EP27: War In Israel—Historical Perspectives and Prayer

You know, sometimes I turn on the on the television and I feel

like I am reading a book that's about 600 pages and I just

jumped in about 450 pages in and I don't, I don't really know

what I'm reading, but I feel, I feel like I should.

And then I feel like I should have an opinion on what I'm

reading and I really have no idea.

Welcome back to another episode of the Grace Church Members

Podcast. I'm Chris Rivers, your host for

today and excited to be with you for another conversation.

If you're new to our podcast, we're glad you're here.

Our goal on every episode is to address discipleship issues in

the life of Grace Church and discuss how to be more fully

devoted to God. This episode is a little

different because we're tackling a current event, the war in

Israel. Now, this is the most

contentious land in the world, and the debate surrounding the

existence of the State of Israel and the Palestinians is also

contested. In this episode, we are trying

to accomplish a couple of things, and we're purposely not

addressing many things. And let me start with the

latter. The massacre and the kidnapping

that took place amongst the civilian population of Israel by

Hamas is not the subject of this podcast, mainly because we don't

have words to add to the horrors that have already been reported.

We also are not trying to speak on just war theory or tackle

this from a political or even theological perspective.

Our purpose is more basic. I think many of you will

resonate with our opening quote from Scott.

The attack from Gaza on Israeli citizens thrust all of us into a

centuries old story that you simply may not be familiar with

yet can't and shouldn't escape. So our goal is really twofold,

#1 give you a historical overview of the region and some

facts and geography around how we got here, and #2 help you

place our ministry partners, a group of Arab Christians based

out of Nazareth in that region as they await in an uncertain

future. In the room, we have Scott

Mazingo and Tim Wardle. Welcome, guys.

Hey, Chris, good to be with you. Thanks for having me here.

Yeah. Well, Tim, you are a member of

Grace Church's Pelham campus, and you are also the chair of

the religion department and associate professor of New

Testament at Furman University. So we thought you would be a

great candidate for a conversation to help our church

think about this topic. So could you just begin by

telling us about your connection to Israel?

Sure. So my wife and I moved to Israel

in 1999 and we lived there until 2001.

And I was a master's student at the Hebrew University of

Jerusalem. I went there to learn I had no

preconceived ideas of what what that would look like.

I just wanted to learn more about Judaism, about my faith,

about the Bible, and so I did a 2 years a master's degree there.

And then in 2015 started going back more regularly.

And so once or twice a year now I help lead groups to Israel,

sometimes with Grace Church, sometimes with Furman students

or from an alumni. This past July I participate in

an archaeological dig in the north of Israel.

So I try and go in various capacities.

OK, what was what was that like? It was really hot, really hard,

and I would do it again in a heartbeat.

Did you did you find anything? I found a Roman coin, a Roman

vase that was all smashed up. And I found a lot of dirt, a lot

of dirt. That's that's what I would

expect on an archaeological dig. Tim, we wanted to have you in.

I mean, you're not a geopolitical expert.

You're not necessarily a expert on the history of the state of

Israel. That's not what you teach, but

you do have a lot of knowledge in your around the subject and

so much more qualified than Chris and I.

But let's go back to your time, their connection, sense.

Do you have friends that are still in the region?

Yeah, we do. Cher and I both have good

friends who are still living in Jerusalem and the area around

it. They have a various or a variety

of occupations. Some are pastors, tour guides,

professors, but others are midwives.

Nurses, businessmen, non profit workers.

So they their occupations cut across a huge swath of Israeli

and Arab society. So let's let's work on some of

our our terminology, so Israeli and Arab.

Let's start there, kind of define those terms for us.

Sure. So Arab is a very broad term and

it refers to anyone who originally came from the Arabian

Peninsula. So Saudi Arabia would be the

origins, but now it refers to anyone who lives.

In a mostly Arab speaking country.

So think about Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, those

kinds of countries. They're all Arab.

And within that then you have like Lebanese Arabs, Syrian

Arabs. And so for Israel, what you'd

say is you've got Palestinian Arabs, OK, And where does that

term Palestine. It's actually an it's an old

term in the time of Jesus. So in the in the 1st century,

the Romans were in control of what we now call Israel, and

they called that the province of Palestine.

And so the term Palestina goes back to the Roman period.

So it's a very old term, but it's become a more political

term recently when you talk about a people group who live

there who are now called Palestinians.

OK, so we have Palestinian Arabs and we have Israelis.

Israeli is a nationality. Israeli is a political term and.

Speaking about someone who has Israeli citizenship.

Well, someone who's in citizenship in the Land of

Israel, right? So there are a lot of Jews who

have Israeli citizenship. About 80% of Israeli citizens

are Jewish, but about 20% of those Israeli citizens are Arab.

And so you've got Palestinians on the one on the ones one

category, then you've got Jews who are Israelis in another

category. Then you also have Arabs who are

Israelis in a third category. They identify with the

Palestinian people, but they have Israeli citizenship.

