By Carol Rushton

Do you know that some Arabs accuse Israel of having an “empire”? While the poor, persecuted “Palestinians” have no land whatsoever?

I’m not kidding.

According to Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, comparable to the U.S. State Department, Israel is about 290 miles long and 85 miles wide at its widest point, only 9-10 miles at its narrowest point. Without Judea, Samaria, and the Golan Heights – all land that the U.N. considers “disputed” –  Israel is even smaller.

To get an idea of just how small a country Israel is, New Jersey is 130 miles long and 70 miles wide at its widest point. Illinois is 210 miles wide and 395 miles long.

Israel is so small that Israeli military pilots have a hard time flying jet training runs. Even when flying from Israel’s southern to northern borders, they barely get up in the air before they run out of air space!

In contrast, most definitions of the Arab/Islamic world include 22 countries in the Middle East and Africa that total over 5 million square miles. If you include Iran, which is not Arab but Persian and Muslim, and very hostile to Israel (chanting “Death to Israel” repeatedly qualifies as hostility), the area of land increases. The Organization of Islamic Corporation, OIC, boasts a membership of 57 countries.

In terms of population, the numbers are stark. The Arab/Islamic world has a population of almost 366 million; Israel only 8,412,000 – and not all of those are Jews.

In the world today, there is only one Jewish state surrounded by 22-23 Arab/Islamic countries whose populations are committed to the destruction of Israel and the death of every Jew.  Jews have only one Jewish homeland while Arabs and Muslims have many countries in which to live and feel comfortable culturally and religiously.

Israel has an empire? Hardly!

By Carol Rushton

For years, Arabs and pro-Arab sympathizers have insisted that there would be peace in the Middle East if Israel would simply accept a two-state solution: Divide Israel into two countries, one for Israel and the Jews, and one for Israel’s Arab population, known more commonly today as “Palestinians.”

Under this scenario, Israel would have to give up their biblical lands of Judea and Samaria for Israeli Arabs to have their “state.” Some plans also include some compromise on Jerusalem and returning the Golan Heights, the biblical land of Bashan, to Syria.

Most world leaders condemn Israel for not accepting the Arabs’ terms, which would include 100% of Jewish settlements removed, a land bridge connecting Judea and Samaria with the Gaza Strip, and the right of return for all Arabs and their descendants who fled Israel after the 1948 statehood declaration. They blame Israel’s rejection of these demands for Muslim terrorism in the Middle East and the world, including terror attacks in Europe and Asia.

What the vast majority of the world doesn’t realize is that the Arabs were presented several times with a two-state solution during the 1930s and 1940s and rejected it.

 

The Balfour Declaration

Jews like Theodore Herzl had been working for years to re-establish a Jewish homeland somewhere in the world where Jews would be free to be Jews without the shadow of persecutions, pogroms, and ghettos dogging their every step. Herzl raised awareness of the Jewish homeland movement by holding a series of Zionist congresses in Europe. Without the Zionist movement, the Balfour Declaration would probably never have happened.

The Balfour Declaration came about against the backdrop of World War I. Great Britain had thought that the war against Germany wouldn’t last but a few months. By 1917, both countries had lost thousands of young men and were bogged down in a conflict that neither side seemed capable of winning.

Enter Chaim Weizmann, a Russian Jewish chemist and ardent Zionist who had found his way to England by way of Germany. Weizmann was able to provide the British military with a way of producing acetone, used in weapons and ammunition, which the military desperately needed to help Great Britain win the war.

Weizmann had met British politicians Arthur Balfour and David Lloyd George, some years before World War I. He was able to enlist both Balfour and George in the dream of a Jewish homeland in the Middle East.

Balfour already believed in the concept of a homeland for the Jews but favored one in Uganda, believing that there were too many problems to establish a Jewish country in the Holy Land, then under Ottoman rule. Weizmann persuaded Balfour to think otherwise.

Weizmann asked Balfour, “Would you give up London to live in Saskatchewan?” When Balfour replied that the British had “always” lived in London, Weizmann responded. “Yes, and we lived in Jerusalem when London was still a marsh.”

The rest, as they say, is history. When George became the prime minister of Great Britain in 1916 and appointed Balfour as foreign secretary, the stage was set for the Balfour Declaration, issued in 1917.

