Video: Tearful Christian Woman Kicked Out Of Her Village Begs Obama To Stop Sending Weapons To The Rebel Jihadists

  

(Deb) The battle rages on for the ancient Christian town of Maaloula, Syria  despite reports that government forces had retaken it.

BBC reported:

Government forces are in Maaloula, but there is still fighting going on. I’ve heard a lot of heavy fire and one or two large explosions as well. Their opponents from the al-Nusra Front – the armed rebel group that is allied with al-Qaeda – appear to still be in the town. I’ve seen about half a dozen wounded government soldiers driven back at speed towards their rear echelon.

I’ve spoken to some local members of the National Defence Forces, a pro-government militia. They say they are fighting for their town and the fact it was a place where Christians and Muslims once lived side by side. They say they are fighting against the people they regard as terrorists.

The town’s residents fled in a hurry to Damascus when the rebels first moved in. They are very upset and angry about what happened. Some told me that when they left, the al-Nusra Front desecrated some of their churches. There is quite a bit of damage to the town, but I can’t see considerable damage to the holy places. In fact, I can see a big statue of the Virgin Mary that is very much intact.

Free Syrian Army (FSA) units and members of the jihadist al-Nusra Front occupied Maaloula for several hours on Thursday before withdrawing when their positions were bombed by government warplanes.

Syria’s state SANA news agency  uses the government’s preferred term “terrorists” to describe the rebels….

Via the Globe and Mail:

A Maaloula resident said the rebels, many of them sporting beards and shouting Allahu Akbar, or God is great, attacked Christian homes and churches shortly after moving into the village overnight.

“They shot and killed people. I heard gunshots and then I saw three bodies lying in the middle of a street in the old quarters of the village,” said the resident, reached by telephone from neighbouring Jordan. “So many people fled the village for safety.”

Now, Maaloula “is a ghost town. Where is President Obama to see what befallen on us?” asked the man, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal by the rebels.

According to one eye witness, five Christians were seized and  told, “either you convert to Islam, or you will be beheaded.”

A  Christian woman from the besieged town who had fled to Damascus tearfully told a BBC reporter about the Free Syrian Army & Al Qaeda Infestation, and begged Obama to stop sending them weapons “because they are killing us!” When asked what the rebels she saw terrorizing the town looked like, she said said they were wearing “Free Syrian Army” clothes. Those would be the “good guys”Obama has been arming. Note that they have been fighting right alongside the al Qaeda affiliated al-Nusra Front.

When the reporter asked her about Obama’s plan to punish the regime for killing civilians with chemical weapons, she cried, “no that’s wrong! It’s wrong!…it’s a big liar (sic) you can watch the video (this one?)  and you can tell…”

We absolutely need to stay out of this war. My God, I’m rooting for the government forces Obama wants to bomb to beat back the rebels Obama’s been arming.

Syria Rebels (Sunni Muslims) Behead 2 Christians -1 Priest-Video Plus

Two Christians, one of them a priest, have been beheaded by militants because they were suspected of cooperating with the Syrian military, according to an Al-Alam report.

A video uploaded to the internet yesterday shows two men with their hands bound, surrounded by dozens of people, many of them armed and cheering in celebration.

Note: Video Below Article

The two are brutally executed – beheaded with a small combat knife. Echoing previous beheading recorded by insurgents, the head is held up to the cheers of onlookers and then placed on the body.

This month has seen an escalation in sectarian atrocities committed by insurgents, who have been publicly armed and supported by America, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey and other actors. Indeed, the atrocities are coinciding with further arms transfers – with new advanced weaponry witnessed in the hands of militants in the past number of weeks.

The most recent beheading recorded on video and uploaded to the internet, reportedly took place in Idlib countryside.

Recently, a Catholic priest was executed by foreign militants. The monastery in which he resided was burnt and looted, echoing the events of a massacre in Homs last month which resulted in the entire population of a Christian village being wiped out and their houses and possessions burnt. Two Christian bishops who were kidnapped by Chechen gunmen in Aleppo earlier this year, are still missing.

As well as Christians, Shia villages are receiving the brunt of a boldly-confident insurgency. This newly-found confidence has resulted in having just recently received confirmation of America’s intent to supply them with more weapons. Last week, militants massacred dozens of villagers in the province’s town of Hatla. Since then, summary executions and sectarian house-to-house raids have taken place.

The following video is extremely graphic and viewer discretion is advised. Many thanks to Arabi Souri, a Syrian activist for the translated version of the video.

The History | Origin of New Years Day / December 31rst / Ball Dropping In Times Square

