11.21.03 - In the coming maelstrom that lies ahead, in the
coming judgment that's going to burst in cyclonic fury over this
world, and this planet, America's only hope -- listen to me, White
House, listen to me, State Department, listen to me, Pentagon,
listen to me, Mr. President -- America's only hope is not GNP, it's
not scientific achievement, it's not an education at Harvard or
Yale, but it's America holding on to that little, tiny state of
Israel and saying, "We will stand with you," because God said, "They
that bless Israel I will bless, and they that curse Israel, I will
curse." -- Rev. Jimmy Lee Swaggart, March, 1985
Fundamentalist Christians in the U.S. are looking to last month's
attack on a convoy of U.S. diplomatic and CIA vehicles in the Gaza
Strip -- which killed several U.S. citizens -- as a watershed event
that will hopefully force the Bush Administration to re-evaluate its
involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Shortly after the
October 15 attack the Jerusalem Prayer Team, a U.S.-based Christian
fundamentalist organization, introduced an e-mail "Action Alert"
with the following: "The Bush Doctrine is being challenged by
Arafat's PLO terrorist organization. If the Bush Doctrine is
defeated, then the war on terrorism is lost. If Israel loses her war
on terrorism, America will lose her war on terrorism. The future of
America hangs in the balance."
The Jerusalem Post posed three questions about a potential U.S.
response to the attack: "If Palestinian Islamic militants are now
targeting Americans in their war with Israel, how should the White
House respond to this dangerous escalation? Did Yasser Arafat know
about the attack in advance? Did he approve it, even tacitly? What
is the future of the Bush Administration's 'Road Map' since the
Palestinian side staunchly refuses to crack down on terror for fear
of triggering a civil war?"
Aluf Benn, the diplomatic correspondent for Ha'aretz, an Israeli
daily newspaper, wrote: "In the immediate aftermath of the bomb
attack... Israel is making the argument it has been trying to make
since the Sept. 11 terror attacks in the U.S. and since the war in
Iraq -- that it and America are facing the same enemy. That the
enemy in Baghdad is the same as the enemy in Gaza."
This blow to the "Road Map" came on the heels of increased
suicide bombings, Israel's strike against terrorist camps in Syria,
its ongoing West Bank "security" fence project, and the Israeli's
government's debate over whether Palestinian Authority Chairman
Yasser Arafat should be exiles or assassinated.
In mid-September, in an effort to put a roadblock in the way of
Bush's "Road Map," several US fundamentalist Christian organizations
sent President Bush a petition urging him to "stop his involvement
in the 'land for peace' process," according to Worthy News, a daily
Christian-based news service. The petition, organized by Worthy
News, Koenig's International News, Bridges for Peace and the
International Christian Zionist Center, "presented the Biblical
foundation for supporting the nation of Israel and showed the
importance of not parceling Israel's covenant land," and serves as a
reminder of how opposed to a Palestinian state many fundamentalist
Christian groups are.
Religious right ramps up support for Israel
Describing the recent visit to the United States of Binyamin
Elon, Israel's Tourism minister and the head of Moledet, "one of the
small right-wing parties that help keep Ariel Sharon in power," New
York Magazine's Craig Horowitz writes: While the "alliance between
the Evangelicals and the Jews is not new, it has suddenly taken on a
sense of urgency and an intensity that haven't been seen before."
During his trip, Elon met with a number of fundamentalist
Christian leaders including Roberta Combs, president of the
Christian Coalition, Mike Evans, founder of the Jerusalem Prayer
Team and author of "Beyond Iraq: The Next Move," "a book that
depicts Islam as evil and finds biblical harbingers of the end of
time in the current global crisis," former presidential candidate
Gary Bauer, now head of American Values, and Ed McAteer, one of the
founders of the Moral Majority.
Elon's trip began paying dividends as thousands of Christians
from around the world -- including a hefty contingent from the US --
participated in the annual mid-October Jerusalem March. According to
Israel Insider, the gathering of Christians was organized by the
International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ), which since 1980
has been "the only Christian [sponsored] celebration to take place
during the Feast of Tabernacles," which coincides with the Jewish
holiday of Sukkot. The daily newsmagazine reported that "officials
at Israel's Ministry of Tourism say the festivities are Israel's
largest annual tourist event, netting the country some $15 to $18
million a year."
Prime Minister Sharon addressed the crowd during opening
ceremonies and thanked the attendees "for coming... and showing
solidarity. Your presence," he said, "sends a strong message to the
world and your friendship is important to us. Very important."
Over the past few years, Christian fundamentalists in the U.S.
have been ramping up their support by forming a number of new
organizations to support Israel, sponsoring visits by right-wing
Israeli officials, raising and funneling money to favored Israeli
charities, and speaking out vociferously against President Bush's
"Road Map."
Fundamentalist road map
Last October, the Christian Coalition organized a pro-Israel
rally -- called "Israel, You Are Not Alone" -- in Washington to
"press for increased support for Israel's fight against terror and
oppose the Bush administration's call for the establishment of a
Palestinian state," the Jerusalem Post reported.
Early in 2002, one of the Religious right's favorites, Rabbi
Daniel Lapin, the president of the conservative Jewish organization
Toward Tradition, got together with Gary Bauer, the failed
presidential candidate who is now president of American Values, and
formed the American Alliance of Jews and Christians (AAJC).