The main text of the letter from Arthur Balfour to Lord Rothschild is below:

“I have much pleasure in conveying to you on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet.

“His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

“I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation.”

The Balfour Declaration gave the Jews permission to have a homeland in the Holy Land.

 

After the Balfour Declaration: The British Mandate Period

In 1922, the League of Nations came up with the Mandate for Palestine, which encompassed the area which now makes up the modern State of Israel and Jordan. This gave Great Britain the authority to encourage Jewish immigration to the Holy Land for the purposes of establishing a Jewish state in the ancient land of Israel. Jews from all over the world could now legally come to the area west of the Jordan River to live, develop the land, and start businesses.

Great Britain even allowed the Jews to form local government bodies after they immigrated. The Mandate for Palestine actually used the words, “the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine.”

However, Great Britain did not keep its promises to the Jews. In the early 1900s, oil companies from Great Britain and the U.S. started to become deeply involved in developing oil fields in Arab countries. This gave Arabs the leverage to pressure Great Britain into retracting their promises to Jews in the Diaspora concerning immigration and a future country in the Holy Land.

Great Britain issued the famous White Papers in 1930 and 1939, detailing their plan not only to restrict Jewish immigration to the British Mandate area in the Middle East but also to prevent as much as possible Jews buying land in that same area.

This caused much tension between the local Jewish government in the Holy Land, the Arabs, and Great Britain for almost the entire period between the Balfour Declaration and the declaration of the State of Israel in 1948.

 

The U.N. Partition Plan and the State of Israel

When World War II ended and the full extent of the horrors that Nazi Germany had inflicted upon the Jews became known, worldwide opinion was very favorable toward the Jews. Considering what the Jews had gone through in the Holocaust, many Western nations were sympathetic concerning Jews having their own homeland in the Middle East.

Great Britain had actually floated the two-state solution in 1937 and 1939, one state for the Jews and one for the Arabs using the entire area of the Holy Land. Both times, Arabs rejected the idea outright, even though Great Britain caved to Arab pressure in severely limiting Jewish immigration to 75,000 over a five-year period and giving the Jews only 5,000 square kilometers while the Arabs would retain the remaining 21,700. Jews weren’t thrilled with these proposals but tried to negotiate for better terms.

Great Britain continued to try to work out a solution between Arabs and Jews but because the British insisted upon the Arabs’ complete approval of any deal, no plan could be finalized. The British finally realized that their efforts were futile and turned the problem over to the United Nations.

The U.N. formed a special committee which recommended the same plan Great Britain had earlier. The Holy Land would be split into two states, one for Arabs, one for Jews. The Jews got the raw end of the deal, retaining a smaller land area with Jerusalem becoming an internationalized city. Even though the Jews viewed the plan as problematic for them, they indicated their willingness to work with the U.N. on the plan. The Arabs refused to consider the U.N. plan.

Below is a quote from Arab League Secretary Azzam Pasha to David Horowitz and Abba Eban in a meeting on September 16, 1947.

“The Arab world is not in a compromising mood. It’s likely, Mr. Horowitz, that your plan is rational and logical, but the fate of nations is not decided by rational logic. Nations never concede; they fight. You won’t get anything by peaceful means or compromise. You can, perhaps, get something, but only by the force of your arms. We shall try to defeat you. I am not sure we’ll succeed, but we’ll try. We were able to drive out the Crusaders, but on the other hand we lost Spain and Persia. It may be that we shall lose Palestine. But it’s too late to talk of peaceful solutions.”

Predictably, the Arabs rejected the two-state solution once again and demanded their own plan: One state under Arab rule. The U.N. told the Arabs to go jump in the lake and adopted the two-state partition plan on November 29, 1947.

This put the Jews between a rock and a hard place. They really needed a larger territory in order to reasonably defend themselves from the Arab nations they knew would attack if they declared a state and to absorb new Jewish immigrants into the country. On the other hand, some land for a Jewish state was better than none. The U.N. partition plan was not a great deal, but at least it was a deal. What should they do?

The Jews decide that while they weren’t completely happy with the terms of the partition plan, an imperfect plan was better than none. On May 14, 1948, the modern State of Israel came into existence. The Arab nations that surrounded Israel attacked the new Jewish state but were eventually defeated.