  In 46 B.C.E. the Roman emperor Julius Caesar first established January 1 as New Year’s day. Janus was the Roman god of doors and gates, and had two faces, one looking forward and one back.  Caesar felt that the month named after this god (“January”) would be the appropriate “door” to the year.  Caesar celebrated the first January 1 New Year by ordering the violent routing of revolutionary Jewish forces in the Galilee.  Eyewitnesses say blood flowed in the streets.  In later years, Roman pagans observed the New Year by engaging in drunken orgies—a ritual they believed constituted a personal re-enacting of the chaotic world that existed before the cosmos was ordered by the gods.
As Christianity spread, pagan holidays were either incorporated into the Christian calendar or abandoned altogether.  By the early medieval period most of Christian Europe regarded Annunciation Day (March 25) as the beginning of the year.  (According to Catholic tradition, Annunciation Day commemorates the angel Gabriel’s announcement to Mary that she would be impregnated by G-d and conceive a son to be called Jesus.)
    After William the Conqueror (AKA “William the Bastard” and “William of Normandy”) became King of England on December 25, 1066, he decreed that the English return to the date established by the Roman pagans, January 1.  This move ensured that the commemoration of Jesus’ birthday (December 25) would align with William’s coronation, and the commemoration of Jesus’ circumcision (January 1) would start the new year - thus rooting the English and Christian calendars and his own Coronation).  William’s innovation was eventually rejected, and England rejoined the rest of the Christian world and returned to celebrating New Years Day on March 25.
    About five hundred years later, in 1582, Pope Gregory XIII (AKA “Ugo Boncompagni”, 1502-1585) abandoned the traditional Julian calendar.  By the Julian reckoning, the solar year comprised 365.25 days, and the intercalation of a “leap day” every four years was intended to maintain correspondence between the calendar and the seasons.  Really, however there was a slight inaccuracy in the Julian measurement (the solar year is actually 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes and 46 seconds = 365.2422 days).  This slight inaccuracy caused the Julian calendar to slip behind the seasons about one day per century.  Although this regression had amounted to 14 days by Pope Gregory’s time, he based his reform on restoration of the vernal equinox, then falling on March 11, to the date had 1,257 years earlier when Council of Nicaea was convened (March 21, 325 C.E.).  Pope Gregory made the correction by advancing the calendar 10 days.  The change was made the day after October 4, 1582, and that following day was established as October 15, 1582.  The Gregorian calendar differs from the Julian in three ways:  (1) No century year is a leap year unless it is exactly divisible by 400 (e.g., 1600, 2000, etc.); (2) Years divisible by 4000 are common (not leap) years; and (3) once again the New Year would begin with the date set by the early pagans, the first day of the month of Janus - January 1.
    On New Years Day 1577 Pope Gregory XIII decreed that all Roman Jews, under pain of death, must listen attentively to the compulsory Catholic conversion sermon given in Roman synagogues after Friday night services.  On New Years Day 1578 Gregory signed into law a tax forcing Jews to pay for the support of a “House of Conversion” to convert Jews to Christianity.  On New Years 1581 Gregory ordered his troops to confiscate all sacred literature from the Roman Jewish community.  Thousands of Jews were murdered in the campaign.
    Throughout the medieval and post-medieval periods, January 1 - supposedly the day on which Jesus’ circumcision initiated the reign of Christianity and the death of Judaism - was reserved for anti-Jewish activities: synagogue and book burnings, public tortures, and simple murder.
    The Israeli term for New Year’s night celebrations, “Sylvester,” was the name of the “Saint” and Roman Pope who reigned during the Council of Nicaea (325 C.E.).  The year before the Council of Nicaea convened, Sylvester convinced Constantine to prohibit Jews from living in Jerusalem.  At the Council of Nicaea, Sylvester arranged for the passage of a host of viciously anti-Semitic legislation.  All Catholic “Saints” are awarded a day on which Christians celebrate and pay tribute to that Saint’s memory.  December 31 is Saint Sylvester Day - hence celebrations on the night of December 31 are dedicated to Sylvester’s memory.
U.S. News and World Report December 23, 1996

via simpletoremember.com

Buried Christian Empire Casts New Light on Early Islam.

wasn't Mohammad married to a Christian? Did he not think he was Christian himself? I see no conjecture here in saying that many of Mohammad's people were Christians. We are talking about mostly illiterates. They would not of understood the differences between ideology and theology. If Mohammad said something they would not of been able to pick up a book and double check. No doubt the early Muslims really did think they were Christians and Jews. I find nothing offensive about considering this.

(The "crowned man" relief found in Zafar, Yemen is seen as evidence that
 there was a Christian empire in the region before Islam took hold. Picture by Paul Yule.)

Buried Christian Empire Casts New Light on Early Islam.(Spiegel).By Matthias Schulz.The commandment "Make yourself no graven image" has long been strictly followed in the Arab world. There are very few statues of the caliphs and ancient kings of the region. The pagan gods in the desert were usually worshipped in an "aniconic" way, that is, as beings without form.Muhammad had a beard, but there are no portraits of him.
But now a narcissistic work of human self-portrayal has turned up in Yemen. It is a figure, chiseled in stone, which apparently stems from the era of the Prophet.
Paul Yule, an archeologist from the southwestern German city of Heidelberg, has studied the relief, which is 1.70 meters (5'7") tall, in Zafar, some 930 kilometers (581 miles) south of Mecca. It depicts a man with chains of jewelry, curls and spherical eyes. Yule dates the image to the time around 530 AD.
The German archeologist excavated sites in the rocky highlands of Yemen, an occupation that turned quite dangerous recently because of political circumstances in the country. On his last mission, Yule lost 8 kilograms (18 lbs.) and his equipment was confiscated.
Nevertheless, he is pleased, because he was able to bring notes, bits of debris and bones back to Heidelberg. Yule has concluded that Zafar was the center of an Arab tribal confederation, a realm that was two million square kilometers (about 772,000 square miles) large and exerted its influence all the way to Mecca.
Even more astonishing is his conclusion that kings who invoked the Bible lived in the highland settlement. The "crowned man" depicted on the relief was also a Christian. 
Yule has analyzed the mysterious, robed figure in a report for the academic journal Antiquity. He is barefoot, which is typical of Coptic saints. He is holding a bundle of twigs, a symbol of peace, in his left hand. There is a crossbar on his staff, giving it the appearance of a cross. In addition, he is wearing a crown on his head like the ones worn by the Christian rulers of ancient Ethiopia.
All of this suggests that the man with a strange, round face is a descendant of the conquerors from Africa who succeeded in making one of the boldest landing operations in ancient times. The invaders continued their attacks. Southern Arabia's holy warrior, Abraha, had taken control of large areas before long. He even attempted to free bishops being held prisoner by the Persian enemy in Nisibis (in modern-day Turkey), some 2,500 kilometers away.
The man embarked on a religious crusade at the same time. He rebuilt the churches that had been destroyed in Najran, and he had new ones built in Marib and Aden.
His most beautiful church was in Sanaa. It had gilded doors and a throne made of ebony and ivory. In the morning, the rays of the sun shone through an alabaster panel in the dome. The Byzantines supported the project, sending craftsmen, marble and mosaics.The result was an architectural miracle, the likes of which all of Arabia had never seen before.
There is historical evidence, in the form of a rock inscription, that Abraha conducted large-scale raids against defiant Arab tribes near Mecca in 552 AD. A few Western historians consider this to be the true year of Muhammad's birth. The scholar Ibn Ishak, who wrote the first biography of the Prophet, states that the proclaimer of the Koran was born "in the year of the elephant."
Oddly enough, the scrawled rock inscription could be interpreted to mean that the tribe of the Kuraish, to which the Prophet belonged, sometimes fought for the Christians. Were they allies? Was Muhammad born in a city that stood under the banner of the cross?
There are indications that this could be true. For instance, a Christian cemetery is mentioned in the oldest history of Mecca, written by the Arab historian Asraki.Read the full story here. via mfs-theothernews.com

