Israel has been much in the news lately, more than usual. It punches above its weight in influence, interest, controversy and international flashpoints.
The very fact that Israel exists, despite the Jews always being comparatively small in number and with so many enemies throughout history, while other, bigger nations have gone away, must make (I would think) even a hardened atheist wonder if there is some divine hand involved. At the very least, there is no denying that Israel is a special country.
Here are some reasons I support Israel.
1. Israel is friendly to the U.S.
When I visited Israel in 2004, through it was only 3 years after 2001, the terrorist attack of 9/11 was still very much on peoples’ minds. I saw a vendor selling a bumper sticker with a picture of an F-16 fighter jet with a star of David on its side and the caption saying something like ‘America, Israel Stands with You’. How many countries would offer that kind of support?
Israel and America also tend to have the same enemies.
And Israel is a democracy, the only one in the Middle East. Their politics can be rough, but it is a democracy. No dictator, no revolutions, no coups, no foreign powers pulling its strings. It offers citizenship to Arabs. Can anyone think of a healthier government in the Middle East?
2. Israel is a rational country.
The Israelis tend to think along the same lines as we do. When they go to war they take care, as much as possible, to avoid civilian casualties.
Compare this to the sub-human behavior of Hamas, which attacked Israel last October, killing about 1,200, mostly unarmed civilians, and keeps hostages to this day from that attack. Israel’s enemies Hamas and Hezbollah are notorious for using civilian areas to launch missiles from and use as places to store weapons. This is sick, cowardly warfare. Israel is a model of restraint and humanity in comparison.
There is no equivalency here. Israel is sane and rational and careful in the way it fights war. Count me on their side!
3. Israel is often besieged.
The motivation for founding the modern nation of Israel was the Holocaust–where Hitler sought to exterminate the Jews of Europe. Six million Jews died. It is estimated that this was one-third of the worldwide population of Jews at the time. After WWII they understandably wanted a safe place to live. Their motto was “Never Again.” In just three years of heroic effort they established their nation–and the U.S. was a key player in the process.
But even then, Israel had to fight for its life. Three times since Israel was established it fought an alliance of enemies who had the goal of erasing it from the map: 1) shortly after it was founded (1948), 2) the Six-Day War (1967), and 3) the Yom Kippur War (1973).
Israel won all three wars. Good for them.
And now Israel has enemies on the north (Hezbollah in Lebanon) on the west (Hamas in the Gaza Strip). And to the east is the archenemy, Iran, which routinely calls for Israel to be wiped out and funds anti-Israel terrorists.
I’m with Israel.
4. God has a special place for Israel.
I have to be careful here, as this is a surprisingly controversial topic. I am not a fan of those who claim absolute certainty on knowing the fulfillment of prophecy on this issue, just as I am not a fan of those who claim specific, narrow insights on the order of end-times events.
There is God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:3, “I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” Some take that to the nth degree. I would say that verse certainly predicts that the Savior will be a descendant of Abraham. And it does testify to something special about the descendants of Abraham.
But we must consider that God gave other covenants too, some that included the whole world, both Jew and Gentile–most importantly, the covenant that ‘whosoever will’ can be saved through Christ. Both Jews and Gentile are saved the same way: through faith in Christ. The offer goes out to all.
But there is still a specialness to the Jews that remains and Gentile Christians need to have a place for that in their faith.
God has said that Israel would one day return to its homeland: Ezekiel 36:24, “For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land.”
Do I think this was fulfilled by the establishment of modern Israel in 1948? I do.
But there is more, including prophesies of a spiritual renewal among the Jews. There will come a turning to Christ among the Jews that we haven’t seen yet. The Apostle Paul says in Romans 11:26-27 (quoting Old Testament prophecies): “The deliverer will come from Zion; he will turn godlessness away from Jacob. And this is my covenant with them when I take away their sins.”
As I see it, in my own simplistic way, we live in between the fulfillment of the two prophesies. The prophesy of a renewed nation of Israel has already been fulfilled (in 1948), but the prophesy of the spiritual renewal of Israel has not happened yet.
So what do I believe we should do? Support Israel, pray for its defense and peace, and pray for the Jews to embrace the Savior. That is what we owe them.
That, and the other reasons listed above, is why I support Israel.