“Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who put darkness for light and light for darkness; who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!” – Isaiah 5:20
On November 3, in the US—after four years of fresh air and a new hope that streamed from Washington towards Jerusalem—the ground shifted. On January 20, that repositioning was formalised in ceremony.
Darkness masquerading as light has officially descended on the United States. Proclamations of the victory of democracy and appeals to love and unity have been dressed up—by the very people who dug the deepest spade cuts of discord into the heart of the country—as the dawning of a new day.
But it was night that fell.
For now, the Democrats have succeeded in vanquishing Conservative America to the back halls of governance; the mainstream media is waging a thorough assault on Donald Trump’s political legacy; and those who celebrated the previous president’s unparalleled pro-Israel policies worry about how the new administration will behave towards the Jewish state.
What we do know is that President Joe Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris, set to govern America as “co-equals”, and professing to be Israel’s friends are, in fact, both enemies of Zionism. In critical ways, both contest the return of a long-wronged indigenous people to all of their ancestral home, and the restoration of that home to them.
The Biden-Harris administration opposes the existence and growth of Jewish population centres in Judea and Samaria. It advocates the ethnic cleansing of these Jews (from the land after which they are named) via the globally-backed land-theft policy deceptively called the Two State Solution. Biden-Harris have said they will throw America’s weight back behind achieving this goal.
Just what this duo plans to do in regard to the genocidal nuclear intents of Iran against Israel (and the US) we shall soon learn. Israel’s general hopes in this regard were expressed in Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s congratulatory message to the new administration.
The godless, globalist left in the US can be as convinced as they like that they have secured the way forward… But we are watching God.
“Bibi” must surely have qualms, given that Biden has expressed a desire to re-enter the Iran deal, and that the ‘new’ White House staff line-up is looking very much like a reassembly of the Obama team, including those who negotiated the deal, and numerous identities hostile to Israel, who will push for a return to the fiasco of Oslo.
This remarshalling of forces is the red flag. Obama was hands-down the most anti-Israel president ever to occupy the Oval Office. He was and is the antithesis of Trump, and there are many who believe that we are facing, in effect, Obama’s de facto third term. This means a dial-back on Israel-US relations to the Obama era and question marks over the core issues: Iran; sovereignty; Israeli-Arab regional relations.
CNN Correspondent Sam Kiley, on January 19, crowed that, “If the Obama administration is anything to go by, there’s no question [but that] the Biden administration [will turn] the screws, getting aggressive, putting heavy pressure on the Israelis.”
If destined to be adverse, the Biden-Harris assault will likely not start off too fiercely, but will intensify as resistance grows. How will the Jewish state counter this?
In less than two months, Israel is due to hold its fourth general election in half as many years. While Netanyahu’s retention of the premiership is not guaranteed, the country is trending towards installing what some political pundits say could be the most right-wing government in the nation’s modern history.
Despite the chagrin expressed by friends of Israel who believe that yet another election is the last thing a Covid-19-hammered economy needs, there is the hope that a right-weighted coalition victory, representing the freshly-expressed will of the Israeli electorate, will be best able to weather the coming political cold-front from Washington. The current race to have all Israel coronavirus-vaccinated before voting day is seen as a potential winner for the right.
There is a general perception that Israel is in a stronger position after one term of Trump in office than it was before 2016. Should the right prevail in March, there is a policy base it can stand on to strengthen its position in the face of a hostile US administration.
That policy base is the land base. The land issue alone, as staked-out common ground, as it were, has the power to be bedrock for the right if they will set their differences aside for the sake of the nation. The organisation called Women in Green said it best; I referred to their principles for sovereignty in C4Israel Australia’s Oct-Nov Newspaper edition and I will revisit that portion again here. They wrote:
“The Land of Israel has warmly welcomed the returning Jewish people [as] is manifest in agriculture, industry, hi-tech, medicine, and countless other areas. If only we continue to adopt the ways of the Zionist return of the people to its land, we will receive an exponentially greater return from the yield of the land and from the yield of the ingathering of the exiles to it. During this period, we must, to a certain extent and for a while, place our global aspirations on the back burner[and] focus on nationalism… We cannot skip this stage. We cannot expect that a people that does not appreciate its essence and does not invest in it will have the ability to stand as a lighthouse for the nations.”
(Read the Women in Green’s “Basic principles of the aspiration for sovereignty” here: www.ribonut.co.il/BlogPostID.aspx?BlogPostId=501&lang=2)
If the right can actively choose to band together to stand on the land, and furthermore to politically pre-empt an antagonistic US, then they will be a buffer and a defence for the Jewish State of Israel.