Arab Spring run amok: ‘Brotherhood’ starts crucifixions

(wnd.com)Center for Security Policy Senior Fellow Clare Lopez cited chapter and verse from the Quran to explain that crucifixions are not simply normal for Islam, they’re demanded.
“Crucifixion is a hadd punishment, stipulated in the Quran, Sura 5:33, and therefore an obligatory part of Shariah,” Lopez said. (MORE)

Not sure of the source of the information here, but it sounds like something the Muslim Brotherhood are capable of.

Corpus Separandum is Latin - The Catholic Church demanded Jerusalem not be part of Israel in 1947?

His Blood Be Upon Us

Pious XII personally intervened after 1945 to commute the sentences of convicted German war criminals. This solicitude for Nazi criminals contrasts sharply with Pius XII ignoring all entreaties to make a public statement against anti-Semitism even after the full horrors of the death camps had been revealed in 1945. "A provisional conclusion, drawn from the study of thousands of documents, is that the mass murder of Jews was fairly low on his list of priorities. Of course, much the same could be said of Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin, but they did not claim to be the “Vicar of Christ” or to represent the Christian conscience."... "The million or so unpublished documents from the pontificate of Pius XII (1939-1958) according to the Vatican’s most recent estimate, will only be available in about four year’s time."...

The_United_Nations ran “Durban II” and on the first day of the conference, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the only head of state to attend, made a speech condemning Israel as “totally racist” and referred to the Holocaust as an "ambiguous and dubious question.” When Ahmadinejad began to speak against the Jews, all European Union delegates left the conference room. The Vatican delegation didn’t say a word. Pope Benedict visited Bethlehem, where the Christian population has dropped from a majority to less than 20%. Benedict delivered a message of solidarity to the 1.4 million Palestinians isolated in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. He said nothing of the suffering of Gaza’s 3,000 Christians since Hamas took over that territory in 2007. Benedict could have decried the bombings, shootings and other Islamist attacks against Gaza Christian establishments, the brutal murder of the only Bible-store owner of Gaza, or the regular intimidation and persecution of Christians there. Instead, the Pope stood beside Mahmoud Abbas as the Palestinian leader deceptively pointed to a concrete separation barrier in Bethlehem and blamed that barrier, as well as Israeli “occupation,” for the plight of Christians.

Carroll a lapsed Catholic priest is a prolific writer on Church-related subjects, such as Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews — A History, and he writes thoughtful and intelligent books. Here’s what Carroll has to say about the UN intention in 1947 to preserve Jerusalem outside either a Palestinian or a Jewish state: Arabs, both Christian and Muslim, wanted control of the sacred centers, but they were not alone in being unable to abide the thought of Jewish control. Yes, the city was the most disputed real estate in Palestine, but mere political turf was not really the issue. The clue to the significance of the Corpus Separandum proposal for the city lay in its being offered in a Latin phrase – the language of Rome, which had initiated Jerusalem’s condition as an apocalyptic nerve center (see the Arch of Titus, near the Colosseum, with its bas-relief celebration of the first century destruction), and of Catholicism, which had kept the condition current. Greeks, too, were part of this, as Byzantium had carried forward assumptions about Jewish expulsion from the land that Constantine and his mother, Helena, had made holy. But by now the Vatican was the chief custodian of exile theology, and it was universally expected to be a party to any internationalizing arrangement. Rome’s unfulfilled desire for Jerusalem was the very genesis of the mimesis – The mimetic rivalry. The Holy See has previously expressed support for the status of corpus separatum. Pope Pius XII was the among the first to make such a proposal in the 1949 encyclical Redemptoris Nostri Cruciatus. This idea was later re-proposed during the papacies of John XXIII, Paul VI and John Paul II. Corpus separatum is Latin for "separated body". The term refers to a city or region which is given a special legal and political status different from its environment, but which falls short of being an independent city state.

Jews Expelled from Jerusalem in 1948

Tuesday, February 15, 2000 - In a historic meeting at the Vatican, Pope John Paul II and the leader of the PLO terrorist organization, Yasser Arafat, signed a covenant. "According to this agreement, Jerusalem should be an international city based on international resolutions and an international guarantee. (The UN decided on more than one occasion that Jerusalem should be an international city.)""They also decided that any step or activity taken by Israel to change this position of Jerusalem is against the law. The agreement also recognises a "Palestinian" state in the land of Israel and agrees on cooperation between the Vatican and the PLO and the Vatican committed itself to assist the so-called "Palestinians". Authorities in the Vatican explained: "the agreement paves the way for establishment of full diplomatic relations with a Palestinian state when it is founded". The PLO representative in the Vatican stated: "This is an historical covenant".