So when we are talking about our Partners Association of Baptist

churches, mainly around the Nazareth area, they identify as

Arab Christians. So Arab by nationality,

Christian by faith. But there's Israeli citizens,

correct? So what is?

What does that mean for them? It means that they have certain

rights that other Palestinians do not have, so they can vote in

Israeli elections. They can be conscripted into the

army, although most are not. They have to pay taxes to the

Israeli state. And so when I say Israeli,

almost always that means a Jewish, so a Jewish state,

right. So they're kind of caught

because they identify more with their Arab brothers and sisters,

but they live in a in a society where they are surrounded by

Jews. So they are a minority of a

minority. Yeah, Arab Christians are

definitely minority of minority. Because the the Arab part,

they're Arab Israelis, so they're 20% of the Israeli

population, so minority there, but most Arabs are Muslim and so

if you're an Arab Christian, you're also in the minority in

Nazareth. It's probably, I don't know the

numbers for sure, but I would guess it's about 80 to 90%

Muslim, 10 to 20% Christian, OK. And just for context, I think

the there's about 18 churches represented in the association

about 1000 baptized believers about 3000 in their community, I

believe is what they would say according to their website.

And we'll have the website URL link in the notes and also some

specific prayer requests that we'll revisit at the end of the

episode from our partners over there.

So, OK, so that sets the stage a little bit and uses some terms

that that get thrown around. Hopefully that's been helpful so

far. So when we talk about the land

of Israel, let's go, we'll go all the way back to the Bible.

All right, So this is, this is the land of David.

This is the land of Solomon. This is the land of the divided

Kingdom, post exile. This is Ezra, Nehemiah.

This is the land of Jesus, Jesus and the disciples.

So what happens around 8070, the years leading up to that that

that changes the dynamic in this area and then kind of walk us

through maybe some stages that happened after that?

Yeah, so the year 70 AD is an important one for Jews and

Christians. It's the year when the Romans

marched into Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple and the

city. They did it because there was a

Jewish revolt, and so the Romans came in and wanted to put down

the revolt to make sure that they could.

Maintain their dominance in the region.

But what it did for Jews and Christians is it moved

Christians and Jews out of Jerusalem and out of Israel

proper. They didn't all leave.

Some of them stayed, but a lot of them fled to neighboring

countries or just neighboring areas.

So then who fills the the vacuum in the years after that?

Good question. So between the year 70 and the

year like about 3:20. There, Jerusalem is not a very

populated place. Israel's not that populated.

The Roman army is the 10th, the 10th Legion is stationed in

Jerusalem. They're just kind of maintaining

peace and order in the empire, but it's not an important place.

In the three 20s, the Roman Empire became Christian, at

least the Byzantine part of it. So you've got what you call

Byzantine Christianity for about 300 years.

So Christians control Jerusalem and Israel more broadly.

And then in the six and 638, the Muslims take over Jerusalem and

they are in control Jerusalem for about 400 years.

And so there's various Muslim dynasties that rule.

And then in 1099 The Crusaders come, The Crusaders from Europe

and they control Jerusalem and the surrounding areas until

1187. So lots of dates here.

And then from 1187, when the Muslim armies defeated The

Crusaders, you've got Muslim control of Jerusalem again.

And that Muslim control of Jerusalem extends from 1187 up

until 1917, so for a long period of time.

So we start out with the Byzantines, and Constantine

might be a name that folks recognize from that period of

time. And then we have the Muslims,

and then we have The Crusaders. Crusaders and Jews.

How'd that? How'd how'd that go?

Did not go very well. This is one period of time when

Jews were not allowed to live in Jerusalem, and they didn't

really want to because The Crusaders viewed them as

enemies. The Crusaders viewed Muslims and

Jews and Eastern Christians as enemies.

And so the initial wave of Crusaders came.

They just slaughtered everyone that they that didn't look like

them. After a while, they began to

realize that was a bad policy, so they began to get along with

the Arabs near them. But yeah, they were a rough

group. And so going all the way back to

what we might call the diaspora, or the scattering of Christians,

we think about the Christians. We think about the Great

Commission and how God used the persecution, basically pushing

Christians all over the world. Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, ends

of the earth. And so here we are, right ends

of the earth. We're in the upstate of South

Carolina. As followers of Jesus, we don't

really think a lot about what happened to the Jewish people.

So where did the Jewish? People go, yeah, good question.

The Jewish people, they they always see, they've always seen

Jerusalem and Judea as their homeland.

So every time they celebrate the Passover meal, they talk about

next year in Jerusalem. So Jerusalem has always been a

central idea, but Jewish Jews have not been in Jerusalem a

very prominently since the year. Well, starting in the year 70,

up until the year 1948, it was a long period of time when Jews,

some Jews were living in Jerusalem, but not a lot.

And so they were spread into various countries.

So they went into what we now call the Middle East.

So Arab, Arab speaking countries today, they moved to Europe and

then they moved even farther like to the to the United

States, but they just spread all over the place.

