eastern Europe. The Ottoman Empire was carved up making the nations making up the MENA nations of the Middle East and North Africa (see map below). One of those Mandates established the ancient homeland of the Jewish People, Israel, and an Arab state of Transjordan (later simply Jordan) which was designated the homeland for the Arab Palestinians. Another pair established was Lebanon and Syria where Lebanon was supposed to have been Christian while Syria was supposed to be Arab Syrians in their historic lands.

 

(MENA)
Middle East and North Africa
Including Turkey and Iran
With North Central Africa

 

Initially, the Arabs residing in all four nations claimed they were Syrians. The French Mandate, which included Syria and Lebanon, claimed to be simply all part of Syria while the British Mandate, which included Israel and Jordan, claimed to be in southern region of Greater Syria. The idea was that they would take all of the area and make their Arab state of Greater Syria. The Arabs believed that all the lands which had been the Ottoman Empire were to remain under Arab and Muslim control. They refused to recognize the Mandates established by the various treaties including the San Remo Conference, the Treaty of Sèvres amongst others. That has been the main problem which has led to the difficulties between Israel and her Arab neighbors which continue into our daily news. Lebanon is no longer a Christian nation, simply a Muslim nation where the Christians are permitted to remain as long as they behave. The Islamic name for such is called a Dhimmi, a form of second-class citizenry. For intents and purposes, and in reality, Hezballah is the current ruling power in Lebanon. That means that Iran has direct control over Lebanon, the Hezballah terrorist military and the Lebanese Army which includes quite an amount of United States military weaponry including Abrams main battle tanks.

 

Back to what it is Israel honestly wants from the rest of the world. This includes the Muslim nations, the United States, the Europeans, the British, the Russians, the Chinese and everybody else. It is actually the thing that the Jewish People have prayed to have for the past two-thousand-plus years. We would like our little plot of land promised to Abraham which extends from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, from the Egyptian Border north to, originally the Litani River (see map below), but we will be just fine with the Blue Line as already inspected and approved by the United Nations after the Israeli withdrawal from Southern Lebanon in 2000. Any people within this region who desire relocating voluntarily, we will give them generous assistance. Those who prefer to remain will need to understand that they will be residing under the laws of the State of Israel. Any terrorist act will result in their being deported and not permitted to return. After this has been settled and we are securely within our border, then please just allow us to tend to our needs and as long as we are left in peace, we will leave the remainder of the world in peace. There will be advantages for the world should this be accomplished. Any medical, technical, agricultural or other discoveries or inventions performed in Israel will be shared with the rest of the world. Israel will be able to make greater strides when we no longer are required to prepare for a war to start at any moment.

 

Twelve Tribes of Israel and the Original Borders for Israel

 

As far as what will be occurring within our borders, that is a simple matter. We will have a large segment of the Jews praying to Hashem while also working to build a better future. We will likely rebuild the Temple making the Third Temple, and hopefully final Temple, a reality and do so with the minimal upset to other religions to the greatest of our ability. Those fearing that this means we will reengage in animal sacrifice, allow us to give a modicum of relief and peace of mind. The first Chief Rabbi of Israel, Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak HaCohen Kook, who some claim believed that animal offerings will not be reinstituted when the Third Temple is rebuilt, thought that only grain and vegetable sacrifices would be reinstituted. His commentary on the Siddur on the sentence at the end of Shemoneh Esrei, “Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant to Hashem as in the days of old and as in the ancient years,” Rav Kook wrote, “In the future, the abundance of knowledge will spread to and penetrate even animals…and the “sacrifices” which will then be from Grain, will be as pleasing to G-d as in days of old (when there were animal offerings).”* This would limit the Third Temple to only vegetarian offerings.

 

