Israel's 60^th Anniversary
It is not surprising that as Israel celebrates its sixtieth anniversary violence is breaking loose as to tarnish its joy. For those of us who know the Lord and understand the truth Israel is the ultimate picture of the prodigal son. Since we know the end of the 'story', we can see in this metaphor that he has come back home and now only a matter of a short time before his eyes open and sees the truth, repents and believes in his Messiah.

"And in that day I will set about to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. "I will pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.
- Zechariah 12:9-10

Meanwhile, the media cannot help but report blatant lies and distortions in most reporting of the event. If you are not one who regularly scans multiple sources of the media as well as media watchdog groups you would think Israel to be a monster. However, that would be until you see the evidence of the likes of the BBC, Associated Press, Reuters and others that I can only describe as a conspiracy against the truth and pure demonic hatred against Israel.

For example, this headline from the New York Times coverage of Israel's sixtieth anniversary could not be more of a one-sided biased slam: "After 60 Years, Arabs in Israel Are Outsiders" - and this from a Jewish owned newspaper! That alone is enough to give the ignorant, undiscerning and uniformed public a further bad taste in their mouth concerning Israel. Thanks a lot New York Times! What a 'nice' way to congratulate Israel on sixty years back in their homeland.

What baffles me the most is that these ludicrous arguments are all based on revisionist history that anybody with a little time and effort can expose. This is just more proof that this is a spiritual battle involving our hearts and minds, and it is another reason why we must understand the prophetic purposes for Israel. If Israel were an unimportant development without any biblical or prophetic significance (a position that is gaining considerable credibility within the church these days), why would satan be spending so much time creating confusion, deception and conflict within both the church and the world today regarding it?

I encouraged every one of you to study to show yourself approved
as we need to be stars that shine, those that have insight among the people ready with answers for the many searching believers who have been confused and led astray by the false teaching and chaos that has infiltrated the majority of the church.

Secondly, we must be salt and light to the fallen world that so desperately is looking for some sort of hope when the majority of the church has become nothing but a joke and an embarrassment that the world can even see through it's charades to such a point that many are now being hauled into courts and taken before judges, not because of persecution but because they are crooks. This is happening because the church has failed to police itself saying "judge not" when that is not even what the scripture means.

We have come to a truly sad and pathetic state squarely in the midst of the great falling away, a.k.a. apostasy, and it has reached into every quarter of every Evangelical and Pentecostal church that previously remained untouched. If you cannot see that, you either are completely out of touch with current events, out of touch with reality, or have no understanding of what the scripture really teaches. I am sorry I have to be so blunt but that is the truth.

I pray that this does not offend but rather helps to open up eyes so that perhaps there is one last chance of real repentance and revival before Christ returns. Revival does not begin with ridiculous amounts of singing, laughing and witchcraft that have been going on in churches all over the world, but rather in tears and repentance of sin, personal revival comes first.

The articles in Be Alert have a reputation for being somewhat "gloom & doom" in outlook, but let that be a motivation for both you and I to get before the Lord of all creation and confess any sin (or reveal anything if that may be the case) that has been blocking us from ministering to others. That has always been the point, to look at the signs of the times and to be inspired and motivated to act godly and scripturally accordingly.

Happy 60^th Israel, and May the LORD bless and keep each and every one of you.
BE/\LERT!
Scott Brisk

Related: Highly Recommended Reading from Moriel
Who Are The Jews?
By Jacob Prasch
[See Here]

DEBKAFILE - May 10, 2008
DEBKAfile's military sources: After seizing control of Sunni West Beirut and besieging the seat of the pro-Western government, Hizballah fighters Saturday, April 10, turned their guns on Sunni Muslim centers in the rest of Lebanon. Some 20 fatalities are reported in three days of combat.

Heavy battles are reported in the northern town of Tripoli, in Alei and the western Beqaa Valley east of Beirut, around Tyre and Sidon in the south, the Chouf mountains in the center and the northern slopes of Mt Hermon close to Lebanon's borders with Israel and Syria.

Our sources report Iran's proxy Shiite terrorists, commanding a 45,000-strong army, are bent on breaking up and disarming Lebanon's Sunni militias, especially that of the majority leader of the Future Movement, the anti Syrian Saad Hariri.

After their victory, they aim to establish a united Muslim bloc dominated by Tehran and Damascus for confronting and then routing the pro-Western, pro-Israeli Christian camp, the traditional key to power in Lebanon.

