Le Nouveau Sionisme Catholique (Gavin D’Costa)

Gavin D’Costa, professeur de théologie catholique à l'Université de Bristol, en Grande-Bretagne:

Most people, if asked to reflect on the state of relations between Christians and Israel, will instinctively mention the ardently pro-Israel and pro-Zionist sentiments not of Catholics but of evangelical Protestants: sentiments that in several instances have helped to shape British and American politics.

And people would be right to do so. Thus, when asked in a 2013 Pew survey of American religious attitudes whether God gave Israel to the Jewish people, more white evangelical Christians (55 percent) than Jews (40 percent) answered in the affirmative. Of that same group of evangelicals, 72 percent sided exclusively with Israel on the Israel-Palestinian dispute, compared with 49 percent of the general U.S. public.

These solidly pro-Israel opinions reflect a biblically-grounded phenomenon that sports a long pedigree and that has been called, simply, Christian Zionism. In its British version, it is associated historically with such “restorationist” figures as the Earl of Shaftesbury in the early 19th century and Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour and Prime Minister David Lloyd George in the second decade of the 20th century. In 1917, this deep-seated impulse played a role in the issuance of the Balfour Declaration that, without “prejudice to the civil and religious rights” of non-Jewish communities in the land, promised British government support for “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.” […]

If this is one face of Christian Zionism—a Protestant face—the Catholic Zionism that I am about to describe presents a different face. It, too, views the foundation of Israel in 1948 as part of the biblical promise of land to God’s chosen people, and views the ingathering of that people as a sign of God’s fidelity to His promises. But the maximalist beliefs held by some conspicuous forms of Protestant Zionism, as in their envisioning of the end times and their recruitment of Jews and “Israel” as instruments toward that vision’s fulfillment, are eschewed in the Catholic conception.

It may be asked: on what basis do I claim that the Church is in fact heading toward such a specifically Catholic form of Zionism? I claim it on the basis of evidence pointing in that direction and in repudiation of a long history of Catholic anti-Jewishness. 

I also claim that this development is of great significance and should be of deep interest not only to the state of Israel and its worldwide supporters, Jewish and Gentile alike, but to all individuals and governments attentive to trends in public opinion relating to religious and political affairs. In addition, in a Europe threatened—haunted—by the return of anti-Semitism, it is nothing short of countercultural in the most auspicious sense of that word. Despite undeniable turmoil within Catholicism itself today, the Church is still home to over a billion souls, and what it thinks and says matters. 

The gestation of this new approach begins in 1965 and gets a special push forward in 1980. Since then the process, which still awaits its full unfolding, has continued to gain traction. The evidence for it is to be found scattered in official Church documents that few read and that fewer, other than professional theologians like myself, are equipped to place in context or assess for their weightiness. But the evidence is both remarkable and unmistakable; as for the theological development to which it attests, that, in my view, is unstoppable.

Lire l'article complet @ Mosaic Magazine

Eric Hoffer: "Ce qui adviendra à Israël sera notre sort à tous"

Eric Hoffer

Eric Hoffer (1902-1983) était un philosophe américain - son premier livre, The True Believer, Thoughts On The Nature Of Mass Movements (Le Vrai Croyant), publié en 1951, est considéré comme un classique - il n'était pas juif:

"Les Juifs sont un peuple particulier: ce qui est permis à d'autres nations est interdit aux Juifs. D'autres nations expulsent des milliers, et même des millions de gens, et il n'y a pas de problème de réfugiés. La Russie l'a fait, la Pologne, la Tchécoslovaquie l'ont fait, la Turquie a expulsé un million de Grecs, et l'Algérie un million de Français. L'Indonésie a expulsé, Dieu sait combien de Chinois, et personne ne dit un mot au sujet des réfugiés. Mais dans le cas d'Israël, les Arabes déplacés sont devenus d'éternels réfugiés.

Tout le monde insiste sur le fait qu'Israël doit reprendre tout Arabe. Arnold Toynbee appelle ce déplacement des Arabes une atrocité plus grande que tout ce qu'ont commis les Nazis.

D'autres nations victorieuses sur les champs de bataille dictent les conditions de la paix. Mais quand Israël est vainqueur il doit supplier pour obtenir la paix. Chacun attend des Juifs qu'ils soient les seuls vrais Chrétiens sur terre.