Israel will not make demands on other nations and instead will do as we are bid by our Torah, to lead lives worthy and honoring Hashem and then our lives will not want for anything. Judaism has a unique feature not found in the other two Abrahamic faiths in that we do not proselytize nor do we insist that others must follow out religion or even believe in Hashem. We simply request that we be permitted to follow our religion and be left to our own ways within our borders and, in return, we will share any great bounty or discoveries we find with the world. In Judaism we are instructed only to tell those who come and inquire about Judaism and not to press any to convert and even to ask those who request to convert why they would want to do so. There are numerous rules and rituals which are required of those following strict Judaism which is why we question why one would desire to take on these potential burdens in their lives when there is no pressing requirement for them to do so. In Judaism, Hashem loves the Jewish People and also loves all people for we are all His children and thus all receive his love. The Jews, it is often stated, believe they are special as the Chosen People. Well, yes, in a warped way. One need understand that being the Chosen People is defined in two ways, the first is the well-known that Hashem chose the Jews, or at least Abraham, Isaack, and Jacob plus likely Moses. Remember, Hashem also chose Noah and gave him the Noahic Code, the Seven Laws for a civilized society. The other side of being the Chosen People is the Jewish People have chosen to follow the Laws given us at Mount Sinai through Moses and written in the Torah which demand of us performing six-hundred-thirteen Mitzvot. (Here is a list drawn up by Chabad for comparison and a second opinion.) So the Chosen People works in both directions and does not mean the Jews are special other than they have agreed upon the laws and customs they are to observe, for which we get to live an orderly life and no special compensation beyond what every other individual receives from Hashem for living a good and honest life.

 

 

Israel, much like Judaism, desires only to be permitted to live within our borders as described above or as shown in the map above. Nothing would make us happier than to be allowed to tend to our own business within the ancient lands of our forefathers. Yet there are those who insist that the Jews never resided in this region despite the historical evidence to the contrary. Of course, some of those making these statements claim that the history of mankind, or at least the only history that matters, started approximately fourteen-hundred years ago with the revelation of the Quran to Mohammad in Mecca and finishing in Medina. The history of the Jewish People dates back slightly more distant with Kings David and Solomon residing over three-thousand years ago and Abraham almost a thousand years before that. That is a very long time ago, but that was the beginning and was where much of what is the beginnings of the basis of the democratic institutions and the Judeo-Christian ethics upon which much of European and American history is based and on which many other cultures base their beliefs. Israel, under Kings David and Solomon attempted to gain empire, as that was the way of the world three-thousand years past. That ended poorly soon after King Solomon when the kingdoms split into a northern and a southern kingdom and the added lands of empire revolted successfully gaining their independence only to be swallowed by the Assyrians and then the Babylonians. The Northern Kingdom fell to Assyria and then the Southern Kingdom, Judah, fell to the Babylonians. The existence of the Northern Kingdom is somewhat a mystery as they are referred to as the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel though some are claiming to be returning in these modern times of the reestablishing of Israel. The Jews, based on the Kingdom of Judah, once conquered by Babylon were prophesized to have to spend four-hundred-thirty years in exile but when Cyrus the Great and Persia conquered Babylon, he freed the Jews to return and build their Temple anew and were only required to pay a tax to Persia in return. The Jews built their Second Temple and were doing quite nicely and then Alexander the Great and his Greeks arrived. The Jews had only been in Babylon for seventy years and had they lived according to the Torah and the laws of Hashem, then they would have lived happily ever after. The Jews failed at living the good and decent life and that is why they were returned into exile and the Diaspora, but more on that later.

 

The Greeks conquered Judea in 322 BCE and except for a few short spans where foreign rule was thrown off, remained conquered through the Roman Empire, the Caliphate, Crusades, Ottomans and finally the British until May 14, 1948. This is where things get interesting. Prophesy has lost some of its wonder in the modern era, but the reestablishing of Israel should put a little polish and a new shine on ancient prophesy. These prophesies provided the core of the Jewish People’s hopes for over two-thousand years along with the knowledge that Hashem promised that we would be returned to our homelands miraculously and our dispersal and exile would end. The promise gave a date according to Ezekiel who said the Jews were to be punished for 430 years because they had turned away from Hashem. This was to become the Babylonian exile. The Persians under Cyrus the Great defeated the Babylonians, as mentioned above, and freed their Jewish captives about 70 years after Judah lost independence to Babylon. This left 360 years which the Jews would require a second exile to fulfill as one must pay Hashem when one strays. In Leviticus 26:18, Leviticus 26:21, Leviticus 26:24 and Leviticus 26:28 the Torah spells things out quite clearly, should the Jews not fully repent their sins they would be punished increased by a factor of seven. Since most of the Jews freed from Babylon decided to live in the Persian society and adopted pagan ways, which is not exactly repenting, their remaining 360 years were multiplied by seven meaning their time in the Diaspora or under foreign occupation became 2,520 years on the original lunar Jewish calendar which translates to 2,484 years. Count from 536 BCE forward 2,484 years and you arrive at 1948. Further, Isaiah’s prophecy Chapter 66:8 states: “Who has heard of a thing like this? Who has seen things like these? Will a land be brought forth with labor pains in one day? Or will a nation be born at one time? For Zion has come into labor pains as well as given birth to her sons.” Israel was established exactly as Isaiah prophesized in a single day. Who said prophesy was dead, certainly not us.

