Destination Yisra'el

The Return of the Messiah and the Redemption of All Israel appears now will Come with Great Calamities and Catastrophes

The 2010 Earthquake in Haiti

 

BibleSearchers – According to the prophecies of the Jewish Sages, the Land of Israel will experience an extreme drought in the first three years of the last seven years before the coming of the Messiah. With a strict reading of the prophets, biblical scholars today believe that this will occur during the next seven years Sabbatical Week of Year (2008-2015) in which the full revealing of YHBH’s Messiah will be in the 8^th year, (2015-2016) the anticipated year of the coming of the Maschiah ben Dovid (Messiah son of David),   As described in the Destination Yisra’el blog titled, “Jewish Prophecies on How G-d put Judea in a 1870 year Drought since the Destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem”, we read, the “heaviest periods of rainfall during the last 1870 years was between the years of 1948-1967. Why? After that day, when the Jewish people took control of the Temple Mount and the entire city of Jerusalem, they had the divine privilege and mandate to take complete possession of the Old City of Jerusalem and then all the Land of Israel, but they did not. What happened?

 

Jewish leaders without emuna, or faith in the divine sovereignty of the G-d of Israel, chose instead to listen to the opinions of their globalists benefactors.  They gave control of the Temple Mount to their hated enemy, the Mufti of Jerusalem and the Muslim Brotherhood, and also gave a good portion of the Old City of David and Eastern Jerusalem to Christian and Islamic interests.  It was in the hands of the Labor Zionists leaders of Israel to take complete possession of the land and the world would have quietly consented. Not only did the Jewish leaders of the Zionist State of Israel fail in her divine responsibility, but her biggest opponents to do so then and also today were the political leaders of the nations that predominately consisted of the Lost Tribes of the House of Israel in Northern Europe and the United States.  It’s as though the Northern Tribes of Israel, now represented literally as the peoples of Northern Europe and the prominent British colonies including the United States.  They are still working out the same rebellion against the G-d of Israel that their forefathers did in the 8^th century BCE before they were exiled as the Lost Tribes of Israel.  Consider this fact carefully, this includes the descendants of the English, French, Dutch, and French European colonists that inhabited the Original 13 colonies of America and Canada – you and I.

 

The Redemption of All Israel could have been over by this day, without all the bloodshed of the Islamic Intifada, and the despicable role of the United Nations plus their appointed “Quartet” making Israel the whipping child of the nations. This redemption, in the word of Hebrew is called “Ahishena”.  It is described in the BibleSearchers Reflections posts under the title of “The Guela (Redemption by Bi’etah or Ahishena”, as when “Redemption comes suddenly, in a miraculous way. Mashiah (Messiah) comes, and the world reaches its correct fulfillment and purpose, together with all the beneficial designations that were promised by Hakadosh Baruch Hu (The “Holy One, bless is He”) by way of His prophets, as is described in TaNaKh (Old Testament). Let us read as written:

 

BibleSearchers Reflections – “Does that mean that there are no prophetic implications in this war?  The prophecies of Daniel and Revelation are an apocalyptic image of a history affecting the Jews that will be reenacted in their prophetic history.  Unless we want to judge the Lord of hosts with the charges that He will be responsible for killing billions of human lives before the time of the end is over, we need to rethink our prophetic philosophical foundations.  As the Lord of hosts removes the angels holding back the “four winds of strife” (violence consuming the whole world or the “four cardinal points” of this planet), we see the God of Israel removing his “protective and shielding hands” from the earth.  This suggests that God is allowing the fullest extent of evil that man can generate to consume this whole globe. 

 

This prophetic scenario is not what medieval Roman Christianity envisioned as the “Rome the City of God” replacing Jerusalem and the millennium of peace had already arrived.  This prophetic scenario is not what modern Roman Christianity wants for the Vatican must take possession of all the holy sites in Jerusalem so that the Pope can reign and rule from God’s Holy City. 

 

This prophetic scenario is not what Protestant Evangelical Christians want as “their” secret rapture has not occurred so they can move to heavenly dimensions while the Jews are killed in the coming holocaust.  This prophetic scenario is not what Seventh-day Adventists want as they are “spiritual Israel,” the “remnant” who “keep the commandments of God and have the faith of Jesus” and the Jews are irrelevant to the prophecies at the time of the end. This prophetic scenario is not what Mormons want as they hold the “prophetic golden tablets” that show that they are the “Lost Tribes of Israel” who will be redeemed back to the Land of Israel. 

 

This prophetic scenario is not what Islam wants because they are waiting for the coming of Isa al-Mesih (Jesus the Messiah) as Isa ben Miriam (Jesus son of Mary) who will bring a world of peace to the followers of “the Prophet” while the Christians and the Jews are destroyed.  This prophetic scenario is not what fundamental radical Islam wants because they have not had the privilege to bring the world under the harsh global domination of Sharia Law, the evil personification of the Jewish Messianic Millennium of peace. 

 

This is also not what the orthodox Judaism truly wishes as the pathway for their redemption. According to Chassidic Rabbi CAE, the “b’ito” redemption began on Rosh Hashanah in the fall of 2005 (Jewish year 5766). The Jews have spent three and a half millenniums reconsidering the harshness; of the bondage of Egypt, destruction of the temple and exile of Babylon, the potential Haman-Amelak annihilation in Persia, the “Abomination of Desolation” of the temple by the Greek Hellenistic Syrian king Antiochus IV Epiphanes,  the harsh domination, exile and persecution by Rome, the isolation and inquisition by Roman Christianity, the desire for complete “extermination” by Nazi Holocaust and the Arab “blood oaths of extermination.”

 

The Jewish resident does not have the desire to consider a “harsh b’ito redemption reality” for the final conclusion of this age before the nations and religious institutions seeking global domination are eliminated.  Have they not been affected enough by pogroms, holocausts, persecutions, inquisitions and exterminations?  No they must now face the final anti-Messiah (antichrist). 

 

In the Israeli blogsite called Mystical Paths, Rabbi Akiva from Yeranen Yaakov personal blogsite we read about “Redemption by “Bi’etah” or by “Ahishena:” 

 

Yeranen Yaakov – “There are 2 types of redemption that could exist according to our sources:

 

· A redemption that is "Bi’etah" - i.e. one that is set at a predetermined time (Rabbi Ovadia Yosef holds that this is the Redemption with which we will be redeemed, even though he holds, on the other hand, that the generation is "זכאי" ["meritorious"]) and a

 

· redemption that is "Ahishena" - i.e. one that will come earlier than its set time.

 

The main differences between the 2 types of Redemption, besides the time that it will take place, is the amount of suffering the Jewish people and the whole world in general will endure until the Redemption takes place and the manner in which the Redemption occurs:

 

· “Ahishena" Redemption is a Redemption that comes suddenly, in a miraculous way. Mashiah comes, and the world reaches its correct fulfillment and purpose, together with all the beneficial designations that were promised by Hakadosh Baruch Hu (The “Holy One, bless is He”) by way of His prophets, as is described in TaNaKh (Old Testament).

 

·  A "Bi’etah" Redemption is a Redemption that a long and hard process precedes it, full of suffering and tests for the Jewish people and for the world in general, which concludes with the terrible death of about two-thirds of the world, in addition to those among the Jewish people who, according to Hakadosh Baruch Hu's calculation, are not fit to be redeemed.”

 

According to some of the sources along with Kabbalists from our time, the percentage of Jews that are said to be killed during this situation, could reach Has Veshalom (destroy the Jews and wipe Israel off the map) about 80%, corresponding to the percentage of the Jewish people who were killed in Egypt during the plague of darkness, as is described in the words of Haza"l (Chochmenu Zichrona Levaracha (Our Sages of Blessed Memory). The type of Redemption that we will receive is dependent on us and on our deeds.

 

“Ahishena" Redemption is dependent on repentance that the Jewish nation will do. The righteous among our generation say that it's not referring to [a repentance] of all of Israel - just the majority of it - everyone according to his ability. In this scenario - that repentance will work for Israel - then, the "Bi’etah" process, which we are currently in the middle of, will stop suddenly, and the Redemption will come immediately.”

 

Blessed be the covenanted ones of Judah, who today are seeking the repentance of the House of Judah.  Yet, it will also take the repentance of the Whole House of Jacob (Israel) including the descendants of the Lost Tribes of the House of Israel, when they are willing to “Call upon the Lord”. It’s time to wake up “Oh House of Israel”!  Though “lost”, you are destined to be “found” as prophesied by the Prophet Ezekiel:

 

Ezekiel 36:22-28 (parts) - “Therefore say to the House of (the Lost Tribes of) Israel, “Thus says the Lord G-d…I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean…I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you…and cause you to walk in My statues, and you will  keep My judgments and do them. Then you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; you shall be My people, and I will be your God.”

 

Israel Defense Force – Torah Spiritual Tenacity with Talmudic Education

Rabbinic Blessing on the IDF Heseder Soldier

 

Arutz Sheva (Israel National News) – “Overlooking the conference table in the Academic Board Room at West Point, the famed American military academy, there stand the statues of three Jewish warrior-scholars - Joshua, King David and Judah the Maccabee.

When leaving West Point, head east, cross the Atlantic Ocean, travel the length of the Mediterranean Sea, come ashore on a Tel Aviv beach, and then make your way towards Jerusalem. About half-way to the holy capital city of Israel you will come upon the city of Modi'in - the revitalized hometown of that same Judah whose statue graces the board room of the United States Military Academy at West Point. And it is here, in the modern city of Modi'in, that new Maccabees are being shaped daily - living, breathing Maccabees, not stone carvings.

The institution turning out those scholar-warriors is the Meir Harel Yeshiva, a Hesder yeshiva (one of a network of Torah study academies combining demanding Judaic studies and military service) headed by Rabbi Col. Eliezer Chaim Shenvald. And one of the first scholar-warriors the yeshiva produced is a young man named Yoad Kaplan, from Caesarea.

In December 2008, at the tail end of Chanukah - holiday of the Maccabees - Kaplan and fellow Meir Harel Yeshiva student Uri Spiegel were squad commanders in the 51st Battalion of the Golani Brigade, gathered in a staging area just outside the Gaza region in southern Israel. Daniel Attar, also a Meir Harel Yeshiva student, was with another company assigned the same mission: enter Gaza and neutralize the enemy.

 

By that point, the Hamas regime in Gaza and its allied jihadists had been bombarding Israeli cities and towns with hundreds of Kassam and Grad rockets for years - ever more intensely after the unilateral disengagement from the region in 2005, in which thousands of Israelis were uprooted from their homes. As Yoad and his comrades waited, they heard and saw the Hamas rockets flying out of Gaza, heading toward their civilian targets on the Israeli homefront.

"We felt like emissaries.... It felt like we were defending our homes," Yoad told a local Modi'in newspaper. For his company commander, however, it was even more literal - his Ashdod home had been hit by a Hamas rocket just a short time earlier.