D'autres nations, quand elles sont vaincues, survivent et se rétablissent, mais si Israël était vaincu une seule fois, il serait détruit. Si Nasser avait triomphé, l'été dernier, il aurait effacé Israël de la carte, et personne n'aurait levé le petit doigt pour sauver les Juifs. Aucun engagement pris envers les Juifs par quelque gouvernement que ce soit, dont le nôtre, ne vaut le papier sur lequel il est écrit.

Le monde entier s'indigne quand on meurt au Vietnam, ou quand deux noirs sont exécutés en Rhodésie. Mais quand Hitler massacra les Juifs, personne ne protesta auprès de lui.

Les Suédois, qui sont prêts à rompre leurs relations diplomatiques avec les Etats-Unis à cause de ce que nous faisons au Vietnam, ne bronchèrent pas quand Hitler massacrait les Juifs. Ils envoyèrent à Hitler du minerai de fer de première qualité, des roulements à bille, et assurèrent l'entretien de ses transports ferroviaires de troupes destinés à la Norvège.

Les Juifs sont seuls au monde. Si Israël survit, ce sera uniquement grâce aux efforts des Juifs. Et aux ressources juives.

Pourtant, en ce moment même, Israël est notre seul allié inconditionnel et fiable. Nous pouvons compter sur Israël plus qu'Israël peut compter sur nous. Il suffit seulement d'imaginer ce qui se serait produit, l'été dernier, si les Arabes, avec leurs soutiens russes, avaient gagné la guerre, pour comprendre à quel point la survie d'Israël est vitale pour l'Amérique, pour l'Occident en général.

J'ai une prémonition qui ne me quittera pas: ce qui adviendra d'Israël sera notre sort à tous. Si Israël devait périr, l'holocauste fondrait sur nous. "

LA Times, 26 mai 1968
Traduction française de Norbert Lipszyc
Source: Debriefing (Menahem Macina)

Lire également:
Jean-Claude Milner: "Autrefois, l’Europe se sentait encore redevable aux juifs exterminés"

Publié par Michael Ledeen @ National Review:

Les Juifs, "Nous prenons jusqu’à quatre-vingts ans", lui dirent les hommes de la Gestapo

François Regnault, philosophe:

"Et maintenant je dirai que le nom de Juif, je l’ai connu par celui de Marguerite Aron, le professeur de lettres de ma mère au lycée Victor Duruy, convertie au catholicisme en 1914, tertiaire dominicaine, et qui avait fondé un groupe destiné à initier quelques-unes de ces jeunes lycéennes volontaires à la spiritualité chrétienne, ainsi d’ailleurs qu’à Claudel (dont je n’ai ainsi jamais eu à faire la découverte); elle s’était retirée à Solesmes, n’avait jamais cédé sur le nom de juive. Elle traita à La Flèche en 1939 du "problème juif devant la conscience catholique". Elle songeait bien sûr à leur "conversion". Elle ne porta pas l’étoile, prétendant qu’en femme élégante, elle ne pouvait passer son temps à la coudre et à la découdre.  

Elle fut arrêtée par les Allemands à Solesmes, à la sortie de la messe du matin à l’abbaye, le 26 janvier 1944, à l’âge de soixante et onze ans. Elle protesta. "Nous prenons jusqu’à quatre-vingts ans", lui dirent les hommes de la Gestapo. Le convoi qui quitta Drancy le 10 février comprenait quinze cents personnes, dont 279 jeunes de moins de dix-neuf ans. Il parvint à Auschwitz trois jours plus tard. Marguerite Aron, inapte au travail, fut très vite gazée. Je sais que je lui avais rendu visite en 1942, accompagné de mes parents ; je m’y revois, mais c’est un souvenir improbable. J’admettrais même que cette évocation soit la rationalisation tardive de ma première rencontre avec le nom de Juif. Pour moi, donc, cette rencontre porte aujourd’hui son nom. Reste que cela m’aura suffi."

Notre objet a, Editions Verdier, 2003. (extrait)

Les Israéliens ont des impératifs non négociables qu'ils ne pourront jamais abandonner (Carl Jacobs)

Un excellent article sur les "réfugiés" palestiniens.

Carl Jacobs @ Archbishop Cranmer blog:

"[…] The ‘Peace Process’ has always tried to reconcile two mutually-exclusive goals: it is supposed to satisfy both Palestinian national aspiration and ‘legitimate’ Israeli security concerns. The problem is that the former condition automatically compromises the latter. The Israelis have certain non-negotiable imperatives that they can never surrender: 

1. The Israelis will never surrender control of the border at the Jordan River.
2. The Israelis will never surrender control of the resources on the West Bank – especially water.
3. The Israelis will never surrender control of the air space over the West Bank.
4. The Israelis will never surrender the high ground that overlooks the major Israeli population centers on the Mediterranean coast.
5. The Israelis will never surrender the strategic depth afforded by the West Bank.
6. The Israelis will never allow a hostile military force under Palestinian control on the West bank.
7. The Israelis will never, ever, ever allow the Palestinians to conclude foreign treaties that allow foreign nations to station military forces on the West Bank.

