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Israeli settlement sanctions: the intensifying battle for Jerusalem
Israeli settlement sanctions: the intensifying battle for Jerusalem
Christians for Israel International
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1 month ago • 31:44 min
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Transcript
[00:00]
Hello and welcome to another weekly
[00:02]
update from Israel and Christians. Today
[00:05]
it is the 10th of September, 2026.
[00:09]
[snorts] We're going to talk today about
[00:10]
Israeli settlement sanctions and the
[00:13]
intensifying battle for Jerusalem.
[00:17]
You might wonder what those two things
[00:20]
have in connection, settlement sanctions
[00:23]
and Jerusalem.
[00:24]
That's what we're going to explore in
[00:26]
today's update.
[00:28]
And the reason for doing that is that a
[00:30]
large number of Western states are at
[00:33]
the moment rallying to impose sanctions
[00:36]
on trade in products from what they call
[00:39]
quote illegal Israeli settlements close
[00:42]
quote. And what appears to be a
[00:45]
political and legal conflict is in fact
[00:49]
an intensifying spiritual battle for
[00:52]
Jerusalem that will lead to a major
[00:54]
conflict between Israel and the nations.
[00:57]
Like a volcano, pressure has been
[01:00]
building up deep underground for decades
[01:03]
and now it is starting to erupt. So
[01:07]
let's unpack all of this.
[01:10]
First of all, the trade bans on
[01:12]
September the 8th, just a couple of days
[01:15]
ago, 12 countries, uh, all western
[01:18]
countries, the UK, France, Canada,
[01:21]
Denmark Finland Iceland Ireland
[01:25]
Norway Poland Portugal Spain and
[01:28]
Sweden
[01:30]
issued a joint statement pledging to
[01:33]
quote, introduce national and/or support
[01:36]
European restrictions on trade in goods
[01:40]
with settlements which are illegal under
[01:42]
international law. Close quote.
[01:46]
Now, it's Britain, France, and Canada
[01:50]
that are the states actually pulling the
[01:52]
strings here.
[01:54]
And the UK is uh taking the lead.
[01:57]
Foreign Secretary Ed Milliband announced
[02:00]
this week a full import ban on
[02:03]
settlement goods within 9 months paired
[02:06]
with action against specific companies
[02:09]
and individuals financing or building in
[02:11]
the settlements.
[02:14]
The 12 nation statement frames the
[02:18]
restrictions as compliance with
[02:19]
international law rather than
[02:21]
punishment.
[02:23]
Uh, for example, it talks about
[02:25]
settlements being illegal under
[02:27]
international law, naming the E1
[02:30]
project. Uh, specifically, we'll talk
[02:32]
more about that. The declaration talks
[02:35]
about actions that are tantamount to the
[02:38]
annexation of Palestinian land.
[02:42]
Uh, it refers to the forcible
[02:45]
displacement of the Palestinian
[02:47]
population by Israel and unprecedented
[02:50]
levels of settler violence and
[02:52]
settlement expansion,
[02:54]
a need to ensure accountability for
[02:56]
settler violence and investigate
[02:58]
allegations against Israeli forces. And
[03:02]
finally, they talk about alignment with
[03:03]
relevant UN Security Council resolutions
[03:06]
supporting a two-state solution with
[03:09]
Palestinian statethood along Israeli
[03:13]
security.
[03:15]
Uh, this latest declaration builds on
[03:18]
ground already shifting under Israel's
[03:21]
feet for a year. Spain banned settlement
[03:25]
imports first way back in September
[03:27]
2025,
[03:29]
a year ago, followed by Slovenia,
[03:31]
Belgium, and now most recently the
[03:34]
Netherlands, which um a couple of months
[03:37]
ago, the government adopted a
[03:41]
administrative measure imposing a
[03:43]
national ban that will take effect in
[03:46]
just a couple of weeks time on September
[03:48]
the 22nd.