 

We took a long time and the ingathering prophesized in the story of the Dry Bones. That was the prophesy from Ezekiel 37:1-14 telling of the restoration of the Jewish People using the parable of the Valley of Dry Bones. The prophesy tells of the ingathering of the Jewish People being brought from the four corners and renewed. The prophesy also speaks of taking tribes of Israel (Joseph) and the tribe of Judah and make them one foretelling that the House of Israel will be a united house once more as it is. The verse goes on to say that being observant and true to the Mitzvahs, the Commandments, will be made easy for the people in Israel, something we can attest to as this has been our case as religion has come upon our souls and persons and following the Commandments of Torah have been placed within reach. Of course, not all are finding returning to their former religious ways as easy as one might hope. The rate at which this would come about once the nation was reestablished was made to appear slow as the bones took time to gather, gain sinew, muscle, skin, and eventually the return of their soul, their religious zeal. This means that Israel is still a work in progress but the love of her people will eventually overcome all obstacles.

 

That brings up to this past week. Very early Thursday morning, Iran fired approximately twenty rockets towards Israel aimed at the Golan Heights. The Israelis residing in the region were awakened and told to take shelter which they were kept secured within for a few hours. These rockets largely fell short of their mark and most of the remainder was intercepted by the Iron Dome systems guarding the region. Despite the entire evening and night previous to the launch having been completely peaceful and quiet, the IDF was tipped to the coming attack when hearing Syrian broadcasts claiming the Israeli forces had attacked a series of positions held by Hezballah within Syria. Despite not having left their positions in the Golan, the IDF knew from experience that this was the signal for “retribution” by the Arab forces, actually in this case, the forces were Iranian. There would be an Israeli attack, but it came subsequent to the launching of multiple, at least twenty, rockets at Israel by Iranian Quds Force (videos below) and Israel retaliated and struck a large area and numerous Iranian and Hezballah bases and munition stockpiles (see map below). There will be claims that the Israeli response, wait for it, was “disproportional” to the Iranian attack launched at Israel. Since when has combat become a proportional enterprise? The entire reason for striking back after the Iranian Quds Force attack is to dissuade any future attacks by making the cost too steep. You do not prevent an aggressor from attacking you by trading them blow for blow, you strike them as hard as you feel is necessary, and if they try such again, this was the third Iranian attack in several weeks, then you make the cost spiral even higher. When a bully picks a fight and the targeted youth gains the upper hand, they do not just allow the bully to walk away without further harm, they bloody the nose of the bully and perhaps a few extra punches for good measure making any future attack out of the question. Iran is the bully in the Middle East along with their terror proxies Hamas, Hezballah, Islamic Jihad and their foreign IRGC forces who practice terrorism throughout the globe as the Ayatollahs desire. Hamas is currently, along with Islamic Jihad, making a spectacle on the Gaza border which is supposed to climax over this weekend and on through Monday in celebration of Nakba Day, the day that six Arab armies attacked the newly declared state of Israel and proceeded to fail to destroy all of Israel and had to settle for winning Gaza and areas of Judea and Samaria which Jordan annexed illegally and called the West Bank. These were and are lands which the League of Nations and United Nations, under Article 80 of the U.N. Charter, promised and guaranteed to be an integral part of Israel. They are also hoping that their month plus rioting and general mayhem would prod the United States into postponing the opening of their Jerusalem Embassy. They obviously have not yet understood President Trump and the changes which came with his taking office.

 

 

Locations of Israeli Counter Strikes Against Iranian and Hezballah Targets

 