These are all legitimate Israeli security concerns, and a true Palestinian state would undermine each and every one. If the Palestinians were to receive a true state on the West bank, Israel would have to surrender on every single point. After all, a state is not a state if it doesn’t have sovereign control of its territory and its borders and its resources and its foreign policy. 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that any Palestinian state would have to be de-militarised. No Israeli government could say otherwise. That condition alone means a two-state solution is off the table, and should lead the reader to immediately question what is meant by ‘two states’. Unless the Americans are willing to break Israeli knee-caps, an actual viable Westphalian Palestinian state west of the Jordan River will never happen. And the Trump Administration has now said: “We won’t break their knee caps. Sorry.” The parties are free make the best deal they can as far as Trump is concerned, but the (ahem) Palestinian trump-card of dispossession has been removed from the deck. The best the Palestinians can ever hope to achieve is some form of autonomy under Israeli sovereignty. 

By cutting off the aid and rejecting the privileged Palestinian definition of refugee, the US has told the Palestinians that there will be no more appeals to the historic wrongs they allege. There will be no more gravy-train of easy American money. It has indicated that the Palestinians will not be considered perpetual refugees entitled to perpetual international support, and perhaps they should be making alternate plans for the future – plans that don’t involve the impossible fantasy of returning by conquest or treaty to a land they will never inhabit. Time is not necessarily on their side anymore. For 70 years, they have been fighting a war of annihilation in their heads – fantasising about the day when, at last, they have the Israelis at the point of a bayonet. For 70 years, they have not faced up to the reality of defeat. They reject the understanding that it was a really bad idea to start a war of annihilation and lose it. Instead they sit in refugee camps living off aid money and nursing their resentments. It’s time for the Palestinians to submit to the reality of defeat. It’s the only possible avenue for peace in the Middle East. 

It’s much easier to come to terms with reality when people aren’t paying you to pretend you are a great force of history striving to correct past wrongs. Then you will suddenly realise you have to find a way to make a living."

Lire l'article complet

Photo virale des fils de Bolsonaro en Israël avec des T-shirts du Mossad et de Tsahal

Tom Gross @ Mideast Dispatch:

Eduardo et Carlos Bolsonaro

This image of Brazilian president-elect Jair Bolsonaro’s sons, Eduardo and Carlos, sporting IDF and Mossad t-shirts on their visit to Israel, has gone viral. 

Brazil’s new president Jair Bolsonaro is strongly pro-Israel, and one of his promises during his recent election campaign was to move Brazil’s embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, one of several policies that has sparked anger on the Israeli and American Jewish far left. 

Haaretz newspaper has been running a campaign against Bolsonaro, even including a massive banner headline “Hitler in Brasilia”, while the New York Times ran a top-of-the-page comment piece claiming “Swastikas have been painted on walls all over the city” [Sao Paulo]. 

I checked with two different trusted Brazilian Jewish friends of mine who live in Sao Paulo whether any of this might be true, and they wrote that this scaremongering was “nonsense” and that “Bolsonaro is genuine philo-Semite” and “his first foreign policy objective is to realign Brazil’s relations with Japan, Chile, Israel, and the US – at the expense of Bolivia, Venezuela, Cuba, and the Palestinian Authority”. 

Tom Gross adds: Brazil is the most important country in South America, and the eighth largest economy in the world. The previous left-wing government of Dilma Rousseff, who was impeached on corruption charges, was very anti-Israel, even taking the rare step of refusing to approve Israel’s choice as ambassador, Danny Dayan, who instead became Israel’s Consul General in New York.

Les références antisémites du Pape, pourquoi les utilise-t-il?

Dans ses sermons, le pape François fait régulièrement référence aux pharisiens et aux hypocrites. Il y a de nombreux exemples de son utilisation du terme pharisien de manière insultante. Les chrétiens fustigent les pharisiens depuis les premiers temps du christianisme. De ce fait, le pharisien est emblématique de l’hypocrisie religieuse en général. Or comme le fait remarquer Giles Fraser, prêtre anglican et écrivain, l'association de pharisiens et hypocrites a toujours eu une connotation fondamentalement raciste: les pharisiens sont des juifs et les juifs sont des hypocrites, peu fiables et fourbes. Compte tenu de la longue et violente persécution perpétrée par des chrétiens contre les juifs, les chrétiens d’aujourd’hui devraient faire preuve de beaucoup plus de circonspection lorsqu'ils se réfèrent aux pharisiens comme le fait régulièrement le pape François.

