In every war, good people fight on the losing side. Whether by surrender or by crushing defeat without surrender, those on the losing side suffer all the consequences that apply to the vanquished.

Not every German was a Nazi. I think it's safe to say that not all Germans who were Nazis were heart-felt believers in Nazi policy, especially the policy of the "Final Solution to the Jewish Problem." Nevertheless, by and large, all Germans who were citizens of the Third Reich collectively suffered the consequences of being on the losing side of World War II. Their cities were collectively bombed. That generation was forever humiliated as a collective people by the barbarity of the Holocaust committed in their own backyard by their fellow countrymen, their friends, their family members, and neighbors.

Christianity can also be said to be in a war, a spiritual war. Yet, many Christians are affiliated with institutional church organizations that inadequately teach Israel's positive, active, and ongoing role in God's biblical plan of redemption. As global events intensify in accordance with biblical prophecy, many members of churches holding to overly liberal theological views are entirely unaware of Israel’s positive strategic role in the past, present, and future of God's overall plan for mankind.

Why is this so important?  For one thing, because it's separation from our biblical roots that will cause our society to fail in its rightful and biblical support of Israel and, in turn, fail to defeat the Islamic jihadists who intend to destroy both Israel and our way of life. Even more dire, from an eternal perspective, is the critical problem that conceptual separation from the biblical roots of Christianity puts Christians in an awkward position with the God of Israel, who’s plan for His people is indeed to save them based on the irrefutable eternal fact that He loves them.

It is the organizations and bureaucracies within Christendom that hold to liberal (read: diluted) and postmodern (read: nebulous) theologies that are a real ally in the war against global Islamic jihad—on the side of the jihadists. As columnist Frank Pastore has put it: “Their [liberal Christianity’s] unwillingness to distinguish truth from error, right from wrong, and good from evil leave them intellectually immobilized to resist the encroachment of false teaching and heresy, and incapable of knowing the good guys from the bad guys in the war for the free world.”

As a result, the liberal church's overly-tolerant, often supportive attitude toward radical Islamic initiatives in the Middle East (which leads to appeasement and emboldening of the enemy’s zeal to destroy everything not committed to belief in Allah and sharia law), can be interpreted, at least in a pragmatic sense, as morally equivalent to the German church’s silence toward the Third Reich—both moral failures of catastrophic magnitude.

Just as the failure to understand the Scriptures from a theological perspective that acknowledges and understands the Jewish roots of the Christian faith contributed to institutional Christendom's utter moral failure during the Holocaust, the current failure to understand the Scriptures from that same perspective leads to institutional Christianity's misguided antagonism and indifference toward Israel today in the face of the greatest threat to the Jewish people since the rise of the Third Reich.

If you are affiliated with one of those mainline church denominations that entertain thoughts of divesting, or actually divests from Israel (Prebyterian USA), or if you've been taught that “the church” is the “New Israel,” or if you are a member of a Christian organization that is any way inordinately politically aligned with the Arab/Palestinian/PLO/PA jihadist cause (especially while simultaneously harboring anti-Zionist/anti-Semitic thoughts toward Israel in your heart), I write in good faith directly to you as an individual.

This aspect of Christianity's two-thousand year old identity crisis places you in a very dangerous spiritual landscape, positioned all too close to harm’s way in light of God’s rapidly unfolding plan to rescue His people, Israel, while destroying their enemies in the process.

Can liberal institutional Christianity today be rightfully compared to liberal institutional Christianity in Germany as the darkness of the Third Reich moved onto the world stage?

Something to think about as the warm and inviting pull of liberal Christian political correctness tickles your ear...

Next:  Memory and Accountability, Words on Walls...

Having reviewed many of the fictions that comprise the Palestinian mythology, Part 3 of the letter is devoted to presenting the information that comprises the real historic record.

Concerning the information already presented, all of it is very accessible and common to many websites published by groups concerned with the truth about Israel and the on-going pan-Arab effort to “wipe Israel off the map.” Simply use any search engine employing the terms “Arab Israeli conflict myth” to examine some of the facts mentioned. A good place to start is: http://www.palestinefacts.org/pf_faq_palestine.php.

Now, on to the facts in support of the actual historic record.