So in in Europe, there's heavy populations.

In what? Russia.

Poland. Yeah, and Eastern Europe,

Eastern Europe, Eastern Europe and Spain was actually a huge

Jewish centre until the Inquisition.

And then they were forced to leave in the 14, about 15

hundreds. And is it?

Is it true that there are different approaches to viewing

the homeland? Like some religious Jews,

they're like, hey, that's God's deal and he's going to bring us

into the homeland when he's ready and God's in charge of

that. And then there are other, maybe

more secular Jews that have a little more independence and

kind of move more aggressively towards returning to the

homeland. Is that is that fair to say let?

Me give you. I'm going to go back a little

bit. Historically, yeah.

So there's the the rise of Zionism.

Is a movement that began in force in the late 19th century.

So 1880s, eighteen, 90s, something like that and that and

that the word that's important because that word gets used a

ton right now. So Christians and Jews both have

various forms of Zionism. I mean, so Zionism really just

means the desire to live in Zion or to live in Jerusalem, OK?

Or you could say Israel more broadly, right?

So for Jews, it was this desire to return to their homeland.

But there were various kinds of Zionism or forms of Zionism.

And so, Scott, that's partly what you were getting at.

Some of the more religious Jews said we don't really think we

should have a political state of Israel.

We think that when the when the Messiah comes, he will create

the land of Israel. Then we can all come back and

it'll be this theocracy where God rules.

But many other Jews said we cannot wait for the Messiah and

so we need to create facts on the ground.

So they started moving to Israel in the early 1900s.

Mid 1900s. So when as there's persecution

in Europe, especially in Western Europe, sorry, in Eastern Europe

you start to see waves of of Jews slowly immigrating.

All right. So in the in the late 1800s,

eighteen 80s, eighteen 90s, you see a series of pogroms that are

beginning in Russia, Poland, that area, it's called the Pale

of Settlement. So Jews are starting to leave

that area of Europe. And and they're trying to either

moving to either Western Europe or they're trying to move to

places where they're safe. And one of the places they

wanted to move was to Israel. And so you start to see Jewish

immigration to Israel in the late 1800s, early 1900s.

It's not always legal and so Jews can't always get there, but

the desire is really is really increasing.

And so you see Zionism increasing as a as a religious

movement. And when they are, when they get

there, you know what? What do they find?

Like, like who's living in the land And how did they begin to

change the land? Yeah.

So when when Jews began to immigrate to Israel and there

there weren't, it was not in great numbers.

But when they started to come, what they found were a lot of

Arabs living in the land, along with some Jews living in the

land. But it was not well populated.

I mean there were various, there were villages, there were towns,

but there weren't big cities. And so when Western Jews,

meaning European Jews when they start moving.

Into Israel, they start to buy up land as much as they can,

'cause that was the system in Europe, right?

You you wanted to own the land so that you could farm the land.

A little different system had applied in Israel that time.

And so the day I just the idea of buying land and owning land

and not letting people on your land was a new a newish kind of

thing that made these Western Jews not very welcome among both

the Jews who had been living there and among the Arab

population. Because before that, everybody's

getting along pretty well. They are getting along pretty

well, that's right. And so just some numbers, I

think these are probably close enough to to say publicly 1880,

about 500,000 Arabs, 10% Christian and about 20 to 30,000

Jews. And so both the Jews and the

Christians are minorities, but everybody's, everybody's working

together to just live peacefully in the land.

Doesn't mean there wasn't tension or strife.

I mean that's going to happen within different people groups.

But it seems like as the economy began to change, then the

religious differences began to get greater between those

groups. Just for just for size.

I meant to say this earlier, but Israel?

Roughly the size of New Jersey. That's right.

So Israel's roughly, roughly the size of New Jersey with a

current population of about 9,000,000.

So just for comparison, South Carolina is just a little over 5

million. So New Jersey with like twice

the size, twice the population of South Carolina.

So it's a good number of folks. OK, so then take us up to kind

of World War One and where what's England's role?

England plays a pretty big role in this changing of the the, the

land that we now call Israel. What take?

Walk us through a couple of steps there.

Sure. So the Ottoman Empire fought on

the side of the Germans in World War One, and as it turned out

that they were on the losing side, The British and the French

were on the winning side. Came to what we now call the

Middle East and they began to carve up the Middle East into

certain areas. And so when the Ottoman Empire

disintegrated, they were the ones who controlled Jerusalem

and Israel. The French took everything north

of what we now call Israel. So Lebanon and Syria became

French controlled and then the countries of what we now call

Israel, Jordan, parts of Egypt, parts of Iraq even became became

under British control. So after after World War One,

you get something called the British Mandate.

OK, so that's a pretty big area for Britain to control.

And so then what are what are they saying about promoting the

migration of Jews back into the land?

About 1917 there's something called the Balfour Declaration.

So a guy named Edward Balfour wrote this memo back to Britain

and said, hey, we support the creation of a Jewish state.