Pharisaïsme (Larousse):  "Manifestation ostentatoire et hypocrite de vertu ou de pitié".
Pharisien,enne (Larousse): "Membre d'une secte juive apparue au IIe s. av. J.-C. qui prétendait observer rigoureusement et strictement la loi de Moïse mais qui, dans l'Evangile est accusée de formalisme et d'hypocrisie." Usage moderne: "Personne qui affecte un respect minutieux d'une morale toute formelle et qui s'en autorise pour juger avec sévérité les actes d'autrui."

Giles Fraser @ Unherd:

Pope Francis loves to reference the Pharisees and hypocrites in his sermons. Whether it is corruption in the priesthood or the European attitude towards refugees, it has become one of his things. Last Sunday, the Pope again used his address at the Angelus to return to this well worn theme. Admittedly, the gospel reading from Mark was all about Jesus’s reaction to the “scribes and Pharisees” who challenge Jesus’s followers for not following the Jewish law. But it was classic Francis: “The hypocrite is a liar, he’s not authentic,” he told his audience. “A man or woman who lives in vanity, in greed, in arrogance and at the same time believes and pretends to be religious and goes as far as condemning others, is a hypocrite.” Many took this to be a reference to the abuse scandals that have rocked the Church in places such as Ireland, from where he has recently returned.

There are multiple examples of Francis using ‘Pharisee’ as a term of abuse. Let one more example stand for many. Last October, at Mass in Casa Santa Marta (St Martha’s guesthouse) where he lives, he said: “Three months ago, in a country, in a city, a mother wanted to baptise her newly born son, but she was married civilly to a divorced man. The priest said, ‘Yes, yes. Baptise the baby. But your husband is divorced, so he cannot be present at the ceremony.’ This is happening today. The Pharisees, or Doctors of the Law, are not people of the past, even today there are many of them.”

Now, I don’t dissent from the general sentiment of these pronouncements. Francis is a good man, wanting to shift the Roman Church in the right direction. And nor do I think Francis is unique in laying so much emphasis on his condemnation of Pharisees and their hypocrisy – Christians have been attacking the Pharisees since the earliest days of the Christian proclamation. Hence ‘Pharisee’ long ago became a code work for religious hypocrisy in general.

But there has always been something basically racist about this association: Pharisees are Jews, and Jews are shifty, untrustworthy, hypocrites. Given the long and violent Christian persecution of Jews, today’s Christians should be far more circumspect in referencing the Pharisees as Francis regularly does.

So who were the Pharisees, and what did they stand for? 

Lire l'article complet

Soutien grandissant d'Israël dans les pays non-Occidentaux

Tomas Sandell

Ci-dessous, le communiqué de l'organisation chrétienne européenne European Coalition for Israel fondée il y 15 ans par Tomas Sandell. M. Sandell a participé à la réunion de l'AIPAC à Washington.  Lors d'une réunion séparée avec l'ambassadeur américain en Israël, M. David Friedman, M. Sandell a été invité à assister à la cérémonie d'ouverture de l'ambassade des États-Unis à Jérusalem le 14 mai à l'occasion du 70e anniversaire de l'État d'Israël.

Washington D.C., March 8th, 2018 – European Coalition for Israel has marked its 15th anniversary with a working visit to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) Policy Conference in Washington D.C. from 4-6 March, where founding director Tomas Sandell was invited to speak about global Christian support for the State of Israel.

In the panel discussion, he explained how the Coalition was founded 15 years ago on the Jewish holiday of Purim to help defend the Jewish state from both rising antisemitism in Europe and new existential threats from Iran and its proxies in the Middle East.

"The uniqueness of ECI is that we do not represent the State of Israel, we are not a Jewish organisation and do not have our base in the US, but we are simply a grass-roots European organisation motivated by our faith and moral convictions. As Europeans, we have a moral responsibility to prevent history from repeating itself, and this is why we have to stand firm against the rise of antisemitism in all its different forms. This includes anti-Zionism, which denies the Jewish people their right to self-determination by calling for boycotts, divestments and sanctions."