Israel became a nation in 1312 BCE, two thousand years before the rise of Islam. The Jewish people held dominion over the land in question for centuries, with a continuous presence in the land for the past 3,300 years. For over three thousand years Jerusalem has been the Jewish capital. The only Arab dominion since the conquest in 635 CE lasted no more than 22 years. Jerusalem has never been the capital of any Arab or Muslim entity. During the twenty years that Jordan occupied Jerusalem (1948-1967), it never sought to make it its capital. Under Jordanian rule, Jewish holy sites were desecrated: synagogues in the Old City were torched and tombstones from the ancient Mount of Olives cemetery were used to pace roads and build latrines (the Nazis desecrated Jewish tombstones in similar manner). Jews were denied access to places of worship at the Western Wall, Tomb of Rachel, Tomb of Joseph, and cave of the Patriarchs. Arab refugees in Israel only began identifying themselves as part of “a Palestinian people” in 1967, two decades after the establishment of the modern State of Israel.

Take into thoughtful consideration the significance of the fact that Jerusalem is mentioned over 700 times in the Jewish Bible and is not mentioned once in the Qur’an.

The Arab world includes twenty-two separate nations. There is only one Jewish nation. The Arab nations have initiated five wars—attempts to annihilate Israel—since 1948. Israel has had to defend itself repeatedly from each attack by an overwhelmingly larger force. Despite this fact, Israel has consistently agreed to peace partition plans brokered by the international community. The Arab world has rejected all partition plans offered by the international community, defiantly refusing to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist. The PLO Charter still calls for the destruction of the State of Israel. So does the Hamas covenant, as well as the founding document of Fatah. Israel attempted to give the PLO-Fatah-Hamas-Palestinian Authority autonomous rule over most of Judea under the Oslo Agreement. Tragically, Arafat’s regime refused to accept responsibility. So has Mahmoud Abbas, Arafat’s “successor” (who’s Ph.D thesis was written in support of holocaust denial). Autonomy under the Palestinian Authority has supplied Israel's enemies with weapons rather than motivation to achieve true peace. Israel has given the Palestinians most of the "West Bank" land and now, Gaza as well. Out of the violent madness erupting with that latest "land-for-peace" deal, a standing army, that some sources put at 7,000 to 10,000, is forming in Gaza.

Since 1948, when a UN resolution set the State of Israel on its way, the UN has been a part of the on-going evolution of the struggle between Israel and the Palestinian Arabs with binding and non-binding resolutions, peace keeping forces, peace conferences and investigations. Unfortunately, an alliance between Arab states, third-world countries hostile to the developed world, and Cold War politics backed by the former Soviet Union, have created a UN environment that is uniquely hostile to Israel.

Of the 175 Security Council resolutions passed before 1990, 97 were directed against Israel.

Of the 690 General Assembly resolutions voted on before 1990, 429 were directed against Israel.

On the other hand, the U.N. has been totally silent on the Palestinian history of suicide bombings, lynchings, terrorist attacks, bus hijackings, cafe bombings, etc.

For one side of the argument – the Israeli side – there is documented evidence supporting the substance of the national position. For the other side – the Arab (“Palestinian”) side – there is largely myth constructed of omitted and distorted fact.

One tragic conclusion that can be drawn is that behind the headlines and mass media talk of negotiated peace is the stark reality that in the treacherous lexicon of the PLO-Fatah-Hamas-PA pseudo-government that’s been created from these false assumptions, the term “peace” has been re-defined. It is strategically employed as a synonym for the deeper Arab-Islamic objective: the destruction of Israel.

In the hands of Israel's lethal enemies, the term “peace” itself has been turned into a code word for hatred and genocidal intent.

And then, of course, there is Iran to consider—the creative source of Islamo-fascism in the seventies and the most powerful state sponsor of worldwide Islamic jihadist terrorism today—as a soon-to-be nuclear threat.

Dear fellow Christian, can’t you see that through the acceptance of lies presented as fact, and the resulting misplaced loyalties, that the world has again succeeded in creating yet another Frankenstein. A post-Auschwitz Frankenstein. Tragically, much of institutional Christianity has succeeded in passively complying once again with the lethal enemies of Israel, the United States, the free world at large, and, ironically, ultimately, Christianity itself. This should not be so.

However, unlike the hauntingly similar path that was taken by the state churches of Germany that led to the Holocaust sixty-five years ago, there is still time for Christians to wake up and do as the Bible teaches us to do: resist evil.

