Oct 23
The Next Middle East War
In the past few weeks, a steady stream of new reports has indicated that another major conflict could soon involve
Israel. I originally had planned to write this article about four weeks ago. The reason for the delay was the fact that new
information related to my subject kept coming up.
Every head of state and political leader with a direct connection to Israel seems to be talking about the prospect of armed
conflict. Jordan’s King Abdullah is the only neighbor of Israel not discussing the possibility of war.
Hezbollah, which controls the Lebanese government, said it will resume its military campaign unless Israel withdraws from the
disputed Shebaa farms area and other pockets of territory occupied during this summer's 34-day war. Muhammad Fanish,
Lebanon’s energy and water minister, announced that the organization "will never give up its arms nor its role of fighting
the occupation." According to him, Hezbollah won't abandon its role "as long as there is occupation of even one foot of our
land."
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak called the recent Lebanon war between Israel and Hezbollah a "warning sign" that another
regional war could soon break out. "The Middle East is on the verge of exploding," Mubarak said in an interview marking 33
years since the Yom Kippur War.
Syrian President Bashar Assad has been giving conflicting messages of peace and war. He's been telling the international
community that he is ready to negotiate with Israel, but he also says war will soon break out if a peace agreement is
not reached. "Two sides are responsible for the current situation (with Israel) - not just one side. The situation is
based on one topic only, the peace process… and perhaps war if no peace is established," Assad said.
The Hamas-controlled Palestinian government has also been talking war. Foreign Minister Mahmoud Zahar said that Israel is an
abomination in the Middle East that will some day disappear. Speaking at a rally in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis,
Zahar said Hamas would never accept Israel's existence.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has become a very reliable source for anti-Israel statements. Last week, he called Israel a
"counterfeit and illegitimate regime that cannot survive" in a live broadcast on state television. "The big powers have
created this fraud regime and allowed it to commit all kind of crimes to guarantee their interests," he said in a speech to a
crowd in the town of Islamshahr in southwestern Tehran.
Even the normally optimistic Israeli government can see the war clouds forming on the horizon. For the first time in more
than a decade, Israel's military has raised the prospect of a new Middle East war. Military sources said the Intelligence
Corps has warned of the possibility of war in 2007. The sources said the corps, in its annual intelligence assessment, has
notified the General Staff that Syria represents the greatest danger of war over the next year.
In the 20 years that I've operated Rapture Ready, I've never seen Israel threatened by so many foes. If war should come,
there are four main fronts from which it may erupt. Here are the most likely scenarios:
1. Hezbollah may simply start up where they left off. In July and August, they fired 4,000 rockets at Israel and they claimed to still have 20,000 rockets aimed in Israel's direction.
2. Hamas laid low during the Hezbollah/Israeli conflict. The leaders of this terrorist group are now saying they are ready to
confront Israel.
3. Syria appears to be preparing for a war with Israel to win back territory it lost in previous wars. It has been building
up all of its military bases that border Israel.
4. Israel may trigger a conflict by launching a surprise attack against Iran's nuclear facilities. Jerusalem has repeatedly
said that Israel would not allow Iran to gain access to an atomic bomb.
I think an Israeli war with Syria would have the most dire outcome. Both of these nations have weapons of mass destruction,
and a major confrontation could easily bring them into play. Because they are so close to each other, a chemical rocket from Syria would instantly trigger a nuclear response from Israel.
Syrian President Assad seems to think he can win back the Shebaa farms area by copying Hezbollah's tactics in Lebanon. His plan of operation is to have a quick war that will force Israel into land concessions. The predicted destruction of Damascus may indicate that Assad will be making a terrible, terrible miscalculation.
“Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap” (Isaiah 17:1).
Paving the Road for Gog and Antichrist
Dictators feed on weakness. Hitler did so when Neville Chamberlain brought home to England the document he excitedly waved to the crowd and cameras, declaring: “We have peace in our time.” Stalin did it when he began the purges of the 1930s, eventually murdering at a minimum 30 million of his fellow Russians while the political and military leaders around him did nothing out of fear of what he would next do to them.