In his intervention, he explained how the mandate to advocate for Israel has grown over the years to also include the United Nations in New York, thus becoming a significant global voice for Israel, but with its roots and base deeply embedded in Europe. He thanked the organisers, AIPAC, for the invitation by saying that there could be no better place to celebrate this anniversary than at the largest pro-Israel conference in the world. An official ECI celebration will take place in Brussels later in the year.

Co-panelist Reverend Mojmir Kallus from the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ) explained that while pro-Israel advocacy was mainly a first-world phenomenon in 1980 when their organisation was founded, it is today growing in strength in the third world. Sandell added that this trend can also be seen at the UN General Assembly, where Israel has a growing support outside of the Western world.

Pays-Bas: Initiative de chrétiens pro-Israël impensable en France et en Belgique

Le JTA rapporte l'initiative des ces chrétiens de père en fils activement pro-israéliens et philosémites - ils sont nombreux aux Pays-Bas.  Ils joignent leurs actes à leurs paroles - plutôt que de rédiger année après année de nombreux articles et analyses... 

In face of labeling push, Dutch Christians hawking Israeli settlement goods,  Cnaan Liphshiz @ JTA:

Pieter van Oordt,à gauche, avec son frère,
Roger, au Israel Products Center in Nijkerk
(Cnaan Liphshiz)

As a boy, Pieter van Oordt would often accompany his father, Karel, on the elder van Oordt’s weekly shopping excursions specifically seeking out products made in Israel.

A Christian Zionist businessman in Amersfoort, some 25 miles east of Amsterdam, Karel van Oordt sought to strengthen the Jewish state economically by purchasing its exports to feed his family of eight. But it wasn’t easy.

“At the greengrocer, my father asked for Jaffa oranges, but they didn’t offer those,” Pieter van Oordt recalled. “Then at the liquor store, dad asked for Israeli wines. Same reply.”

Four decades later, those Israeli goods and thousands more are available across the Netherlands thanks to the international advocacy group founded by Karel van Oordt in 1979. Pieter and his brother, Roger, have run Christians for Israel since their father’s death in 2013.

Through its own import agency, the Israel Products Center, or IPC, the organization brings in 120,000 bottles of Israeli wine each year, as well as many tons of Dead Sea cosmetics and other merchandise. Most of the products are sold in IPC’s own store, on its website or by a corps of 200 volunteer door-to-door sales agents, a majority of them women.

The effort is unique in Europe, and not only because IPC profits are distributed annually among a small group of shareholders who reinvest the money back into the business. Also because IPC openly promotes the sale of settlement goods, part of a conscious effort to bolster the settler movement and push back against European efforts to distinguish them from goods produced in Israel proper.

Last month, in a letter in the company’s new catalog, Pieter van Oordt, who runs IPC, specifically urged his customers to purchase two brands of wine, dates and olive products produced in the West Bank.

Workers installing a 36-foot menorah outside the Dutch headquarters of Christians for Israel, December 2013. (Courtesy of Christians for Israel)

“Now the government wants to say on our products that they’re not from Israel,” said Pieter van Oordt, referring to the adoption in November of EU regulations mandating that goods produced in Israeli settlements are labeled as originating in Palestinian territory. “So we must tell our customers that it’s not true.”

Most IPC customers probably agree with van Oordt. The company’s most dedicated patrons are ideological supporters of the Christians for Israel movement, which is popular among European Protestants who believe it is their religious and moral duty to help Jews return to their ancestral lands.


Lire la suite

'Israël' est le mot qui manque dans le narratif contemporain de la Shoah en Europe

Même les Juifs ne l'utilisent pas...

Thomas Sandell est un journaliste chrétien finlandais qui est accrédité auprès de l'UE.  Il est un des membres fondateurs de European Coalition for Israel, a Christian initiative promoting Europea-Israeli cooperation. Thomas Sandell a écrit @ Times of Israel:

There was not much sympathy for Israel in the comments made by senior European leaders after the nuclear deal with Iran announced on Tuesday. German Foreign Minister Frank Walter Steinmeier was quick to point out that ”the Israeli Government should at least read the agreement before they start criticising it.” He is not alone. Back in 2003 an EU survey came to the bitter conclusion that ”Israel is the main obstacle to world peace.”

European irritation with Israel is obvious again now. 

The argument is simple: the nuclear race has been stopped and diplomacy has finally won. So the Israeli Prime Minister is against the agreement. Big deal?

The lack of understanding for the concerns expressed by the Israeli Government is remarkable, given that what we know as the European Union is often said to have been built out of the ashes of the Holocaust.