 

The Arabs’ One State Solution

While the Arab countries were defeated by Israel in the late 1940s, they never stopped trying to wipe Israel off the face of the earth. Arab nations attacked Israel again in 1956, 1967, 1973 and have supported and launched many terrorist attacks against Jews and Israel through the years. Even when Israel signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan and signed the Oslo Accords with the PLO, none of these brought peace to Israel with her Arab neighbors.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered Yasser Arafat a far-reaching agreement to allow the establishment of a “Palestinian” state in 2000 at the White House. The agreement would have greatly endangered Israel’s security while giving Arafat and those he represented 98-99 percent of what they wanted.  Arafat rejected the deal and was blamed by American President Bill Clinton and Arabs in the Middle East for missing what they considered a great opportunity.

Dennis Ross, a long-time U.S. government official and not exactly pro-Israel, gave his account of the 2000 White House summit between Barak and Arafat in his book, The Missing Peace, and in a lecture in Australia as reported in an Australian publication, The Volunteer.

Quoting from Wikipedia, Ross “suggested that the reason for the failure was Arafat’s unwillingness to sign a final deal with Israel that would close the door on any of the Palestinians’ maximum demands, particularly the right of return. Ross claimed that what Arafat really wanted was ‘a one-state solution. Not independent, adjacent Israeli and Palestinian states, but a single Arab state encompassing all of Historic Palestine.’ Ross also quoted Saudi Prince Bandar as saying while negotiations were taking place: ‘If Arafat does not accept what is available now, it won’t be a tragedy; it will be a crime.’”

In 2008, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert offered Arafat’s replacement, Mahmoud Abbas, an agreement that would have once again greatly compromised Israel’s security, including a withdrawal from 93% of Judea and Samaria. Abbas turned down this deal as well.

 

Conclusion

For almost 100 years, Arabs living in the Holy Land have been offered agreements, treaties, plans, and deals for a two-state solution: One state for Arabs and one state for Jews. Jews have accepted these plans with reservations. Over and over again, the Arabs have rejected these offers. Every single time.

As Dennis Ross pointed said, Arabs have proved they are not interested in a two-state solution. They are only interested in a one-state solution: An Arab country from Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea as reflected on their maps, with no Israel and no Jews.

The overwhelming majority of Arabs have never accepted Israel and the Jews in the Middle East. They never will.

By Carol Rushton

The Arabs have told the story that when Israel declared statehood in May 1948, most of them had to flee Israel for the surrounding Arab/Muslim countries for fear of their lives. They had to abandon their property and all their belongings, which have since been illegally seized by Israel and given to Jews. This, they say, is why Arabs who once lived in Israel and their descendants should have their property returned to them.

The Arabs demand of “the right of return” has always been a major sticking point in any negotiations between Israel and Arabs.

Did the Arabs flee Israel for fear that Jews in Israel would attack and kill them during Israel’s 1948-1949 War of Independence?

 

Arab Violence Against Jews Before Israel’s Statehood

Arabs in and surrounding the future state of Israel had always rejected any plan that presented a two-state solution using the British Mandate area in the Middle East: Arabs having one state and Jews in another. While the U.N. was putting together it’s partition plan, Arabs warned that they would become violent if the U.N. insisted on presenting the plan. Jamal Husseini, spokesman for the Arab Higher Committee, promised that Arabs would defend “the soil of our beloved country with the last drop of our blood” (The Struggle for Palestine, 1976, page 308).

After the U.N. voted on and passed the partition plan in November 1947, Arabs rioted and murdered hundreds of Jews, Arabs, and British citizens. Arab attacks on Jews continued up until the announcement of the establishment of the State of Israel by David Ben Gurion on May 14, 1948. The Arab Higher Committee continued to incite violence against Jews and anyone else who supported a Jewish state, insisting that Arabs “would fight for every inch of their country.” Many Jews were mercilessly slaughtered by Arab forces before the formal announcement was made.

The Arabs took pride at murdering hundreds of Jews. Jamal Husseini made the following state to the U.N. Security Council on April 16, 1948. “The representative of the Jewish Agency told us yesterday that they were not the attackers, that the Arabs had begun the fighting. We did not deny this. We told the whole world that we were going to fight” (U.N. Security Council Official Records, S/Agenda/58, April 16, 1948, page 19).