Fear, then, is the key to weakness. Franklin D. Roosevelt had it right when he pronounced, “We have nothing to fear but fear, itself” during the time of the Great Depression and the lead-up to World War 2. Fear-engendered weakness is the bane of mankind, and there is only one who can deal with it effectively.
Jesus said: "For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Tim 1:7). Tragically, the diplomatic world, as all other entities of the humanistic kind, will never take this truth into account in dealing with international crises, or any other kind of crisis. Satan is the chief ruler of the darkness of this world, and he more often than not blinds the minds of men and women to the truth that God, alone, has the answers to the problems festering and bubbling upon Planet Earth.
Thus it is with no great wonder that we observe the goings-on in diplomatic circles, while they attempt to deal with the dictator, Kim Jong Il, and the North Koreans lighting up yet another nuke in this fearful world. For the “international community” to have done otherwise than come up with absolutely toothless sanctions would have been a surprise. That they did formulate such an impotent action surprises no one--especially not Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who, no doubt, carefully viewed the matter with much pleasure.
The Iranian dictator, you see, like all other tyrants, feeds on fear and fear-mongering. He is of his father, the devil, and that father of lies–Satan—knows that fear sucks the life from humanity, replacing it with a vacuum, a void into which dictators and demons always rush to fill. Make no mistake, the Prince of Persia, against whom Daniel the prophet and the messenger who brought him prophetic truth from God struggled, is alive and well in the Middle East. That demonic force’s fellow minions strike fear into the rest of the world, making Paul’s forewarning more true than ever in our day: “For we struggle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Eph. 6:12).
Bible prophecy predicts a time when the world’s diplomats will show their weak-spined impotence. It will be at the most fear-filled moment in history for the nation Israel. We who study current issues and events through the magnifying glass of God’s prophetic Word believe that future time of Israel’s greatest danger will involve many of the devilish antagonists that are Israel’s avowed enemies today. And the assault will include some who today pretend to be the friends of efforts for world peace.
When the force comes like a great juggernaut toward Israel, the Neville Chamberlains of the time will protest. And, that is all they will do, in taking action against the blood-lusting force of evil. God’s Prophetic Word reports this future attack, and the diplomatic protest this way: "And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates, To take a spoil, and to take a prey; to turn thine hand upon the desolate places that are now inhabited, and upon the people that are gathered out of the nations, which have gotten cattle and goods, that dwell in the midst of the land.Sheba, and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish, with all the young lions thereof, shall say unto thee, Art thou come to take a spoil? hast thou gathered thy company to take a prey? to carry away silver and gold, to take away cattle and goods, to take a great spoil?” (Ezek. 38:11-13).
This apparently unstoppable force will, thankfully, be stopped. We believe the force to be led by the nation Russia, leading its confederates –including Persia (Iran, today) and many other of Israel’s enemies, to wipe that Jewish state from the map, then take the spoils of war. The intended spoils, no doubt, will mainly be the vast oil fields of the whole region. God, himself, the Ezekiel 38 and 39 Gog-Magog prophecy says, will destroy all but one-sixth of these forces.
Actions by the diplomats today, in dealing with the North Koreans, and next, the Iranians, is a foreshadow of things to come. They are not only setting the stage for the future leader called “Gog” to think his “evil thought,” and bring his coalition against Israel. The diplomatic actions in this regard, by the UN, and even the Bush Administration, in my view, are paving the road for Antichrist to one day take the opportunity to feed on the fears of the people of earth. The people left behind, following the Rapture of the Church, will, for the most part accept the peace made with death and hell (Isa. 28: 15, 18). They will take the path of least resistance, and it will mean hell on earth for a God-rejecting world.
Jesus is the answer for escape out of such a future. He offers freedom from fear, and eternal life with God the Father.
--Terry