 

Each year on January 27th, Holocaust Remembrance Day, senior political leaders across Europe express their commitment to stand with the Jewish people in Europe when they are under threat. ‘There can be no Europe without Jews’, the EU Foreign Policy Chief, Federica Mogherini, stated in January after the terrorist attack in Paris where five Jews were killed in cold blood.

But what about Jews (and Arabs) in Israel? One word which is often missing in the contemporary European Holocaust narrative is the word ”Israel”.  EU leaders deplore the terrorist attacks in Toulouse, Brussels, Paris and Copenhagen but are mostly silent when terror strikes in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv or Netanya. When I introduced myself to a senior EU official on Holocaust Remembrance Day earlier this year by saying that I am the founder of the European Coalition for Israel, his reply was as shocking as it is typical for some members of the European ruling class: ‘And what does Israel have to do with any of this?’ Suite.

"Bonjour, je suis Goy et je défends Israël!"

Ça fait longtemps qu'on n'a pas fait une petite thérapie de groupe!
Qui est goy et se sent suffisamment Goy qui défend Israël pour dire publiquement qu'il est goy et qu'il défend Israël?
Allez, c'est pas sale, on peut l'avouer!
Répétez après nous:
"Bonjour, je suis Goy et je défends Israël!"

Ces Goys qui défendent Israël.

Photographer Evyatar Dayan looks at Tel Avivians — secular, religious and otherwise inclined — as they go about their daily routine.  Israel 21c.

 

Les gouvernements européens acquiescent tacitement à l'exode silencieux des Juifs

"As a Catholic, as an Englishman, as a civilised human being, I feel a profound sense of responsibility towards the Jewish people as a whole, but towards my Jewish compatriots in particular. Preserving the Jewish presence in our midst is as much a solemn duty for our generation as it was for our parents and grandparents, who fought to defeat the Nazis."

 

Daniel Johnson @ Standpoint: Europe Must Never Again Betray Its Jews

The Belgian politician Karel De Gucht
claimed Jews have a “belief that they
are right” (photo: European Union)

Anti-Semitism is a very ancient and a thoroughly modern phenomenon: it was as common among ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans as it is among their present-day successor states. It constantly mutates: Christian anti-Judaism became right-wing anti-Semitism and now left-wing anti-Zionism. Those who wish to resist and if possible destroy its roots must also adapt to the moving target.

Take, for example, the case of Karel De Gucht. He is a leading Belgian liberal politician, who served as foreign minister and then as a European Union commissioner from 2009 to 2014, responsible for aid and trade. Two of the Belgian prime ministers under whom he served, Guy Verhofstadt and Herman Van Rompuy, also became high EU officials and it is fair to assume that De Gucht’s outlook is typical of the European political elite.

Yet in 2010, this supposedly liberal representative of this supposedly liberal union of supposedly liberal nations told Belgian radio: “Don’t underestimate the opinion . . . of the average Jew outside Israel. There is indeed a belief — it’s difficult to describe it otherwise — among most Jews that they are right. And a belief is something that’s difficult to counter with rational arguments. And it’s not so much whether these are religious Jews or not. Lay Jews also share the same belief that they are right. So it is not easy to have, even with moderate Jews, a rational discussion about what is actually happening in the Middle East.” Washington was controlled by Jews, De Gucht declared, even in the Obama era: “Do not underestimate the Jewish lobby on Capitol Hill. That is the best organised lobby, you shouldn’t underestimate the grip it has on American politics — no matter whether it’s Republicans or Democrats.”

It is revealing that De Gucht not only got away with this public outburst, but that it is not even mentioned in his Wikipedia entry under the heading “Controversies”. Such views are indeed seen as uncontroversial by many Europeans who consider themselves liberal. To utter them in public is a breach of diplomatic etiquette, but certainly not a resigning matter, and De Gucht in fact faced no serious consequences. At a public event just after the De Gucht incident I asked Peter Mandelson, a former EU commissioner who happens to be Jewish on his father’s side, what he thought about it. Lord Mandelson looked uncomfortable with the question and gave a non-committal reply, but later in private he made it clear that he was indeed disgusted by De Gucht’s conduct. Should the commissioner resign? “That is for him to decide,” was the reply. The fact that De Gucht came under no pressure to resign suggests that his brand of “soft” anti-Semitism is ubiquitous in Continental corridors of power.  [Note:  it is perfectly acceptable in Belgium for a schoolteacher, Pierre Piccinin, to complain of the "Zionist mafia" (he also worked for the European School) or for someone like Abu Jahjah to be a columnist at one of the most respected Flemish newspapers (De Standaard) and a frequent guest at TV and radio programmes.]