Next: Israel’s Biblical Position in the Arab-Israeli Conflict

We all realize that conflicts such as the Arab-Israeli crisis don't occur in a vacuum.

Consider just one example. It's considered responsible standard procedure to learn the history of antisemitism as part and parcel of any complete study of the Holocaust.  Without knowledge of the history of antisemitism, especially the two-thousand year history of Christian antisemitism, one can never truly understand what fueled the catastrophe in Europe.  Without the larger context, one would only be seeing the more immediate causes of Hitler's Final Solution, remaining blind to the roots of the antisemitism that made it possible to achieve.

Similar principles need to be applied understanding the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Sadly, the element conspicuously absent from most one-sided pro-Palestinian diatribes against Israel is historical fact. Why?  Because an accurate reading of the historical record is the key to debunking the mythology that partisan proponents of the Arab-Palestinian dilemma base their presuppositions in.

What is being referred to when we speak of “the mythology” supporting the Arab-PLO-PA-Palestinian position in the disputed territories?

Myths such as the fictitious role of the state of Israel as a colonial movement of imperialistic Western society.  Myths such as ancient Jewish Judea and Samaria being part of some fairy-tale Arab homeland rather than the homeland of the Jewish people for over 3,000 years.  Myths that claim the Jewish people 'stole' the land from contented Arab settlers rather than point the finger at the pan-Arab community that ordered their people to flee in 1948 -- despite repeated requests from Jewish leadership that residing Arabs remain and settle in peace.  Myths such as the establishment of the state of Israel being the 'cause' of the original Arab refugees rather than tracing guilt back to the oil rich Arab nations who encouraged the creation of 'refugee camps' in the first place.  Myths that the 'alien' Jewish people suddenly immigrated into the land 'after 2000 years,' displacing ‘the Palestinian Arabs’ with the ‘new’ Jewish state, while Arabs are portrayed as being native there for millennia.  Myths that turn fledgling Jewish efforts of self-defense into 'massacres' just as the recent defensive military initiative in Jenin was fraudulently labeled a 'massacre' in April 2002.   Myths that revolve around the strategically coined term, 'Palestine,' a Roman corruption engineered as a displacement substitute for the original Hebraic terms 'Judah and Ephraim' in an historically documented effort to disassociate the land from Jewish ownership, transferring ownership in concept to Rome in 136 CE.   Myths that there is no place for 'homeless' Arab 'refugees' to live in when the nation of Jordan was delegated as the original territory (Transjordan) for a 'Palestinian state' back in 1947.  Myths that arise from the omission of historical facts concerning all previous international plans for dual statehood that Israel accepted and the Arab world systematically rejected—refusing to acknowledge Israel's right to exist.

The omission of much documented information has facilitated the myth of today—a complex system of politically loaded, mythological assertions that the world has largely bought into.  An intelligent system of mythology that can lay claim to such infamous successes as having elevated the pioneering terrorist Yassar Arafat to the stature of legitimate statesman and Nobel Prize winner as well as maintaining the pan-Arab political strategy that put over 600,000 innocent Arab refugees in harm's way in the first place. The injustices done to the Arab Palestinian refugees have only been perpetuated by the Arab world's refusal to acknowledge the Palestinian state which was already established in 1947—now known as the nation of Jordan—a year prior to Israel's claim to statehood.

But perhaps most repulsive of all the myths is the perception of the Islamic jihadist 'hero' that has been fabricated: disguising oneself as a genuine non-combatant--even as a rabbi on a busload of Jewish girls coming back from camp--then blowing yourself up alongside innocent men, women, and children.  This perception has been 'sold' to innocent children in grade school--from kindergarten on up--as a legitimate form of freedom fighting.  This is treachery, perfidy at its baseline worst, the very signature of Evil itself. 

And yet, there are many in your community who believe that Israel is the "root cause" of the conflict in the Middle East.  Let there be no mistake, you have been successfull manipulated by the genius behind the successful dissemination of these myths and more.  It could be argued that public opinion has not been so thoroughly persuaded of such enormous lies since the Propaganda Minstry of the Third Reich persuaded Christian Europe that the Jewish community there was inherently evil and deserving of liquidation.  We must resist being persuaded that evil is good and good, evil.  What we did not do as Christians then, we must do now.  We are called to resist such evil.