On the fourth day of the Hizballah offensive, the pro-Western prime minister Fouad Siniora is trapped by a Hizballah-Amal siege force in his Beirut office, taking supportive calls from Western leaders who denounce Hizballah's Iranian and Syrian backers. None have offered tangible assistance for holding out against the Hizballah onslaught.

The majority leader, the anti-Syrian Saad Hariri, and his ally Druze leader Walid Jumblat were rescued Friday from their Beirut mansions by the army. Hariri's Future TV station was taken off the air and razed, and Hizballah forces are now threatening his southern Sunni stronghold in Sidon. The UN peacekeeper force is deployed in this same region.
Original Report Here

ARUTZ SHEVA (Israeli National News) - By Hana Levi Julian - May 9, 2008
Dozens of Jews gathered Friday morning to demonstrate at the "sheep junction" south of Hevron, a key roadblock located at a site where there have been many terror attacks in the past.

The government promised US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice it would open up the road to Palestinian Authority Arab traffic - which would also increase terrorists' access to Jewish towns.

Southern Hevron Hills Regional Council leader Tzviki Bar Chai called on residents to protest, noting that Arab terrorists have carried out numerous attacks at the junction.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak previously has promised that he would not remove any roadblocks in cases where the lives of Israelis would be endangered.

Three IDF soldiers have been murdered and dozens of others wounded in past terrorist attacks at the "sheep junction" site. - - - -
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Jeremy Bowen's documentary is full of omissions and historical revisionism.
HONEST REPORTING - Media Critqiues Communique - May 7, 2008
The events leading up to the creation of the modern-day State of Israel exactly 60 years ago have been examined and re-examined by qualified historians. So why was Jeremy Bowen given the responsibility of producing the BBC's one-hour documentary "The Birth of Israel" broadcast on May 4, 2008? (Available to view online only in the UK. This program, may, however, be broadcast internationally at a future date.)

Middle East editor Bowen has consistently demonstrated a slanted view of Israel and the regional conflict and his documentary continues in this vein.

A taste of things to come arrives in the first few seconds of the broadcast, which features images of Islam's Dome of the Rock and a Christian crucifix against a Jerusalem backdrop. Despite the deep religious connection of Judaism to both Jerusalem and the land of Israel, this image is, incredibly, omitted. And herein lies the major flaw of the entire program - the legitimate roots of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel going back three millenia are either downplayed, delegitmized or ignored altogether.

• Whitewashing Jewish rights to a state:

While Bowen talks about Palestinian farmers working the land for centuries, scant attention is paid to the continuous Jewish presence dating back to antiquity, instead implying that the waves of Jewish immigrants arriving in the pre-state years were an alien implant.

Nowhere does Bowen explain that a Palestinian sovereign state had never existed and that prior to partition, Palestinian Arabs did not view themselves as having a separate identity. In fact, Bowen ignores some 100,000 Arabs who emigrated from neighboring countries during the British Mandate period alone and are today considered Palestinians.

Bowen simplistically sums up Britain's 1917 Balfour Declaration: "One nation promising the land of another to a third," conveniently omitting that the land of another was not the reality and that the third nation [the Jewish people] had legitimate and just claims to that land.

As if to hammer home his point, Bowen also says that the Holocaust created a new moral argument for a Jewish state. Is Bowen implying that there was no moral case before the Nazi genocide? While the Holocaust undoubtedly proved the urgent need for a Jewish state, it in no way should minimize legitimate Jewish claims to a state of their own prior to the destruction of European Jewry.

Despite this, one interviewee states: "Why should the Palestinians who had not heard of it pay the price of the Holocaust? --- Why displace the Palestinian people to pay a price for a crime which they had not committed?" While Bowen briefly mentions the Mufti of Jerusalem's wartime sojourn in Nazi Germany with Hitler, he fails to mention the Palestinian leader's support for Hitler and his participation in the killing of Jews in wartime Europe.

• Moral equivalency:

Bowen employs the typical BBC stance of moral equivalency in describing the current conflict: "Israel uses airstrikes and ground incursions. Palestinians rocket Israeli border towns. Both sides blame each other." Thus, Palestinian terrorism is equated with Israeli efforts to defend her citizens.

• Palestinian and Arab victimhood:

Bowen, however, moves away from this equivalency, instead taking every opportunity to portray an Arab David as the victim of the Israeli Goliath. Yet, despite a history of aggression against the Jews - including riots in the 1920s and 1936 and the infamous 1929 Hebron Massacre - the Arabs are painted as victims of Jewish power and malevolence.