There will probably also be great amounts of attempted disruption coming from the Palestinian Authority which they will launch from Eastern Jerusalem. This will be an unofficial protest, but there has not been a Nakba day which was not also made into a Day of Rage since the first intifada was launched back in the 1980’s. We are fairly sure that part of the reasoning behind the Iranian rocket attack was also to place pressure on the United States to not relocate their embassy. We can only hope that the response they suffered in response to their rocket launches will be sufficient to deter their future thoughts for such misadventures. We simply want to live within our borders in peace and security and in return will share our discoveries with any in the world finding them advantageous. We do not want a war but as has been proven in the past, we will fight if one is foist upon us. We surrendered land to Egypt for peace and made peace with Jordan. We withdrew from Lebanon and Gaza with hopes for peace and received terrorists waging wars in return. Now much of the world demands we give away land overlooking the heart of the nation to the Palestinian Arabs who are ruled by the PLO, a recognized terrorist organization, and the world is aghast that we do not wish to commit suicide. Next we will have the United Nations demanding from the General Assembly for Israel to answer for these attacks on Syria despite their knowing full well Israel was attacked first. But it does not matter that Israel was attacked first, what matters is the Jews are defending themselves for the first time as an independent nation in over two-thousand years. It will take the world a little getting used to but they had best get used to it faster, please. We will not suffer to be attacked and just sit back and plead that everyone stop being mean to us, we will act like what we are, a proud and independent nations fully capable of fighting to protect ourselves. Strike at us and we will respond, that is the reality. Israel is a nation and a member of the United Nations which means we have the same rights as every other nation and we will protect ourselves and our rights. If we are left in peace, then all will be peace, but if we are attacked, then we will return violence with violence of our own, that is just as much a promise as is our promise for peace.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

* Olat Reiyah, Volume 1 (Jerusalem 1983) 292

 

 

Arab Summit Lays Traps for Trump and Israel

 

The 29th Arab Summit which adjourned April 15, 2018, has been panned by many as having provided President Trump with a great opportunity to finalize and end the Arab-Israeli conflict. Their resolution which was the main subject on their final days all but ignored the conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Bahrain and Sudan, giving them scant attention. Their statement released gave full attention to the Palestinian situation declaring, “We reaffirm that the Palestine Cause is the entire Arab nation’s main priority, stressing the Arab identity of occupied East Al-Quds as the capital of the State of Palestine.” Their mention of East al-Quds is a restatement of the Arab laying claim to eastern quarter of Jerusalem which includes the Old City and the Temple Mount with all the holy sites of three religions. One small item which bears great weight on their claim is the way Jordan refused to permit Jews at all times and Christians and other non-Muslims access to any of the holy areas of the Old City including the Temple Mount and the desecrations which caused the grave markers of the Mount of Olives cemetery to be strewn and broken utilized as paving stones and to construct bathrooms. This was the Jordanian idea of full and equal access for all religions which has only been realized since 1967 after Israel liberated their occupied territories from Jordan who had illegally held these areas since the 1948 war to eradicate the Jewish State which failed but still managed to steal away lands belonging to the Jewish State under the San Remo Conference and the treaties which followed. Should the world desire that the Temple Mount remain accessible to all, then the Arab Summit trap must be sidestepped and the Arabs denied their supersessionist demands. Their statement put their demands succinctly and in full claiming, “The conflict could be ended through a two-state solution that guarantees the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the borders of July 4, 1967, with East Al-Quds as its capital.” The demand that the borders be set as they were on the day before the Arab attacks started the Six Day War where Israel liberated her formerly Arab occupied lands as well as the Sinai Peninsula, the region returned to Egypt in exchange for peace. The Arab Summit is demanded a complete reset of the situation which brought on the Arab assault to destroy Israel on July 5, 1967, something which completely ignores all previous treaties and agreements which all allowed Israel to retain lands such that Israel have a defendable border. The borders of July 4, 1967, would not allow for Israel to be defendable as it would leave Tel Aviv in direct range of the Judean Hills and a mere nine miles from Arab forces standing on the high ground overlooking most of Israeli infrastructure.

 

Let us look first at the United Nations Security Council and their suggested solution laid out in United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, the carefully worded plan for the basis in resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict. The clause which has caused the most bafflement and confusion within the debates states, “Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict;” which was debated to great extent with Hugh Mackintosh Foot, Baron Caradon taking the center stage in the debate on the wording of the resolution. Allow us to quote from this in depth article explaining Lord Caradon’s reasoning and purpose for his wording, “Much play has been made of the fact that we didn’t say “the” territories or “all the” territories. But that was deliberate. I myself knew very well the 1967 boundaries and if we had put in the “the” or “all the” that could only have meant that we wished to see the 1967 boundaries perpetuated in the form of a permanent frontier. This I was certainly not prepared to recommend.” Lord Caradon was specific that Israel was not to be forced to return to the same borders present on July 4, 1967, which was a major cause of the Six Day War. Many believe that the real intent of UNSC Res 242 was to have Israel return parts of the Sinai Peninsula, possibly allowing the Israel border to follow along the central mountain spine of the Sinai Peninsula and to have the Jordan River as the Israeli eastern border. Needless to point out, the Arabs have always stated this resolution claiming it actually states either, “the territories” or worse, “all the territories” while refusing to recognize the actual wording of simply “territories” allowing for the Israeli borders to be altered providing Israel with the additional territory to provide her defensible borders with the strategic depth required to do so. At a minimum, the vast majority of military strategists agree that for Israel to have the strategic depth and a defensible border, Israel should necessarily continue to hold the lands east of the Jordan River, the high grounds overlooking the Jordan Valley as well as the high grounds overlooking central Israel from the Judean Heights (see the cutaway showing the tactical necessities). President Trump had best familiarize himself with the tedious and specific arguments and deliberations which contributed to the formalized final draft of UNSC Res 242 before finalizing any presentation of his Deal of the Century so that he avoids falling into the Arab Summit laid trap.