At the same time, you get a different British politician

making promises to Arab peoples who live in the same land.

And so right in the right, in the beginning of the British

period, British are trying to establish their their control

over the region, and they're making promises to both people

groups, which doesn't lead to good things in the end, Yeah,

but it sounds very political. It's very political.

Yeah, very political. So.

So Britain's a major player in how this area is getting carved

up. I mean, and literally when we

talk about carved up, we're creating boundary lines,

national boundary lines. Yeah, they took maps and just

drew lines, just drew lines on maps, which I mean, it's just,

you know, like just different different way of thinking about

where we landed, where we are now.

And so and then we have a terrible, a really, really

terrible time in history leading up to World War 2.

So just kind of kind of walk us through some of what was

happening. And I think that's probably a

time to introduce anti-Semitism. Can you give us, you gave us a

good definition of Zionism. Can you give us a good

definition of anti-Semitism? Yeah, anti-Semitism really just

means anti Jewish sentiments, right?

So things where you're blaming Jewish people for certain

things, you can take a lot of different forms.

There is something called Christian anti-Semitism that

goes back to like the 2nd century.

It's it's a very deeply established and tragic thing.

But anti-Semitism, in terms of anti Jewish sensitivities began

to really ramp up in the same time that Zionism is becoming a

really important thing. And those two things go together

right, Right. So as Jews are feeling more

pressure, they're feeling discriminated against.

Some of them are being bullied or are being killed at the same

time that that's happening, they're thinking we need we need

to go somewhere, we need somewhere safe.

Sure. Yeah.

And so the rise of Zionism in the late 1800s, early 1900s is

happening. At the same time we're starting

to see a lot of anti Jewish sensibilities, especially in in

Western and Eastern Europe. Yeah, so they're just they're

looking for a place to go. They do not have a home.

Even here in the United States, there's strong anti-Semitic.

Sentiment. And then of course we we know

about what happened during World War Two.

We know the Holocaust. Take, take what I said earlier

about the population of South Carolina, I think 5.2 million.

So 6 million Jews die in the Holocaust.

It's just unfathomable, right? And so that definitely changes

the dynamic as far as. How the Jews are viewed in some

circles on the words world stage.

Is that correct? That's right.

And so the best tell us about the United Nations.

What role are they playing? Why do they even come into the

conversation? What's the role between United

Nations and Britain on the heels of World War 2?

So the United Nations is this, this collective body that

individual countries have given have ceded certain control or or

powers to them to make decisions, make a global or

universal decisions. The United Nations has a role to

play or had a role to play in the creation of the State of

Israel because the various countries that are in the United

Nations wanted, a lot of them wanted Israel to be.

They wanted a safe place for the Jewish people, right?

Right. They wanted this, this land to

be or this country to be created.

Particularly on the hills of what it particularly on the

heels of the Holocaust, right. So there's a lot of sense of

compassion, of horror and what happened.

And so this this guilt really too, we need to do our part to

protect the Jewish people because we haven't done a good

job of it. And so that's how a lot of

European countries, especially Western European countries, got

behind the creation of the state of Israel.

Britain was the biggest backer, the US was a very strong backer.

So you got various countries who are really pro of the creation

of the state of Israel. At the same time, in the United

Nations, you've got a a collection of countries that are

very opposed to the creation of the state of Israel.

So it was a very contested thing.

In the United Nations, the vote was definitely not unanimous.

But what the United Nations did 'cause they had the they had the

collective authority to make some decisions.

They said we think the British Mandate, meaning the land that

is in what we now call Israel, that it should be divided

between Jews and Arabs. And so they came up with a plan.

They drew lines on a map. And the Arab people, the Arab

people who are in control in Israel at the time, they

rejected the plan because it wasn't in their favor.

They were going to lose stuff. They had, they had the majority

of the population, but they were getting slightly less than 50%

of the land. Yeah.

I mean up until that time they own all the land, right, Right.

So any, any division of the land they were opposed to, but

especially the way it was being divided because it wasn't a fair

share, right say. So what happens next?

There's a war? Yeah, so the war goes by

different names. In 1948, the British have Now

they've left Israel, there's a power vacuum.

That and that's important because they have been involved

post Ottoman Empire, British Mandate, but basically they kind

of washed their hands of the whole situation they did.

And they just left. It was not a the British just

wanted out, sure, Yeah, they wanted out, man.

And they had supporters of the Jews and the supporters of Arabs

in their army. I mean part of, I mean, you said

earlier use the word mass, Chris.

I mean, part of this conversation is this show.

It's been a mess for a long time, and there are human

decisions and historical decisions that, and sure,

there's different perspectives and different interpretations

and how things came about, but but there are factual things

that happened that have created a lot of this, lot of this mess.

Which when you, you know turn on cable news and you're like Oh my

gosh, I I see no end game. I see no way out of this apart

from Jesus. This is we're just trying to get

catch you up a little bit on the history of how we how we even

got here. So we have we have a war in 48.