the NT curses Jews. some xians translate that curse differently then other xians, but in the end I don't feel very comfortable with a faith that is based on a document that confused people for 2000 years (supposedly)... and frankly I don't ...think they were confused. I take people at their word that they are peaceful, but history is not interpreting that curse well... and Jews are aware of this. I'm not orthodox... I'd like to be, but my life is cushioned in secularism. I live next door to a minister who lends me his lawn mower in the summer despite the fact that he is a Ron Paul fan and thinks the Rothschilds control the banks. I understand that there are people who do not understand their own texts and therefor act on their own human nature. I've had a nice conversation with a guy from New Guinea... eating people was just part of his culture. I get it. I also understand that we can not survive if we point out the truth all the time and have to get along. I would like to clarify... I don't fear Christians. I will tell you why. The Holocaust proved to be the absolute worst thing that ever happened to the church. If another Holocaust happened it would be exponentially bad for Christians. The reason is that if every last Jew were killed off (1) it would not deny the messianic prophesy... because our messiah could be the child of gentiles who were from the line of David. (2) many moral Christians would be angered and would convert to Judaism after every last Jew was killed. Judaism is an inherent Western position. As long as there are Christians there will be Jews... till the end of time. If I were a church leader it would make sense
on a pure level of benefit
to protect 'Israel.
To not support Judaism from a Christian position is suicide. It is true that we Jews now depend on you for our protection. Our planes will not fly without your technology. We Jews might contribute, but our relationship is symbiotic. So do not fear any hate from me. On the other hand... as much as our relationship is dependent on one another... there is also an inherent character of the Christians to kill Jews that comes directly from your doctrine. it is like a death wish however. it might be seen as a misinterpretation... but it appears to be a misinterpretation that won't ever go away because replacement theology can be argued axiomatically.

Islamic "scholar": Saying Merry Christmas is worst then fornication or killing someone

eye

Hasan Ali: Muslims being converted by solar-powered talking bible

Hasan said Jais research shows Christian were spreading their faith through free classes and counselling. — File pic

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 17 — Evangelical Christians are using high-tech devices such as solar-powered talking bibles to proselytize to Malay Muslims in Selangor, state lawmaker Datuk Hasan Ali said today.
Hasan, who is in charge of the state’s Islamic affairs portfolio, said the state’s religious authority (Jais) had discovered that Christian missionaries were now spreading their gospel through technologically-advanced means apart from setting up welfare groups providing cash and other financial aid to single mothers and the destitute.
He added that Jais’s research showed Christian evangelists were spreading their faith to young Muslim students in free tuition classes and counselling sessions, besides distributing Christian pamphlets in public places, homes, universities and places that were ostensibly called “community centres” to carry out their evangelical work.

The website claims the device’s batteries can be recharged using solar power.

The ex-PAS state commissioner disclosed this in a written reply to a question from Umno-Sungai Burong assemblyman Datuk Mohd Shamsudin Lias.
According to a website called Book of Joe, the palm-sized radio-like device contains all the books in the New and Old Testaments and is fitted with batteries that will run for almost 10 hours before needing to be recharged, whether by the sun, a light bulb or a nine-volt AC adapter. It costs only US$99.95 (RM310).
 This latest disclosure, after a controversial August 3 raid by Selangor Islamic authorities on the Damansara Utama Methodist Church (DUMC) in Petaling Jaya, could trigger another Christian-Muslim conflict.
Christian leaders have consistently denied claims that they are attempting to convert Muslims, but relations between the two creeds with roots in the Middle East continue to smoulder in multi-religious, multi-cultural Malaysia where the religion of the federation is Islam as stated in the Federal Constitution.
Hasan said Jais is working to counter Christian proselytism of Muslims by holding sessions to clarify Islamic doctrine and its laws.
The lawmaker said Jais is also seeking to strengthen the enforcement of the Non-Islamic Religions (Control of Propagation Amongst Muslims) Enactment 1988 as well as the Syariah Criminal Offences Enactment 1995.

via themalaysianinsider.com

all it takes to destroy their faith in Mohammad is open questioning.

Christian Biblical ethicists claim God didn't promise Israel to Jews

(EOZ) In September, David P. Gushee and Glen H. Stassen, two Christian ethicists, wrote "An Open Letter to America's Christian Zionists." The main point of this letter was to dispute the biblical idea that God gave Israel to Jews alone:

Not to put too fine a point on it, we wish to claim here that the prevailing version of American Christian Zionism—that is, your belief system—underwrites theft of Palestinian land and oppression of Palestinian people, helps create the conditions for an explosion of violence, and pushes US policy in a destructive direction that violates our nation’s commitment to universal human rights. In all of these, American Christian Zionism as it currently stands is sinful and produces sin. We write as evangelical Christians committed lifelong to Israel's security, and we are seriously worried about your support for policies that violate biblical warnings about injustice and may lead to the outcome you most fear—serious harm to or even destruction of Israel.
We write as evangelicals to you, our fellow evangelicals. On the shared basis of biblical authority, we ask you to reconsider your interpretation of Scripture, for the sake of God, humanity, the United States, and, yes, Israel itself, the Land and People we both love.
We acknowledge that your evangelical-fundamentalist American Christian Zionism (henceforth simply “Christian Zionism”) is a product of a Christian community that loves and reads the Bible. This is on its face a good thing--for there appear to be fewer and fewer American Christians whose love of the Bible and whose devotion to reading it can be taken for granted. We commend your love for the scriptures.
Both now and in the past, whenever Christian Zionism emerges its essential origin is simply Christian reading of the Hebrew Bible, or what Christians call the Old Testament. Our love of the Bible takes Christians into the pages of the Old Testament; there we cannot help but discover the centrality of a Promised Land for the Jewish people. The trajectory of the canonical Old Testament moves inexorably toward and away from the Promised Land—the patriarchal narratives in which a people and land are promised despite humble origins; enslavement in Egypt; the miraculous Exodus and grim wilderness wanderings under Moses; the conquest of the Promised Land; the establishment, split, and eventual conquest of Israel as a political entity; the Babylonian exile and dispersion of the Jewish people; and a partial return to the land, at which point the OT historical narrative ends.
...
We suggest to you that contemporary Christian Zionism is well-intentioned but needs correction at some very important points. This requires some careful biblical and theological work—from within the basic framework of evangelical Christianity. This means that the relevant scriptural texts need to be studied in detail, and that Christian theology needs to do its proper work with those texts.
For example, we suggest that Christian Zionists who move from a generalized love of Israel to a specific claim that the contemporary state of Israel has divine title to the entire Holy Land, need to take more seriously the complexity of what the Bible actually says about God’s promises to Abraham.
Genesis 15:18 reads: “On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, ‘To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates.” The next verse goes on to name the various peoples to whom the land belonged at the time.
The territory denoted by the space between these two rivers includes modern-day Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, half of Iraq, half of Egypt, parts of Turkey and Saudi Arabia, the modern state of Israel, as well as the occupied Palestinian territories.
A literal reading of the text that assumes that the descendants of Abram are only the Jewish people faces a problem here. Either God is not very good at keeping his promises, or God’s plan is for contemporary Israel ultimately to conquer all of these other countries and occupy their land. That would result in an Israel ruled by its 90% majority Arabs, or an Israel attempting to subjugate that 90% by force.
But the promise looks very different if we take seriously all of the offspring of Abraham. Genesis 15:4-5 has God taking Abram outside and telling him that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars of the heavens. Genesis 17:4, probably the pivotal text, has God saying to Abraham: “This is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of nations.” Many nations, a multitude of nations; many offspring, many kings—read Genesis 17 again and see the plural nouns here.
Close readers of Scripture will know that in fact Abraham did become the father of many nations. With Sarah he became the father of Isaac and the ancestor of all in his line, via Jacob and Esau. With Hagar he became the father of Ishmael and all in his line. And with the long-forgotten Keturah (Gen. 25:1) he became the father of Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah. The Old Testament clearly positions Abraham as the father/ancestor of not only the Jewish people but of a vast number of other peoples, all scattered through the territories promised in Genesis 15. Abraham becomes the father of dozens of peoples, exactly as the Bible says! It is certainly true that the Old Testament primarily tells the story of the line of Isaac and therefore of what became the Jewish people, but that cannot cancel the significance of the promises to Abraham and the many peoples credited to him in Genesis.
...Perhaps you will respond by saying that God promises the land of Canaan specifically to the Jewish people. You might cite here Genesis 17:8: “I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien, all the land of Canaan, for a perpetual holding.” This interpretation would require restricting the “offspring” in question to Abraham’s offspring through Sarah via Isaac and then on to Jacob and excluding Esau. But the promise to possess the land includes the offspring of Isaac, and the offspring of Isaac includes Esau, with his five Edomite sons and their offspring, as Genesis 36 states, and that includes multitudes of Canaanites, not only Jews. It would also require the assumption that we know what Gen. 17 means territorially with the term “Canaan” and that it corresponds with the Zionist’s version of the proper boundaries of the modern state of Israel.

In a later letter, published November 12, the same two wrote:

The responses that disagreed did not discuss the biblical passages, but shifted the topic to the politics of the present government of Israel and the West Bank, and Hamas, and whether Israel forced Palestinians out of their homes or not.
These are important topics, but we are hoping for biblical discussion.
What we are asking is whether our readers see Genesis 15 and 17 saying that Abraham is the father of many nations, with descendants as many as the stars of the universe. And whether the territory includes all the land between the Nile and the Euphrates, which of course includes many nations, most all Arab. We believe ours is the plain, literal reading. No one has explained a different reading in response.

I have no idea why no Christian Zionist took it upon themselves to answer this letter within the worldview of Christian theology. Honestly, if it is true, it is a bit disappointing.
So, even though I am not a Christian nor a Jewish Biblical scholar by any means, I would like to make a point.
It seems strange that the authors' arguments that God's promises apply to all of Abraham's descendants do not take into account later declarations by God.
For example, God explicitly told Jacob in Genesis 28:13 that "I am the LORD, the God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac. The land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed."
This happened at Bet El (Bethel). One can argue about the size of the land promised by God at that point, but one cannot argue that the promise was made to anyone but the Jewish people. And Bet El is on the "wrong" side of the Green Line. Would the authors admit that, Biblically, this must remain a part of Israel?
More explicitly, in Exodus 23, God tells the Israelites:

But if thou shalt indeed hearken unto his voice, and do all that I speak; then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries. For Mine angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorite, and the Hittite, and the Perizzite, and the Canaanite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite; and I will cut them off. ...And I will set thy border from the Red Sea even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness unto the River; for I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand; and thou shalt drive them out before thee.

And in Deuteronomy chapter 1:

The LORD our God spoke unto us in Horeb, saying: 'Ye have dwelt long enough in this mountain; turn you, and take your journey, and go to the hill-country of the Amorites and unto all the places nigh thereunto, in the Arabah, in the hill-country, and in the Lowland, and in the South, and by the sea-shore; the land of the Canaanites, and Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates. Behold, I have set the land before you: go in and possess the land which the LORD swore unto your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give unto them and to their seed after them.'

The straight translations of these passages are somewhat contradictory and without further study I imagine it is difficult for Christians to know how to reconcile them. But it is extraordinarily dishonest to interpret only one of God's promises to Abraham and his children in a vacuum without even considering the more explicit promises He made later to Jacob, Moses and the children of Israel. Is it not the same God who made all of these promises? Are not all of them of equal weight? If so, then the issue is not interpreting one of them, but reconciling and interpreting all of them together.
Beyond that, it seems to me that the entire Biblical narrative would be problematic if most of the peoples who were God's covenental partners simply disappeared from the story or played only bit parts. If the children of Israel were not the main intended recipients of God's promises, then why would the Bible spend so much time only dealing with them and all but ignoring the Ishmaelites and the Edomites?
The writers make other arguments about whether today's Jews should still be considered to be within the same covenant, but that is a much bigger topic. And before I spend time on that, I would love to know how they interpret and reconcile the many other Biblical verses tying the Land of Israel with, specifically, the Jews.

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(Parenthetically, I think it is not clear at all that you can consider Esau's progeny to be "Canaanites." While Gen. 38 says they lived in Canaan, the Canaanites were presumably the descendants of Canaan, Noah's grandson through Ham. Which means, ironically, that Canaanites are not Semites, but rather "Hamites." So don't accuse me of anti-Semitism :) )

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I am afraid that this might turn into a very big theological thread, and I am not really comfortable with that here; Christian theology is not a topic that belongs on this blog. Hopefully  it will spark discussion among Christians that will take place elsewhere.