 

Cutaway View of Tactical Advantage and Necessity
of the Jordan Valley and Judean Hills for Defending
Coastal Plains and Israel Alongside the Mediterranean Sea

 

The Arab Summit has produced the only solution the Arabs, including the Palestinian Authority, have ever claimed will work and even then they make that conditional. They make a point to stress that they “affirm the illegality of the American decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel,” as such a recognition also makes a recognition of the existence of the State of Israel, something the Arab World still rejects and refuses to recognize. They further emphasize this with their declaration, “we categorically refuse to recognize Jerusalem (Al-Quds) as the capital of Israel, where East Al-Quds will remain the capital State of Palestine. We warn against taking any action that would change the current legal and political status of Al-Quds.” The Arab Summit did not miss the opportunity to blame Israel for the entirety of the situation claiming, “will end the political stalemate resulting from the intransigence of Israeli positions.” The most dangerous of the Arab Summit statements was their unwillingness to positively end the unstableness of the area and the conflict the Arabs insist on continuing against Israel until they succeed in destroying the Jewish State. This was made evident in their posturing with, “The conflict could be ended through a two-state solution that guarantees the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the borders of 4 July 1967 with East Al-Quds as its capital.”

 

Allow us to now get a tad upset with the entirety of the Arab Summit declarations over three words, “could be ended,” and not would be ended or shall be ended or anything to indicate finality of the agreement in cementing a complete and total end to the Arab-Jewish Conflict, and make no pretense, that is the reality of the conflict. The Arab Summit insists on continuing their denial of the right of the Jews to self-determination. The sad part is that most of Europe also does not recognize the right of the Jews to self-determination. According to Islam, the driving force behind the lives of the Arab World, the Jews are forever Dhimmi, second-class citizens with limited rights, needing to be cared for by their betters, the believers of Islam. In Europe, this was initially driven by the Church which believed they had replaced the Jews as the Chosen People and the Jews being rejected by Hashem were now considered as followers of the devil and accursed. This belief has carried on through the Reformation to the numerous Protestant forms of Christianity and has been accepted by secularist in Europe, as it has become second nature to both Europe and the Islamic World of the MENA* states. Both Christianity and Islam have a problem with the existence of Israel in that should the Jews return to their ancient homeland and prove the prophesy that the Jewish People would be gathered again to Eretz Yisroel, then the idea that Christianity replaced Judaism and that Islam replaced both in both cases because the formers had a better and more final version of the Word of Hashem, then this becomes challenged as the original Word of Hashem of Judaism becomes reestablished. This makes Israel a threat to both faiths with an interesting exception of Christianity which has embraced the return of the Jews to their ancient homelands as one of the precursors for the coming of the Messiah. In Christianity, that return is the “Second Coming” while in Judaism it is the initial coming of the Messiah.

 