The Arab and Muslim countries in the Middle East were already preparing to attack the new Jewish state before May 14, 1948. They told the Arabs that they would wipe Israel off the map in three days. These countries urged the Arabs to leave their homes so they wouldn’t be caught in the fighting, confident that within less than a week, the Arabs would be able to return and take over a land with no Jews.

Aref el-Araf, who was mayor of Jordanian-ruled East Jerusalem in the 1950s wrote in his book, The Catastrophe, “The Arabs thought they would win in less than the twinkling of an eye and that it would take no more than a day or two from the time the Arab armies crossed the border until all the colonies were conquered and the enemy would throw down his arms and cast himself on their mercy.”

 

Israel Begs Arabs to Stay

Jewish leaders repeatedly urged the Arabs to stay and not leave. The Assembly of Palestine Jewry broadcast the following announcement on October 2, 1947.

“We will do everything in our power to maintain peace, and establish a cooperation gainful to both [Jews and Arabs]. It is now, here and now, from Jerusalem itself, that a call must go out to the Arab nations to join forces with Jewry and the destined Jewish State and work shoulder to shoulder for our common good, for the peace and progress of sovereign equals.”

The Proclamation of Independence that David Ben Gurion read on May 14, 1948, included a statement that also appealed to Arabs to stay in Israel.

“In the midst of wanton aggression, we yet call upon the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve the ways of peace and play their part in the development of the State, on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its bodies and institutions. . .We extend our hand in peace and neighborliness to all the neighboring states and their peoples, and invite them to cooperate with the independent Jewish nation for the common good of all.”

Despite these pleas from the Jews and their leaders, the Arabs started fleeing Israel before and after the May 14, 1948 announcement of the modern State of Israel. Arab leaders in other countries had much more influence on the Arabs within Israel than the Jews leaders.

One example is what happened in Haifa in April 1948. Jewish and Arabs forces were already fighting and on April 23, 1948, Jewish forces were successful in capturing the city. A British police reported for the city of Haifa on April 26, 1948, documented that “every effort is being made by the Jews to persuade the Arab populace to stay and carry on with their normal lives, to get their shops and businesses open and to be assured that their lives and interests will be safe.” By the end of fighting, 50,00 Arabs had left, many of them fearful of being branded traitors by Arab leaders for staying and living under Jewish rule.

One of Syria’s representatives to the U.N., Faris el-Khouri, accused the Jews of slaughtering Arab in Haifa and said it was “further evidence that the ‘Zionist program’ is to annihilate Arabs within the Jewish state if partition is effected.” The next day, Britain’s Sir Alexander Cadogan told the truth about what happened in Haifa: The fighting was the fault of Arabs for repeatedly attacks against Jews in the area, not Jews attacking Arabs, and that any reports of Jews mass murdering Arabs were false.

Another example of what happened in Faluja, an Arab town in southern Israel. Three thousand  of the Arab population in Faluja left after the fighting had stopped. The New York Times reported the situation on March 4, 1949.

“Observers feel that with proper counsel after the Israeli­-Egyptian armistice, the Arab population might have advantageously remained. They state that the Israeli Government had given guarantees of security of person and property. However, no effort was made by Egypt, Transjordan or even the United Nations Palestine Conciliation Commission to advise the Faluja Arabs one way or the other.”

 

Quotes Urging Arabs to Leave Israel

Arabs dispute that any Arab countries or Arab leaders urged them to leave Israel, either before, during, or after 1948. They claim that it was because of Jewish violence, fighting, and massacres against them that forced them to leave Israel.

Below is a list of quotes by Arab leaders and others that prove they encouraged Israeli Arabs to leave Israel.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Said boasted, “We will smash the country (Israel) with out guns and obliterate every place the Jews seek shelter in. The Arabs should conduct their wives and children to safe areas until the fighting has died down.”