Operation Cast Lead (also called the Gaza War) began on the sixth day of Chanukah with a series of airstrikes, but one week later, on a Saturday night, the infantry was ordered to penetrate the enemy lines. The 51st, Kaplan's battalion, was one of the first in.

 

The Praying Israeli Soldier

 

It was also one of the first hit when the enemy fired dozens of mortars toward the advancing Israeli ground forces. Yoad and 17 other soldiers suffered wounds of varying severity when a shell landed in their midst that very night. Suffering from what was determined to be moderate injuries, Yoad was evacuated to Soroka Hospital in Beersheba, where he was rushed immediately into the operating room. Doctors worked diligently to save his arm.

After a few days of hospitalization, Yoad mentioned matter-of-factly to his doctor that he was going to begin an officer's course in two months. It was then that Yoad got the shocking news: only after another year of rehabilitation would it be possible to determine if he could ever return to a combat unit, much less an officer's course.

But Yoad would not be held back.

For the next several months, he made intense efforts to strengthen himself both physically - with physiotherapy three times a week - and spiritually - with a return to high-level learning at Meir Harel Yeshiva. Doctors, physiotherapists, friends and family were amazed by Yoad's speedy recuperation, which they saw as just short of miraculous.

Within seven months of suffering what was supposed to be a debilitating arm injury, Yoad requested to return to combat duty. He quickly persuaded all the relevant decision-makers that he was fit to take part in the infantry officer's course, no matter how physically demanding it may be.

So it was that Yoad Kaplan was called to step forward before hundreds of new and veteran officers two months ago to be awarded recognition as Outstanding Officer of the Course. At the concluding ceremony, when Yoad received his Second Lieutenant rank, IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi and Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak offered high praise for Yoad's dedication to excellence. His success, they said, demonstrates the awesome power of faith in the righteousness of one's cause and tenacity in reaching one's goals - with which one can achieve the impossible.

Building those character traits, along with moral and practical leadership skills, are part and parcel of the encompassing Torah learned, lived and taught at Hesder Yeshivas such as the Meir Harel Yeshiva. There can be no doubt that Judah the Maccabee would feel more at home overlooking Rabbi Shenvald's study hall than he ever could peering down from the mantelpiece at West Point.”

 

Credit to Nissan Ratzlav-Katz – “IDF Feature:Tenacity and Talmud” – Arutz Sheva – July 2, 2010

“UnSettled Settlements - Christian Tax-Exempt Funds aid Jewish Settlements in West Bank” – Part Three

Fight for the Land in the Jewish Settlement of Har Bracha

 

BibleSearchers Reflections – “One of the fundamental objectives of the Jewish and non-Jewish organizations seeking with their passion to neutralize the basic integral right of the Jewish people to live in their own land, is to attack those whose passions are to help and to assist the Jewish people.  In America, American citizens are allowed to go to Mexico and buy a home and no one cares. Chinese come to America and build great communities and proudly call them “China Town USA” and they have the privilege to do so for America was built on the foundation of freedom. That fact does not exist for the Jews in the West Bank, Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, or Jordan or anywhere in the Muslim world. The Jordanians, thought to be moderates, will be executed if they sell their home to a Jewish person.  

 

The New York Times international reporters are aptly on the scene doing what they do best, with one exception, they will usually not be fair and balanced providing the same objective journalism that they demand conservative speakers and moderators in the United States on the airwaves. “Fair and balanced” does not exist in their lexicon for the Jewish Orthodox people in Israel. 

 

Yet it is true, many Americans, which Jewish scholars researching believe are the true Lost Tribes of Israel have amazing innate urges no doubt imprinted by the Divine, to help their Jewish cousins reclaim their ancient homeland.  What they do not recognized yet, the lands which the Palestinians want for their future homeland are the promised lands that were given to and promised again by the G-d of Israel, according to the sacred oracles of the prophets of Israel, to become the future homeland of the Returning Lost Tribes of Israel.

 

The facts exist that the Jewish people did not migrated away from Judea and Samaria because of any personal reasons or earth catastrophic changes making the land unfit for them to live, but because they were driven away by the imperial forces of Rome. Over 90% of the Jewish population were either slaughtered or sent into exile as slaves to the rest of the Roman Empire, forbidden ever to return. 

 

The reality factor, not stated in the following article, is the fact that the European countries have funded the Arabs and Palestinians, to the discrimination of the Jewish people with billions of dollars over the last three decades.  Also, Muslim charities in the United States as well as all the Arab oil producing states including Egypt and the Muslim Brotherhood headquartered in Egypt have all been government, and semi-government benefactors to the Palestinian people.

 

The Arabian, Syrian and Persian states had shown no desire to teach the Palestinians of Arab Bedouin descent, the ways of autonomous governing, the building of a civilization and social order for a long term possession of a homeland. Neither did they teach them the rules of governance to live in harmony with your neighbors including the Jewish people.  Rather they taught them the anti-thesis; to establish a state within a land that was designated to be the homeland for the Jewish people in Palestine with the goal to eventually destroy the State of Israel and remove the presence of the Jewish people from the Middle East, forever.

 

It is so easy to yield to the urge of demagoguery and begin branding Orthodox Jews, who desire to live on the land that was given to them by the G-d of Israel, as ultra-rightists, anarchists, hard-right factionists, and virulently anti-Arabists. The Arabs and the Jews were living in close proximity to each other 150 years ago in the days of the visits of American author, Mark Twain and Scottish painter David Roberts,

 

The whole premise of the Palestinian refugee is that they were refugees before the Jews ever began returning to the Land of Israel, for no Islamic country in the Middle East wanted the Palestinians to live in their own national borders.  The Balfour Agreement in 1917 by Great Britain designated that the entire Land of Palestine was to be a homeland for the Jews.  This was prior to the reaffirmation by the League of Nations in 1922 that the Jews had the right to live in the entire Land of Palestine. This “Land of Palestine” included both sides of the Jordan River, Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and Gaza.  Prior to the 1917 Balfour Agreement, the 1922 League of Nations resolution, the Arab Bedouin populations were present in meager numbers over the prior hundreds of years. Their diminished numbers were attested in the 19^th travelogues of Mark Twain and other explorers that testified that Palestine was a desolate land; parched, barren, and depopulated.

 

Mark Twain (1860) – “A desolation is here that not even imagination can grace with the pomp of life and action…We never saw a human being on the whole route. We pressed toward… Jerusalem…Jerusalem is... lifeless. I would not desire to live there. It is a hopeless, dreary, heartbroken land… Palestine is desolate and unlovely. Can the curse of the Deity beautify a land?

 

Yet, two decades later after the 1922 League of Nations resolution, with the blessings of the United Nations, this entire land dedicated for a refuge for the Jewish people was partitioned again with unhanded agreements with Abdullah of Jordan, and 80% of the land promised for a Jewish homeland was taken away and transferred back into Arab hands.

 

The facts of history will attest, the Palestinians were a nomadic people with no ties living in a land. When they lived in Saudi Arabia, they sought to topple the throne of the Saudi king and they were exiled. The Palestinians living in Jordan with Yasser Arafat also planned a coup to overthrow the ruling Hashemite dynasty and they were exiled.

 

Weeks before the State of Israel was formally declared in 1948, the Egyptian government addressed the Arabs living in Israel to move out of the Land of Palestine so the Egyptian and other Arab countries could kill the Jews living in the land quickly and easily.  Suddenly 500,000 resident-Arabs left voluntarily to other Arab nations as two million Jews arrived from the four corners of the globe.

 

Those who were once non-employed nomads, now employed by Israeli Jews, packed their bags and left in hopes of the promises that they would return and take possession of all Jewish people’s properties that were expected to be destroyed in the Arab genocide of the Jews. The fact that the Arab nations seeking to slaughter the Jews in mass lost the war, also refused to provide a homeland for the Arab Bedouins within their own lands that were now their refugees.

 

In the months before the final collapse of the rule of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, thousands of Palestinians, living in Iraq, were deported back to Israel. They were found to be plotting against the State of Iraq who gave with great largess money to every family of a suicide bomber fighting the Intifada against Israel.  

 

Let the full historical truth come forth in the revelation of why the Arab countries do not want the Palestinian people to assimilate into their own countries and we come to a certain reality. Unlike America who opened her doors to the peoples of the world, the Islamic Arab states have closed their doors to the Palestinian people and to the Jews.

 

Yet the prophets also have foretold that when the final conflicts are over, and the Messiah has come, this whole region will have been engulfed in catastrophes associated with fire, that will ravaged the rest of the populations in Damascus, Lebanon, Tyre, Sidon, Ashkelon, Gaza, and the region of Ekron. They will be consumed with fear (Ashkelon), sorrow (Gaza), their hopes crashed (Ekron), and depopulated (Ashkelon).  In the era after when the “king of Gaza” will perish, a remnant of these peoples will become believers in the G-d of Israel.

 

Zechariah 9:6-7 – “And I will cut off the pride of the Philistines (Palestinians),I will take away the blood from his mouth, and the abomination from between his teeth, but he who remains , even he shall be for our G-d, and shall be like a leader (aluf/”peaceful element”) in Judah. 

 

There is no evidence, according to the prophets that a Palestinian State will ever be declared as a national state. There is evidence that Philistia, the fields of Ephraim and Samaria (Shomron) will come under the possession of the House of Joseph.  Let us notice that the “Final Solution” to the destiny of the Jews will be to take possession of their tribal homeland in Judea along with the Lost Tribes of Israel who will, in that day, in league with the Jews of Israel, take possession of Judea and Samaria.  These facts have already been prophetically determined:

 

Obadiah 15-19 (parts) – “For the day of the L-rd upon all the nations is near…on Mount Zion there shall be deliverance, and there shall be holiness; the house of Jacob shall possess  (the inherited lands of) their possessions, the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame; but the house of Esau (Petra and Saudi Arabia) shall be stubble; they shall kindle them and devour them, and no survivor shall remain of the house of Esau…

  

The south shall possess the mountains of Esau (Arabis), and the lowlands shall possess Philistia. They shall possess the fields of Ephraim and the fields of Samaria. Benjamin shall possess Gilead. And the captives of this host of children of Israel shall possess the land of the Canaanites as far as Zarephath shall possess the cities of the South (Negev and Sinai). Then saviors [descendants of Judah (legal Judiciary) and the Lost Tribes of Israel] shall come to mount Zion to judge the mountain of Esau (Middle East and the Land of Arabia), and the kingdom shall be the L-rd’s.

 

The inheritance of the Lost Tribes of Israel will include the “fields of Ephraim and the fields of Samaria, where the West Bank and the Jewish settlements therein are under international dispute.  This is where the “Quartet” is seeking to impose the demands of the House of Esau, called the Royal House of Saud, living in the mountains of Esau (Arabia). There will be no dispute; the West Bank will come under the possession of the House of Joseph and associated with the Return of the Lost Tribes of Israel, who once lived in Northern Europe and America.  They will also take possession of Philistia, in the land of Hamas where the Gaza Palestinians live today.