"Jews Care About Their Own!" Is Not An Indictment

Edward Gilbert, the leader of the Catholic Church in Port of Spain...

EXERCISING THE EMPATHY MUSCLE (h/t Daled Amos) by Rabbi Avi Shafran

Politicians are often subject to derision, often for good reason. Recently, though, a Catholic cleric hurled an unusual and creative insult at local politicos: They are like Jews.
Edward Gilbert, the leader of the Catholic Church in Port of Spain, the capital of the southern Caribbean nation of Trinidad and Tobago, made the comparison between elected officials and “the original Jewish people,” explaining that Jews, at least in ancient times, cared only about their own.
“The Jews were compassionate and caring to the people of their nation, to the people of their race…,” Archbishop Gilbert reportedly said during an October 24 religious ceremony commemorating the 225th anniversary of the Roman Catholic presence on Trinidad. Christianity, he proudly asserted, “universalized the concept of love.”
Predictably, the Anti-Defamation League protested the sermon, calling Mr. Gilbert’s statements “a disturbing repackaging of ancient anti-Jewish canards and supersessionist beliefs.” The American Jewish Committee chimed in with chiding of its own, contending that “such prejudicial comments not only reflect personal ignorance, but also ignorance of the teaching of the Catholic Church since Nostra Aetate.” That was a reference to the Vatican II declaration repudiating the centuries-old “deicide” charge against all Jews, stressing the religious bond shared by Jews and Catholics, and reaffirming the eternal covenant between G-d and the People of Israel (though it does not, of course, renounce the essential beliefs of Christianity).
Personally, I wasn’t insulted by the Archbishop’s characterization, even if he meant to include contemporary Jews.

Because caring for one’s own is eminently defensible. In fact, it’s the only way to truly care for anyone.
Not much effort is needed to profess true love for all the world; but to actually feel such love just isn’t possible. Gushing good will at everyone is offering it to no one.
That is because, by definition, care grows within boundaries; our empathy for those closest to us, to be real, must be of a different nature than our concern for others with whom we don’t share our personal lives. Boundaries are what make those beloved to us… beloved to us.
Every person lives at the center of a series of concentric circles, the smallest one (in a healthy dynamic) encompassing parents, spouses, and children; the next circle out, other family members and friends; the one beyond that, members of their ethnic or religious groups. At a distance removed from that is a larger circle of human beings with similar values. And further out still, the circle containing the rest of humanity.
It is perfectly proper that we feel, and demonstrate, our deepest concern for the circle closest to us. More: it is the only way to achieve genuine care, providing us the ability to bestow it, if in a less intense form, upon those in the next circle out, and, in turn, on those beyond it.
Nothing demonstrates the danger of “universalizing the concept of love” better than the religion Mr. Gilbert represents. For all Christianity’s claim to have expanded its affection to all of humanity, early Church history was characterized by the vicious intolerance demonstrated by early “fathers” and emperors; the Middle Ages’ Crusades left swollen rivers of blood; and, a few centuries later, Reformation battles between Catholics and Protestants added millions of corpses to the body count.
Perceptive Jews and non-Jews alike understand how essential it is that ethnic or religious groups show special concern for other members of their “tribes.” They sense what to some may seem counterintuitive: it is precisely the intense empathy we feel and express for our “inner circles” alone that enables us to feel genuine, if somewhat less acute, concern for those in more distant ones. People who focus their deepest feelings on those close to them are those most likely to truly care about their fellow citizens or wider circles still. Exercising the “empathy muscle,” so to speak, provides the ability to feel—less intensely but more genuinely—concern for people who are not close to us.
So while the Trinidadian cleric may have been attempting an insult, he inadvertently provided his listeners—and all who were reached by media reports of his words—something else: a valuable opportunity to ponder how caring works.

this post gets to the heart of why liberal universalism (also meaning Catholicism) is the heart of what is wrong with the world today and how true love does not come from abstract ideas like "the world", but rather true love comes from loving within boundaries. That means NATIONALISM, and your FAMILY. The real haters think they are in love with Gaia or some material everything. The real lovers have walls. The real haters want to tear down borders. The real haters want to push standards that are not compatible with FAMILY. The real haters want to create universal equivalencies. They want to take away difference. The real haters don't want to recognize gender. The real haters don't want to recognize borders. The real haters are what today we consider social liberals... and they have so much in common with the liberals of yesteryear... yes the liberals called Christians.

Christianity is growing

Around_the_globe Christianity is growing and mutating in ways that observers in the West tend not to see. Tumultuous conflicts within Christianity will leave a mark deeper than Islam's on the century ahead. Philip Jenkins, The Next Christianity Between the weakening of the Church after the rash of sexual scandals on the one hand and the resurgence of Islam on the other, the global predominance and outright dominance of Islam is a new reality that the world will have to come to grips with. Or maybe not. Maybe that is the old Christianity you're thinking of. Philip Jenkins writes about The Next Christianity, the resurgent Christianity that is outpacing Islam--perhaps even in global politics:
Read more » (Daled Amos)(Chart from African Activist)

I'm not sure this is a good thing for Christians, nor am I certain that this is a bad thing for Muslims

Holy Land clerics bless Palestinian UN bid

(AFP/Brietbart) Priests in the Holy Land [That is what the Catholic Church calls Israel] used their sermons on Sunday to give their blessing to the Palestinians' [That is what the Catholic Church calls non Jews in Israel]bid for United Nations membership. The retired Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Michel Sabbah, the first Palestinian to hold the post since the Crusades, was to preach in the Roman Catholic church in the northern West Bank city of Nablus. A joint statement by Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican and Lutheran priests pledged their "support for the diplomatic efforts being deployed to win international recognition for the State of Palestine... on the June 1967 borders with Jerusalem as our capital." The priests went further than their bishops, who in a statement this week confined themselves to a call for intensified prayer and diplomatic efforts ahead of the Palestinian membership request, to be sent to the UN Security Council on Friday. "Palestinians and Israelis should exercise restraint, whatever the outcome of the vote at the United Nations," the bishops said. "We call upon decision-makers and people of good will to do their utmost to achieve the long-awaited justice, peace and reconciliation between Israelis and Palestinians." Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu look set for a UN showdown next week, with Abbas planning to push for membership for a Palestinian state and Netanyahu arguing against it. "Despite the pressures that we face, Palestine goes to the UN on the 23rd of this month to seek admission as a full member," Abbas told Egyptian television on Wednesday.