Do not be decieved by your leadership who may use their pulpits to persuade you against the validity of Israel's existence and the extortionist facade of land-for-peace deals.  The Islamists do not want land.  The Islamists do not want peace.  They want the annihilation of Israel.

All but alone in doing so, Winston Churchill warned of what lay ahead in 1930's Europe.  As writer David Brudnoy has put it: "We have no Churchill today, but thanks to the Internet and other means of mass communication, we know what’s coming: a combined Arab, European, and United Nations drive to delegitimize Israel and submit Jews to a 21st-century Final Solution."

Next:  Facts Behind the Myths...

I am not a scholar, nor a preacher.  I hold none of the documentation accorded those with either distinction.  But, I also don't believe that depth of insight into profound matters of consequence is relegated only to those who have obtained those things. 

This is a layman's view.  An informed laymen's view, which may provide freedoms not available to those constrained by credentialed ties to institutions. 

And so it is that I state the deeper, underlying reason for this letter: It is my sense of things that Postmodern Institutional Christianity suffers from an identity crisis of life-threatening proportion.  And that is why it has a skewed, distorted view of Israel in general and the Arab-Israeli conflict in particular.

It’s a generally acknowledged fact that in America, large-scale denominational churches tend to be more liberal than locally autonomous, non-denominational congregations. Also, that the Bible, as well as subjects like biblical prophecy, are more often exclusively taught within the non-denominational community. This letter is to those of a more Liberal predisposition, who may consider Israel to be the cause of conflict in the Middle East while seeing “the Palestinians” as, more or less, innocent victims of an oppressive “occupation.”

I write in three parts: Part 1 dealing directly with myth and fact as concerns the Arab-Israeli conflict, Part 2 dealing with reasons in support of aligning oneself, as a Christian, primarily with Israel.  Part 3 will prescribe a remedy for healing the spiritual identity crisis that I think inflicts modern Western Christianity.  More parts may be added if inspiration strikes.

I may be writing to the reader as "family," then again, I may not. A problem here is how to define "Christian"and then, how to identify individuals who fit the definition. Nevertheless, a solution can only be found in trying. We live in near-cataclysmic times, whether politically or theologically speaking. At any rate, read on, as I think that what I have to say may be instructive, whether Liberal or Conservative, even if you're not a Christian.

This has to do, afterall, with ultimate things.

In a nutshell, my reason for singling out Liberal Christians, without getting too "scriptural" and coming off like a preacher, which I am not, is that as I see it, you, as a Liberal Christian, have sat under teaching very different from that which I've received. As a result of a less intense focus on Scripture, it makes sense that your view of the Arab-Israeli conflict moved more in an overly-sympathetic direction of the so-called “Palestinian” dilemma than mine.  According to Ephesians 2, as I see it, Israel is the spiritual commonwealth of my spiritual residence, not “Christianity,” per se.  I view Abraham as my spiritual father and consider my access to, and knowledge of, the God of Israel, as being connected directly to the covenant made with Abraham. Therefore, I am blessed through Abraham and his descendants and count it as my willing obligation to stand with them in gratitude--through thick and thin--for all they have suffered to bring me to faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

From the stronghold of this great metaphysical reality that is only available through a more certain view of Scripture, my view of Israel's predicament is a much longer, over-arching, longitudinally historic view. This view envelops me within the context of “Israel” as a believer in the Jewish Messiah. To understand what I mean by this, see Ephesians 2 and Romans 9-11. I admittedly identify less with Christianity than I do Messianic Judaism, for example. I see Christianity as originally being conceived of and taught by Jesus as a form of transformational, transcultural Judaism, in only vague manner represented today in, for instance, the highly centralized, bureaucratically-driven, institutional format that much of Christianity takes today.

As a result, through the greater, faith-based lens of Scripture, I see today's so-called "Palestinian uprising" as an intrinsic element of the latest lethal attempt in a long history of antisemitic genocidal intent, to eradicate the Jewish people from the face of the earth.

Therefore, in the spirit of dialogue and understanding, I share with you this letter in hope that more understanding may lead to more dialogue, more dialogue to the truth of the matter. And that Israel may gain more support from new friends who have chosen to see the light and repair their broken identity as Christians through repair of the broken spiritual sibling relationship with their elder sibling, Israel.