 

Let us fear not, the G-d of Israel will have the last word. This prophecy for the Lost Tribes of the House of Israel is not conditional, for it is bound by G-d’s Holy Name.  We are talking about reclamation and redemption literally for the “Lost Tribers” back to their ancestral homeland. The geo-physical and geo-political conditions will be such, that we will not have any other options.

 

Ezekiel 36: Ezekiel 36:22, 24-28 (parts)  - “Thus says the Adonai G-d, “I do not do this for your sake, O House of Israel, but for My holy Name’s sake, which you have profaned among the nations wherever you went…I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols…

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them. Then you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; you shall be My people, and I will be your G-d.”

 

People are upset, very upset, because they want to abort the prophetic fulfillment of HaShem (G-d of Israel) given in the prophecies by the prophets of Israel. Let us read the four part series, condensed in two parts of the New York Times article titled, “Tax-Exempt Funds aid Settlements in West Bank”;

 

New York Times at Har Bracha, Shomron, Israel – “Twice a year, American evangelicals show up at a winery in this Jewish settlement in the hills of ancient Samaria to play a direct role in biblical prophecy, picking grapes and pruning vines. Believing that Christian help for Jewish winemakers here in the occupied West Bank foretells Christ’s second coming, they are recruited by a Tennessee-based charity called HaYovel that invites volunteers “to labor side by side with the people of Israel” and “to share with them a passion for the soon coming jubilee in Yeshua, messiah.”

 

But during their visit in February the volunteers found themselves in the middle of the fight for land that defines daily life here. When the evangelicals headed into the vineyards, they were pelted with rocks by Palestinians who say the settlers have planted creeping grape vines on their land to claim it as their own. Two volunteers were hurt. In the ensuing scuffle, a settler guard shot a 17-year-old Palestinian shepherd in the leg. “These people are filled with ideas that this is the Promised Land and their duty is to help the Jews,” said Izdat Said Qadoos of the neighboring Palestinian village. “It is not the Promised Land. It is our land.”

 

HaYovel the Jubilee is one of many groups in the United States using tax-exempt donations to help Jews establish permanence in the Israeli-occupied territories — effectively obstructing the creation of a Palestinian state, widely seen as a necessary condition for Middle East peace. The result is a surprising juxtaposition: As the American government seeks to end the four-decade Jewish settlement enterprise and foster a Palestinian state in the West Bank, the American Treasury helps sustain the settlements through tax breaks on donations to support them.

 

A New York Times examination of public records in the United States and Israel identified at least 40 American groups that have collected more than $200 million in tax-deductible gifts for Jewish settlement in the West Bank and East Jerusalem over the last decade. The money goes mostly to schools, synagogues, recreation centers and the like, legitimate expenditures under the tax law. But it has also paid for more legally questionable commodities: housing as well as guard dogs, bulletproof vests, rifle scopes and vehicles to secure outposts deep in occupied areas.

 

In some ways, American tax law is more lenient than Israel’s. The outposts receiving tax-deductible donations — distinct from established settlements financed by Israel’s government — are illegal under Israeli law. And a decade ago, Israel ended tax breaks for contributions to groups devoted exclusively to settlement-building in the West Bank.

 

Now controversy over the settlements is sharpening, and the issue is sure to be high on the agenda when President Obama and the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, meet in Washington on Tuesday. While a succession of American administrations have opposed the settlements here, Mr. Obama has particularly focused on them as obstacles to peace. A two-state solution in the Middle East, he says, is vital to defusing Muslim anger at the West. Under American pressure, Mr. Netanyahu has temporarily frozen new construction to get peace talks going. The freeze and negotiations, in turn, have injected new urgency into the settlers’ cause — and into fund-raising for it.

 

The use of charities to promote a foreign policy goal is neither new nor unique — Americans also take tax breaks in giving to pro-Palestinian groups. But the donations to the settler movement stand out because of the centrality of the settlement issue in the current talks and the fact that Washington has consistently refused to allow Israel to spend American government aid in the settlements. Tax breaks for the donations remain largely unchallenged, and unexamined by the American government. The Internal Revenue Service declined to discuss donations for West Bank settlements. State Department officials would comment only generally, and on condition of anonymity.

 

Jewish settlers gathered to dedicate an unauthorized West Bank outpost, Givat Egoz, opposing President Obama's call for a settlement freeze.

 

“It’s a problem,” a senior State Department official said, adding, “It’s unhelpful to the efforts that we’re trying to make.” Daniel C. Kurtzer, the United States ambassador to Israel from 2001 to 2005, called the issue politically delicate. “It drove us crazy,” he said. But “it was a thing you didn’t talk about in polite company.” He added that while the private donations could not sustain the settler enterprise on their own, “a couple of hundred million dollars makes a huge difference,” and if carefully focused, “creates a new reality on the ground.”

 

Most contributions go to large, established settlements close to the boundary with Israel that would very likely be annexed in any peace deal, in exchange for land elsewhere. So those donations produce less concern than money for struggling outposts and isolated settlements inhabited by militant settlers. Even small donations add to their permanence.

 

For example, when Israeli authorities suspended plans for permanent homes in Maskiot, a tiny settlement near Jordan, in 2007, two American nonprofits — the One Israel Fund and Christian Friends of Israeli Communities —raised tens of thousands of dollars to help erect temporary structures, keeping the community going until officials lifted the building ban. Israeli security officials express frustration over donations to the illegal or more defiant communities.

 

“I am not happy about it,” a senior military commander in the West Bank responded when asked about contributions to a radical religious academy whose director has urged soldiers to defy orders to evict settlers. He spoke under normal Israeli military rules of anonymity.

 

Palestinian officials expressed outrage at the tax breaks.

 

“Settlements violate international law, and the United States is supposed to be sponsoring a two-state solution, yet it gives deductions for donation to the settlements?” said Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator. The settlements are a sensitive issue among American Jews themselves. Some major Jewish philanthropies, like the Jewish Federations of North America, generally do not support building activities in the West Bank.

 

The donors to settlement charities represent a broad mix of Americans — from wealthy people like the hospital magnate Dr. Irving I. Moskowitz and the family behind Haagen-Dazs ice cream to bidders at kosher pizza auctions in Brooklyn and evangelicals at a recent Bible meeting in a Long Island basement. But they are unified in their belief that returning the West Bank — site of the ancient Jewish kingdoms — to full Jewish control is critical to Israeli security and fulfillment of biblical prophecies.

 

As Kimberly Troup, director of the Christian Friends of Israeli Communities’ American office, said, while her charity’s work is humanitarian, “the more that we build, the more that we support and encourage their right to live in the land, the harder it’s going to be for disengagement, for withdrawal.”

Sorting Out the Facts

 

Today half a million Israeli Jews live in lands captured during the June 1967 Middle East war. Yet there is a strong international consensus that a Palestinian state should arise in the West Bank and Gaza, where all told some four million Palestinians live.  Ultimately, any agreement will be a compromise, a sorting out of the facts on the ground.

 

Most Jewish residents of the West Bank live in what amount to suburbs, with neat homes, high rises and highways to Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Politically and ideologically, they are indistinguishable from Israel proper. Most will doubtless stay in any peace deal, while those who must move will most likely do so peacefully.

 

But in the geographically isolated settlements and dozens of illegal outposts, there are settlers who may well violently resist being moved. The prospect of an internal and deeply painful Israeli confrontation looms.  And the resisters will very likely be aided by tax-deductible donations from Americans who believe that far from quelling Muslim anger, as Mr. Obama argues, handing over the West Bank will only encourage militant Islamists bent on destroying Israel. “We need to influence our congressmen to stop Obama from putting pressure on Israel to self-destruct,” Helen Freedman, a New Yorker who runs a charity called Americans for a Safe Israel, told supporters touring the West Bank this spring.

 

Israel, too, used to offer its residents tax breaks for donations to settlement building, starting in 1984 under a Likud government. But those donations were ended by the Labor Party, first in 1995 and then, after reversal, again in 2000. The finance minister in both cases, Avraham Shohat, said that while he only vaguely recalled the decision-making process, as a matter of principle he believed in deductions for gifts to education and welfare for the poor, not to settlement building per se.

 

In theory, the same is true for the United States, where the tax code encourages citizens to support nonprofit groups that may diverge from official policy, as long as their missions are educational, religious or charitable. The challenge is defining those terms and enforcing them. There are more than a million registered charities, and many submit sparse or misleading mission summaries in tax filings. Religious groups have no obligation to divulge their finances, meaning settlements may be receiving sums that cannot be traced.

 

The Times’s review of pro-settler groups suggests that most generally live within the rules of the American tax code. Some, though, risk violating them by using the money for political campaigning and residential property purchases, by failing to file tax returns, by setting up boards of trustees in name only and by improperly funneling donations directly to foreign organizations. One group that at least skates close to the line is Friends of Zo Artzeinu/Manhigut Yehudit, based in Cedarhurst, N.Y., and co-founded by Shmuel Sackett, a former executive director of the banned Israeli political party Kahane Chai. Records from the group say a portion of the $5.2 million it has collected over the last few years has gone to the Israeli “community facilities” of Manhigut Yehudit, a hard-right faction of Mr. Netanyahu’s governing Likud Party, which Mr. Sackett helps run with the politician Moshe Feiglin.

 

American tax rules prohibit the use of charitable funds for political purposes at home or abroad. Neither man would answer questions about the nature of the “community facilities.” In an e-mail message, Mr. Sackett said the American charity was not devoted to political activity, but to humanitarian projects and “educating the public about the need for authentic Jewish leadership in Israel.”

 

Of course, groups in the pro-settler camp are not the only ones benefiting from tax breaks. For example, the Free Gaza Movement, which organized the flotilla seeking to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza, says on its Web site that supporters can make tax-deductible donations to it through the American Educational Trust, publisher of an Arab-oriented journal. Israeli civil and human rights groups like Peace Now, which are often accused of having a blatant political agenda, also benefit from tax-deductible donations.  

 

 

Jewish settlers mourned after Palestinian attacker wielding an ax and a knife killed a 13-year-old Israeli boy and wounded a 7-year-old in Bat Ayin, a settlement in the West Bank.

 

Some pro-settler charities have obscured their true intentions. Take the Capital Athletic Foundation, run by the disgraced Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff. In its I.R.S. filings, the foundation noted donations totaling more than $140,000 to (non-existent) Kollel Ohel Tiferet, a religious study group in Israel, for “educational and athletic” purposes. In reality, a study group member was using the money to finance a paramilitary operation in the Beitar Illit settlement, according to documents in a Senate investigation of Mr. Abramoff, who pleaded guilty in 2006 to defrauding clients and bribing public officials. Mr. Abramoff, documents show, had directed the settler, Shmuel Ben Zvi, an old high school friend, to use the study group as cover after his accountant complained that money for sniper equipment and a jeep “don’t look good” in terms of complying with the foundation’s tax-exempt status.