[03:50]
And that ban covers goods from the West
[03:53]
Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Golden
[03:55]
Heights, including intermediate trade by
[03:58]
Dutch companies abroad.
[04:02]
Ireland has adopted an occupied
[04:05]
territories bill applicable to goods
[04:08]
only after the government stripped out
[04:10]
services over its own legal analysts
[04:13]
objections. And this bill has cleared
[04:15]
its final vote in July and awaits
[04:18]
signature
[04:20]
So we have a whole range of countries
[04:23]
taking very similar action, trade
[04:26]
restrictions, bans, sanctions, call them
[04:29]
what you will.
[04:31]
Israel uh has responded as might be
[04:33]
expected furiously. it in relation to
[04:37]
the British UK announcement. It closed
[04:41]
the British consulate this week in East
[04:43]
Jerusalem pulled the UK out of Israel's
[04:47]
Gaza ceasefire support arrangements that
[04:50]
the UK had helped to establish. Israel
[04:54]
halted uh Britain's security training of
[04:58]
Palestinian authority security forces
[05:02]
and it banned a dozen British
[05:03]
parliamentarians from entering Israel.
[05:06]
Israel's foreign minister Gideon Sa
[05:09]
accused London and its partners of
[05:11]
stoking anti-semitism.
[05:14]
So this uh this uh legal, political,
[05:19]
economic sanctions are being regarded as
[05:22]
a deeply um hurtful attack on the very
[05:27]
nature of the Jewish state of Israel.
[05:30]
And there's a complete disconnect, an
[05:32]
enormous gap in the approaches of Israel
[05:36]
on the one hand and its allies and these
[05:40]
western states on the other.
[05:44]
What is actually happening here? Well,
[05:45]
the main argument used to justify these
[05:48]
trade brands bans is the international
[05:51]
court of justice's recent advisory
[05:54]
opinion in July 2024
[05:58]
which found that the occupation by
[06:01]
Israel
[06:03]
of territories
[06:05]
uh which are called the West Bank and
[06:07]
East Jerusalem uh are unlawful. And the
[06:11]
court said that other states have a
[06:13]
legal duty not to render aid or
[06:15]
assistance to this occupation.
[06:18]
According to the court, or at least a
[06:20]
majority of the judges of the court, the
[06:23]
reason the occupation is illegal because
[06:25]
the land, including East Jerusalem,
[06:27]
belongs to the Palestinian people. And
[06:30]
the occupation is preventing the
[06:32]
Palestinians for establishing
[06:35]
a state on the land that belongs to
[06:38]
them. The ICJ opinion is the legal hook
[06:42]
that most of these government's own
[06:44]
lawyers and outside groups like Amnesty
[06:47]
and Human Rights Watch point to as the
[06:51]
basis for the trade bans.
[06:55]
So let's reflect for a moment on this
[06:58]
idea that the territory
[07:03]
um East Jerusalem and the West Bank as
[07:05]
they're called in UN parliament
[07:09]
uh East Jerusalem is of course the old
[07:12]
city of Jerusalem. It contains the
[07:14]
western wall, the temple mount, the old
[07:17]
city of Jerusalem with the four
[07:20]
quarters, the Jewish, [snorts]
[07:22]
Christian, Armenian, and Arab quarters.
[07:25]
This all belongs according to the court
[07:27]
to the Palestinians, and Israel has not
[07:30]
the slightest claim to it.
[07:34]
West Bank is in the eyes of the Jewish
[07:38]
people Judea and Samaria. It's the
[07:40]
heartland of where their people was born
[07:44]
and it's the place that the Jews have
[07:46]
been coming back to over the last couple
[07:48]
of centuries. They didn't come back to
[07:50]
Tel Aviv and Hifa. They came back to
[07:53]
Jerusalem and to the mountains of
[07:56]
Israel. This is the land that the UN and
[08:00]
now the International Court of Justice
[08:02]
says does not cannot belong to Israel
[08:04]
and must and can only belong
[08:08]
to the Palestinians
[08:11]
which by definition is the non-Jewish
[08:14]
population of Palestine.