And that is what they call REPLACEMENT THEOLOGY! It is inherent to the Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican and Lutheran church. The Pope can not be trusted until he renounces this creed. The pope will never renounce this. Anything nice the Pope says about Jews is merely public relations.

Mel Gibson does a Glenn Beck

'Mel Gibson called me an oven-dodger', claims Winona Ryder....

....When you slander Jews and your fans start hating you... No, you are not redeemed by becoming a phony Jew lover. Your sin is between you and G-d. It was your problem that you made it public to begin with. The Maccabi's are not your whores. The Maccabi's are not your smoke and mirror. Mel Gibson has a lot of nerve to blemish the good name of those who would of told this piss ant where to put it.

(Deadline) Warner Bros has set up an untitled drama that teams Gibson and screenwriter Joe Eszterhas on the telling of the heroic story of Jewish warrior Judah Maccabee. Eszterhas will write the script, and I understand that Gibson will collaborate with him. Maccabee teamed with his father and four brothers to lead the Jewish revolt against the Greek-Syrian armies that had conquered Judea in the second century B.C. Gibson has the first option to direct but will definitely produce the film through his Icon Productions banner. It’s understandable why Warner Bros would want to be back in business with Gibson, who was once a high-profile fixture there and who made a fortune for that studio with the Lethal Weapon series and other films.

A que from Obama. No one will think about your hatred and abuse if you declare Jew day in America.

Did Jew Like Beck?

Glenn Beck singles out Nine of the most dangerous people in the world (eight of whom just happen to be Jews), He even had to apologize after his ignorant comments comparing reform Judaism to Islam. Islam is the ultimate evil. An ideology that clearly promotes hate and violence against all non-Muslims, especially Jews. Reform Judaism, on the other hand, is a liberal movement that tries to love everyone (especially Muslims), says the JIDF

Glenn Beck singles out Nine of the most dangerous people in the world (eight of whom just happen to be Jews), He even had to apologize after his ignorant comments comparing reform Judaism to Islam. Islam is the ultimate evil. An ideology that clearly promotes hate and violence against all non-Muslims, especially Jews. Reform Judaism, on the other hand, is a liberal movement that tries to love everyone (especially Muslims), says the JIDF

Glenn Beck has got it right on the Middle East says... says Barry Rubin........We can all be like "Elohim" who is one of many Adonai in outer space...with lots of goddess wives in a harem ....Certainly, Beck makes silly mistakes on factual matters and details. ...yeah, I'd say so. ... Yet what’s important is that he comprehends the big picture. ...Did I mention the goddess wife orgy...in outer space? ....I don’t say this based on a superficial view or on his support for Israel...

...Something about the Mormon church being...REPLACEMENT THEOLOGY... which actually is like the Catholic theology is not ...Born Again... in believing that the Jews will realize who the Messiah is when Yashuah returns.	...Thanks for the Jew Curse on FOX News and no elaboration that it was all a misunderstanding! His audience interpreted it just the way I understood it and his fans say it was only in reference to George Soros, but no one got it... so he doesn't explain. Leaves it out there for misunderstanding.  Jesus is going to get JEW later.

Hamas Warns Israel Not to Ally With Christian Zionist Terrorist Glenn Beck

This is one of those reasons I do side with Beck one some issues. But this is another reason why you have to be careful with Christians of any flavor, should they represent you because your enemy puts you in a box with those whose final mission is acceptance of a man or men who claim to be divine and have not "finished" anything... which is the final test for Jews. Consider also that Beck might be a very good talk show host, but he has at the very least always erred on the side of informing his viewers over the danger of backlash against liberal Jews... I'd say he is poor Rep for Israel, regardless of if one accepts the contexts of his claimed misunderstandings.

By Khalid Amayreh/Al Qassam

Hyperbole, venom and BS from our trusted friends from Hamas

Glenn Beck

Gloating over the recent killings in Norway of dozens of innocent people at the hands of an Israel-inspired Christian Zionist terrorist, Glenn Beck, the American right-wing talk show host, compared the victims of the shooting at a Norwegian summer camp to Hitler Youth in his radio program on Monday, according to a Daily Telegraph report.