 

While the donations by Mr. Abramoff’s charity were elaborately disguised — the group shipped a camouflage sniper suit in a box labeled “Grandmother Tree Costume for the play Pocahontas” — other groups are more open. Amitz Rescue & Security, which has raised money through two Brooklyn nonprofits, trains and equips guard units for settlements. Its web site encourages donors to “send a tax-deductible check” for night-vision binoculars, bulletproof vehicles and guard dogs. Other groups urge donors to give to one of several nonprofits that serve as clearinghouses for donations to a wide array of groups in Israel and the West Bank, which, if not done properly, can skirt the intent of American tax rules.

 

Americans cannot claim deductions for direct donations to foreign charities; tax laws allow deductions for domestic giving on the theory that charities ultimately ease pressure on government spending for social programs. But the I.R.S. does allow deductions for donations to American nonprofits that support charitable projects abroad, provided the nonprofit is not simply a funnel to another group overseas, according to Bruce R. Hopkins, a lawyer and the author of several books on nonprofit law. Donors can indicate how they would like their money to be used, but the nonprofit must exercise “some measure of independence to deliberate on grant-making,” he said.

 

A prominent clearinghouse is the Central Fund of Israel, operated from the Marcus Brothers Textiles offices in the Manhattan garment district. Dozens of West Bank groups seem to view the fund as little more than a vehicle for channeling donations back to themselves, instructing their supporters that if they want a tax break, they must direct their contributions there first. The fund’s president, Hadassah Marcus, acknowledged that it received many checks from donors “who want them to go to different programs in Israel,” but, she said, the fund retains ultimate discretion over the money. It also makes its own grants to needy Jewish families and monitors them, she said, adding that the fund, which collected $13 million in 2008, was audited and complies with I.R.S. rules. “We’re not a funnel. We’re trying to build a land,” she said, adding, “All we’re doing is going back to our home.”

 

Yet, it may be in the interest of “fairness” that the New York Times also write an expose on the Islamic charities and their overwhelming evidence of funding terrorist in Israel, America, Europe and even Russia. While we wait…and wait, let us continue to Part Four on the “Unsettled Settlements”.

 

Credit to Isabel Kershner and Myra Noveck – “Tax-Exempt Funds aid Settlements in West Bank” – New York Times – July 5, 2010

 

BibleSearchers Reflections Series “Settlements: Jewish Opportunity or Jewish Martyrdom”

 

Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Northern Israel: A World of Opportunity Awaits” – Part One

 Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Jewish Martyrdom in a Palestinian State: Not a Live Option” – Part Two

Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Christian Tax-Exempt Funds aid Jewish Settlements in the West Bank” – Part Three

Go to “UnSettled Settlements - Christian Evangelicals and Jewish Orthodox’s Devotion to the Jewish Settlements in West Bank” – Part Four

 

You might be Interested – New York Times Pictorial of Jewish Settlements, “Take a Stand, then a Deduction” – Slide Show

 

To understand more about the Return of the 10 Tribes of Israel,

Contact Kol Ha Tor, the Voice of the Turtledove,

As a Reception from the House of Judah is forming to welcome the returning House of Israel

 

Who are Israel's true friends?

Centcom commander General David Petraeus

 

BibleSearchers Reflections – “It’s amazing how the G-d of Israel is forcing a certain reality of hard decisions. Let us not forget, the final reality will be G-d’s reality for future human life, or HaSatan’s future reality of a world devoid of G-d and His chosen people. If you are a “Spiritual Israelite” and wish to choose that the Jews, and the Lost Tribes of Israel do not exist, or are meaningless in the final cosmic battle between G-d and Satan, think again!  In the future, Sabbath keepers will be identified as Jewish and their destined fate according to the forces of darkness will be one and the same. The defense of Israel is also a defense of the world view of the G-d of Israel. If He abandons the Jewish people, He will abandon us. On that one moment of time, as His Messiah hung on the “Tree”, and said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”, why should He not abandon you and me for our unfaithfulness to the Torah? Did not His Messiah proclaim:

 

Matthew 5:14 – “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law (Torah) and the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, “till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law (Torah) till all is fulfilled.

 

Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does (keep the 613 commands of the Torah) and teaches them he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” For I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.”  

 

A firm historical and spiritual understanding of our Hebrew-Jewish roots is also our pathway of salvation and redemption. It is also our key to the biblical understanding of our geo-political world view. In the fairness of being “fair and balanced” let us look at the other side of this dialogue, yet not forget, the first Zionist was the G-d of Israel. He coined the word. Let us remember, we don’t have to be Christian Zionists, we can accept our divine mandate that many of us are the literally the Lost Tribes of Israel or disciples of YHVH’s Messiah who as a Hasidic Orthodox Jew said, “Follow Me!”  It is time for us to become involved and friends with our Jewish cousins. Both of these groups will believe that as G-d stated, He will dwell in Zion at Jerusalem.

 

Stephen M. Walt – “I've been fighting the temptation to weigh in on the current "crisis" between the United States and Israel -- Lord knows I've already said a lot on this issue over the past few years -- but a few comments are in order.

 

As one would expect, hard-line groups in the Israel lobby like AIPAC, the Conference of Presidents, JINSA and WINEP are now trying to pin the blame for the rift on the Obama administration. They want to portray Obama as insufficiently supportive of the Jewish state, in order to force him to back off the same way he did during last summer's confrontation with Netanyahu over a settlement freeze.

 

This view has it exactly backwards. Whatever you might think of its strategy or its tactics, the Obama administration has been genuinely committed to achieving a two-state solution before it is too late. This policy is not an act of hostility toward Israel; on the contrary, it is an act of extraordinary friendship for Obama to keep this difficult item on an already overcrowded agenda.

 

As former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and current defense minister Ehud Barak have warned: If the two-state solution fails, the Palestinians will be occupied forever and Israel will become an apartheid state. Instead of helping Israel drive itself off a cliff -- as George W. Bush did -- the Obama administration is trying to prevent that disastrous outcome. And because Obama's team understands that the relentless expansion of Israel's illegal settlements is making a two-state solution increasingly difficult to realize, they believe that a halt to settlement building is a key part of a successful peace process. That includes East Jerusalem, by the way, whose annexation by Israel in 1967 is regarded as illegal by the rest of the world, including the United States.

 

Achieving a two-state solution is obviously in America's strategic interest as well, because it would remove one of the major sources of anti-Americanism in the Arab and Muslim world. The vast majority of Muslims reject al Qaeda and its murderous methods, for example, but they share its harsh views about U.S. policy towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A two-state solution won't solve all of our problems in the region, of course, but it would make a lot of them easier to address. It's clear that the U.S. military, which now has a lot of experience in the region, thinks so too. As Centcom commander General David Petraeus told the Armed Services Committee earlier today:

 

General David Petraeus – “The enduring hostilities between Israel and some of its neighbors present distinct challenges to our ability to advance our interests in the AOR [area of operational responsibility]. Israeli-Palestinian tensions often flare into violence and large-scale armed confrontations. The conflict foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel. Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of U.S. partnerships with governments and peoples in the AOR and weakens the legitimacy of moderate regimes in the Arab world. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda and other militant groups exploit that anger to mobilize support. The conflict also gives Iran influence in the Arab world through its clients, Lebanese Hizballah and Hamas

 

A two state solution is also the best guarantee of Israel's long-term future. By showing real backbone this time and explaining to the American people why his approach is right, Obama could be a true friend to the Jewish state.”

 

Netanyahu, AIPAC and the rest of the "status quo" lobby don't get that, and neither do narrow-minded politicians like Joe Lieberman or John McCain. They seem to think it is okay for Israel to keep expanding its control over Palestinian lands and that the United States should back Israel's actions no matter what it does. When disputes arise they should be handled privately, because, as Lieberman put it, the U.S. and Israel are "family." Not true, of course: the United States and Israel are separate countries whose interests are not always identical, and sometimes it makes sense to air those differences in public. The "Christian Zionists" are even worse: They think Israel should control these lands forever in order to fulfill their wacky interpretation of Old Testament prophecy and bring the "end-times" closer. Never mind what happens to Israel itself in the process.

The writers Stephen M. Walt, left, and John J. Mearsheimer.

 

In fact, these people are false friends of Israel, because their recommended course of action will keep it on its current dangerous path. So when you hear them defend the special relationship, or when they accuse Obama or Mitchell or Biden or Clinton of putting unwarranted pressure on Israel, ask them what their long-term solution is. Do they think Israel should control all the territory that once was Mandate Palestine? If so, do they favor a one-party democracy in which Jews and Arabs get equal voting rights, or an apartheid state in which Jews rule over stateless Palestinians? Or are they in favor of ethnic cleansing, the same way that former House Speaker Dick Armey was?

 

Or perhaps they support Netanyahu's bizarre version of "two-states," where Israel keeps all of Jerusalem and confines the Palestinians to a handful of dismembered Bantustans under Israeli control? Those are the only alternatives to a viable two-state solution, and if you don't like them, then you should give Obama credit for his efforts and hope that he holds his ground this time. Because time really is running out.”

 

There will be a One World Government, the kingdom of G-d ruled by Himself from His Throne in heavenly Jerusalem, manifested as His Messiah in earthly Jerusalem. There will not be “two-states” nor anyone living on the “Land of Israel” who are willing to desecrate the holiness of this land that belongs to the G-d of Israel. 

 

Isaiah 9:6-7 – “For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given;

And the government will be upon His shoulder.

And His name will be called, Wonderful, Counselor,

Mighty G-d, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end.

Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom,

To order it and establish it with judgment and justice

From that time forward, even forever.

The zeal of the L-rd of hosts will perform this.”

 

Isaiah 66:1 – “Heaven is My Throne, and

Earth is My Footstool.”

 

Isaiah 2:2-5 – “Now it shall come to pass in the latter days,

That the mountain of the L-rd’s house shall be established on the top of the mountains,

And shall be exalted above the hills;

And all nations shall flow to it.

Many will come and say,

‘Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the G-d of Jacob;

He will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths.’

For out of Zion shall go forth the law (Torah),

And the word of the L-rd from Jerusalem.

He shall judge between the nations and rebuke many people,

They shall beat their swords into plowshares,

And their spears into pruning hooks;

Nation shall not life up sword against nation,

Neither shall they learn war anymore.

O house of Judah, come and let us walk in the light of the L-rd.”

 

Credit to Stephen M. Walt – “Who are Israel's true friends? (Hint: it's not AIPAC)” -    March 16, 2010

 

Stephen Martin Walt (born July 2, 1955) is a professor of international affairs at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. He coauthored The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, A Prosecutorial Brief against Israel and Its Supporters with John Mearsheimer.

 

To understand more about the Return of the 10 Tribes of Israel,

Contact Kol Ha Tor, the Voice of the Turtledove,

As a Reception from the House of Judah is forming to welcome the returning House of Israel

A Light behind the Darkness

 
Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis

 

It is Chodesh Tammuz – the month of Tammuz, (Sunday, June 13 to Sunday, July 11, 2010), and in a matter of days, we will inaugurate the month of Av. This is a period that from the very genesis of our history has been marked by tragedy and even if we refuse to see the Hand of G-d, there is nothing coincidental about that which befalls our people.