Bowen ignores the fact that Israel was attacked by five Arab armies immediately after declaring its independence. Instead he is at pains to stress the numerical and organizational superiority of Israel's army in order to perpetuate his concept of Arab victimhood. While historians have accepted that the Arabs were ill-prepared to win a war, this should not gloss over the fact that it was those same Arab forces who launched an aggressive war that they eventually lost. Bowen should also not have played down the very real sacrifice and hardships endured by the fledgling Israeli state which lost some 1% of its population during her War of Independence.

• Impartial on Partition:

Referring to the partition of Mandatory Palestine, Bowen claims: "The Jews got the best of it - more than half the country, even though they owned around 10% of the land and there were twice as many Arabs."

Bowen selectively quotes historical facts to yet again portray the Arabs as victims. In fact, the boundaries were based solely on demographics and approximately 60% of the Jewish state was to be the desert in the Negev while the Arabs occupied most of the agricultural land.

In addition, according to British statistics, more than 70% of the land in what would become Israel was not owned by Arab farmers, it belonged to the mandatory government. Those lands reverted to Israeli control after the departure of the British. Nearly 9% of the land was owned by Jews and about 3% by Arabs who became citizens of Israel. That means only about 18% belonged to Arabs who left the country before and after the Arab invasion of Israel.

• Massacre of the truth:

Jewish attacks on Arabs are played up by Bowen and given much detail, with claims of "massacres" against Palestinians featuring prominently in the program, while Arab attacks on Jews are seen in far more abstract terms.

Bowen gives much airtime to the story of Deir Yassin, but fails to discuss the context behind the incident or the politicization and conflicting accounts of what really happened. For it was certainly not the intention of Israeli forces to carry out a "massacre" of non-combatants in what was actually a fierce battle, as residents of Deir Yassin and foreign forces opened fire on the Israelis.

Bowen goes on to quote an Israeli Haganah intelligence officer at the time who makes claims of terrible atrocities carried out by the Irgun and Lehi forces in Deir Yassin. However, that very same source has been called into question by Israeli historian Dr. Uri Milstein who believes that this was produced for political reasons to discredit the Irgun and Lehi and prevent their absorption into regular Jewish forces.

Interestingly, Bowen relies on the "eyewitness" account of Hazzem Nusseibeh a Palestinian journalist at the time, who in a previous BBC documentary actually admitted that he had been told to exaggerate claims of Jewish atrocities at Deir Yassin in order to encourage Arab armies to come to the aid of the Palestinian Arabs (it had the opposite effect, causing Arabs to flee their homes). Nusseibeh, however, does not repeat this assertion in Bowen's documentary, which relies on a secondary source instead.

• "Ethnic Cleansing":

Bowen also plays loose with the historical interpretation of Plan D, citing the charge that this Israeli military operation was intended to "ethnically cleanse" the Arab population. While acknowledging that there is a debate amongst some historians on the issue, he prejudices this by claiming that the "Jews went on the offensive".

This, despite the mainstream historical view, backed up by prominent historian of this period Benny Morris who maintains that there was no Zionist "plan" or blanket policy of evicting the Arab population, or of "ethnic cleansing". Plan Dalet of March 10, 1948, was the master plan of the Haganah - the Jewish military force that became the Israel Defense Forces - to counter the expected pan-Arab assault on the emergent Jewish state.

Bowen also takes the liberty of claiming that "Jewish leaders had discussed moving Arabs out for years", without offering any historical sources or background context. In any event, no Israeli government has ever adopted or carried out this policy.

• "Expansionist":

Bowen concludes by focusing on the charge that Israel is continuing policies of "expansionism". This, despite Israel's withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 and continuing efforts to achieve peace and Israel's stated policy of bringing about a Palestinian state.

This is but a selection of issues concerning Jeremy Bowen's documentary. We are sorry that those of you outside the UK are currently unable to view this program on the BBC's website. Please, however, send your considered comments to the BBC Complaints website, particularly if you have seen this program already.

Original Report Here

See the Video Posted on YouTube:
Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

* Emphasis Original

 

NEW YORK TIMES [NYTimes Group/Sulzberger] - By C. J. Chivers - May 10, 2008
MOSCOW - Nuclear missile launchers and columns of tanks rolled through Red Square on Friday in a display of martial hardware not seen since the Soviet Union's waning days.

The parade, much smaller than similar commemorations in the Soviet period but laden with significance and mixed messages, marked the 63rd anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany, which is observed in Russia as Victory Day, a solemn state holiday.