We have a war now So what's happening during the war?

What's it? What are some of the natural

consequences of war in 1948 or now?

Sorry, now 1948. OK, so in 1948 there was a war

between Jews and Arabs, and there the goal for both is to

take as much land as they can get.

The Israeli side won the war, so they call it the war for

independence. And so it celebrated every May.

Something. I forget the exact date on the

Arab or Palestinian side, They refer to that conflict as the

catastrophe, the Nakba, right? Because they lost.

And what what ended up happening is Israel actually took even

more land than the UN had partitioned for them, right?

So they've got even more land. The Arabs got even less.

And one of the effects of that war, which really leads to some

of the contemporary conflicts that you see today in Gaza, is

there was a refugee crisis. And by how large of a crisis?

So when Israel took as much land as they did, most Arabs who

lived in that land fled right? For very.

I mean, it's war, right? They they fully assumed that

they would be allowed back into their land at some point when

the hostilities were over. That never happened.

And so it created this refugee problem where you got about

700,000 Palestinians who flee to various countries or well,

various countries around Israel. So Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and

Egypt are the places where those where those people fled.

OK, so at that. So hundreds of thousands of

people, 700 thousands of people that are fleeing natural

consequences of war, some migration, some are displaced,

borders are set looking to return back and that's just not

possible. For for for a number of them.

So then what happens next? What happens next?

Well, let me back up and say one other thing.

So most Palestinians fled. Some of them stayed in their

land, right. And so the the people who now

live in Nazareth, who are partners with Grace Church, they

were part of the contingent who stayed.

So they didn't flee. So if you if in 1948, if your if

your family fled, you're now called a refugee.

If your family stayed, you're an Israeli citizen, right?

So that you're an Israeli Arab. Really.

That's that's the IT goes to 1948.

Between 1948 and 1967, the neighboring Arab countries

around Israel are unhappy about Israel controlling the land that

they do right because up for for 1300 years or so that landed all

of an Arab and now all of a sudden this Western group,

really that's how they thought of the Jews coming in.

They thought of these Europeans who are coming in and taking

land from them. And are there still a good

number of the refugees from the war that are living in Jordan or

other neighboring countries at that time?

Yeah. Yeah.

So. So Arabs who were forced to flee

from their homeland, their ancestral home, right.

They are living in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt.

Right. So they were forced to flee.

Or sometimes it depends on who you ask.

They voluntarily flee. Were they forced to flee?

Exactly. But they became refugees, they

were not allowed back into their land.

So in 1967 this growing anti Israel sentiment, it's been

growing in the Arab world, especially led by Egypt.

And in 1967 you get Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt all

attacking Israel at the same time.

Israel. Israel started the war, you

could say, because they hit the Egyptians first, but it was

really, it was because the Israelis knew this was coming,

OK. In 1967, it's called the Six Day

War because in six days Israel doubled in size.

They took an area of length called the Golan Heights from

Syria. They took what's called the West

Bank from Jordan, and they took the Gaza Strip from Egypt.

All right. So all three of those

territories became part of Israel proper, or at least they

were. They weren't necessarily legally

annexed, but they they became under Israeli control.

And this is a this is a really big defining moment for this

newer Jewish state. I mean they they see God's hand

provision, I mean miraculous in in in six days they're able to

turn back enemies from all sides and take the land.

And is it fair to say that that Zionist sentiment, maybe this is

how God is securing their final place in the land, is through

this? Through war season like this.

That is certainly how a lot of Christian Zionists saw it, and

Jewish Zionists, right both. Up until this point, there were

a number of very religious Jews who had who had decided not to

support the state of Israel because it had been of human

creation. But in the Six Day War, what

they what they claimed was that they saw God's hand in allowing

Israel to defeat their enemies in six days.

And so they So some of these religious Jews said, OK, we're

on board now. It's not just this human thing

that's happening. God must be involved.

So Zionism, you would say that you are incorporating more

branches of the Zionist movement into support of this?

Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. And so I think for the first

time we've mentioned Gaza Strip and West Bank.

Give us just quickly, geography. Where is Gaza?

Where? What's West Bank?

Of what? Sure.

So the West Bank is much larger than the Gaza Strip.

The West Bank is means the West side of the Jordan River.

So the east Bank of the Jordan River is the country of Jordan

today. The West side was part of

Jordan. But then when Israel conquered

that territory in 1967, it became part of Israel.

But it's designated differently. It's not.

But what you call it matters, right?

So you can call it the West Bank, the Occupied West Bank,

the Palestinian territories, or if you're a strong Zionist, you

might call it Judea and Samaria, called by its biblical names.

And this is where like the city of Bethlehem, the birth place of

of Jesus would be great point. So Bethlehem is in the West

Bank, Jericho's in the West Bank.

There's a bunch of biblical sites that are in the West Bank.

That are in the West Bank. And then what about Gaza?

So Gaza was a very small piece of land.

It's about 25 miles long and about 6 miles wide.