 

In this year of 5770, the clouds above us are ominously dark and stormy....events are unfolding so rapidly that it’s difficult to keep up with it all. To be sure, the entire word is affected – the tribulations are not limited to us Jews, but as always, that which befalls the world at large impacts on us even more. So while people throughout the globe have to struggle with unprecedented natural disasters – Tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and the latest catastrophe to hit the U.S -- oil spills polluting our beaches and killing marine life, and while the U.S. and nations throughout the world have to deal with economic disaster that just doesn’t seem to go away, and while we are all forced to watch helplessly as our country falls deeper and deeper into debt, we, the Jewish people have to contend with much more.

 

It is not only our comfort level and life style that is at risk – our very existence as a nation is on the line. Israel is being demonized throughout the world and we see signs of this even here in our own U.S.A. To be sure, most of us tend to dismiss this demonization as just so much “politics” – nothing to get excited about, Still others are willing to join the chorus of vilifies, and see no tragedy in the dismantling of Israel, G-d forbid. “This has nothing to do with us”, they assure themselves, “It’s all about Zionism”.  But those of us who are in the know are only too aware that in every generation, the anti-Semites find a new way to package their venomous hatred that makes it palatable for mass consumption. So today, it is “Israel and Zionism that legitimizes Jew baiting even if there are those among us who refuse to accept this reality.

 

We, the Jewish people, are one body, and when one part of us is injured, then the entire body is affected, but alas, despite two thousand years of history that substantiates this, the great majority of our people have yet to accept it. . So like it or not, as Israel is being demonized throughout the world, it is not only Israel that is attacked, but every Jew as well.  And as I said, sadly, we see evidence of this even on these shores. And I’m not only referring to  the despicable remarks of Helen Thomas, the elderly White House reporter who occupied a most venerable chair, but more significantly, the shift in U.S. policy vis a vis Israel. 

 

I wonder how many of us paid heed to the article in the New York Times on Sunday, July 3. I will quote just 2 brief paragraphs from that column entitled “Nudge On Arms Further Divides the U.S. and Israel”. It reads as follows: “It was only one paragraph buried deep in the most plain-vanilla kind of diplomatic document, 40 pages of dry language committing 189 nations to a world free of nuclear weapons. But it has become the latest source of friction between Israel and the United States in a relationship that has lurched from crisis to crisis over the last few months.

 

At a meeting to review the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty in May, the United States yielded to demands by Arab nations that the final document urge Israel to sign a treaty – a way of spotlighting its historically undeclared nuclear weapons.”

 

There has always been a sacrosanct, silent agreement that the Jewish people, who survived the most savage Holocaust in the annals of mankind, that the Jewish people, who presently live in a sea of hostile nations  – nations who are once again determined to annihilate her and inflict a new Holocaust upon her, are in need of every defense system that they can have. Therefore, American policy has always been to close its eyes to the nuclear capacity of Israel. And now, for the very first time, all that is changing. The repercussions to such a shift in American policy are inestimable, and mind you, I’m not even referring to the conflicts that have torn apart the traditional friendship and support that has marked the relationship between Washington and Jerusalem.

 

Nor am I referring to the Flotilla fiasco, in which Israel was censured and ostracized for trying to prevent deadly weapons from reaching her shores – deadly weapons meant to maim, kill and annihilate her citizens. No matter which way we turn, Israel is always the villain and our killers are always the innocent victims.  Parenthetically, it is worthwhile to note that that same NY Times article pointed out that the document did not single out Iran for her nuclear ambitions.

 

And as if this was not enough to give us sleepless nights, we have to struggle with internal spiritual bankruptcy as well which was highlighted by the supreme court nominee, Elena Kagan. When asked about her activities on x-mas day, when a terrorist tried to attack our shores, she responded by saying, “I did that which every good Jew does on x-mas – I went to a Chinese restaurant.”, a remark that brought down the house and earned her the praise of the media who designated her as “charming and funny”. 

 

Sadly, the average Jew found nothing objectionable in that remark. He too agreed that it was quite funny. But that remark was a tragic commentary on the spiritual bankruptcy that prevails among so many of our people. . All nations revere their commandments, their faith, but we, who stood at Sinai, we, who received our commandments from G-d Himself, make a mockery of His laws and invite the nations to ridicule them as well. So, how does all this register in front of G-d? I shudder to think of the answer.

 

To be sure, we are Hashem’s children and He will never give up on us, but just consider how a father feels when his son ridicules his teachings and shows him no respect. Long ago, the Prophet Isaiah cried out, “Banim g’dalti v’romamti ....I raised and exhalted children, but they have rebelled against Me. An ox knows its owner, a donkey its master’s trough, but Israel does not know, My people does not perceive.”

 

So where do we go from here? What hope is there? What we are witnessing today is the fulfillment of prophesy. We are living in the period that has been described as Ikvesa D’Moshiach – a time when, if you know how to listen, the footsteps of Moshiach are audible. So, in the midst of all this darkness, there is a bright shining light that is beckoning to us all. We need only open our Holy Books to discover incredible prophecies unfolding before our very eyes.

 

In last week’s parsha, Pashas Bolok (Numbers 24:24), Targum Yehonathon Ben Uziel teaches that just before the coming of Moshiach, ships from  Constantinople (Turkey) will come and cause pain to our people. They will be joined by other nations as well, but they will ultimately be destroyed.

 

In the Talmud it is written that during this period, oil will fill the waters and the fish will die. And then, just consider what is written in Yalkut Shimoni – that in the period that ushers in Messiah, the King of Persia (Iran) will develop a  weapon that will threaten the world and create panic in Israel. But the passage tells us to be strong and to remember that all this is unfolding to make way for our final redemption – the coming of Messiah. The Klausenberger Rebbe, Z’tl, said that these passages should be well remembered, for while they may not be understood now (at the time that he spoke) they will be a source of strength to our people in the very near future.

 

Unfortunately however, the average Jew is suffering from Torah illiteracy and has no way of understanding that which he is witnessing with his own eyes. It’s time for all of us to wake up – to open our holy books – to call out to our Heavenly Father in prayer and ask Him to take our hand and lead us through the darkness.

 

At this point, I think it only fair to call attention to the fact that there are some righteous gentiles who do understand and see the light, and who have the courage to raise their voices on behalf of Israel. I quote just a few passages from the Spanish ex Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar:

 

Spanish ex Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar  - “It is easy to blame Israel for all the evils in the Middle East. Some even act and talk as if a new understanding with the Muslim world could be achieved if only we were prepared to sacrifice the Jewish State on the altar, This would be folly. If Israel goes down, we all go down. To defend Israel’s right to exist in peace within secure borders, requires a degree of moral and strategic clarity that too often seems to have disappeared in Europe. The United States shows worrying signs of heading in the same direction.

 

The West is going through a period of confusion over the shape of the world’s future. To a great extent this confusion is caused by a kind of masochistic self-doubt over our own identity, by the rule of political correctness, by a multiculturalism that forces us to our knees before others, and by a secularism which, irony of ironies, blinds us even when we are confronted by jihadis promoting the most fanatical incarnation of their faith. To abandon Israel to its fate, at this moment of all moments, would merely serve to illustrate how far we have sunk and how inexorable our decline now appears.    

 

Israel is a fundamental part of the West. The West is what it is thanks to its Judeo-Christian roots. If the Jewish element of those roots is upturned and Israel is lost, then we are lost too. Whether we like it or not, our fate is inextricably intertwined.

 

Sixty-two years after its creation, Israel is still fighting for its very survival. Punished with missiles raining from north and south, threatened with destruction by an Iran aiming to acquire nuclear weapons and pressed upon by friend and foe, Israel, it seems, is never to have a moment’s peace.

 

For years, the focus of Western attention has understandably been on the peace process between Israelis and Palestinians. The real threats to regional stability however, are to be found in the rise of a radical Islamism which sees Israel’s destruction as the fulfillment of its religious destiny and, simultaneously in the case of Iran, as an expression of its ambitions for regional hegemony. Both phenomena are threats that affect not only Israel, but also the wider West and the world at large.....”

 

Credit to Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis with the The Rebbetzin's Viewpoint

– “A Light Behind the Darkness” – July 8, 2010

Spanish Prime Minister Don José María Aznar - If Israel goes down, we all go down

Spain’s former Partido Popular Prime Minister, José María Aznar
 

“Anger over Gaza is a distraction.

We cannot forget that Israel is the West’s best ally in a turbulent region”

 

José María Aznar – “For far too long now it has been unfashionable in Europe to speak up for Israel. In the wake of the recent incident on board a ship full of anti-Israeli activists in the Mediterranean, it is hard to think of a more unpopular cause to champion.

 

In an ideal world, the assault by Israeli commandos on the Mavi Marmara would not have ended up with nine dead and a score wounded. In an ideal world, the soldiers would have been peacefully welcomed on to the ship. In an ideal world, no state, let alone a recent ally of Israel such as Turkey, would have sponsored and organized a flotilla whose sole purpose was to create an impossible situation for Israel: making it choose between giving up its security policy and the naval blockade, or risking the wrath of the world.

 

In our dealings with Israel, we must blow away the red mists of anger that too often cloud our judgment. A reasonable and balanced approach should encapsulate the following realities: first, the state of Israel was created by a decision of the UN. Its legitimacy, therefore, should not be in question. Israel is a nation with deeply rooted democratic institutions. It is a dynamic and open society that has repeatedly excelled in culture, science and technology.

 

Second, owing to its roots, history, and values, Israel is a fully fledged Western nation. Indeed, it is a normal Western nation, but one confronted by abnormal circumstances.

 

Uniquely in the West, it is the only democracy whose very existence has been questioned since its inception. In the first instance, it was attacked by its neighbors using the conventional weapons of war. Then it faced terrorism culminating in wave after wave of suicide attacks. Now, at the behest of radical Islamists and their sympathizers, it faces a campaign of delegitimisation through international law and diplomacy.

 

Sixty-two years after its creation, Israel is still fighting for its very survival. Punished with missiles raining from north and south, threatened with destruction by an Iran aiming to acquire nuclear weapons and pressed upon by friend and foe, Israel, it seems, is never to have a moment’s peace.

 

For years, the focus of Western attention has understandably been on the peace process between Israelis and Palestinians. But if Israel is in danger today and the whole region is slipping towards a worryingly problematic future, it is not due to the lack of understanding between the parties on how to solve this conflict. The parameters of any prospective peace agreement are clear, however difficult it may seem for the two sides to make the final push for a settlement.

 

The real threats to regional stability, however, are to be found in the rise of a radical Islamism which sees Israel’s destruction as the fulfillment of its religious destiny and, simultaneously in the case of Iran, as an expression of its ambitions for regional hegemony. Both phenomena are threats that affect not only Israel, but also the wider West and the world at large.