This problem that the Arab Summit nations refuse to accept the existence of Israel and use the phrase, “could be ended,” instead of accepting any agreement as a final and acceptable end to hostility, such as terrorism, warfare, rocket attacks or Iranian nuclear attack, they leave open the intent and near certainty that all of these aggressions are to be continued. That is not peace by any definition; they are simply demanding a reset of the borders to the most advantageous set of borders for their attempts to erase Israel. This is not an offer of peace but a guarantee of ever-continuing warfare and violence in all of its numerous variations. The only peace which can be had would be to find a means of having the Palestinian Arabs in the Shomron to be returned their Jordanian citizenship and their being given enticements to move to Jordan or find a new homeland which will accept them and the granting of citizenship to the refugees by the nation where they reside as their camps are more like neighborhoods with apartments and stores surrounded by barbed wire. If the refugees were also permitted to choose where they are to reside, all of them outside of Israel being the only stipulation, even given some enticement which would likely cost less than one year’s funding of UNRWA** and the aid sent to the Palestinian Authority. This would have the advantage of finality ending this seventy-year plus struggle, but the Arabs will not accept any finality in which Israel remains and Jews have self-determination. This is, unfortunately, the position taken by many nations in the world whenever there is a vote in the United Nations. In reality, Israel is far more accepted when it comes to international relations as Israel has embassies in over one-hundred-fifty nations. Israel is a healthy nation with a thriving and growing economy and has given the world many wonderful discoveries as well as being amongst, if not the, first nation to arrive after there has been a disaster, natural or otherwise, anywhere in the world when permitted by the government, providing aid, search and rescue and often a field hospital which has functional departments for virtually any service a full sized hospital offers. Israel is a member nation in the United Nations despite being deprived of normalcy due to the Arab World and the European nations both of which do whatever they are able to prevent Israel sitting on the Security Council or to be a member, let alone chair, and of the numerous United Nations agencies. It is because of these irrational acts of belligerence against Israel often exemplified by the actions of the United Nations Agencies such as the Human Rights Commission, UNESCO, UNICEF and especially the General Assembly that Israel should fear the world accepting the phrasing, “could be ended,” as actually meaning an end to the violence and an actual peace treaty. Israel is being served by the Arab Summit a guarantee of continued violence with intent to destroy the Jewish State depriving Jews of self-determination and depriving them of life and only allowing the Jews of Israel the peace of the grave, not a peace of arms. Of course, Arab selectivity of decisions, declarations, resolutions and even wording where the words must be as they perceive them and not as they were approved, comes to the fore with their rejection of President Trump, including his recognition of Jerusalem as the Capital City of Israel, and their complete acceptance of President Obama and especially his claims that Jerusalem was actual al-Quds and that Israel must return to the July 4, 1967 lines; yet it is Israeli rejectionism that is the problem and Arab rejection of Israel is absolutely natural and completely understandable and utterly defensible, thus whatever the Arab Summit decides must be accepted as completely fair and just why Israel must be rejected as an abomination. Please excuse us if we refuse to accept Arab rejectionism concerning Israel and their demands that Jews accept their Dhimmi status.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

*MENA = Middle East and North Africa

**UNRWA = United Nations Relief and Works Agency

 

Of Science, Christianity, Jews, War, Demography and Islam

 

We can cover the initial item, the war against the Jewish People, with a simple recognition of historical fact which has become so well known and uncontestable, as stated in the Passover Haggadah, “In every generation one rises up against us.” That simple sentence states the minimal condition where there is one person who will rise up and call for our murders. The unstated and unfortunate reality is that one is often a political leader, a leader of a nation, or the dictator of an empire who is the one rising to destroy us. The list is filled with illustrious names of their eras with names such as Pharos Ramses I and Pharos Ramses II, Haman, Nebuchadnezzar, King Ahasuerus, Tsar Nicholas II, Ottoman rulers Sultan Mehmed I, Mehmed II, Suleiman I, Mustafa I, Murad IV, Suleiman II, Mahmud I, Abdülhamid I, Mehmed V, Musa Çelebi and the remainder of the Ottoman leadership throughout the ranks all used the Jews to fund their positions. This continued from invader to invader and foreign rulers and dispersion sent Jews throughout the Roman and later the Ottoman Empires and beyond to every corner of the globe driven most often through the necessity to flee pogroms, rioting or genocidal efforts to destroy the small minority of Jews within almost every border.

 

Probably the least obvious but greatest surprise was the reaction by the Japanese High Command when visiting Nazi SS officers demanded that the Japanese release their Jews and send them to the German death camps. The Japanese flatly refused the German demands threatening to turn against Germany should these demands persist. The Nazi officers left empty handed and with much challenged authority after having their wings clipped. The Palestinians and their Arab and Iranian backers are the most evident threat to Jews with many others in the background ready to launch into the picture. Anti-Semitism has returned across much of the globe including Europe, Russia, the Arab World and even to include the United States and the rest of the Developed World. The new anti-Semitism includes two new forms, anti-Israelism and anti-Zionism. The sad part is that many far left Jews are what are referred to as Post-Zionists who no longer believe in a Jewish nation and instead call for a joint nation allowing all the Arabs claiming to have been dispossessed to return with full rights. The small problem is that under their solutions, hundreds of thousands of Arabs claiming refugee status would take advantage of the opportunity to move to the area and live in an area where the economy functions. These Arabs would far outnumber the Jews who would soon find Arab rule destroying their efforts and stealing all that has been built leading to their eventual destruction. Israel would be dissolved and the Jews fleeing or dead should such a plan ever be enacted. The problem is the leftist parties already within the Israeli governance who are willing to do whatever it takes to get into power and enact just such a dream under the idea of solving the problems. There are two ways of solving problems, allow the problem to win or to continue the limited immigration rather than opening the floodgates and surrendering to the coming destruction of all which has been built.