And you have roughly 2 million and you've got 2 million people

living in that small strip of. Land.

Right. Half of which I think they say

are children. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. So the Gaza Strip then became

this. It had been part of Egypt.

Israel took that land from Egypt.

They took even more. They took the Sinai Peninsula as

well. But what happened then is a lot

of the original Palestinian refugees who had fled to this

place called the Gaza Strip in order to flee the Israelis,

they're now under Israeli control.

And the Israelis aren't very happy about it because there's a

bunch of Arabs that are now under their control and they

don't know what to do with them. The Arabs aren't happy about it

because they're under Israeli control.

So even starting in 1967, it was kind of a a mess in some ways in

terms of what do you do with this land that we conquered, but

has all these people here that we don't?

I mean, if you're on the Jewish side, you say that we don't

really want. Right.

Yeah, 'cause there's always security concerns here.

A lot of, a lot of fighting. Just just all the just tension

all the time. OK, so then where where does

Hamas as it relates to Gaza? Tell us about The Who is Hamas

in The Rise of Hamas. Sure.

So Hamas is part of a larger movement.

It's called the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Muslim Brotherhood started in the 1920s.

It was an Egyptian thing, and it spread to a lot of different

Arab countries. And so you see branches of the

Muslim Brotherhood in, you know, in various countries today, most

governments don't really like the Muslim Brotherhood.

They're more revolutionary, they're more reactionary, and

they're more of a kind of return to very conservative Islam in

some ways. Yeah, they have strong religious

beliefs. They really do.

Yeah, right. And so for Hamas specifically,

the, the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood is Hamas.

And Hamas was just one among several political parties among

the Palestinian people until, well, they were just one of many

until 2005. In 2005 Israel, who has been

controlling the Gaza Strip they decided to pull out of the Gaza

Strip and just leave it at the give it over to the

Palestinians. They were tired of trying to not

really police it because they weren't they were trying just to

make it secure for Israelis but they were trying to secure from

the inside. So they said, wait, this is

crazy. They pulled out.

So we're going to put up borders, big fences and walls.

And and so in the, as the Israelis were pulling out of the

Gaza Strip, you start, you have Palestinian elections in the

Gaza Strip, right, Because there has to be someone to take over

and Hamas ends up taking over. So the Palestinian Authority had

been kind of the other main, that's the other main party.

They had been in control and then they lost the elections to

Hamas. And since 2005, there's not been

any elections. Hamas has.

Just kept control. Yeah.

So for almost 20 years. But specifically as it relates

to their existence, in their charter defining their

existence, they call for the eradication of all Jews,

correct. They do so in their charter.

Yeah. They said that they want to.

I mean one of the slogans right now is to free Palestine or or

Palestinian or Palestine all the way to the sea or something like

that. That's that's a Hamas charter.

They're saying that we don't want the state of Israel to even

exist. We want all this land back.

And so Hamas is a is a very militant group, but it's

complex. They're not just military,

they're also they're they're in charge of the education system

in Gaza. They're in charge of all the

civic kind of things. Like they do a lot of stuff.

Yeah. Like the humanitarian stuff,

Yeah. But they have a militant side to

them that has not endeared them to many people.

And I think that's what where people say, well, do people do

folks living in Gaza do, do they?

What do they think of Hamas? Well, I mean, I don't know that

they have much of A. Much of A choice.

You probably wouldn't get a straight answer if you ask them

because they live, many of them live in fear of Hamas.

Now some of them are supporters, but a lot of them live in fear.

So Hamas isn't. I mean all Hamas people are

Palestinian, right? But not all Palestinians are

Hamas. In fact, a very small number of

Palestinians are Hamas. It's probably it's in the of a

of a place that's 2 million people in the in the Gaza Strip.

If I were to venture a guess, I would say 10 to 20,000 are

hardcore Hamas supporters and then you got millions.

I mean 1.8 million or at least 1.9 anyway.

A lot. It's not great at math.

A lot are they're just they just happen to live there, right?

That's right. And they can't leave because

Israel controls the borders and Egypt controls the border

crossing, and so Palestinians who live in the Gaza Strip are

stuck. Yeah, and they're different from

Palestinians that live in the West Bank.

Those two are not connected. And there are a number of folks.

West Bank, like you said, is a much larger territory.

OK. So then just real quickly, as we

as we kind of wrap up this portion, how do we get from 2005

to now? Any thoughts on what you've seen

most recently in the deterioration of the talks idea

of A2 state solution, any any thoughts on that?

So A2, the idea of A2 state solution is that there would be

at some point in the future a Palestinian state and an Israeli

state right side by side. That is becoming increasingly

unlikely, mostly because of what are called Israeli settlements.

So Jews going in and living in parts of the West Bank and they

used to be living in the Gaza Strip.

That's what they, when they pulled out the Gaza Strip, they

they left all their settlements in terms of like, how we got to

like the conflict just in the last three weeks, Right.