 

The core of the problem lies in the ambiguous and often erroneous manner in which too many Western countries are now reacting to this situation. It is easy to blame Israel for all the evils in the Middle East. Some even act and talk as if a new understanding with the Muslim world could be achieved if only we were prepared to sacrifice the Jewish state on the altar. This would be folly.

 

Israel is our first line of defense in a turbulent region that is constantly at risk of descending into chaos; a region vital to our energy security owing to our overdependence on Middle Eastern oil; a region that forms the front line in the fight against extremism. If Israel goes down, we all go down. To defend Israel’s right to exist in peace, within secure borders, requires a degree of moral and strategic clarity that too often seems to have disappeared in Europe. The United States shows worrying signs of heading in the same direction.

 

The West is going through a period of confusion over the shape of the world’s future. To a great extent, this confusion is caused by a kind of masochistic self-doubt over our own identity; by the rule of political correctness; by a multiculturalism that forces us to our knees before others; and by a secularism which, irony of ironies, blinds us even when we are confronted by jihadis promoting the most fanatical incarnation of their faith. To abandon Israel to its fate, at this moment of all moments, would merely serve to illustrate how far we have sunk and how inexorable our decline now appears.

 

This cannot be allowed to happen. Motivated by the need to rebuild our own Western values, expressing deep concern about the wave of aggression against Israel, and mindful that Israel’s strength is our strength and Israel’s weakness is our weakness, I have decided to promote a new Friends of Israel initiative with the help of some prominent people, including David Trimble, Andrew Roberts, John Bolton, Alejandro Toledo (the former President of Peru), Marcello Pera (philosopher and former President of the Italian Senate), Fiamma Nirenstein (the Italian author and politician), the financier Robert Agostinelli and the Catholic intellectual George Weigel.

 

It is not our intention to defend any specific policy or any particular Israeli government. The sponsors of this initiative are certain to disagree at times with decisions taken by Jerusalem. We are democrats, and we believe in diversity.

 

What binds us, however, is our unyielding support for Israel’s right to exist and to defend itself. For Western countries to side with those who question Israel’s legitimacy, for them to play games in international bodies with Israel’s vital security issues, for them to appease those who oppose Western values rather than robustly to stand up in defense of those values, is not only a grave moral mistake, but a strategic error of the first magnitude.

 

Israel is a fundamental part of the West. The West is what it is thanks to its Judeo-Christian roots. If the Jewish element of those roots is upturned and Israel is lost, then we are lost too. Whether we like it or not, our fate is inextricably intertwined.”

 

Credit to Command the Raven – “If Israel goes down, We all go down” – June 17, 2010 published in the British News, “The Times”.

 

The Most Excellent Don José María Aznar was the 76^th President of the Government of Spain, 4^th President of the Modern Spanish Government (May 4, 1996 – April 17, 2004) also known as the “Prime Minister of Spain”.  He governed under Spanish King Juan Carlos I of Spain

 

“Jerusalem and the Jew owe Europe and the West nothing! - Eliezer Whartman, the Westinghouse Radio correspondent in Israel during the War of 1967

 Liberation of the Western Wall in Jerusalem by Israeli Paratroopers in the Six Day War of 1967

 

In this combination of two photos, Israeli army paratroopers Zion Karasanti, left, Yitzhak Yifat, centre, and Haim Oshri, right, stand next to the Western Wall, Judaism holiest site, in Jerusalem's Old City after it was captured during the Six Day War on June 7, 1967, left, and 40 years later, May 16, 2007. The image on the left is etched in history - an iconic photo that captured Israel in its most triumphant moment. Three young, battle-worn faces gazing up in wonder at the Western Wall, moments after capturing Judaism's holiest site in the Six-Day War.

 

Eliezer Whartman - “Jerusalem and the Jew owe Europe and the West nothing. They did not build this city; they did not live in it; neither did they defend the city when they and others came to destroy it. And the Jews will be damned if they will let anyone take it away.

 

Jerusalem stood long before there was a New York. It was a thriving Jewish community while Berlin, Moscow, London, and Paris were little more than forest or swamp. Jerusalem gave something real to the world, which it rejected in favour of a more humanistic moral code.

 

Jerusalem is where the prophets walked and the Jew fought off waves of heathen would-be-conquerors. Where he bled and died on its battlements and when finally overwhelmed and led away into captivity, the Jews swore that before they forgot Jerusalem, they would see their tongues cleave to their palates, their right arms wither.

 

For two pain-filled millennia, while they sojourned as unwelcomed guests, they prayed daily to return to Jerusalem. Three times a day the world, they prayed daily to return to Jerusalem. Three times a day they petitioned the Almighty: “Gather us from the four corners of the world, bring us upright to our land; return in mercy to Jerusalem, Thy city, and dwell in it as Thou promised”.  On every Yom Kippur and Passover, they fervently voiced the hope that next year would find them in Jerusalem.

 

The European inquisitions, pogroms, expulsions and ghettos into which they jammed them, forced baptism in the name of Christianity, national quota systems, genteel anti-Semitism, and the final unspeakable horror, the holocaust (and worse, the West’s terrifying disinterest in it) – all these have not broken Judah.  Rather, it forged them into steel.  Only a fool will think that Judah-Israel can be broken after all it has been through?  After Dachau-and Auschwitz, can one believe that they would be frightened by threats of blockades and sanctions?  They have been to Hell and back – a Hell of mainly Christian European making. And no one ever said a word.

Jerusalem in 1948

 

The West never breathed the slightest protest, when the Jordanians shut off the holiest of Jewish places, the Western Wall, in violation of the pledges they had made after the war. Western hearts bled when Berlin came under siege.  It rushed an airlift to “save the gallant Berliners”. The West thundered against the Berlin wall – but not one peep over that other wall, the one that tore through the heart of Jerusalem.

 

The only time the West came to life, was when the city of Jerusalem was at last reunited. Then it spoke loftily of “justice” and the need for the “Christian” quality of turning the other cheek. Yet, no matter how diplomatically one  puts it, the truth, deep inside the institutionalized Christian gut, is that great churches would prefer the city to be destroyed rather than have it governed by Jews.

 

If Judah’s miraculous return to Jerusalem has tied certain Christian institutionalized theology into knots, then perhaps it had better reexamine its catechism. After what the Jews have been through, they are not going to passively accommodate themselves to the twisted idea that they are to suffer eternal homelessness until they accept the theology of others.

 

Now for the first time since the year 70 AD, when the Romans put a torch to the temple, there is complete religious freedom for all in Jerusalem. Everyone has equal religious rights.  The Jew is home – Judea-Israel – a lovely sound for a nation that was forced to wander over all the face of the earth.  So get used to the idea that they are not leaving.  They are redeeming the pledge made by our forefathers: Jerusalem is being rebuilt. “Next year” and the year after, and so on until the end of time – “in Jerusalem!”  (J.G. Messervy-Norman, “Meat in Due Season”, page 148-149)

 

Credit to J.G. Messervy-Norman – “Meat in Due Season” – http://www.Biscuittreebooks.com

 

Unsettled Settlements – Jewish Martyrdom in a Palestinian State: Not a Live Option – Part Two

Poppies along Derech Alon – Shlomi Springer/Arutz Sheva Gallery of Israel #863

 

BibleSearchers Reflections – Where in the world are a national people living from the beginnings of antiquity that are surrounded by nations who despise them and wish for their extermination? If this were to happen in any of the European countries, Russia or the United States the politics of the United Nations would be vastly different. Yet, these are the same national entities that are forcing a reality upon the State of Israel that they would not accept for themselves. 

 

Let us assume that a Palestinian State actually becomes a reality.  History would suggest that this model has already been tried before.  The Chancellor of Germany, Adolf Hitler, unable to take over the highly fortified Nation of Czechoslovakia that was surrounded by natural defenses of mountains, sought to allure the west to allow him to protect the interests of ethnic German nationals living within Czechoslovakia.  As documented in BibleSearchers Reflections, in the sub-article, “The Jews, Hitler, the Holocaust and the Time of Jacob’s Troubles”, we read:

 

BibleSearchers Reflections – “Nazi expansionism began in earnest in 1939.  They had already taken over the Saarland by a plebiscite vote in January, 1935, and then in March 12, 1938, they took over Austria.  In the Munich Conference on September 28 and 29, 1938, Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain of Great Britain abandoned the most prosperous and most democratic country in central Europe, along with the leaders of France and Italy, when they conceded that the three million ethnic Germans living in the region in Czechoslovakia where they were a minority, could have autonomy within the center of the country of Czechoslovakia. 

  

Chamberlain return to England triumphant that he had brought, “peace in our time”, along with these words, “How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas masks here because of a quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing.”  (Ibid 47)  By March, 1939, Germany had taken over Czechoslovakia and in six months, Britain was at war with Germany.  Chamberlain was now history. 

 

This concept is called Balkanization, where a minority ethnic group is given autonomy within a national country, was later tried again in Yugoslavia by the US and NATO in order to carve out a Moslem State within the existing sovereign nation of Yugoslavia, whose national framework was a conglomerate of Moslems, Eastern Orthodox (Christians) and Roman Catholic citizens.  The wars at Kosovo with the resultant thousands losing their lives in religious genocide, is also the present political blue-print imposed upon the State of Israel by the United Nations with the internal Palestinian state, the West Bank and Gaza. 

 

In fact, when the United Nations and the United States were in the process of invading the Balkans, President Bill Clinton assured Yasser Arafat that this war was done to “give him time to create a more positive attitude and support by the American people to support a Palestinian State in Israel.” 

 

The morale of the story was that Chamberlain’s name has gone down with infamy in history for selling out the destiny of the third strongest nation in Europe. The citizens of the Nation of Czechoslovakia would first come under Nazi control and then pawned out to the Russians to remain under the communist control all through the Cold War.

 

This same model is being used again in the Land of Israel, this time to the people chosen to be G-d’s light to the nations. If the sell-out of Israel were to succeed, here is a foretaste of what will happen not to the Jewish Zionists, the Jewish globalists, the Jewish internationalists, the Jewish secularists, but to the Jewish orthodox, who are worshipping the G-d of Israel and keeping their covenant with their G-d. The anger of the G-d of Israel will have no bounds even against the Lost Tribes of Israel in America and Northern Europe, who have participated in such infamy.

 

Let us now turn to the Jerusalem Post in the article titled; “Between Principle and Peril”:

 

Jerusalem Post – “It is perhaps somberly appropriate to address this issue of settlers remaining in a future Palestinian state one week after a state investigation committee made its final report on the failed resettlement of the Jewish expellees from the Gaza Strip. Five years from the announcement by Ariel Sharon's agitprop that there was a solution for every settler, most of the expellees are still in limbo.

If this was the best the government could do for the 9,000 former residents of Gaza and Northern Samaria, it is hard to expect a superior performance if such a tragedy is revisited on a population that is twentyfold larger. Once the Israeli peace camp could expect international largesse to resettle the expellees, but the current global financial crisis and the prevailing winds of austerity dash such optimism.

