Last week, Israel’s Knesset passed another controversial “Basic Law,” enshrining Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people and Jerusalem as its “eternal capital.” This is in concurrence with historical foundations and legal declarations by the British and then the United Nations—more than 70 years ago.
The Palestinian Arabs’ DNA and heritage can be traced back just a few generations to clans and tribes in the desert lands of Arabia. Yet, these Arabians deny the demonstrable Jewish presence in the Holy Land for over 3,000 years and Islamic extremists among them exert armed resistance to modern Israel’s right to peacefully exist there today.
It is not just a difference in religious ideology (Islam versus Judaism) or an ethnic resistance (Arabs versus Jews). It is Islam’s deep, religious convictions (according to clear teachings in their holy book, the Qur’an) which have eternal, personal consequences for its followers.
Allah has willed it, and their eternal destinies and heavenly pleasures depend on their perpetual resistance to Jewish “occupation.” Islamic polemicists reconstruct recent political history, as well as change biblical history, espousing Islam as a supremacist religion bent on ruling the world.
Islam itself is complex and often confusing. Friday sermons by Islam’s imams in mosques throughout the world often blatantly express hatred toward Jews in general and Israel and America in particular. Their denunciations frequently incite their adherents to violence, with religious riots and terrorism often resulting immediately thereafter.
Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and one of his top advisors for the Middle East, is also an Orthodox Jew. He has sought to relate to the better side of Mahmoud Abbas (Palestine Authority’s perpetual president) and negotiate steps for peace in the region.
Unfortunately, Mr. Abbas has persistently avoided being a “partner for peace,” proving again the oft-quoted maxim by Abba Eban, one of Israel’s early Prime Ministers, after the 1973 Geneva peace talks, that “The Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”
In March of this year, Mr. Kushner sought to broaden the perspectives and regional partners by hosting a highly unusual White House conference on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Astute observers noted that the Palestinians, who have been boycotting Trump since his announcement that the U.S. would have an embassy in Jerusalem, were not present.
Instead, Israel was there, alongside Arab states with which it does not have diplomatic relations, such as Bahrain, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Kushner seems to be working with the young, 32-year-old, progressive Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (known to his friends by his initials, MBS), leveraging the Muslim Sunni Gulf States against Shiite Iran and the Islamic terrorist leadership in Gaza and Lebanon.
The up-and-coming crown prince (whose family name Salman means “blessing, peace or to be safe”) is said to have spoken to the PA’s 83-year-old Mahmoud Abbas to stress that now is the time for them to seize the present opportunity for peace with Israel. Only then can Abbas make building a modern nation for his perpetual “refugees” and their multi-generational descendants his legacy.
Jared Kushner may have to yet sweeten the pot with incentives for Abbas, along with the terror leadership of Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, whose fundamentalist Islamic ideology will not allow them to accept the Jewish democracy of Israel or any peace accord with any non-Muslim entity. The Qur’an and Allah would never allow it. However, the Qur’an does provide the practice of Taquiyya, where Islamists can deceive infidels for the good of Islam until they are in a position of strength to reverse the cursed agreement.
Will Muslim Palestinians ever agree to peace with Israel? I don’t believe so. It would be against their fundamentalist faith and the Islamic practice since the seventh century.
There is nothing in the Bible to suggest these Arab Islamists will agree to any peace treaty with Israel. They, more likely, will do as they have for decades, to the befuddlement of past U.S. presidents, and just wait for Kushner/Trump’s peace efforts to wear out.
However, as stated earlier, most of the Palestinians are actually of Arab origin and from what is presently Saudi Arabia. Therefore, a strong leader from that nation might be able to get them to agree to his peace covenant with Israel, at least for a season of years.
Ultimately, if this is “the deal,” the “covenant of death” spoken of in the prophecies of the Jewish prophets Ezekiel and Daniel, it will be backed by the strong man himself—the “man of sin” or “the lawless one” (2 Thess. 2:3-8), the “little horn” (Dan. 7:8, 21, 24-25), the “prince who is to come” (Dan. 9:26-27), the “beast” (Rev. 13:4-10)—the Antichrist (1 John 2:18, 22).
But, this predicted “son of perdition” will not be “revealed” on the world stage until after there has been a great apostasy, a dramatic “falling away” or rejection of Christianity by professed believers (2 Thess. 2:3). Secondly, a new temple has to be built in Jerusalem, where (after 3/12 years of peace) the Antichrist will declare himself to be God (2 Thess. 2:4; Dan. 8:23-25; Rev. 13:1-10).
Could this future Antichrist be a Muslim Gentile, as proposed by prophecy scholar Joel Richardson? And could the false prophet (Rev. 13’s second beast) be a persuasive Jewish diplomat, who is kind of a counterfeit Elijah to deceive the nation of Israel and astound the world, as proposed by Marvin Rosenthal, the Jewish-born leader of Zion’s Hope? I’m not predicting. I’m just asking. Time will tell.
In the meanwhile, let us be spiritually sensitive and learn to discern and comprehend the prophetic agenda of God, as it imminently unfolds before us. “Watch, therefore, for you do not know what hour your Lord will come. … Therefore you also must be ready, for in an hour when you least expect, the Son of Man is coming” (Matt. 24:44).
If we are, in fact, living in the last days, these powerful end-time characters will soon begin to come to the forefront. As modern saints of God around our world patiently endure opposition, persecution and desolation in unparalleled ways in these final days, may we “keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus” (Rev. 14:12b). The passage goes on to say that those saints “who die in the Lord from now on” will “rest from their labors, and their works follow them.”
Let us continue to serve our risen Lord, by the power of His Spirit, until He takes us home!
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