[08:18]
So who owns the land? Well, ever since
[08:21]
the 7th century BC, the land now known
[08:25]
as the state of Israel and the
[08:27]
Palestinian territories, occupied
[08:29]
Palestinian territories, was governed by
[08:31]
a series of foreign powers. The last
[08:35]
empire was the Ottoman Turkish Empire
[08:38]
governed from Constantinople,
[08:41]
now known as Istanbul. That empire fell
[08:44]
in World War I. The Allied powers took
[08:47]
control of the territory that had become
[08:50]
known as Palestine as they took control
[08:53]
of all of the former Ottoman, Turkish,
[08:56]
and German Empire territory. [snorts]
[09:01]
In the subsequent negotiations and
[09:04]
establishment of the League of Nations,
[09:06]
the British were given the task by the
[09:08]
League of Nations to enable the Jewish
[09:11]
people to reestablish their national
[09:13]
home in Palestine. That was the core and
[09:16]
main objective of the mandate for
[09:19]
Palestine.
[09:21]
And there were of course mandates for
[09:23]
many other territories.
[09:25]
[sighs and gasps]
[09:26]
And it could be said that the British
[09:27]
failed in administering the mandate to
[09:31]
reconcile competing Jewish and Arab
[09:34]
claims.
[09:36]
The British homeland was not established
[09:38]
by the end of the British mandate. The
[09:43]
result on the contrary was a kind of
[09:45]
civil war within Palestine
[09:48]
between the Jewish
[09:51]
uh forces, the Jewish population, the
[09:53]
Arabs led by a very [snorts]
[09:56]
strongly Islamist anti-Semitic leader of
[09:59]
the Grand Mufty of Jerusalem and the
[10:02]
British in the middle.
[10:04]
The British gave up the mandate,
[10:07]
announced their intention to leave in
[10:10]
1948,
[10:11]
and handed the Palestinian problem, as
[10:14]
it had become known, back to the United
[10:16]
Nations, which in the meantime in 1945
[10:21]
had been established to replace the
[10:24]
League of Nations. Now, not
[10:26]
surprisingly, the UN was unable to solve
[10:30]
the conflict.
[10:32]
It made several proposals, one of them
[10:35]
being the partition plan in November
[10:37]
1947,
[10:40]
which was rejected by the Arabs and the
[10:43]
conflict further intensified from
[10:45]
November 47 onwards [snorts] and 6
[10:48]
months later, the Jewish people declared
[10:50]
the establishment of the state of Israel
[10:53]
on the 14th of May 1948.
[10:57]
At that moment,
[10:59]
sovereignty of the land was still in
[11:03]
dispute and that dispute was not
[11:05]
resolved by the United Nations, which
[11:07]
had no authority to resolve such
[11:10]
disputes and nor has it been solved
[11:12]
subsequently by any binding judicial
[11:15]
decision, nor by any agreement between
[11:17]
Israel and its hostile Arab neighbors.
[11:21]
And interestingly, Israel itself did not
[11:24]
define its own borders when it was
[11:26]
established. The declaration of
[11:28]
independence refers only to the concept
[11:31]
of Eret Israel, the land of Israel. And
[11:35]
quite deliberately
[11:38]
um the Jewish people refused
[11:41]
to
[11:43]
uh confine their borders to whatever the
[11:46]
UN or others might have dictated.
[11:49]
[snorts]
[11:50]
The Arabs continued their campaign to
[11:52]
try to eliminate the Jews and destroy
[11:54]
the Jewish nation. And after surviving
[11:58]
several wars, Israel took full control
[12:01]
of what had become known as the West
[12:03]
Bank, that is Judea and Samaria, and
[12:05]
East Jerusalem, that is the old city and
[12:08]
the Holy Basin. And this occurred when
[12:11]
Israel was defending itself against Arab
[12:13]
aggression in the Six-Day War in June
[12:16]
1967.