Edward Atiyah, the Secretary of the Arab League office in London, had this to say in his book, The Arabs. “This wholesale exodus was due partly to the belief of the Arabs, encouraged by the boastings of an unrealistic Arabic press and the irresponsible utterances of some of the Arab leaders that it could be only a matter of weeks before the Jews were defeated by the armies of the Arab States and the Palestinian Arabs enabled to re-enter and retake possession of their country.”

Syria’s prime minister in 1948, Haled al Azm, wrote in his memoirs, “Since 1948 we have been demanding the return of the refugees to their homes. But we ourselves are the ones who encouraged them to leave. Only a few months separated our call to them to leave and our appeal to the United Nations to resolve on their return.”

The August 16, 1948 edition of the Beirut newspaper Sada al Janub quoted Monsignor George Hakim, Greek Orthodox Catholic Bishop of Galilee. “The refugees were confident their absence would not last long, and that they would return within a week or two. Their leaders had promised them that the Arab Armies would crush the ‘Zionist gangs’ very quickly and that there was no need for panic or fear of a long exile.”

Filastin, a Jordanian newspaper, reported on February 19, 1949, “The Arab States encouraged the Palestine Arabs to leave their homes temporarily in order to be out of the way of the Arab invasion armies.”

Ad Difaa, another Jordanian newspaper, quoted one Arab refugee on September 6, 1954. “The Arab government told us: Get out so that we can get in. So we got out, but they did not get in.”

On June 8, 1951, Al Hoda, a New York Lebanese newspaper, reported, “The Secretary-General of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha, assured the Arab peoples that the occupation of Palestine and Tel Aviv would be as simple as a military promenade. He pointed out that they were already on the frontiers and that all the millions the Jews had spent on land an economic development would be easy booty, for it would be a simple matter to throw Jews into the Mediterranean. . .Brotherly advice was given to the Arabs of Palestine to leave their land, homes and property and to stay temporarily in neighboring fraternal states, lest the guns of the invading Arab armies mow them down.”

U.S. Consul General in Haifa, Aubrey Lippencott, wrote on April 22, 1948, that “local mufti-dominated Arab leaders [urged] all Arabs to leave the city, and large numbers did so.”

The Economist, not exactly a pro-Jewish publication, reported on October 2, 1948, “Of the 62,000 Arabs who formerly lived in Haifa not more then 5,000 or 6000 remained. Various factors influenced their decision to seek safety in flight. There is but little doubt that the most potent of the factors were the announcements made over the air by the Higher Arab Executive, urging the Arabs to quit. . .It was clearly intimated that those Arabs who remained in Haifa and accepted Jewish protection would be regarded as renegades” or in other words, traitors.

Time magazine carried the following report of the battle of Haifa in May 1948. “The mass evacuation, prompted partly by fear, partly by orders of Arab leaders, left the Arab quarter of Haifa a ghost city. . .By withdrawing Arab workers their leaders hoped to paralyze Haifa.”

Benny Morris, a Jewish historian who has done extensive research on this period of Israel’s history, documented in his book, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, that starting as early as December 1947, “Arab officers ordered the complete evacuation of specific villages in certain areas, lest their inhabitants ‘treacherously’ acquiesce in Israeli rule or hamper Arab military deployments. . .There can be no exaggerating the importance of these early Arab-initiated evacuations in the demoralization, and eventual exodus, of the remaining rural and urban populations.”

In two books, Middle Eastern Studies and the previous one cited, Morris reported on the actions of the Arab Higher Committee in pushing Arabs out of Israel. Morris quoted from the order to the Arab National Committee in Jerusalem to evacuate Arabs out of the city. “Any opposition to this order. . .is an obstacle to the holy war. . .and will hamper the operations of the fighters in these districts.”

Morris is not the only one to bring attention to the Arab Higher Committee. The Near East Broadcasting Station in Cyprus reported on April 3, 1949, “It must not be forgotten that the Arab Higher Committee encouraged the refugees’ flight from their homes in Jaffa, Haifa and Jerusalem.”

The Arab military forces, the Arab legion and the Arab Liberation Army, ordered the evacuation of Arab women and children from the town of Beisan and a village south of Haifa.  Morris writes that this “tended to sap the morale of the menfolk who were left behind to guard the homes and fields, contributing ultimately to the final evacuation of villages. Such two-tier evacuation- women and children first, the men following weeks later – occurred in Qumiya in the Jezreel Valley, among the Awarna  Bedouin in Haifa Bay and in various other places.”