The “Hitler Youth” organization was a paramilitary youth organization comprising teenagers and children, entrusted with task of harassing and attacking and terrorizing perceived or real enemy of the Third Reich. It existed from 1922 to 1945.
Beck, a self-proclaimed Christian Zionist and Israel-firster, described the brutal carnage “as a shooting at a political camp, which sounds a little like the Hitler Youth. I mean who sends their kids to a political camp? Disturbing.”
He stopped short of praising the murderer, suggesting that the victims got what they deserved.
Torbjon Eriksen, a former press secretary to Jens Stoltenberg, Norway’s Prime Minister, dismissed Beck’s comments as “ignorant, incorrect and hurtful.”
“Young political activists have gathered at Utoya for over 60 years to learn about and be part of democracy, the very opposite of what the Hitler Youth was about,” he told The Daily Telegraph. “Glenn Beck’s comments are ignorant, incorrect and extremely hurtful.”
Beck is an ardent supporter of Israel. He is totally against any peace arrangement between the Jewish state and the Palestinians, especially one involving territorial “concessions” by the Zionist state.
Beck visited Israel last week during which he admonished Israeli leaders to refrain from “giving land” to the Palestinians, the authentic rightful owners of the land, because “you have no right to give away God’s land to the goyem or Gentiles.”
In the past, Beck and his other Christian Zionist fellows lauded and cheered Israeli massacres of Palestinians, including the intentional murder of hundreds of Palestinian and Lebanese civilians in Israeli aerial bombing and artillery bombardment.
There is no doubt that Beck’s comments are grave and serious for what they represent and signify. This is no less than a new kind of Nazism raising its ugly head.
Christian Zionism is the new Nazi beast, a kind of a Fourth Reich, looming on the horizon. It is evil, murderous and genocidal.
They mendaciously call themselves Christians. However, their hateful speech, vindictive behavior and the nefarious way they relate to those who disagree with them suggest that they possess no iota of true Christian morality.
The message of Christ is based on love and peace, but the Christian Zionist manifesto is based on death and destruction. This means these people take their cue, not from Christ and his values, but rather from Old Testament savageries and other hateful ideologies that represent the ultimate antithesis of everything that Jesus taught.
Like their Jewish Zionist colleagues in hate, Christian Zionists would like to induce and expedite violence, tribulations, wars and genocides on a huge scale in order to accelerate the second advent of Jesus. This is why these genocidal monomaniacs wouldn’t mind if Israel exterminated millions of Palestinians, Muslims as well as Christians, as long as the genocide would effect and speed up Jesus’ second coming.
Likewise, these criminal fanatics, utterly immune to rationality, reasonability and common sense, wouldn’t mind a no-holds-barred approach to those who disagree with them. Hence, liberal-minded people, leftists, Muslims and other Christians, such as Roman Catholics, would have to be slaughtered and annihilated, all in Jesus’ name.
Even their current strange bed-fellows, the Zionist Jews, would eventually have to convert or die.
The ostensible embrace by a key representative of the American evangelical Zionist camp of the recent Oslo massacre and its perpetrator exposes naked a pornographically violent cult that calls itself Christian while actually doing Hitler’s work.
Just imagine the fact that we are talking about a combination of evil forces at work, including the nefarious powerful freemason cult, which penetrates many societies and governments, the Zionist movement, and neo-fascist Islamophobes seeking to ignite an internecine clash between Islam and the West.
The evil forces are enemy to both true Christianity and Islam, which necessitates that the followers of both great religions put up a united stand against a common enemy that is hell-bent on exterminating millions to fulfill its morbid whims and vagaries.
Today, it is Oslo; tomorrow it may be London, Paris, Berlin and Rome. The Catholic world is especially at risk of being a chief target of these mindless fanatics who think that the Pope is enemy number-1 to Jesus Christ. Hence, one would have to be constantly vigilant because these highly-motivated fanatics are capable of doing the unthinkable.
Finally, there are many short-sighted Jews who are effectively shooting themselves in the foot by joining ranks with these genocidal Christian extremists. Zionist Jews may be prompted to think that these mindless fanatics and gullible extremists are “useful idiots” who can be used to malign Islam and help the Israel win “the public relations battle.”
However, it should be understood that befriending, let alone embracing these dangerous people, would be akin to placing a venomous snake in one’s lap.
It could kill you.
Enough hyperbole. The Hamas charter is clear what Hamas has in store for the Jews. The rest is projection, dumb and hysterical propaganda from a bunch of murderous killers. via sheikyermami.com

Apocalypse Trans-Am 2

John Scott's Apocalypse Trans-Am 2,
with the entire Book of Revelation scratched into its paint,
is now on display at the National Gallery.
(Photo courtesy NGC)

To think that it almost never was. When a curator from the National Gallery visited Scott’s studio in 1993 and discussed the idea of buying the car for the permanent collection, Scott had a sad reply: “You’re too late.” The Apocalypse Trans-Am had been scrapped.

A recent photo of John Scott.
(Photo courtesy Nicholas Metivier Gallery)

“The first one just rotted away, because nobody gave a sh-t about it,” Scott says in a phone interview, from the Nicholas Metivier Gallery in Toronto. “It went to the scrapyard and it became a square. I was going to keep the square but it weighed about 2,000 or 3,000 pounds.”
Scott had originally made the piece in 1983, and believed it was the best work he’d done as an artist, but he couldn’t find a buyer, nor even a gallery that would take it as gift. It was a dark time in his career, he says, when he was “stomped on quite thoroughly critically.” I ask him if his Trans-Am was harshly criticized. He says it was “harshly ignored.” After several years he had no choice but to send it to the crusher. “It broke my heart,” he says.

“The first one took me about two weeks,” he says. “I did it all myself. I did a lot of drugs and worked around the clock. The second one, I had help, and it took me about five weeks.”
Why did it take longer with helpers?
“Because they were just f-ck ups,” he says, with typical candour. “What I had to restrain people from doing was writing their own poetry into the car. They would start writing their own stupid verse into the car. You explain to them that, ‘No, it's a sacred text. It’s all one piece. You can’t improvise on the Old Testament’.”

via communities.canada.com

The old testament? I don't remember reading the book of Revelations in the Torah. What a waste of time. This should of been ignored like it was before. It's a stupid idea. btw... most of the crap that goes on in art museums and art schools is stupid crap. In this case... the crap is stupid because the concept of what the crap is about isn't clear. Is it cool because it is the bible? It is almost like this drag queen is mocking the bible. That is the problem with Christianity. Because of it's orthodoxy... any kind of disagreement with the text makes one a heretic. It seems terribly obvious that these artists have not been reading the Torah. Writing the whole thing like a hand written torah scroll, but written on a car... that you can't read when it is moving. I just don't get it... but then again... I don't get a damn thing about the acid trip that Christians call Revelations. The whole thing seems a bit forced. I started reading a little of it and I found little of value to life. It is like a bunch of freaky Dungeons and Dragons kids decided to write something silly and completely ludicrous.