So once Hamas took over in the Gaza Strip, what you see is

continual conflict between Hamas and the Israeli government which

really just means Israel proper, right.

And so Hamas will shoot rockets into got into Israel now and

again is what will respond with much greater force to try and

put it down And that that conflict has been simmering

since 2005 or 6 it erupts every now and again.

So in 2009, two thousand and twelve 2014, two 1019, you see

some sometimes where Israel respond with more force, right.

And So what happened and three weeks ago was above and beyond

anything that had happened before.

So Hamas really has been contained in the Gaza Strip and

they were they were able to in various ways leave the Gaza

Strip and come and slaughter a bunch of, I mean 1300 Israelis.

And so in previous conflicts, you might have had like 5

Israelis die and there was a strong response, 1300 people

dead and then about 200 plus hostages.

It's a different, it's a different kind of thing, yeah.

It's unfathomable what's happening, right.

So that's what leads to where we are now.

It's kind of stuck because Israel doesn't.

Israel wants to go in and free their hostages and get rid of

Hamas, but they don't have an end game.

And so they, I mean they don't want to go, they don't want,

they do not want to go in and occupy the the Gaza Strip again.

Right. And again, you have a number of

Palestinians, Arab Palestinians, that would not support.

What Gaza has done by any, by any means correct, a lot of

people in Gaza and a lot of you in the West Bank, Palestinians

would say that is that is totally against who we are as a

people. Yeah, which just adds to the

complexity. And then we come back to our to

our friends or Arab Christians what, what, what would, what do

you think life is like for them now?

And then Chris recently this summer was part of a a trip to

go over and support them. And so we'll talk a little bit

about. What that was like and but what

do you what do you think the type of tension that they're

that they're feeling now they're in the north, so they're

shielded from a lot of the violence which is down in the

South or the threat of violence. But, but I know I'm asking you

to, you know, speak into their world a little bit.

But what do you think? I mean, Arab Israeli life is

difficult, whether you're Christian or not.

If you're Christian, it's even harder, 'cause we talked about

how they're minority within a minority, right, Earlier on this

podcast. But even if, But even if you're

just like Muslim or Christian, if you're an Arab Israeli, you

are looked at suspiciously. So you have citizenship, but

you're really a second class citizen.

You don't. I mean, in theory you have all

the rights, but in practice you don't.

Really. Nazareth is not as clean as

other Israeli cities because these Israelis don't put as much

money into it, right? So there's a lot of things where

they already feel marginalized. And an event like what happened

in what is happening between Gaza and Israel, those same

suspicions that are placed upon Hamas and Gaza are sometimes

also placed upon Arab Israelis living anywhere.

Like we can't trust them, they might turn against us.

All those things are feeding into the strong sense of being a

minority in Israel. And and they're living outside

of the West Bank. Real quickly some of your

friends that live in like Bethlehem like their life is

even more challenging as a era Christian in the West Bank.

Just like transportation wise, like just tell us a little bit

of like what what that would be like to have work and go to a

job, right. So if Grace Church were to go to

Israel today, which we can't, but if we were to go just right

just today or tomorrow, we could very easily cross from Jerusalem

into Bethlehem. There is a border.

Our bus just sails right through.

If you are, if you happen to be an Arab or just a Palestinian

living in Bethlehem, and you work on the Israeli side of the

border, which is something which many do, you might have to get

up at 4:00 AM to get in line at the border crossing because it

might take you about 3 hours to cross because the Israeli

soldiers are checking everyone's ID.

Then you work and then to get back, it might be another two

hours at the border to get back. And so just life is difficult

and just the things we take for granted like transportation,

it's it's not for granted for them, right.

Just life is difficult. Yeah, Chris, what did you, what

did you witness? What did you feel?

What did you experience when you were over there visiting our

partners? Yeah, I would, I would say

definitely a group of people that are humble, kind, faithful

in the small things. Vulnerable.

I mean, you talked about being the minority of the minority,

but I mean they have such joy and their smiles are never

stopping. They.

It was interesting to be there and to experience that region.

So we got there, we went in July and we got there and went to

Nazareth. Nazareth Baptist House Seminary

is where ABC has kind of headquarters.

So we got to meet. Bedere Mansour, who is the

development officer there for ABC, and he introduced us to the

many different churches that are in this network.

So there's 18 churches that they support within ABC.

And we stayed in Tehran, which is north of Nazareth and that's

where we were a home. We had that as a home base.

So, you know, just meeting Ziad and his wife Rhonda and Josh

and. Just a handful of people living

there they their church is a three story church so they have

the at the bottom they have where children's student

ministry meet. In the middle is where the

church is and then at the top was a place that we slept as a

team and so just meeting them and connecting with them they're

just so kind feeding us want to have a meal every, every time we

we are with them, they. You know that it's about to be

good when they pull out the Coke, OK?

They pull out a Coke and they pull out these little shot glass

plastic cups, which is what they pour the Coke in and it's 11:00

at night and it's time to drink Coke and have a good time and

hang out. And so they are doing great work

there. We went there for Avbs.