Before Biden-Harris attempts to backtrack to Oslo; before they court the PA and reinstate the Palestinian veto; before the thumbscrews are turned on Israel to force a formal land yield (I say ‘formal’ as opposed to the wide-reaching, ‘informal’ land grab in Judea and Samaria that the PA, with EU funding, has been getting away with for years) to an entity that desires not ‘co’-existence with Israel but the ‘non’-existence of the Jewish state…
…And moving into the space created by Donald Trump’s Deal of the Century—while the new administration is focused on its pledge to see 100 million Americans vaccinated by April 30—Israel could make a crucial and important investment in nationalism, and declare its sovereignty over Samaria and Judea—the Jews’ historical patrimony that no other nation has ever had as a country.
Israel’s right to do so is supported by the Bible; by its 4000-year-old history; by its liberation of the land from an illegally occupying, belligerent Jordan in a war of self-defence; and by international law as promulgated in the 20th Century and which still stands in the 21st.
Israel should not be afraid of the new, fraudulently elected American leadership whose anti-God agenda threatens to only lead the United States further into the night.
As the Hebrew prophets foretell, the deeper the darkness descends on the nations, the brighter the light will shine upon Zion. (Isaiah 60:1-2)
It is the greatest of chronological ironies, and the most irrefutable of timeless truths, that Israel’s wholly unique, impossible endurance as a people in the Diaspora, its rebirth as a nation in its own land, its survival against immense opposition and its astounding progress since independence—every step of this national journey has been along a road suffused with suffering and tried by tribulation.
Nothing comes easy to Israel, but still Israel moves ahead.
Zionism is on course, unstoppable. The Promised Land is being, and will be, fully restored to the Jews.
Heaven has determined this. Though all of “the forces of Hell” are marshalled to stop it, they are doomed to fail.
The godless, globalist left in the US can be as convinced as they like that they have secured the way forward, that this election outcome means ‘full steam ahead’ for all that they purpose.
But we are watching God. And He who has chosen Israel as His very own is watching over His word to perform it. (Jeremiah 1:12)
“So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.” – Isaiah 55:11
A Personal Word
C4I National Director Ian Worby has invited me to write a personal update to my Australian friends—those made during my speaking tours of Australia, and the many I have had the thrill of guiding around Israel.
You are missed! And I know how much many of you miss Israel!
The last group I guided before the Covid-19 hammer fell was the March 2020 Vision Christian Tour; a wonderful experience even as the virus loomed so threateningly over us—rendering our futures unsure.
As it did for so many people, everything changed overnight for us. After seeing off the Vision group I went into immediate quarantine and received the first of what soon became a string of cancellation calls; friends from the Sunshine Coast who I had been preparing to begin guiding just a couple of days later.
Like dominoes, group after group dropped away. Following successive years of record-breaking tourism, it was like the hot eastern wind—the chamsin—that comes in after a wet winter, instantly evaporating the moisture and within days turning Israel from a lush Eden into a parched and emptying Land.
Not only was I instantaneously out of work, but our three adult children, who were employed in the catering industry but still living at home—also lost their jobs. We were cast onto the mercy of God and have been there ever since, a testimony to His faithfulness and protection.
We relocated to the Czech Republic where my wife, Franny shares property with her father, and it is here, in Central Europe— in our own private “Goshen”—that we are riding out the storm.
Originally, I felt confident that within a few weeks I’d be able to commute to Israel (it’s a short flight) and begin guiding once more. But of course, that was not to be.
Our oldest daughter contracted Covid, and the rest of us were quarantined once more. Thankfully we are all well now. Israel and the Czech Republic have gone through recurrent waves of the virus and been repeatedly locked down. Indeed, they are locked down as I write. On January 25, Ben Gurion Airport was hermetically sealed; no flights allowed in or out.
Like many Israel-lovers, I too am now outside the Land; watching longingly from a distance the developments that continue to swirl in and around her. And so much is going on of which I shall write, God willing, going forward.
With all the enduring uncertainties, it is impossible to predict when I will again be able to guide God’s Land. Nonetheless, I have blocked off dates for what will—with prayerful hope—be the first post-Corona Vision Christian Tour of Israel: vision.org.au/campaigns/israel-tour-2021/
Meanwhile I stay thankful to the Lord for His goodness, and pray blessing and protection over Israel and Australia. May it not be too long before we meet again—in the Center of the Earth, or Down Under. Shalom!
Editors Note: If you feel led to sow into Stan and his family at this time, you can forward your love offering to:
Lions Gate Ministries,
BSB: 034664
Account No: 373163
by the end of March.
This account is administered by Pastors Peter and Melissa Haigh from Cairns and they will then electronically transfer the amount to Stan.
There is no tax deduction available for this, but receipts can be issued. Please remember to stipulate that your gift is for Stan and if a receipt is required email your address to: melissa@lionsgate.global or phone 0439 352 465.
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