 

The fear of serious resistance to expulsion orders also accounts for the renewed interest in a solution that leaves many Jewish communities within a Palestinian state. It will require the Jewish communities of Judea and Samaria to make a Hobbesian choice between principle and peril.

The principled and patriotic decision would be for the communities to remain in place. Jewish "sumud" (steadfastness) will demonstrate to the Arabs that Jews are not latter day Crusaders – an alien entity – but are motivated by their religious and historical link to the land of their forefathers.

The sages in the Talmud, perhaps observing a similar predicament in their era, opined that it is preferable for a Jew to live in the land of Israel even in a city with a non-Jewish majority than to live outside it in an ancient version of Borough Park in Brooklyn.

It is also a matter of simple reciprocity. If an Israeli state can be expected to host an Arab minority approaching 20 percent, then a neighboring Palestinian state can be expected to do the same for Jewish communities rather than emptying its territory of Jews.

UNFORTUNATELY, THE issue of principle clashes seriously with the perilous reality on the ground. There are no prospects whatsoever that would allow a Jewish minority in a Palestinian state to survive and prosper. Jews electing to remain will consign themselves to suffering and probably martyrdom. And martyrdom in Judaism is a last resort, not the preferred option.

The benign treatment accorded British nationals in the Republic of Ireland once that country had attained its independence will not be revisited in a future Palestine. Observe the fate of Jewish communities throughout the Arab world, where even the minuscule remnants of the Yemenite Jewish community face persecution and mortal danger.

One can also extrapolate from the dwindling Arab Christian communities: persecution by the Muslim majority has made emigration the preferred option; Bethlehem, once a symbol of Arab Christianity, is effectively a Muslim town. If this is the treatment accorded people who share a similar culture and speak the same language, can Jews expect greater benevolence?

 

A newly independent Palestine can be expected to honor Jewish minority rights at best on the level that newly independent Poland adhered to the provisions of the League of Nations minority treaty – i.e., it will ignore them totally. The Kingdom of Jordan imposes a death penalty on anyone convicted of selling land to Jews. In Israel, by contrast, when the chief Rabbi of Safed exhorted Jews not to sell houses to Arabs, the Israeli legal system came down upon him like a ton of bricks. One may not even have to resort to pogroms.

Dominating the remaining Jewish communities will be mega-mosques with mammoth loudspeakers that will regale the Jews 24/7 with decibel splitting calls to prayer. Perhaps the new neighbors will be toxic and noxious factories. If the Jews fail to get the message, we will move on to boycotts, violence against property escalating to violence against individuals, followed by abduction, detention and murder.

 

For form's sake, a Palestinian leader may even issue an intermittent denunciation (preferably in English), but the perpetrators will receive an encouraging wink and a reward. The international community will not lift a finger for fear of endangering the "peace process." The voices of progressivism will intone that the settlers brought it on themselves.

Perhaps a Palestinian state may tolerate a supine Jewish minority that will dutifully appear at anti- Zionist demonstrations. The Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria however will not abjure their Zionist beliefs to make this scenario a reality, while the Arabs will not countenance the presence of a Jewish Ahmed Tibi assertive of Jewish minority rights.

This inevitable scenario could be deterred if the Palestinian state feared a crushing military reaction from Israel or violent retribution from the Jewish populace in Israel that would transpose the situation into the Greco-Turkish case of the 1920s or India and Pakistan in 1947, namely a mutual expulsion of minorities. But this eventuality would be thwarted by Israel's human rights cartel and legal establishment, while military conquest will only bring us back to square one in the conflict and perhaps exacerbate it further.”

Credit to Amiel Ungar – “Between Principle and Peril” – June 23, 2010 – Jerusalem Post

 

BibleSearchers Reflections Series “Settlements: Jewish Opportunity or Jewish Martyrdom”

 

Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Northern Israel: A World of Opportunity Awaits” – Part One

Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Jewish Martyrdom in a Palestinian State: Not a Live Option” – Part Two

Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Christian Tax-Exempt Funds aid Jewish Settlements in the West Bank – Part Three

Go to “UnSettled Settlements - Christian Evangelicals and Jewish Orthodox’s Devotion to the Jewish Settlements in West Bank” – Part Four

You might be Interested – New York Times Pictorial of Jewish Settlements, “Take a Stand, then a Deduction” – Slide Show

 

To understand more about the Return of the 10 Tribes of Israel,

Contact Kol Ha Tor, the Voice of the Turtledove,

As a Reception from the House of Judah is forming to welcome the returning House of Israel

 

Unsettled Settlements – Northern Israel: A World of Opportunity Awaits – Part One

 

BibleSearchers Reflections – The transition from a world of national states to a One World Order is not expected to be a bed of roses but in reality will be a rocky and probable catastrophic transition. What is amazing is that it is the Jewish State of Israel and the Israelite nation of the United States of American that are locking horns over this issue.  Here are “cousins” in a feud.   The Founding Fathers of America were British citizens now known to be Lost Tribe of Ephraim. These two tribes are the Jews of the House of Judah and the British Americans descendants of Ephraim, the younger son of the Tribe of Joseph.   

The second reality is that America was founded by Israelite descendants. Their descendant as an internationalist and trans-nationalist like President George W. Bush, was not permitted to leave his legacy as the one to destroy the sovereignty of the United States and transition the American people into an International Global Union, called North American Union. It’s not that he didn’t try.   

 

It appears that it will take an Islamic Ishmaelite that will eventually carry the banner to take away the sovereignty of the United States of America whose Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights by the Congress of the United States were all founded upon the legal moral principles of the Torah Law. 

 

This law was given to the Jews and Israelites at the mount called Sinai.  It was imbedded in the framing of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights of the United States. As this Islamic descendant presides over a nation imploding they will realize that our environment has been destroyed in the Southern Gulf States by global forces intent on power, greed, and control.  This once great nation will be reduced to “one among equals amongst the nations”. 

 

What is becoming more transparent is that the global agenda of transition to a Federation of Economic Unions will pit the United States against Israel until both are destroyed; one governed by a descendant of Islam, possibly from the loins of Ishmael ruling over Israelites, and the other, Israel, governed by a descendant of Isaac, the son of Abraham. The House of Abraham is at war today against each other. Believe the prophets and the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob will win, as the State of Israel will eventually transform itself into Greater Israel governed by Torah law. That transformation is the greatest challenge of the Jewish people today.  When they raise the banner and blow the Shofar, and cry out to the G-d of Israel, the final transformation will begin to Greater Israel.

 

In the meantime, the Jewish settlements have become the harbinger of change.  Who will win? The words such as “right wing” and “intransigency” suggest that when the gauntlet is drawn, the Jewish State will be on the road to its Messianic idealistic future. The globalists One World Order will be created on the Laws of the Gentile Nations, while Greater Israel will be recreated on the Laws of Torah. The prophets of Israel agree that a Messianic State of Greater Israel will be the future of both the Jews of the House of Judah and the Return of the Lost Tribes of the House of Israel. Prophetic history strongly affirms that there are no other national peoples, states, or empires whose history has continued from its origins until now with a promise of eternity except at Zion, in the Land of Israel. Let us look at the settlement issue from the eyes of an American foreign policy magazine, “Foreign Policy” with the article titled, “Unsettled” .   

 

Foreign Policy – “Barack Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu may manage to paper over their differences next week, but deep disagreements remain -- Israel's settlements foremost among them. 

 

Just days before a scheduled fence-mending visit to Washington by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, I received an email from the Jerusalem Post that invited me to move to territory that most of the world considers occupied Arab land.

 

The email, titled "Enhanced financial assistance for Aliyah to Israel's North in 2010," promised up to $14,000 in cash and numerous other benefits ("aliyah" is the term for when Diaspora Jews move to Israel). The email showed a smiling young mother and daughter looking out over a vista of red tile-roofed houses, rolling green hills, and a large lake.

 

A few clicks revealed that the Golan Heights -- which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 war -- is among the "northern" communities seeking prospective immigrants. Elsewhere on the site of Nefesh B'Nefesh -- which means "Soul-to-Soul" and is the Israeli organization promoting the initiative -- was a map that linked to numerous settlements in the West Bank that are also available for newcomers.

 

Rather like old Palestinian maps that did not acknowledge the state of Israel, the Nefesh B'Nefesh illustration omits Israel's pre-1967 "Green Line" border and any reference to the Golan Heights, West Bank, or Gaza. Settlements were the cause of the Obama administration's last big blow up with the Netanyahu government, during Vice President Joe Biden's trip to Israel in February, and are likely to remain the biggest obstacle to restarting Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

 

Netanyahu, due to meet with President Barack Obama July 6 to make up for a session canceled after the May 31 Gaza-bound flotilla fiasco, announced a 10-month moratorium on new settlement construction last November in large part due to U.S. pressure. But the moratorium permits completion of projects already started as of Nov. 25 and excludes the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem, both of which Israel has annexed but whose status in international law remains that of land occupied during a war. According to a report by Peace Now and its American sister organization, Americans for Peace Now, there was a "33% spike in building starts" in occupied territories on the eve of the moratorium, "effectively inoculating the settlers in advance so that they would feel little or no effect."

 

Unless the moratorium is extended beyond its scheduled expiration on Sept. 26, Peace Now states, "these past 10 months will have had no significance on the ground -- either in terms of settlement construction (which never stopped) or political impact.... Worse still, the moratorium may actually end up having laid the groundwork for a major increase in settlement construction, with settlers working hard, in advance of the expiration, to gain approval for new projects to be implemented as soon as the moratorium ends.

 

Michael Herzog, a retiring brigadier general in the Israel Defense Forces, says Netanyahu will not extend the moratorium -- even with all its loopholes -- unless the Palestinians agree to move to direct negotiations from the proximity talks begun in May by U.S. envoy George Mitchell. A veteran of failed negotiations in 2000 and at Annapolis in 2007, Herzog wants new talks to begin and succeed. "We cannot afford a third failure," he told an audience at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy on July 1.

 

Palestinian leaders say they have little incentive to begin direct negotiations while Israel continues to subsidize settlement growth. Given the choppy pattern of U.S.-Israel relations under Obama and the dynamics of Netanyahu's right-wing coalition, it wouldn't be a surprise if Israel announced some new housing activity just before, during, or after the Obama-Netanyahu meeting: perhaps some digging around the old Shepherd Hotel in East Jerusalem. Plans to demolish the hotel and build Jewish housing in its place are particularly controversial because it would be the first time since 1967 that such construction would occur in Sheikh Jarrah, a predominantly Arab neighborhood north of the Old City.

 

"It seems as though Bibi [Netanyahu] believes it is easier and less costly to fight with Obama than his [Netanyahu's] interior minister or the mayor of Jerusalem," says Lara Friedman, director of policy and government relations for Americans for Peace Now.

 

Stephen Hadley, a former national security advisor under George W. Bush and now part of a Middle East study group at the U.S. Institute of Peace, says he thinks the Obama-Netanyahu summit will go relatively smoothly after months of friction. "This visit is doomed to succeed," Hadley told the Washington Institute crowd. But that doesn't mean all is roses. "The crunch time will come in September" when the settlement moratorium and Arab League approval for proximity talks both expire, he said.

