The news about the war of Israel on the Gaza territory is devastating today. It would be best if you weren’t a pro-Palestine to be in the horror of what is going on there and what is going on in the same vein already for more than half a year. And still, there is no end to this war!
This article is my public cry about the moral and religious treachery of Israel against God’s very well-known particular disposition towards Israel. God’s disciplined presence in Israel openly confirms it—thousands of years of experience in salvation, and moral and religious education.
A few words about myself: being Jewish by birth, I lived assimilated in soviet Russia till the time of Brezhnev. For my love of cultural freedom, I was deprived of Russian citizenship by his government, and thrown out in August 1978 without a passport to Israel. There I learned from breathtaking living Jewish memory, confirmed by thousand years of old books, always published anew, the real history of Israel with God’s guidance and defence.
The modern story of Israel, as I have also learned, started with the Six Days War against Egypt and Syria, Jordan who both joined Egypt in attacking Israel — and they all were defeated in six days from 5 to 10 June 1967. The war, preserved as a Divine feat in the national memory of Israel, was a holiday of real miracles, and it gave Israel Sinai, the West Bank and the Golan Heights. In comparison, looking at the difficulties of Israel today, it was really for nothing.
In 1978, when I came to Israel, the President of the United States, Jimmy Carter, organized the Camp David Accord for peace between Egypt and Israel, and on 26 March 1979, the peace was concluded. The peace with Egypt was a source of future disasters for Israel, not fully appreciated by Israel. Initially, Israel was immediately deprived of Sinai with annulled Israeli fundamental contractions there of a big military base, several cities, discovered sources of oil, etc.
A map of military movements during the Six-Day War. Israel proper is shown in royal blue and territories captured by Israel are shown in various shades of green.
Israel received through this peace the control of Gaza, the territory with a few million uneducated Palestinians who were abused by the Egyptian administration during the years, before Six-Day War, and were obliged to live there without real help for development.
Moreover, the peace with Egypt has transformed the Israeli strongman Ariel Sharon, who was insulted by the retreat of Israel from its strong positions, in a militant super-hero man with unrestricted local ambitions, replacing the careful and cultivated policy of Israeli governments before him. Starting with Sharon’s personal war against the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in Lebanon, in 1982, and the disaster of the Sabra and Chatila massacre, Sharon witnessed the death of the Israeli ally who carried this massacre, Lebanon’s President Bachir Pierre Gemayel, leader of Maronite Christians. America sent troops to help negotiate the PLO’s exit from Lebanon, withdrawing them after negotiating a ceasefire that ostensibly protected Palestinian civilians.
During this historical, disastrous movement of Israeli forces, I left Israel for France, after four fruitful
years in Jerusalem, not being able to protest against the catastrophe of the peace with Egypt and Sharon’s “revolution”. Later came the Gaza disaster. Sharon was elected Prime Minister on February 6th, 2001. Between the 16th and 30th of August 2005, Sharon controversially expelled 9,480 Jewish settlers from 21 settlements in Gaza and four settlements in the northern West Bank. He made Gaza self-sufficient under the rule of Hamas.
Once it became clear that the Jewish settlers’ evictions were definitely going ahead, a group of conservative Rabbis, led by Yosef Dayan, placed an ancient curse on Sharon known as Pulsa diNura, calling on the Angel of Death to intervene and kill him. Sharon’s stroke occurred a few months after this curse of Rabbis and before he had been expected to win a new election in 2006. In fact, he was widely interpreted as planning to clear Israel out of most of the West Bank, in a series of unilateral withdrawals.
After spending eight years in a coma, Sharon died on 11 January 2014, ten years ago. The future disaster was hiding behind the brave Israeli Army. Today this army is fighting shadows of Hamas in Gaza, killing over eight months dozens of thousands of peaceful women, men, older persons and children who honestly and without complaints permit the hiding of a few thousand Hamas fighters, sometimes with combat missiles aimed at Israeli cities.
How is this possible?
14 thoughts on “Is Israel Exploiting the Mercy of the Almighty?”
“Israel” (which, like “El Salvador”, has to be taken with a grain of salt) is of course exploiting the mercy of the Almighty, but not in more so or differently than other countries — the USA, Russia, China, whoever — do. Everyone in Europe and the Mediterranean region is descended from Jacob by now, which is much more certain than the fact that everyone of European descent is descended from Charlemagne; the idea that God reserves a special blessing for those descendants of Jacob who have refused to accept the Messiah is one without support in Scripture. Why any Catholic would believe that says something about the state of the Church today. Those descendants of Jacob who, through the years, accepted the Messiah did not cease to be Jews; on the contrary, those Gentiles who were baptized became, in essence, Jews, subject to the Heir of David and the true High Priest. “… do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God can raise up children to Abraham from these stones.”
The modern, secular state of “Israel” is not inherently better or worse, more blessed by God or more cursed by God, than Haiti or Serbia or Thailand. Period. It is full of sinners who can still be saved by the grace of God — just like Haiti and Serbia and Thailand — and in that sense “Israel” is exploiting the mercy of God. We can only pray that they move from exploiting God’s patience to availing themselves of God’s mercy.
As for the actions of the Israeli government, their actions give me no reason to believe they have any awareness of the mercy of God. What they do demonstrate is an awareness of the feelings of guilt of Americans and Europeans, and they have been exploiting those feelings to the hilt for decades.
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pax
Dear Outis,
Besides your theories about «universal descendants of Jacob», I do agree with your analysis. The difference between us is my personal experience in Israel which has awaken in me a real descendant of Jacob.
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The war in Gaza is different from the previous ones . Iran was concerned that Israel and Saudi Arabia were close to a rapprochement. So Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas conspired together to disrupt this . After a year of planning Hamas launched it’s savage attack on October 7 knowing that Israel’s response would be brutal. As far as the Hamas leadership ( comfortably ensconced in their luxurious villas in the Persian Gulf ) were concerned it didn’t matter how many innocent Palestinians were killed. Their objective was achieved Saudi Arabia suspended talks with Israel .
To add to the misery of the people of Gaza and the Israeli hostages , an extreme right wing Israeli Prime Minister wanted to stay out of jail . So he launched an invasion to prove that he was the leader Israel needed.
As a Jew ,I am devastated at the loss of life on both sides.
If only the Palestinians and Israelis had leaders to end this nightmare . I pray fervently that God would find them. In the words of Isaiah , Lo yisah goy al goy cherev …..nation will not raise up sword against nation.
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pax
Dear Jock Orkin,
I am as deprived as you. Still, it’s a great mistake of Israel to permit Hamas to lunch Oct 7, and it is also even greater mistake, with an aspect of Hillul-Hashem, to lunch this invasion on Gaza.
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pax
To AN ORDINARY PAPIST
It is the third of my articles consecrated to the Hamas-Israeli conflict. It is the first I put the difficult question: why Israeli answer to Oct 7 is so brutal to peaceful, simple Palestinians who have nothing to do with the war games of Hamas ?
He doesn’t mention Oct 7 th once
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pax
I have mentioned 7 oct in two of my previous articles on Catholic Stand.
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pax
This question you can make on the destiny of Israel: why they didn’t «turn the tables» on Romans, on Christians, etc.
Maybe because Sharon was giving land away instead of having it taken from them. Then
again, maybe he had the right idea – seeing that the annexations truly backfired.
What’s more interesting is that G-D allows men to manipulate angels into killing for revenge.
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pax
This was an act of real desperation.
Makes one wonder what these rabbi couldn’t turn the tables on Hamas