[12:19]
And so since June 1967, Israel, we've
[12:22]
had this whole question about occupation
[12:25]
and ownership of the land.
[12:28]
Israel um has exercised control but not
[12:32]
asserted full sovereignty over the
[12:34]
territory that it that was previously
[12:38]
part of the mandate for Palestine.
[12:41]
And instead of asserting full
[12:42]
sovereignty, Israel has since 1967 taken
[12:46]
various measures.
[12:48]
Um,
[12:50]
let's mention four of them in
[12:52]
particular. First, Israel united the
[12:54]
whole city of Jerusalem, bringing it
[12:56]
under Israeli law and jurisdiction,
[12:59]
declaring Jerusalem to be the
[13:01]
indivisible capital of the state of
[13:04]
Israel.
[13:05]
Um but
[13:08]
Israel has not officially claimed full
[13:10]
sovereignty over Jerusalem. It talks
[13:13]
about Israeli law jurisdiction.
[13:17]
Secondly, Israel introduced a military
[13:20]
administration over the remainder of the
[13:23]
West Bank partly because some in Israel
[13:25]
believed it was required to as an
[13:27]
occupying power under international law
[13:30]
and partly as a means to control
[13:33]
Palestinian terror.
[13:36]
and also partly as a tactic to negotiate
[13:39]
peace with the Arab world in the hope
[13:40]
that conceding land will bring peace.
[13:44]
The idea of land for peace.
[13:47]
Thirdly, at the same time, Israel has
[13:49]
since 1967 enabled and encouraged
[13:52]
Israelis
[13:54]
to live in the West Bank. That is to
[13:56]
cross the green line
[13:59]
uh as the 1949 armistice lines have
[14:02]
become known
[14:04]
to cross that line and to enable
[14:07]
Israelis to live in the territories that
[14:10]
Jordan occupied for 19 years,
[14:14]
which has become known as the West Bank.
[14:16]
but for long periods of history have
[14:18]
been known as Judea and Samaria
[14:21]
and Jud Jordan Jordan had of course
[14:24]
forcibly removed ethnically cleansed the
[14:27]
West Bank of Jews. So many of them were
[14:30]
returning to their homeland and land and
[14:34]
houses which they owned.
[14:36]
Uh fourthly, in the 1990s,
[14:39]
Israel
[14:41]
conceding to international pressure
[14:43]
entered into the Oslo Accords with the
[14:45]
Palestinian Liberation Organization, the
[14:49]
PLO. And these Oslo Accords promised the
[14:53]
Palestinians autonomy and gave them an
[14:57]
kind of interim autonomy.
[15:00]
Um but they did not uh grant or enable
[15:04]
or recognize the creation of a
[15:07]
Palestinian state. Everything was left
[15:09]
open for permanent status negotiations
[15:13]
which have never really happened. And so
[15:15]
we have this very confusing
[15:17]
interim
[15:19]
governance created by the Oslo Accords
[15:22]
which are series of bilateral
[15:26]
agreements or treaties between Israel
[15:30]
and the PLO which is a a non-state
[15:34]
entity. Now, this rather confusing mix
[15:38]
of policies is a reflection of deep
[15:41]
differences of opinion within Jewish
[15:43]
society and across the non-Jewish world
[15:45]
about the status of the land. So, what
[15:49]
are those different views?
[15:51]
Well, at the risk of oversimplification,
[15:54]
ever since 1948, there've basically been
[15:56]
two kinds of views. On the one hand,
[16:00]
many, but not all, in Israel and in the
[16:03]
Jewish community and their allies around
[16:05]
the world hold the view that the Jewish
[16:09]
people have a right to live in the land
[16:11]
of their ancestors.