Next: Myths & Facts Regarding Israel’s Role in the Current Attack on Its Existence

Sixty-nine years ago, Nazi officials instigated deadly outbursts of violence throughout Germany, Austria, and the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia. The Germans officially explained the violence as a spontaneous outburst of public rage in response to the assassination of Ernst von Rath, a low-ranking official at the German embassy in Paris. The Nazis blamed "World Jewry" for the assassination and, ostensibly as reprisal, unleashed a massive pogrom against Jews within the Third Reich. The event came to be known as Kristallnacht, the "Night of Broken Glass" and effectively transfered responsibility for "solving" the "Jewish Question" to the SS. 

On December 6, 1987, in Gaza, Israeli land occupied by the PLO, an Israeli was stabbed to death while shopping. One day later, four residents of the Jabalya refugee camp in Gaza were killed in a traffic accident. Rumors that the four had been killed by Israelis as a deliberate act of revenge began to spread among the Arab population. Mass rioting broke out in Jabalya on the morning of December 9. This sparked a wave of unrest that engulfed Judea, Samaria, Gaza, and Jerusalem. False charges of Israeli atrocities and instigation from the mosques played an important role in starting the first intifada. The event signaled the successful galvanization of all militant parties—official and “unofficial”—into the on-going war against Israel that has been assigned the label “peace process.”

Since that day in Gaza, Arafat’s Palestinian Authority has played a lead role in orchestrating the prolonged program of violence against the Jewish people. When compared, the general “blueprints” for both Nazi and PLO initiations of large-scale, long-term, antisemitic violence appear very similar: First, patiently cultivate hate among the general populace via the widespread distortion of truth (for instance, both employ(ed) children’s books to teach hate). Secondly, maintain ideological support for violent activity in such a way as to cause it to appear “official” to civilian instigators while avoiding any direct causal connection with the government proper. Finally, exploit the occasion of a well-suited or staged emotional incident for the purpose of triggering and fueling “spontaneous” eruption by the general populace.

Now, simply “connect one more dot” to complete the overall pattern of hate.

Haj Amin Al Husseini, the former grand mufti of Jerusalem, had a well-documented relationship with the Third Reich, to include personal relationships with Hitler, Heinrich Himmler, Joachim Von Ribbentrop, and Adolph Eichmann. During World War II, the mufti journeyed to Nazi Germany where he personally asked Adolf Hitler to invade British-ruled Palestine and rid it of Jews. He then spent the rest of World War II as Hitler's special guest in Berlin, advocating the extermination of Jews in radio broadcasts back to the Middle East and recruiting Balkan Muslims for infamous SS "mountain divisions" known as the Handjar (Sword), that tried to wipe out Jewish communities throughout the region. Husseini's men attended SS training courses and visited Sachsenhausen. He visited Nazi concentration camps with Heinrich Himmler, Head of SS. When the war ended, Husseini was arrested in France, but in June 1946, he escaped and made his way to asylum in Egypt.

There he made his nephew, the young Mohammed Abdel-Raouf Arafat As Qudwa al-Husseini, then living in Cairo, his personal protégé.

The mufti eventually died in exile in 1974. His place as leader of the radical, nationalist Palestinian Arabs had already been secured by his nephew, Mohammed Abdel-Raouf Arafat As Qudwa al-Husseini, better known to us today as “Yasser Arafat.”

The nephew of the Nazi-collaborating mufti apparently learned his lessons well. In August 2002, Arafat gave an interview in which he referred to "our hero al-Husseini" as a symbol of Palestinian Arab resistance.

And so, the now-departed Arafat’s personal quest to destroy the Jewish presence in the Middle East began as an Egyptian terrorist long before the state of Israel (or “the Palestinian people”) came into existence. On his murderous path to winning the Nobel Prize for Peace, he successfully brought terrorism to world attention, pioneering the innovation of hijacking and blowing up airplanes in the 1970's. As a direct result of his lifelong anti-Zionist campaign, hundreds of innocent men, women, and children from all over the world were slaughtered for the achievement of his political objectives.

Now, Osama bin Laden, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and the leaders of global Islamic terrorist groups, inspired and encouraged by the imams of the Arab world, build on the foundation built by Arafat.  And so, it can be argued, that Arafat, based upon the lesser known facts of the historical record, built on Hitler’s foundation. And Hitler, of course, built on earlier long-standing antisemitic precedent.

But that’s another true story, best saved for another day.