Yet the greatest danger to Jews today comes from a different quarter. Anti-Semitism has mutated again and is now a particular problem among Muslim communities in Western Europe. According to the study by Günther Jikeli, “Antisemitic Attitudes among Muslims in Europe”, Muslims show consistently higher levels of anti-Semitism than the general population in every country that has been surveyed. In the UK, for example, a Pew survey in 2006 showed that 46 per cent of the Muslim population had an unfavourable view of Jews compared to 7 per cent of the population as a whole. A 2008 survey comparing Christians and Muslims found that in Austria — historically one of the most anti-Semitic countries in Europe — 10.7 per cent of Christians agreed with the statement: “Jews cannot be trusted.” Among Muslims, the figure was 64.1 per cent.  [...]

Because the attempt to exterminate the whole Jewish people took place in Europe, the post-war nations of our continent made a collective vow never to allow such a thing to happen again. Yet today, 70 years later, anti-Semitism has redoubled its strength and has returned to Europe with a vengeance. Jews are leaving in record numbers. Governments are tacitly acquiescing in this silent exodus by making life more difficult for Jews — restricting kosher slaughter or circumcision, for example — and by failing to take adequate steps to ensure their security. Jewish Europe is vanishing before our eyes, as the Dia-spora goes into reverse.

Does all this matter? As a Catholic, as an Englishman, as a civilised human being, I feel a profound sense of responsibility towards the Jewish people as a whole, but towards my Jewish compatriots in particular. Preserving the Jewish presence in our midst is as much a solemn duty for our generation as it was for our parents and grandparents, who fought to defeat the Nazis. As the last survivors of the Holocaust and the last exiles and émigrés pass away, we must take over their role as witnesses to the truth and guardians of that moral obligation. Never again should Jews have to live in fear among us. Never again should Jews feel that their loyalty is distrusted. Never again should they lack a state that is theirs, living in peace and security within recognised borders. Britain’s commitment to defend Israel’s right, not merely to exist, but to flourish, should be especially strong: it was, after all, the Balfour Declaration that brought the Jewish homeland back to life. Britain did not cover itself with glory during the Mandate period, but we do have a chance to redeem ourselves today by standing up for Israel at the UN and other international bodies, as our Anglophone cousins in Canada, Australia and the United States generally do. When Israel responded to attacks from Gaza last year by destroying the ability of Hamas to launch missiles and use tunnels to infiltrate Israel, the Prime Minister refused to join in the chorus of condemnation. Like Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, David Cameron has proved himself a friend of Israel. If only the rest of Europe could say the same.

“Never again” must be our watchword. Never again shall we betray the people whom St John Paul — the Polish Pope and righteous gentile who himself saved Edith Zierer, a Jewish concentration camp survivor — called our “elder brothers”.

Les Juifs s'en vont parce que les jihadistes sont déjà parmi nous

This is Christian Europe, which, of all the continents of the world, ought to feel the deepest shame at the rise of this “new anti-Semitism”.

Repris d'un blog chrétien, Archbishop Cranmer:

Massacre antijuif Hyper Cacher : 
des jeuness exultent sur les lieux du crime

The words of French Prime Minister Manuel Valls echo down the centuries of anti-Semitic Europe, where Jews have been marginalised, persecuted, reviled, expelled and turned to ash in the ovens of Auschwitz. France could survive the emigration of any ethnic group, he avers. But if the Jews leave, “France will no longer be France. The French Republic will be judged a failure.” [...]

You see, it isn’t only France: incredibly, half of the Jewish populations of many European countries are so fearful, intimidated and oppressed that they are considering leaving their homes, families and communities and emigrating to a foreign land.

Car vandalisé à Paris avec
des inscriptions antisémites

Cries of “Death to the Jews” ring across towns and cities as the spectre of Nazi ghettos descends once again. “They pursue the Jews in the streets of Berlin… as if we were in 1938,” says Israel’s Ambassador to Germany, Yakov Hadas-Handelsman. He has also heard chants of “Jewish pigs” and “Gas the Jews”.

“Since March 2012, I am ambassador of Israel in Germany,” he said. “If someone had told me that I witnessed such hateful, incites hatred and anti-Semitic phenomena would be in public in this country, I would not probably have thought it possible.”