 

Meanwhile, a host of benefits beckons for American Jews who decide to move to Israel at a time of high unemployment in the United States. Nefesh B'Nefesh, which receives one-third of its aliyah budget from the Israeli Ministry of Immigrant Absorption, promises employment coaching and white-collar job opportunities. In the "North," its website says, "there is demand for grant writers, fundraisers, marketing and communications professionals and international sales people. The North is also ripe for entrepreneurship, and there are resources available to assist those who are interested in opening a business in the area." As to the possibility that these homes and businesses might someday have to be relinquished in the cause of peace, the website has nothing to say. The Israeli Embassy in Washington declined comment on the issue.”

 

On behalf of the Jewish settlers in Samaria, Judea and now the Golan Heights, and their Lost Israelite supporters in America and Europe, thanks for the promotion! Maybe it’s time for “Peace Now” to become pro-Zionist for the G-d of Israel is the Divine Supporter of Zion. You would not want to miss out - redemption!

 

By Barbara Slavin – “Unsettled” – Foreign Policy - July 2, 2010

 

BibleSearchers Reflections Series “Settlements: Jewish Opportunity or Jewish Martyrdom”

 

Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Northern Israel: A World of Opportunity Awaits” – Part One

Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Jewish Martyrdom in a Palestinian State: Not a Live Option” – Part Two

Go to “Unsettled Settlements – Christian Tax-Exempt Funds aid Jewish Settlements in the West Bank” – Part Three

Go to “UnSettled Settlements – Christian Evangelicals and Jewish Orthodox Devotion to the Jewish Settlements in West Bank” – Part Four

 

You might be Interested – New York Times Pictorial on Jewish Settlements, “Take a Stand, then a Deduction” – Slide Show

 

To understand more about the Return of the 10 Tribes of Israel,

Contact Kol Ha Tor, the Voice of the Turtledove,

As a Reception from the House of Judah is forming to welcome the returning House of Israel

 

Torah Codes predict, and Warn about, Obama Presidency - Obama and Jewish Gematria

Presidential Candidate Barak Hussein Obama

 

Israel Insider – “The following facts will make it abundantly clear why, two Jewish researchers, Joel Gallis and Dr. Robert Wolf, asserted with utter certainty in May 2007, long before Barack Hussein Obama had won his first primary and when it appeared that Hillary Clinton was a sure thing, that he would be the next president of the United States. More recently, in August 2008, the scholars reported that Obama's name "intersects" with a passage in the apocalyptic book of Daniel, Chapter 7, and specifically Daniel 7:25, which speaks of the last "king" who would oppress God's people under the rubric of bringing about "change" to the world.

 

The scholars show that the numerical equivalent of "Barack Hussein Obama" in Gematria – the

practice of finding the numerical value of letters and creating associations between words and

phrases – is 501.

 

In an article from August 2008, the scholars elaborate that this number is associated with the "end of days" and two factors that they say the Torah indicate would trigger the apocalypse: the

rise of Islam and the fact that Jews are bringing about their own fall – by overwhelming helping to elect Obama:

 

The connection is that the descendants of Yishmael are the evil that will befall the Jewish People at that time. We will anger G-d through the work of our hands, mkici dyrna (a gematria of 501), and the evil of the mil`rnyi (also a gematria of 501) will befall us. So what could we have possibly done with our hands that would anger Hashem? With our very own hands, we finance and work to put the wrong people in power over us. This action results in our downfall.

 

By putting into power leaders in Israel who don’t believe in G-d, we help bring about a spiritual collapse. And by electing dangerous leaders in America and other countries, we assist in bringing our physical and moral downfall. We vote for these people, we put them in power, and we raise money for them. This inappropriate work of our hands will bring evil upon us in the form of Yishmael (Ishmael).

 

For not only is 501 the value of mkici dyrna (The work of our hands), and our punishment, the mil`rnyi, but it is also connected to the next President of the United States that we are helping put in power through Jewish efforts. For 501 is also the gematria of y`x representing the “new head, or leader of America.”

 

So who will be the new y`x of America? Our readers probably will be shocked to learn that 501 is also the gematria of dn`ae` oiiqeg wxa, Barack Hussein Obama. Hashem watches as countless Jews, especially in Hollywood, California, rush to send their money to Obama’s campaign chest. And so, with our own hands we are in the process of taking a descendant from Yishmael and placing him as our Rosh in the White House, just 7 years after 9/11.

 

He is indeed the evil that will befall us at the end of days, the evil that Moses spoke to our ancestors about. But there are those who argue that Obama is youthful and energized in his appearance and his ideas. Why shouldn’t we believe him when he says the magic words that he is a “friend of Israel”? How do we really know he’s dangerous to us? Not only is his name the same gematria (501) as Yishmaelim (Islamic descendants of Ishmael), evidencing that he is a Muslim although he denies it, but it also has a further connection to a wave of impending evil against the Jews and the rest of the world.

 

At our Passover seders, we spill a drop of wine when we mention each of the 10 plagues, and also when we mention the abbreviation of those plagues by saying ag`a ycr jvc. Well this abbreviation of the 10 plagues also has a gematria of 501, the same as Barack Hussein Obama and the Yishmaelim.

Barack Hussein Obama in Traditional Muslim Garb

 

Obama and radical Muslims will bring as much havoc, destruction, and confusion to the world as all the 10 plagues together brought to Egypt. It’s interesting how Rabbi Yehudah, who made the acrostic or abbreviation of the plagues, took the first Hebrew letter of each plague. However, with respect to the last plague, zexka zkn, the killing of the first born, he took the bais (the first letter of the 2nd word of the plague), rather than the mem (the first letter of the first word). Perhaps he knew that in the future, during the end of days, there would be an Obama. Perhaps his message is a warning to us that has been encoded in the Haggadah for nearly 2 thousand years until today.

 

The foreign minister of Hamas has recently endorsed Obama for president. The Los Angeles Times devoted a lengthy front-page story headlined, “Allies of Palestinians see a friend in Barack Obama. Ali Abunimah, a resident of Obama’s district, claims that Obama said several years ago when running for the Senate, that he was sorry he couldn’t talk more about the Palestinian cause since his primary campaign had constrained what he could say.

 

Words of Similarity in Hebrew with the Gematria (501) of the Name Barack Hussein Obama

 

· “Barack Hussein Obama” – “dn`ae` oiiqeg wxa

· “Descendants of Ishmael, half brother of Isaac” – “Yishmaelim”

· “New Head or Leader of United States” – “y`x

· “work of our hands”- “mkici dyrna

· “evil or punishment”  - “mil`rnyi

· “Hebrew abbreviation of the Ten Plagues of Egypt” – “ag`a ycr jvc

· “That which will befall you at the end” – “zixg`a mkz` `xwi xy`”

 

Daniel 7 (25) deals with the last king of the 4th beast of exile who will humble 3 other kings. Rav Saadia Gaon stated that the 3 kings or leaders who will be humbled, are from Israel, Greece (representing Europe, second interpretation; United States, as the Grecian purveyor of democracy and Hellenism for “Greece is the face of Rome/European Union”), and Yishmael (representing the Arab nations). This haughty, arrogant king will speak words against G-d and the Jewish People, and he will try to “change” the times and the law. How interesting is it that this very word, change, is the key word used by Obama in his campaign?

 

Daniel 7:23-25 – “The fourth beast shall be fourth kingdom on earth, which shall be different from all other kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, trample it and break it in pieces.

 

The ten horns are ten kings who shall arise from this kingdom. And another (horn) shall rise after them; He shall be different from the first ones, and shall subdue three kings.

 

He shall speak pompous words against the Most High, shall persecute the saints of the Most High, and shall intend to change times and law. Then the saints shall be given into his hand for a time, times and half a time (three and one-half years)”.

 

The coded, end of days message that Yaakov gave over to his sons was not deciphered by them. But our generation, the generation alive at the end of days, can understand the clues and break the code. In Yaakov’s statement there are 4 words zixg`a mkz` `xwi xy`(“that will befall you in the end”). The word xy`that describes the identity of the evil has a gematria of 501 the same as Barack Hussein Obama. And if you look at the word zixg`a, in the end, the first 3 letters contain the initials of Obama. The bais is for wxa Barack, the aleph is for dn`ae` Obama, and the ches is for oiiqeg Hussein.

 

The scholars, using the clues of the book of Daniel, say that Obama will reign as "King" for three and a half years. In their May broadcast, they ascribe special significance to the date of April 8, 2009, the day before the festival of Passover (Pesach), when the once-in-28-years the “Kiddush HaChamah” called the "Blessing of the Sun" is to be recited. They believe that between now and that date there will be dramatic developments that involve Iran.”  As BibleSearchers  Reflections revealed;

 

BibleSearchers Reflections – “Only three times since Creation, and in the history of the descendants of Adam, that the twenty-eight year cycle solar cycle of the sun returned to the Wednesday spring equinox position in the heavens on Erev Pesach (the eve of Passover) on the same day of the week at its creation day of revelation. So the prayer blesses of the sun when it returns to its full circle of the heavens to its original position in the heavens where it stood at the time, on the 4^th day of Creation.  As written:

 

“Meir Einai Chachamim” by the Ostrovster Rabbi – “From the time of Creation, there are three times that Kiddush HaChamah falls on Erev Pesach (Passover): the year they left Egypt—it is mentioned in the Talmud that Kiddush HaChamah happened on Erev Pesach on a Wednesday—and the second time was in the year of the redemption of Mordechai and Esther, who then fasted on the 14th, 15th, and 16th (of Nissan). The third time Kiddush HaChamah occurs on Erev Pesach, not much time will pass before the redemption comes, God willing.”

 

When will this twenty eight year cycle of the sun and the heavenly bodies return to their original position at the Spring Equinox, during the 4^th day (Wednesday) of Creation, during the Spring Equinox, that occurred on the eve of the Passover (Erev Pesach)?  This amazing date occurred only two times since the creation of Adam and will occur one more time before the Messiah returns. These four days are as follows:

 

1. The 4^th day of Creation when God created the “greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night…and set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth.” (Genesis 1:16-17);

2. The redemption of the Israelites from Egypt;

3. The redemption of the Jews from annihilation by the decree of Prime Minister Haman in Persia, saved by the prayers of Mordechai and their Queen Esther, who fasted for three days on the 14^th, 15^th, and the 16^th day of Nissan.

4. In the final days before the final redemption of this planet by the messiah, the sun will return to its position in the heavens where it was on its day of creation on the 4^th day (Wednesday) that occurred on the eve of Passover. 

 

Credit to Israel Insider – “Torah Codes predict, and warn about, Obama Presidency” – November 7, 2008

 

Credit to Kol Ha Tor Research Team

To understand more about the Return of the 10 Tribes of Israel,

Contact Kol Ha Tor, the Voice of the Turtledove,

As a Reception from the House of Judah is forming to welcome the returning House of Israel