Jordan’s King Abdullah wrote in his memoirs, “The tragedy of the Palestinians was that most of their leaders had paralyzed them with false and unsubstantiated promises that they were not alone; that 80 million Arabs and 400 million Muslims would instantly and miraculously come to their rescue.”

 

So What Happened to the Arabs That Left Israel?

According to census records, a total of 809,100 Arabs were living in Israel by November 30, 1947, when the U.N. voted on the partition plan. After Israel’s War of Independence ended in 1949, census records counted a total 160,000 Arabs who were still in the country. Even though Arabs cite much higher figures, only 650,000 Arabs could have left Israel between 1947 and 1949.

The surrounding countries to which the Arabs fled  – mostly to Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon – refused to resettle and absorb these Arabs into their countries. Instead, they have kept them segregated in refugee camps under the most appalling conditions. These refugee camps have become hotbeds of anger, discontent, and terrorism. Most of the Arab countries in the Middle East – including very wealthy Saudi Arabia – rejected the Israeli Arabs and contributed little to nothing in aid, through either the U.N. or other programs to help or alleviate the suffering of these peoples.

In fact, Israel and the United States were the major donors to the UNRWA to help these Arabs, contributing millions of dollars while the Arab countries in the Middle East contributed little or nothing. At the start, the U.S. gave $25 million and Israel gave $3 million to the fund while the Arab countries only gave $600,000. As late as 1994, Israel still gave more aid to UNRWA for the Arab refugees than all the Arab countries combined excepting Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Morocco.

Israel is quick to point out, and justly so, that Jewish refugees fleeing from hostile Arab and Muslim countries received no compensation whatsoever from any government that expelled them. Jews down through the centuries, including in the 20^th and 21^st Centuries, have had to leave their homes, their money, and their possessions with little more than the clothes on their backs. Israel has always welcomed Jews under these conditions and has borne the cost for their resettlement, job training, Hebrew language classes, absorption, and other expenses that Jewish refugees incurred. No one has cried crocodile tears for Jewish refugees, and Israel has never allowed them to live in the horrific situations that Arab refugees have been forced into by their own people.

It is obvious that the reason Arab countries have refused now for almost 70 years to properly take care of these Arab refugees is because the Arabs and Muslims would prefer to use the refugees as political pawns in any “peace” negotiations with Israel while also having the added benefit of making Israel look bad in the eyes of the world.

Egypt’s foreign minister, Muhammad Salah ad-Din, made this clear to the Al-Misri newspaper in an interview published on October 11, 1949.”It is well-known and understood that the Arabs, in demanding the return of the refugees to Palestine, mean their return as masters of the Homeland and not as slaves. With a greater clarity, they mean the liquidation of the State of Israel.”

At a 1957 refugee conference as reported by the newspaper Beirut al Massa on July 15, 1957, Syria passed the following resolution. “Any discussion aimed at a solution of the Palestine problem which will not be based on ensuring the refugees’ right to annihilate Israel will be regarded as a desecration of the Arab people and on act of treason.

In 1949, Israel publicly extended an offer to the Arab refugees to return to Israel and provide compensation for them. They rejected Israel’s offer and refused to consider it.

Former UNRWA official Sir Alexander Galloway said in April 1952, “The Arab States do  not want to solve the refugee problem. They want to keep it as an open sore, as an affront to the United Nations and as a weapon against Israel. Arab leaders don’t [care] whether the refugees live or die.”

The Arab refugees claiming property rights in Israel have morphed from under 700,000 in 1949 to over 5 million in 21^st Century.  When the PLO or any Arab/Islamic group or country talk about “peace” with Israel, the right of return for Arab refugees who fled Israel in the 1940s and early 1950s is always brought up.

The truth is that many of the original Arab refugees are either dead or elderly. There is no way at this point that Israel could possibly absorb 5 million Arabs and still remain a viable Jewish country. To do so would be committing national suicide.

 

By Carol Rushton

Over the last twenty-five years, I have noticed an increasingly disturbing trend among Westerners, especially Americans, who call themselves Christians or are Christian leaders – that of a deep, unreasonable, maddening hatred toward Israel and Jews.

