By Avi Issacharoff

A moment before beginning his supper, Masab, son of West Bank Hamas leader Sheikh Hassan Yousef, glances at the friend who has accompanied him to the restaurant where we met. They whisper a few words and then say grace, thanking God and Jesus for putting food on their plates.

It takes a few seconds to digest this sight: The son of a Hamas MP who is also the most popular figure in that extremist Islamic organization, a young man who assisted his father for years in his political activities, has become a rank-and-file Christian. “I’m now called Joseph,” he says at the outset.

Masab knows that he has little hope of returning to visit the Holy Land in this lifetime.

“I know that I’m endangering my life and am even liable to lose my father, but I hope that he’ll understand this and that God will give him and my family patience and willingness to open their eyes to Jesus and to Christianity. Maybe one day I’ll be able to return to Palestine and to Ramallah with Jesus, in the Kingdom of God.”

Nor does he attempt to hide his affection for Israel, or his abhorrence of everything representing the surroundings in which he grew up: the nation, the religion, the organization.

“Send regards to Israel, I miss it. I respect Israel and admire it as a country,” he says.

“You Jews should be aware: You will never, but never have peace with Hamas. Islam, as the ideology that guides them, will not allow them to achieve a peace agreement with the Jews. They believe that tradition says that the Prophet Mohammed fought against the Jews and that therefore they must continue to fight them to the death.”

Is that the justification for the suicide attacks?

“More than that. An entire society sanctifies death and the suicide terrorists. In Palestinian culture a suicide terrorist becomes a hero, a martyr. Sheikhs tell their students about the ‘heroism of the shaheeds.’”

And yet, in spite of the criticism of the place he left, California can’t make the longings disappear.

“I miss Ramallah,” he says. “People with an open mind. … I mainly miss my mother, my brothers and sisters, but I know that it will be very difficult for me to return to Ramallah soon.

Next week an interview here on www.24-7israel.com
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Evangelicals familiar with the situation paint a dire picture of Bible-believing Christianity in Europe. Though sad, this is no surprise, as the Continent has been sliding toward unbelief for hundreds of years.

All this impacts modern diplomacy, since leaders like Gordon Brown of Great Britain are obviously products of their upbringing, like all of us.

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England has suffered from the God-hating philosophies of men like Herbert Spencer, Charles Lyell, and Thomas Huxley for generations. It continues to fascinate me that a wholesale attack on the Old Testament was launched with such subtle viciousness, and the result is that entire populations no longer believe the Bible is the true source of faith and peace.

That’s why Brown can decide that the best way to solve the Israeli-Arab conflict is to force a two-state solution “based on 1967 borders… alongside a peaceful, democratic and territorially viable state of Palestine that accepts you as its friend and partner… with Jerusalem the capital for both,” a “just and agreed settlement for refugees,” and “Israel freezing, and withdrawing from, settlements…”

This is instructive for two reasons.

From a purely geopolitical standpoint, why is it a good thing to give a state to a culture based on barbarism? Is this strategically good? Leaving aside for the moment Israel’s security predicament, doesn’t rewarding terrorism foster more terrorism and spread all over the world?

Of course it does, and this is an obvious truth. The question rarely asked is, why do the Palestinians deserve a state? Why? Whatever they touch withers. Why would the establishment of a Palestinian state suddenly encourage the Palestinians to behave like civilized people? After all, didn’t Abba Eban famously say that the ‘67 borders were “Auschwitz lines”? It remains a solid point.

Secondly, and far more important, Brown’s stance shows a disdain for Scripture. I know that liberal scholars, Emergent leaders, and others really don’t like it when people say that predictive prophecy is valid, and that God’s promises to the Jews were literal and irrevocable. Presumably, Brian McLaren would sit down with the Yasser Arafats of the world and “dialogue” with them.

Yet we who believe the Bible is the word of God must point out that the promises to the Jews are being fulfilled in such remarkable detail that the realities of the Bible must have bearing on political decisions within the international community.

Simply put, squeezing Israel is wrong. It is morally indefensible.

But that’s what the attacks on Scripture have brought us.

How poignant that England at one time had men like Charles Spurgeon to lead it. Spurgeon had no need of the tendency to preach half the Bible. He said, “Omit neither the terrors of Sinai, no the love-notes of Calvary.” He understood that the whole Bible is necessary to show people true reality.

Emergent and Marcus Borg hate predictive prophecy and consider it to be the playground of fanatics and the dull, but consider something else Spurgeon said: “Mark this. No prediction of Scripture has failed.” He understood that the Bible is clearly what it claims to be and that its obvious predictions are obvious.

Unfortunately, the teaching that the Bible is symbolism, myth, or legend has brought us to a place where people feel that since there is no legitimate historical/religious claim of the Jews on the Land of Israel, then there is no sensible reason not to divide it for a 23rd Arab state. From a human standpoint, it makes sense. That’s why the Auschwitz lines, which are not defensible, are legitimate.

My contention that Middle East negotiations should be based on biblical revelation is as odd to the Bible’s detractors as their humanistic diplomacy is weird to me. This is a great divide that will not be bridged.

God clearly said through the prophet Amos (Amos 9:15) that He would one day bring the Jews back into the land and that they would never be uprooted again. This has obviously happened. Yet it is an historical coincidence/irritation/”Nakba” to those who don’t like the idea that the Jew is ultimately triumphant in Scripture. Let’s be honest: this is the stance of many, whether they be Hamas or “careful” Christian thinkers.

So Scripture is scrubbed with the soap of “critical” thinking and liberal scholarship. That’s why a smart guy like Gordon Brown can hiss at the “settlements” and say with a straight face that it’s in everyone’s best interests to establish a Palestinian state based on the ‘67 borders.

In this new Age of Enlightenment, when man’s ideas about problem-solving are both looney and wildly popular, remember another thing Spurgeon said Christmas week, 1874:

“Be a Bible man, go so far as the Bible, but not an inch beyond it.”

Jim Fletcher is a member of the executive committee of the National Christian Leadership Conference for Israel (NCLCI). He can be reached at jim1fletcher at yahoo.com

Jerusalem post