 

All right, so the Jews have been persecuted in both the Muslim and Christian worlds nearly constantly and before by the major idolatrous powers for close to four thousand years should one include the exile in Egypt which was where distrust of the Jews, known then as the Hebrews, first began and has continued unabated ever since. But the Christians have controlled almost half of the world for the past eighteen centuries, how are they now included as persecuted? That is an easy one to answer, there was the remainder of the world which they did not control and sometimes they suffered from Christian upon Christian violence such as the War of the Roses. the Hundred Years’ War, Second Hundred Years’ War (the first lasted 116 years and the second lasted 126 years), the Eighty Years’ War and the entirety of the Catholic-Protestant wars including the Thirty Years’ War and more all of which were ended by the treaties named the Peace of Münster and the Peace of Westphalia. Another war which has taken many forms and been fought on many fronts have been the wars between the ever expanding Islamic forces against Christendom which started as early as 622 AD or 625 AD (see map below) depending on the source, but all sources would agree that Christianity was being conquered by Islam and was well underway by 650 AD (see map below). This war is still being fought today, at least by Islam even if not by Christendom.

 

Christian World 500AD

 

 

Islamic Conquests Under the Caliphs

 

Christianity has been facing an even more insidious encroachment which has been eating at it from within. This has been the modernization and the growing Secular Humanism belief where there is no longer any reason to believe in a Supreme Being as technology and science have described most of what was originally attributed to the gods or to a Supreme Being. The rest of the reasoning for Secular Humanism claims that humans can act honestly and ethically without any expectations of rewards or punishments from any higher source. The only need is to rely on ourselves, our better inclinations, the laws we write, and the communal expectations and limits which are mutually agreed upon to prevent actions which would be deemed undesirable. Should we have any problems, those can be resolved through government actions and laws which will become the new guides as to how we live our lives. The new guardians of our humanity will be the new anointed ones in long robes, the judiciary, which will act by the cold application of the laws. This revolution has all but stripped the heart out of Christian Europe leaving it without the steadying guidance of a traditional set of moral truths which have been replaced by what one would expect of any faith where mankind is the highest moral judge, hedonism. This hedonistic value system which places the personal freedom and pleasures above any other expectation has led to a precipitous drop in the reproductive rate leaving Europe, including Russia, with a steadily declining population which has an ever increasing average age as in many instances the reproductive rate has fallen to 1.5 births per woman or even lower. Some examples include Moldova and Portugal with 1.2 births per woman; Bosnia-Herzegovina, Greece, Poland and Spain at 1.3 births per woman; Cyprus, Hungary, Italy, Malta and Slovakia at 1.4 births per woman; Austria, Bulgaria, Channel Islands, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Switzerland and the Ukraine at 1.5 births per woman. The replacement rate in the developed world is 2.1 births per woman with it reaching as high as 3.4 births per woman in some developing countries with higher infant mortality rates and with the global average being 2.33 births per woman. Modernity and the related influences have also had an effect upon the Islamic world or, as some have theorized, the conditions have grown unbearable to the point that people no longer desire to bring children into this world in these countries which does not explain why their birth rates were so much higher ten, twenty, thirty and fifty years ago. The evidence is the introduction of electricity, television, modern comforts and conveniences have brought the same problems to the Islamic world as it develops as it has the Christian world though in the Islamic world none dare claim they are Secular Humanists for fear of being executed. The other variable is education and literacy. These are related issues and for the majority of MENA nations, they have just started to witness changes in these areas. Below we have a graph of the literacy rates for women aged fifteen to twenty-four years of age in Oman, Iran, Algeria, Egypt and Morocco as these are the prime start of childbearing ages and increased literacy usually leads to higher grade education and even increased college admissions which raise the age of initial childbearing thus lowering the average number of births per woman in a nation.