Israel bashing is all the rage in the United States today. Perhaps that’s to be expected when the U.S. has a president and first lady who embrace Muslim terrorists and shun Christians and Jews – unless you’re the politically correct kind, of course. What is so surprising is that some Christians are jumping on the anti-Israel bandwagon with such gusto.

For someone who was raised in a home by Christian parents who were unapologetically pro-Israel and pro-Jewish, the American Christian leaders and pastors who viciously attack Israel and Jews are bewildering. They can write or talk with logic and reason, supported by Scripture, about any other topic in the world. But when it comes to Israel and Jews, the poisonous hatred that drips from their pens would be more appropriate to describe ISIS terrorists than a tiny minority of the world’s population that has been hounded from pillar to post for most of their existence. If you didn’t know any better, you would think it was IDF soldiers who were crucifying and beheading Christian men in the Middle East while raping Christian women and girls 30 times before lunch, not the barbarians who are threatening to impose their Stone Age culture on Western civilization.

My first contact with Anti-Semites who claimed they were Christians was in a Bible study when I was going to a college in the Oklahoma City area right out of high school. The Bible study was nice enough but the man leading the group happened to make a very anti-Israel statement at the end. I didn’t want to get into a heated argument with this man, but I wanted him to know that not everyone in the room agreed with him about Israel and the Jews. I made a simple pro-Israel statement and left it at that.

Unfortunately, this man and his friend could not just “leave it at that.” They hounded me for the rest of the evening. When one got tired of attacking me, peppering me with questions, and arrogantly quoting Scripture, he would get up and the other man would take his place. It was an exceptionally unpleasant experience from these so-called “Christians” that I have never forgotten.

Being that young, I thought that these men were the exceptions to the rule. How could anyone call themselves a Christian and hate Israel, hate Jews? This thought was as baffling to me then as it is today.

As someone who lived in Israel for eight years during the 1990s, I can emphatically say that there is a great difference between the Israeli government bureaucracy and the average Jew that you meet on the street.

Those who work in the Israeli bureaucracy are generally not very pleasant toward non-Jews. This is not true of every Israeli government employee, but it is true of most. You have to understand that they must be suspicious of the intentions of non-Jews toward their country because of their past history. The Israeli government also has a vested interest in protecting the Jewish character of Israel. Too many non-Jews living in the country dilute the Jewishness of the country. And because Israel is the only Jewish state in the entire world, and a very small one at that, the Israeli government wants to encourage Jews, no matter where they are from, to emigrate to Israel.

However, most Jews that you meet away from the Israeli government are deeply appreciative that a non-Jew would deliberately choose to live in their country, share their problems, go through terror attacks, try to learn a very difficult language, and do nothing but want to support them and contribute to their country, especially when the non-Jew has a choice to live in a much more prosperous and comfortable country, like the United States of America.

While I lived in Israel, I was able to learn so much about the daily life of an Israeli Jew that most people never have the opportunity to experience. Having to go to five different stores to do all my shopping – no Walmarts in Israel  – was definitely an adjustment. Learning to speak halfway decently in a Semitic language was another challenge. I could also do without the “Middle Eastern” attitude that some Israeli men have toward women.

But I also learned that Jews have the biggest hearts. Rarely was I alone on a major Jewish holiday like Passover or Rosh HaShanah. Even if the Jewish friends I eventually made couldn’t have me over for a holiday meal, they would try to find a family who could.

Then there was the time when some Jews I barely knew and had been working with at The Jerusalem Post newspaper for only a short time called me at my apartment when I was sick with a bad cold. I was shocked. I had worked for Christian organizations and been a member at different churches but never had anyone personally called me at home from either a church or a Christian workplace to check on me when I was ill. They asked if they could do anything for me, get me anything from the store or the pharmacy, or bring me food. I’ll never forget that, either.

I suspect that most, if not all of these “Christian” Anti-Semites have never bothered to learn anything about Israel, must less visit there on a tour. They might risk changing their minds about the country they so love to hate.

While I have many wonderful – and some not-so-wonderful – memories of Israel, this is not the reason why I support Israel and the Jews.

First of all, non-Jews are commanded to love the Jews. God told Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3, “Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee: And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee; and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.”