That was at a church in Benny. So Benny is north of Nazareth as

well. Rama Church is another church

that was in this area and so we went to support them.

So it was a little bit of a different trip than we've ever

done at Grace because we went there solely to support them in

this VBS. They had 85 kids at this VBS at

A at a woman's house that she let them use the field because

they don't actually have a physical building for the church

in Benny. And just to see the student

leaders that they started this about 10 years ago and to see

the leaders now who had started at the very beginning, 10 years

ago now leading, translating it was it was a joy.

I mean it was, it was absolute joy to see and it was the

hottest. I think they had record heat

index. It was as you said.

Yes, might have been there at the same time.

Yeah, it was. It was hot and but just to see

the work and what God was doing there.

I think the most compelling thing that I saw is their vision

for children. And to see the next generation

raised up to follow Jesus and you know the cities and Tim, you

probably could talk more about this.

But in Benny, Tehran, these different areas, those cities

are large. So you're in community houses

are right up next to each other. And so to say, hey, we've got a

week where your kids can come spend time with us and play and

hang out and. I mean I don't think they they

do care that they're hearing Christian the gospel.

But you could tell the first couple days, just the excitement

there were so many kids there that don't know Christ.

And so to see their the leaders there and just to be a part of

the work that God's doing there and just very raw, very basic.

You know, we're not talking a lot of production.

Right, That's right, I. Mean.

It is. It is.

You're in a room and it's hot, and there's a machine that has

ice in it that's blowing cold air and you're just hoping that

it's going to cool down. Yeah.

But it is just relating, having fun, relating and connecting

back to the stories in the Bible.

That's right. And the person of Jesus.

That's right. You talk about a group of people

living as exiles. You know, we can we can read

that in in First Peter and try to try to emulate that.

But that is their. That is their life.

That's right. Yeah.

OK, well, we didn't solve any problems here today and no one's

asking us to, thankfully. But what we wanted to do is we

wanted to walk through some terms.

We wanted to walk through a little bit of history.

You know, sometimes I turn on the on the television and I feel

like I am reading a book that's about 600 pages and I just

jumped in about 450 pages in. And I don't, I don't really know

what I'm reading, but I feel, I feel like I should.

And then I feel like I should have an opinion on what I'm

reading. And I really have no idea.

And so we just wanted to really try to give you the Cliff Notes

version. We really wanted to reintroduce

our partners and our friends at the Associated Baptist Churches

in Israel located out of Nazareth.

And we just want to close our time and we just want to, we

want to pray for them and we want to pray for the region.

And we want to pray for peace. And so if you would allow us to

do that, we would just encourage you to pray with us as we close

our time. So Chris, would you get us

started? Yeah, let's do that.

Lord, thank you so much for the people that you love.

And I want to just lift up people like Neria Samaria.

I want to lift up Tarneem. Lord, I want to lift up Ziad and

Rhonda. I want to lift up Bouchara and

Rhonda. I want to lift up Tony, Lydia.

There's so many names Iman, Lord Juliet who hosted the VBS, Lord

Bouchara as he has been through so much recently.

But God you are restoring him. But I just want to.

I just want to thank you for Bedere and his wife, Rhonda, as

they. Are helping lead an organization

that is trying to support this church, these churches.

I pray for Luna as she helps develop student leaders in that

area. Lord, I want to pray for Fadi

and just There's so many names that I could share.

God, I just lift them up to you. Pray that you would encourage

them in their faith, that you would draw them close to you,

and that Lord this time would be a time where you restore to them

the joy of your salvation. God, we do pray for safety for

all of our friends, those that follow Jesus call the name of

Jesus specifically that they would be salt and light, that

you would shield them from any of the extremism and hatred

especially amongst the young population that is so prevalent

and the heightened tensions during war.

God, we pray for for peace for the whole area, but we play pray

specifically that our. Our friends, our, our brothers

and sisters in Christ could be they could, they could be

peacekeepers. That they would be effective

witnesses to the peace that comes from Jesus.

That you would allow them to love.

You would allow them to spread hope.

You would allow them just to be different in in a time of war.

Father, we have never seen war. I'm just thankful that Lord my

my children have never seen war and I can't imagine living

through that. And so we ask that that it would

come to an end and that there would be peace, there would be

security for the entire region. That only through Jesus is this

conflict that we have outlined in some really broad strokes is

there going to be hope in a future.

But I want to pray, as Bedere has asked us, to pray that the

Son of Righteousness will rise with healing in its rays, and

that the name of Jesus would be known and glorified throughout

this entire region. Father, I echo these prayers.

We do pray for peace. You tell us that blessed are the

peacemakers, and I pray that in ways big and small, that we can

be involved in that both here in Greenville and in other parts of

the world. So pray for safety, for peace,

and or your tender work in people's hearts, drawing them to

to draw them to yourself and to give people hope and security as

well. Amen.

Amen.