It was intended both as a tribute to the dwindling ranks of surviving veterans and as a display of Russia's efforts to revive armed forces made moribund by the Soviet Union's collapse.

It was also widely described as a sign that the Kremlin wanted to show the world that it had recovered from the embarrassments of the 1990s and that its foreign policy had not softened in a transfer of presidential power this week. - - - -
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FRONTPAGE MAGAZINE - By Alan M. Dershowitz - March 13, 2008
Article 51 of the United Nations Charter guarantees its members "the inherent right to---individual self defense" against "an armed attack." In January of 2006, Hamas was elected to govern the Palestinian Authority. After Israel ended its occupation of Gaza and removed all of its settlers, Hamas threw the Palestinian Authority out of the Gaza and assumed de facto as well as de jure control over the entire Gaza Strip. Its leaders then instructed its military wing to direct rockets at civilian targets in southern Israel. At first these rockets were Qassams with a relatively short range. Now they include Katyushas, which can reach to Israel's large cities, including Ashkelon, with its population of 120,000 civilians. Hamas has officially declared that its policy is to develop or smuggle even longer range missiles capable of reaching Israel's largest city Tel Aviv and its lifeblood, Ben Gurion Airport. It has promised to keep aiming its missiles at civilian targets until the Jewish state is finally destroyed.

If this is not an "armed attack" under Article 51, then I don't know what is. The only argument against it being an armed attack is that rocketing civilian population centers, as Hamas is doing, is a war-crime. International law prohibits, even during a declared war, the deliberate targeting of civilians or the bombing of areas of civilian population centers with absolutely no military significance. But war-crimes may also constitute an armed attack: Hitler's invasion of Poland was both, as the Nuremberg Tribunal determined. If anything, an armed attack that is also a war crime justifies the right of self defense even more than a mere armed attack.

Nor can it be said that these attacks on Israeli towns and cities are merely the work of individual terrorists or terrorist groups. The military wing of Hamas is in fact a terrorist organization, as the Untied States and the European Community have recognized. But since Hamas is in political and military control of the liberated Gaza Strip, the military wing of Hamas is also the official army of that government, as Hamas itself has proclaimed.

What then are Israel's rights under international law, under the law of war, under historical precedents and under various treaties and human rights concepts? What have, and what would, other nations whose cities and towns were attacked by enemy rockets do? Israel certainly has the right to counterattack its enemy, destroy its capacity to fire rockets and engage in "belligerent reprisal." The only constraint on Israeli action is "proportionality." Israel's military actions must be proportional. But proportional to what? Certainly not to the actual number of people who have thus far been killed or injured by rocket attacks. Israel has spent an enormous amount of money building shelters to protect against rockets. Close to a thousand rockets have been aimed at southern Israel in recent years. Each one of them had the capacity to kill dozens, if not hundreds of civilians. The fact that no Hamas rocket has yet hit a school bus, a kindergarten, an ambulance, a synagogue, or a school yard is simply happenstance. It is only a matter of time until this happens. No nation has to wait until the goals of its enemy are fulfilled before it engages in a proportional response. Proportion must be defined by reference to the threat posed by the enemy and not by the harm it has produced. No nation need allow its enemies to play Russian Roulette with its children.

Israel has tried several options, each of which has been condemned by vocal members of the international community, human rights groups and religious organizations - some of whom have been silent about the Hamas war crimes that precipitated the Israeli actions. Israel has tried economic sanctions, border controls, targeted attacks on terrorists and ground incursions. Each of these generally acceptable war measures carry with it the risk of some civilian casualties. The reason for this is that the distinction between combatants and civilians has deliberately been blurred by Hamas. Rockets are fired from densely populated areas, precisely in order to force Israel into choosing between allowing its own civilians to continue to be killed by its inaction, or taking actions that risk hurting killing some Palestinian civilians. Either way Hamas wins. If Israel does nothing, then Hamas accuses it of impotence. If it does something, then Hamas accuses it if disproportionally. Hamas leader Khaled Mashal characterized Israel's military actions in Gaza as "the real Holocaust." Even Mahmoud Abbas, the so-called moderate Palestinian leader in the West Bank said that Israel's military efforts to stop the rockets was "more than a Holocaust".

The time has come for Israel's critics to tell Israel what it should do in the face of these escalating rocket attacks on its civilian population centers. If economic sanctions, border controls, targeting terrorists and ground incursions should not be done, what are the alternatives?