One of the reasons Anti-Semitic Christians give for their hatred of Jews and opposition to Israel is that the Jews killed Jesus Christ. At the time the Lord said all of this to Abraham in Genesis 12, did He not know the future? Did He not know that thousands of years in the future the religious leadership of Israel would lead the Jewish nation in having Jesus Christ crucified? Of course He did.

How many times have I sat in church and heard a pastor say that we all killed Jesus because of our sins? How many times have I heard a pastor or preacher say that if I was the only person who had sinned in the world, Jesus would still have come down from heaven and died on the cross for me?

The Apostle Paul is quite clear in Romans 3:23. “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” That includes Gentiles as well as Jews.

Although the Jews have rebelled against God at various times throughout their history, they have still remained the apple of God’s eye. Any person or nation who has come against Israel has in the long run come out the worse.

Dr. E. F. Webber, the founder of Southwest Radio Church of the Air, used to say that Christians had no business judging Israel and the Jews. If the Jews needed judging, the Lord would do it, and He could do it better than anyone else.

God’s word in Genesis 12 is without exception. Non-Jews, and this includes Gentile Christians, are to love the Jews. The Lord even promises to bless those who do. This is a no brainer.

Secondly, the modern State of Israel is a fulfillment of end-times Bible prophecy. Below is a small selection of the Old Testament prophecies and promises that God made to the Jews about returning to Israel in the last days.

“For, lo, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will bring again the captivity of my people Israel and Judah, saith the LORD: and I will cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they shall possess it” (Jeremiah 30:3).

“And I will bring you out from the people, and will gather you out of the countries wherein ye are scattered, with a mighty hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out. And I will bring you into the wilderness of the people, and there will I plead with you face to face” (Ezekiel 20:34-35).

“Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel” (Ezekiel 37:12).

“Fear not: for I am with thee; I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west; I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back: bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth” (Isaiah 43:5-6).

“He shall cause them that come of Jacob to take root: Israel shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit” (Isaiah 27:6).

“But ye, O mountains of Israel, ye shall shoot forth your branches, and yield your fruit to my people of Israel; for they are at hand to come. For, behold, I am for you, and I will turn unto you, and ye shall be tilled and sown: And I will multiply men upon you, all the house of Israel, even all of it: and the cities shall be inhabited, and the wastes shall be builded. . .For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land” (Ezekiel 36:8-10, 24).

“Who hath heard such a thing? Who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children. Shall I bring to the birth, and not cause to bring forth? saith the LORD: shall I cause to bring forth, and shut the womb? saith thy God. Rejoice ye with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all ye that love her: rejoice for joy with her, all ye that mourn for her” (Isaiah 66:8-10).

What do these Christians do with God’s promises to bring the Jews from all over the world in the latter days to restore them to their ancient lands in the Middle East, as has been done in the 20^th and 21^st Centuries through the modern State of Israel? What do they do with God’s promise of a Millennial Kingdom for the Jews? Do they believe in Replacement Theology in which the Church replaces Israel? You certainly cannot believe that we are living in the last days as prophesied in the Bible and also reject Israel as being a fulfillment of end-times Bible prophecy.

Thirdly, Christians are commanded to love their fellow human beings, no matter who they are. The Apostle John makes this crystal clear in I John 4:7-11, 20-21:

“Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. . .If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.”

Remember that old song, “They Will Know We Are Christians By Our Love”? The hatred spewed out by most Anti-Semitic Christians toward Jews and Israel is so venomous, you would never know they were Christians.

The Apostle Paul warns Christians in Romans 11:17-23 against any arrogant or boastful attitude because they have accepted Jesus Christ as the Messiah while the Jews as a whole have not.

“And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert grafted in among them, and with them partakes of the root and fatness of the olive tree; Boast not against the branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee. Thou wilt say then, The branches were broken off, that I might be grafted in. Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear: For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee. Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness: otherwise thou also shalt be cut off. And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again.”

God’s word is clear. “For thus saith the LORD of hosts; After the glory hath he sent me unto the nations which spoiled you: for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye” (Zechariah 2:9).

“Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee” (Psalm 122:6).

Those who are Anti-Semitic toward Israel and the Jews risk God’s judgment upon themselves. Including Christians.