[16:13]
After all, they argue Abraham, Isaac,
[16:15]
Jacob, and their descendants, and the
[16:17]
kingdoms of Israel and Judah were all
[16:20]
located in the land that the world now
[16:22]
recalls East Jerusalem in the West Bank
[16:25]
or Palestinian territory. Some of these
[16:28]
people believe it's a biblical right.
[16:30]
Others believe it's a historical or a
[16:33]
political or a legal right.
[16:38]
That's one category of views. The other
[16:41]
group of views are those who uh and
[16:44]
these are probably numerically
[16:47]
the majority of people reject or are
[16:51]
ignorant of the Jewish connection with
[16:53]
the land and believe that the
[16:55]
Palestinians are the sole rightful
[16:58]
owners of the land. And this group
[17:01]
includes some who claim that the only
[17:03]
way to solve the conflict is either to
[17:06]
create a Palestinian state in the
[17:09]
occupied territories, that's the
[17:11]
two-state solution, or others believe
[17:14]
the only way to solve it is to
[17:16]
completely dismantle Israel and replace
[17:18]
it with a single democratic state of
[17:22]
Palestine.
[17:24]
That latter view is gaining traction
[17:28]
and the whole spectrum of approaches is
[17:30]
represented in Israel which is why
[17:32]
Israeli elections have been so
[17:34]
complicated.
[17:36]
One of the reasons and why official
[17:38]
Israeli policies concerning the occupied
[17:41]
territories have been so confusing and
[17:44]
contradictory over the decades. And to
[17:46]
this day, lawyers across the globe
[17:49]
continue to be debate the question of
[17:52]
who owns these territories. There is no
[17:56]
consensus, not even within the
[17:58]
International Court of Justice, where
[18:01]
there is a wide range of views.
[18:03]
According to the court's vice president,
[18:06]
Julius Sebutindi, the legal principle
[18:08]
normally applicable in such situations
[18:12]
known as the principle of uti posidatus
[18:15]
urus
[18:17]
uh should be applied to Israel and these
[18:20]
territories. Meaning that in 1948,
[18:22]
Israel inherited as its borders the
[18:26]
administrative boundaries of mandate
[18:29]
Palestine. That would give Israel right
[18:32]
to territorial sovereignty over
[18:36]
uh everything up to the Jordan River. So
[18:40]
from the river to the sea. [gasps]
[18:43]
Uh this conflict concerning sovereignty
[18:45]
of the land is not just about the
[18:48]
occupied territories. It really is about
[18:50]
the whole of Palestine, the territory
[18:53]
that in World War I was allocated to the
[18:55]
mandate for Palestine. And at the center
[18:58]
of this land, literally in the center is
[19:01]
the city of Jerusalem.
[19:05]
So I want to turn just to look now at
[19:07]
Israeli and Palestinian Arab positions
[19:10]
on sovereignty in more detail. It may
[19:14]
come to s as surprise to some of our
[19:17]
listeners that while Israel asserts its
[19:20]
rights to allow Israelis to live in the
[19:23]
territories under military
[19:25]
administration,
[19:27]
it does not officially claim sovereignty
[19:29]
over East Jerusalem or Judea or Somaria.
[19:34]
Israel's position
[19:36]
uh regarding Jerusalem, as I say, is a
[19:39]
little ambiguous. It claims that all of
[19:41]
Jerusalem is part of the state of
[19:45]
Israel. So it is a kind of exercise of
[19:48]
sovereignty but not in that word over
[19:52]
Judea and Samaria. It's different.
[19:54]
Israel's position is that it has
[19:58]
historical claims but that sovereignty
[20:01]
of the occupied territories as they have
[20:04]
become known has been in a vacuum in
[20:08]
obeyance since 1922
[20:11]
and according to Israel
[20:13]
at least officially the question of
[20:15]
sovereignty of the land can only be
[20:16]
resolved through negotiations.