The answer to this question is important not only to Israel, but to the United States and other democratic nations that will surely face the prospect of having to take actions to prevent terrorist attacks by enemies who deliberately hide among civilians. The barrage of unconstructive criticism directed against Israeli self-defense actions will only encourage more terrorism of this kind.
Original Report Here

The Euro-Med Partnership includes all 27-EU states and the ten Mediterranean nations of Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, the Palestinian National Authority, Syria, Tunisia and Turkey.
RUSSIAN NEWS & INFORMATION AGENCY (RIA Novosti) - April 1, 2008
CAIRO - The presidents of France and Egypt will become the first leaders of the Mediterranean Union due to be launched in July 2008, the Asharq Al-Awsat daily said on Monday.

EU leaders last month approved a proposal by France and Germany to establish the Mediterranean Union - a club of EU member states and other countries having access to the Mediterranean Sea, designed to streamline migration policy, and encourage trade and environmental protection.

The London-based Saudi newspaper said the organization is planning to have two chairpersons - one from the EU and the other from other states. "An agreement has almost been reached to assign the posts: Nicolas Sarkozy will lead the Union on behalf of Europe, and Hosni Mubarak on behalf of the remaining Mediterranean countries."

The organization's head office will be based in Tunisia and will have two divisions - European and Mediterranean, employing 20 officials, who will manage and monitor projects and organize biennial summits

The Union's establishment is expected to be announced in Paris on July 13 during a Euro-Mediterranean summit, which will be attended by 43 heads of state, as well as chiefs of the Arab League and the African Union.

Originally France proposed the Union should comprise only EU member states and countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea, but this was vehemently rejected by Germany and some other EU states, who said it would reduce EU influence and could undermine other organizations, namely the Barcelona Process or Euro-Mediterranean Partnership.

The Euro-Mediterranean Partnership comprises 37 countries, including all 27-EU states and 10 Mediterranean nations: Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, the Palestinian National Authority, Syria, Tunisia and Turkey.
Original Report Here

ARUTZ SHEVA (Israeli National News) - By Gil Ronen - March 23, 2008
Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama is currently hiding his anti-Israel views in order to get elected, according to a well-known anti-Israel activist. The activist, Ali Abunimah, claimed to know Obama well and to have met him on numerous occasions at pro-Palestinian events in Chicago.

In an article he penned for the anti-Israeli website Electronic Intifada, Abunimah wrote:

"The last time I spoke to Obama was in the winter of 2004 at a gathering in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. He was in the midst of a primary campaign to secure the Democratic nomination for the United States Senate seat he now occupies. But at that time polls showed him trailing.

"As he came in from the cold and took off his coat, I went up to greet him. He responded warmly, and volunteered, 'Hey, I'm sorry 'Hey, I'm sorry I haven't said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race.'
I haven't said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race I'm hoping when things calm down I can be more up front.' He referred to my activism, including columns I was contributing to the The Chicago Tribune critical of Israeli and US policy [and said:] 'Keep up the good work!'"

Barack, Michelle, Edward and Mariam
Abunimah's report included a photo of Obama with his wife Michelle seated at a table with virulently anti-Israeli Professor Edward Said and his wife Mariam, in what Abunimah said was a May 1998 Arab community event in Chicago at which Said gave the keynote speech.

In an interview earlier this year for the leftist radio show "Democracy Now!," a daily TV and radio news program hosted by Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, Abunimah said he knew Obama for many years as his state senator "when he used to attend events in the Palestinian community in Chicago all the time."

"I remember personally introducing him onstage in 1999, when we had a major community fundraiser for the community center in Deheisha refugee camp in the occupied West Bank," he recounted. "And that's just one example of how Barack Obama used to be very comfortable speaking up for and being associated with Palestinian rights and opposing the Israeli occupation."

About face 'to get elected'
The Arab-American activist went on to say: "In 2000, when Obama unsuccessfully ran for Congress I heard him speak at a campaign fundraiser hosted by a University of Chicago professor. On that occasion and others Obama was forthright in his criticism of US policy and his call for an even-handed approach to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict."

"Obama's about-face is not surprising," Abunimah wrote. "He is merely doing what he thinks is necessary to get elected and he will continue doing it as long as it keeps him in power."
 
When Obama first ran for the Senate in 2004, the Chicago Jewish News interviewed him on his stance regarding Israel's security fence. He accused the Bush administration of neglecting the "Israeli-Palestinian" situation and criticized the security fence built by Israel to prevent terror attacks: "The creation of a wall dividing the two nations is yet another example of the neglect of this Administration in brokering peace," Obama was quoted as saying.