According to a Toward Tradition press release, the Washington,
D.C.-based AAJC will be a "unique synthesis of Jewish authenticity
and Christian grassroots muscle."
In late May of last year, Rabbi Yehiel Eckstein, president of the
International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (IFCJ), and Ralph
Reed, former executive director of the Christian Coalition and
current Republican Party chairman of Georgia, launched "Stand for
Israel." The Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz reported that "Stand for
Israel" hopes to become a "Christian version of the pro-Israel lobby
on Capitol Hill, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee
(AIPAC)." According to New York's Craig Horowitz, Rabbi Eckstein
"was named the third-most-important Jew in America by The Forward,"
because "[h]e spent years as a kind of outcast among his peers for
his efforts to foster better relations between Jews and
Evangelicals; now the Jewish community has begun to see things his
way."
Stand for Israel recently set aside the last Sunday in October
for its annual Day of Prayer and Solidarity for Israel and the
organization aimed for more than 5 million Christians to show
support for Israel in churches across the country.
In July 2002, thanks to a $2 million donation by the
International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, 400 American Jews
moved lock, stock and barrel to Israel. According to the Christian
news service, AgapePress, "It was the largest single U.S. group" to
move to Israel in 25 years. Bishop Huey Harris, whose church, the
First Pentecostal Tabernacle in Elkton, Maryland, helped raise money
for the exodus, told AgapePress: "What I'm seeing is the Scriptures
being fulfilled right before our very eyes." AgapePress reports: "He
says what he is looking for next is for the Church to be raptured,
and then Jews receiving Christ as their Messiah."
In early February of this year, a group of prominent Christian
broadcasters including Dr. Jerry Rose, Dr. David Clark, Dr. Michael
Little, President of the Christian Broadcasting Network, Belarmino
"Blackie" Gonzalez joined Dr. Mike Evans, of the Jerusalem Prayer
Team, at the Opry Land Hotel in Nashville, TN. to help him launch
the Evangelical Israel Broadcasting Network (EIBN).
Armageddon on their minds
According to Dr. Evans, the mission of EIBN "is to guard,
protect, and defend Eretz Yisrael and its people until the Messiah
comes to Zion." The phrase "until the Messiah comes to Zion" is more
than a little troubling, especially if you're a Jew. Many believe
that Bishop Harris' vision and Dr. Evans' dedication to the cause is
motivated by belief in the "end-times," which will take place in
Israel only after the Jews have returned there. "The key episode in
pre-millennial theology is an event called 'the rapture,'" writes
author Fred Clarkson in Eternal Hostility: The Struggle Between
Theocracy and Democracy. "All the saved Christians, dead and alive,
are brought up into the clouds with Jesus prior, during or after
(depending of the school of theology) a period called 'the
tribulation.'"
Craig Horowitz: "Though specifics are a little sketchy, there is
a generally accepted version of events leading up to Judgment Day.
First, and this is key, Jews will return to Israel. A wicked world
leader -- the Antichrist -- will assume power by deceiving everyone
into believing he will bring peace. Soon after, the final battle,
the Apocalypse, Armageddon, will be fought.
"At its conclusion, Jesus will descend from Heaven. He will come
down the Mount of Olives on the east side of Jerusalem, through the
Golden Gate, and into the city. (Just in case, Muslims bricked over
the Golden Gate when they controlled the Old City.) There will then
be a thousand-year reign of peace on Earth."
In "Armageddon Anxiety: Evil on the Way" William Cook
quotes Grace Halsell, author of 14 books including "Prophecy and
Politics: The Secret Alliance Between Israel and the US Christian
Right," who says Christian Zionists believe that "Every act taken by
Israel is orchestrated by God, and should be condoned, supported,
and even praised by the rest of us." In 1988, Halsell wrote that "Christian Zionism is a dangerous and
growing segment of Christianity."
"These days, however, the [Religious right] movement's agenda
appears to have become our president's vision for the country,"
Maureen Farrell wrote in a Buzzflash.com Reader Commentary just
prior to the invasion of Iraq. "[President] Bush's flirtation with
End Times rhetoric makes some suspect that he actually perceives
himself as God's instrument," columnist and author Gene Lyons
pointed out.
The first chapter of Joel Rosenberg's new novel "The Last Days"
"deals with Islamic militants targeting and attacking a U.S.
diplomatic and CIA convoy heading into Gaza with a massive and
deadly bombing. This morning such an event actually happened inside
Gaza," Rosenberg, a well-connected conservative activist, columnist
and author wrote on the morning of October 15.
"Is the West Bank and Gaza the next battleground in the global
war on terror? Should Yasser Arafat be brought to justice, dead or
alive, along with Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein?" asks
Rosenberg, whose previous best-selling novel, "The Last Jihad," was
a fictional account of the war against terrorism that takes America,
Israel and Iraq to the brink of a nuclear conflagration. That book
was published a few months before the president's invasion of Iraq
and has been recently released in paperback.
Politically savvy Christian fundamentalist leaders are wise
enough to either deny or to equivocate at the suggestion that their
support for Israel -- or for the war in Iraq for that matter -- is
rooted in Biblical or End Times theology. In 2002, however, Gary
Bauer was a bit more forthright in a conversation with a Washington
Post reporter, saying that conservative Christians believe that
"America has an obligation to stand by Israel" based on "readings of
the Scripture, where evangelicals believe God has promised that land
to the Jewish people."
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2003 Working Assets Online. All rights reserved