[20:19]
Israel mainly argues that its control of
[20:22]
the territories is justified by security
[20:25]
demands.
[20:27]
If Israel gives up control of the
[20:29]
territories, it will be annihilated,
[20:32]
exposed to terror attacks
[20:35]
in the likes of Hamas's terror attacks
[20:37]
on the 7th of October. So, it really has
[20:40]
to keep control of these territories in
[20:42]
order to secure its very existence.
[20:47]
Now, in contrast to this uh view, the
[20:51]
Palestinians and their supporters in the
[20:53]
Arab Islamic world particularly, but
[20:55]
also in some Western states hold a very
[20:59]
strong counterposition. That is they
[21:01]
assert that the Palestinian people and
[21:04]
only the Palestinian people have full
[21:06]
sovereignty over all of the territory
[21:09]
mandate Palestine and their opinion is
[21:12]
now supported by the highest court in
[21:14]
the world the high the international
[21:16]
court of justice or at least a majority
[21:19]
of judges on that court.
[21:22]
For decades, Israel has tried to manage
[21:26]
uh these tensions, these different views
[21:29]
by means of a compromise, implementing a
[21:32]
range of different measures while
[21:35]
avoiding the underlying question of
[21:36]
sovereignty. But this policy arguably
[21:40]
has backfired. It has weakened Israel's
[21:43]
negotiating position. It's given fuel to
[21:45]
its enemies around the globe. It has
[21:48]
confused the public and enabled Islamist
[21:51]
extremism to take root in Palestinian
[21:53]
society. And this tension is now coming
[21:56]
to a head. Islamist aggression and
[21:59]
violence
[22:01]
reflected in the horrors of October the
[22:03]
7th requires the Israeli government to
[22:05]
increasingly exercise military power and
[22:09]
assert its historical and legal claims.
[22:12]
This assertiveness is in turn provoking
[22:15]
its own backlash both from within Israel
[22:18]
and around the world reflected in this
[22:21]
latest round of trade bans
[22:24]
on settlement products.
[22:27]
Uh it's true that within Israel since
[22:30]
October the 7th 2023
[22:33]
almost 3 years ago opinions within
[22:35]
Israel have shifted dramatically to the
[22:38]
right. There's a growing view in Israel.
[22:41]
The whole idea of Palestinian statement
[22:43]
is untenable. That Israel must be much
[22:46]
more assertive in defending its
[22:48]
existence as a Jewish state, even if
[22:50]
this means preventing the Palestinians
[22:53]
from having a state. This question of
[22:57]
course is going to be one of the topics
[23:00]
[snorts] that will play out in the
[23:01]
upcoming Israeli elections.
[23:04]
Uh in the UN, however, the majority of
[23:07]
UN member states
[23:09]
um oblivious to the fact that
[23:12]
Palestinian society has been deeply
[23:14]
infiltrated by violent, hate-filled
[23:18]
Islamist ideology,
[23:20]
uh now reject the argument that Israel's
[23:22]
presence in these territories is
[23:24]
justified by security concerns. And of
[23:27]
course, they reject Israel's historical
[23:30]
and legal claims.
[23:32]
So sooner or later, it seems that the
[23:34]
Israeli government will have to make a
[23:36]
choice. Either to assert full
[23:38]
sovereignty over these territories or
[23:40]
abandon its claims and withdraw Israelis
[23:43]
living there. And of course, it's not
[23:45]
going to do the latter.
[23:48]
One option that has been discussed in
[23:50]
recent years has been to assert
[23:52]
sovereignty over only area C in the West
[23:56]
Bank. It's about 70% of the West Bank.
[23:59]
Uh, of course, this will not appease the
[24:01]
international community, nor will it
[24:02]
bring peace with the Palestinians who
[24:04]
seek control from the river to the sea.