 

Literacy in Oman, Iran, Algeria, Egypt and Morocco

 

Where this will make a difference in the future is with lower births, Islam will soon approach or possibly equal Christians in reproductive rates and thus an equilibrium will have been met. The main factor which has spurred the recent upsurge in Islamic expansion was a combination of retaining high reproductive rates while experiencing lower infant mortality rates thus leading to a rapid increase in populations which strained the economic growth, or lack thereof, across the MENA states. This was brought on with the introduction of modern medical facilities in many if not most of the major cities thus providing better prenatal and post-birth care resulting in lower infant mortality and better reproductive health for the women as well. But modernity has started to catch up in the form of education and literacy which has provided women with more information and a greater opportunity to work and find economic improvement. These are items which most often have produced dropping reproductive rates in nations worldwide. The MENA nations of the Muslim world are no different. With a more steady population returning, these nations are not going to be likely to feel any need for expansionist policies nor will they be demanding greater ability for their excess population to migrate into Europe and the rest of the developed world. Further, as their world develops they will find the need to retain their populations, especially their now educated population, and this will lessen their pressures on the rest of the world. This will lessen the pressures Islam has been pressing on the Christian world and the lines will remain drawn as they currently are with hopefully a lessening in the levels of violence experienced in these regions, particularly the African Transition Zone (see map below) where some of the greatest Islamic-Christian conflicts have occurred.

 

African Transition Zone

 

This will still leave the threats posed by the increasing Secular Humanism but there may even be a light in the darkness here as well. The last centuries have seen science remove much of the mysteries in our lives and explain away things we thought mystical removing their magic and cementing explanations. Now the scientists are really getting into the very fabric which our universe consists of and they are finding some things which are changing opinions and the argument. The first item was the realization that had any of numerous constants been different by even less than one single percentage point in relationship with all of the others, then our universe would have been very different or not have existed at all. Even had it simply been different, that would still have made lifeforms, such as ourselves, impossible, and that does put a different look to things. We are now realizing how extremely special and precious our universe actually is and that it appears in many ways to have been designed especially for life to exist. Still, even with such a design we are realizing that intelligent life, if that is what we qualify as being, may not be anywhere near as abundant and actually so special that there may only be a small number of other intelligent species in our galaxy if even one other and even so, they may not exist in our time frame. We are starting to see that we may be the only intelligent life in the Milky Way at this time and as such, we may not find other intelligent life with whom we would have anything in common. It may be that if there is another intelligent lifeform, they have colonized other star systems and are so far advanced from us that we would have nothing in common, and we would be fortunate if they even considered us intelligent. On the other hand, we may be the first and foremost intelligent lifeform and should we reach the point of colonizing other star systems, then when the next intelligent lifeform evolves, we might be so far in advance of them that we would not realize their being intelligent, though we would probably think so much of ourselves that we would posit we would be capable of realizing their intelligence. Our lack of ability to see the abilities of animals on our own planet does place this in danger.

 

What does any of this have to do with the threats to Christianity and Judaism or belief in a Supreme Being at all? What would be the result of science proving that there was an actual intelligent design to the universe? What happens when science postulates the existence of a Supreme Being which came before and may very well exist currently and will continue existing even after our universe dies? Does that definition sound familiar to anybody? Should science, or a fair number of scientists which has already begun, start to make an argument, then religion, Judaism and Christianity would find their beliefs becoming more aligned with science, actually, it would be science becoming aligned with them, and this could benefit both sides of that equation. There will always be those areas of doubt where science has yet to assign numbers and equations and is still somewhat fuzzy on what is occurring, but we are not referring to using lack of knowledge as the reasoning for Supreme Being. What we are referencing is that science will have found formulations and such proofs and items which point to there being a necessity for an ordering intelligence to the universe and that this creates the need in science for a Supreme Being. Professor Einstein believed in the existence of an ordering logic behind the universe and was a believer in Hashem. His belief may not have fit with your average Rabbi, Priest, Minister or Cleric, but at least he saw a necessary place for such belief. We know that Physicist Stephen Hawking is a doubter who does not believe or find any need for a Supreme Being. But what can you expect for a person who also lends his name to the BDS Israel campaign, which is an attempt to economically cripple the Jewish State. Guess one could say that Stephen Hawking and the Supreme Being are not in agreement, and we know on which side with which we prefer to reside. But, science is growing closer to religion and religion has learned from their mistakes and has left room for science, being assured in their belief that the proof is out there. Christianity can take faith from the fact that the Jews remain a force in the world that there is hope for them to have similar lasting power providing they remain open to ideas and willing to meet facts with reasonable skepticism and sufficient confidence to admit when perhaps they had made an error in their previous position. We can only hope that the world of science can be equally acceptive and honest.

 

Beyond the Cusp