[24:08]
Israel could, of course, simply maintain
[24:11]
the status quo, avoiding this whole
[24:13]
issue, continuing its military
[24:15]
campaigns,
[24:17]
but that too has become unacceptable to
[24:19]
most UN member states
[24:21]
uh that including Western states by the
[24:24]
way that have been traditional allies of
[24:26]
Israel. So this current round of trade
[24:29]
bans is a sign that even Israel's
[24:32]
traditional allies such as Germany have
[24:34]
had enough. They will not assist Israel
[24:37]
militarily and they will impose
[24:39]
increasingly harsh measures to force
[24:41]
Israel to remove its military and
[24:44]
civilians from the occupied territories.
[24:48]
[snorts]
[24:48]
Logically, this in time will lead to
[24:51]
military action against Israel if it
[24:54]
does not comply.
[24:57]
Interestingly, the current Israeli
[24:58]
government uh is more explicitly
[25:03]
referring to its historical and legal
[25:06]
claims to the land. We saw in Gideon
[25:09]
Sar, the foreign minister's uh statement
[25:12]
this week in response to the UK's
[25:15]
measures. He said, quote, [snorts] "The
[25:18]
Jewish people have the right to live
[25:19]
throughout the land of Israel. The
[25:21]
connection and right of the Jewish
[25:23]
people to this land is documented more
[25:25]
extensively than those of any other
[25:27]
people in human history. The move by the
[25:30]
Labour government in Britain is
[25:31]
particularly absurd given that more than
[25:33]
a century ago was the Belfford
[25:35]
Declaration of the British government
[25:37]
that formally recognized the historic
[25:39]
right of the Jewish people to
[25:41]
reestablish their national home in the
[25:43]
land of Israel including Judea and
[25:47]
Samaria. This served as the foundation
[25:50]
of the British mandate was recognized by
[25:52]
the League of Nations and subsequently
[25:54]
incorporated into article 80 of the
[25:56]
United Nations Charter. Close quote.
[26:00]
It's a very interesting statement. It's
[26:02]
not a full assertion of legal
[26:04]
sovereignty or right to legal
[26:06]
sovereignty, but it is a clear statement
[26:08]
of historical rights. Will [snorts] be
[26:11]
interesting to see how this develops.
[26:13]
The question of how to deal with
[26:14]
sovereignty of the territories will be a
[26:17]
key issue in the elections as we've
[26:19]
said.
[26:22]
Right? So how are we as Christians to
[26:24]
respond to this? Well, the Bible gives
[26:26]
us some guidelines.
[26:29]
Uh first of all on the one hand the
[26:31]
Bible says quite clearly the Lord has
[26:33]
given the land to the Jewish people as
[26:36]
an eternal possession
[26:39]
and further that the Lord will bring his
[26:42]
people back to the land after their
[26:44]
dispersion among the nations.
[26:47]
And so from the perspective of the
[26:49]
Bible, the Jewish people have a uh a
[26:52]
kind of right to the land
[26:55]
and an obligation to live in and
[26:58]
cultivate the land to which the Lord is
[27:01]
bringing them home.
[27:04]
Secondly, however, it could be said that
[27:06]
the right to the land brings a
[27:08]
responsibility with it. The Jewish
[27:10]
people have not only a right to live in
[27:12]
the land, they have a responsibility to
[27:14]
exercise sovereignty over it.
[27:17]
This includes showing mercy towards the
[27:21]
strangers in the land and administering
[27:23]
justice.
[27:25]
The administration of the land is to be
[27:27]
as it were an example to the nations of
[27:29]
godly justice and righteousness.
[27:34]
This also means that the responsibility
[27:37]
on the state to use the necessary force
[27:39]
to confront and eradicate evil and
[27:42]
hostile elements to keep law and order
[27:46]
enforce the law. This is of course a
[27:48]
huge challenge when the majority of
[27:51]
non-Jews in the territories,
[27:53]
Palestinians currently under Israeli
[27:56]
military administration
[27:58]
and now also under Palestinian authority
[28:01]
control have a deep hatred towards the
[28:04]
Jewish people and many within
[28:07]
Palestinian society are willing to
[28:09]
sacrifice their own children to kill
[28:12]
Jews and destroy the Jewish nation. So,
[28:15]
Israel is faced with a dilemma that is
[28:18]
unique to Israel and unique in history.
[28:22]
Another biblical perspective is that the
[28:25]
nations face a choice whether to submit
[28:28]
to or oppose the Lord's sovereign
[28:30]
purposes in bringing the Jewish people
[28:33]
home.
[28:34]
Many nations are governed by leaders
[28:36]
whose attitude attitude towards Israel
[28:38]
is shaped by Islam which does not and
[28:42]
cannot tolerate Jewish sovereignty over
[28:44]
Islamic land. At least that's a
[28:46]
perspective of many in the Islamic
[28:49]
world.
[28:51]
The church on the other hand is the body
[28:53]
of those who have been included in God's
[28:55]
eternal covenants with the people of
[28:57]
Israel.
[28:59]
The church is the body of Gentiles and
[29:02]
Jews who have been included in the
[29:04]
Commonwealth of Israel, says Paul in
[29:07]
Ephesians 2. The church has an important
[29:10]
role to play in this critical time of
[29:12]
world history.
[29:14]
Our task, however, is not to think up
[29:16]
political solutions. That is the job of
[29:19]
governments. The role of the church is
[29:22]
to speak prophetic truth into our
[29:25]
nations with love, to comfort the Jewish
[29:27]
people in their difficult journey,
[29:31]
uh to strengthen our Christian brothers
[29:33]
and sisters in the land, and to pray
[29:35]
unceasingly to the father for the coming
[29:38]
of the kingdom. And in the words of the
[29:42]
prayer that Jesus taught, we pray,
[29:45]
"Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come,
[29:48]
thy will be done on earth as it is in
[29:50]
heaven.
[29:52]
And so we close this weekly update with
[29:55]
prayer. We pray for the Israel and her
[29:59]
leaders that as nations turn from words
[30:03]
to action, wisdom will guide them to
[30:06]
answer one-sided treatment with clarity
[30:08]
and to speak truth while also reaching
[30:11]
out in friendship and billing allies
[30:13]
across the globe.
[30:15]
We pray that the upcoming elections in
[30:19]
Israel
[30:21]
that the people will elect leaders who
[30:23]
have the courage to confront evil and
[30:26]
assert full sovereignty over the land
[30:28]
that has been a trust entrusted to the
[30:30]
Jewish people
[30:32]
so that all who live in the land will be
[30:34]
blessed.
[30:36]
We pray for the enemies of the Jewish
[30:38]
people, especially in the Islamic world,
[30:40]
that hearts of stone will be turned to
[30:42]
hearts of flesh.
[30:45]
Pray for the Arab Christians in the
[30:47]
land, both in Israel and in the disputed
[30:50]
territories, that they will be filled
[30:53]
with love for the Jewish people, that
[30:55]
they will be peacemakers and have the
[30:57]
mind of Christ. Pray for the leaders of
[31:00]
the nations and pray that the church
[31:03]
will rise to its calling to speak speak
[31:06]
truth and love into the world to comfort
[31:09]
the Jewish people and to intercede
[31:12]
in the spirit and pray for the peace of
[31:15]
Jerusalem.
[31:18]
That brings us to the end of this weekly
[31:20]
update. I want to thank you for
[31:22]
listening. It's been rather a long one.
[31:24]
There's a lot to grapple with. We
[31:27]
encourage you to go forward in prayer to
[31:31]
study the world and world events in the
[31:35]
light of the Bible.
[31:37]
And uh we look forward to being with you
[31:40]
next week. Thank you so much. God bless.
[31:42]
away.
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A large number of Western states are rallying to impose sanctions on trade in products from “illegal Israeli settlements”. Listen to the Weekly Update