Jews are being advised not to go out onto the streets wearing a kippah. In Toulouse, Jewish children are shot in a Jewish school. In Brussels, people are randomly killed in a Jewish museum: if they happen to be Jews or Israelis, all the better. In Liege, a café displayed a sign in its window which said dogs were welcome, but Jews were not allowed to enter.

This is Christian Europe, which, of all the continents of the world, ought to feel the deepest shame at the rise of this “new anti-Semitism”.

And the oppressors are not all hardened Islamists obligingly plotting their next spectacular on SnapChat and WhatsApp for the convenience of MI5: no, many are simply ordinary but angry, young, male Muslims, itching for some self-proclaimed imam to issue the Call to Jihad. To these young male Muslims, the Israeli occupation of Gaza is a certain grievance, but the Jewish occupations of Paris, London and Amsterdam also need sorting. To the media, they may be male; they may be Asian or “of Asian appearance”. But no, they may not be called Muslim, for that would cause great offence.

These extremists, Baroness Warsi insists, “do not follow any faith”. Sajid Javid, the first elected Muslim to join the Cabinet, is not so blind: “The lazy answer from people out there is to say that this had got nothing whatsoever to do with Islam and Muslims and that should be the end of that part of the debate,” he said. “That is lazy and that would be wrong. You can’t get away from the fact that these people are using Islam, they are taking a great religion, a peaceful religion of a billion people around the world, taking this religion and using it as their tool to carry out their horrible activities.”

The Jews are leaving Europe not because the Jihadists are coming, but because they are already here, dwelling among us. They hate Israel and they loathe Jews, but, pace Manuel Valls, we say almost nothing and do very little. Instead, we let the Jews emigrate to the United States or “go back” to Israel, and they are doing so in their thousands every year. In the Holy Land they may be surrounded on all sides by the enemies of Zionism, but at least they have in Benjamin Netanyahu the leader of a government which will not hesitate to shelter and defend them. It will even bury their martyred bodies in fortified Jewish cemeteries in Jerusalem, where their sanctified graves will never be defiled with swastikas.

Article:  Cranmer

Le Vicaire Andrew White qui a défendu les 6 Juifs restant à Bagdad est maintenant à Jérusalem

"I am British and very pro-Israel, which 

would place me at incredibly high risk" 

Pour la première fois en 2000, il n'y a plus d'église à Ninive et l'Europe est silencieuse, trouvant plus important de critiquer Israël, le seul pays dans la région qui respecte ses chrétiens et ses minorités.  Qui, en France ou en Belgique, connaît ce chrétien remarquable qu'est le vicaire Andrew White? Obligé lui aussi de partir.  Et qui malgré la sclérose en plaque dont il souffre, son enlèvement, les violences, est resté jusqu'au bout.  Il a protégé les six derniers Juifs qui vivent encore à Bagdad; (The Iraqi Jewish community, which dates back to Babylonian exile more than 2,500 years ago, today numbers precisely six, White says. Two medical professionals (one of whom works at St. George’s), three elderly women, and one elderly man.)

Michael Leeden @ Pajamas Media:

"I’ve been shot at and bombed and they’ve tried to blow me up. People say, “Aren’t you afraid where you are?” Never, not one day; I love it. I feel really sad that I’m not there now."

General Mattis? General Suleimani? James Bond? No, it’s a man of the cloth, Canon Andrew White, an Anglican who tended to Christians (and Jews, too, it turns out) in Baghdad in good times and bad, who tirelessly negotiated for the release of hostages, worked for inter-religious harmony throughout Iraq, traveled constantly to “the West” in a quest for moral, financial, diplomatic and military support for the dwindling Christian population of his adopted country, and just recently was recalled to his native England, where he is clearly frustrated beyond words. At least the words he has been educated to use in public. [...]

Is it the end of Christianity in the Middle East? Could be, he says, at least so far as Iraq is involved:

"What is a Christian life there now? The Bishop of Mosul said recently that for the first time in 2,000 years there was no church in Nineveh [an ancient city that is now part of Mosul]. That’s the reality."

It is indeed the reality, and not just in Iraq. And “the West” is silent, as it has been so often when it faces evil far from its own boundaries. Meanwhile, Andrew has moved on, to the one country in the Middle East that provides its citizens with religious freedom and the security to practice their faith. He’s in Jerusalem, trying to achieve reconciliation between Muslim and Jewish religious leaders. It’s not an altogether new venture for him; in his last days in Baghdad, he was the “rabbi” for the city’s remaining six Iraqi Jews. And back at that conference in Copenhagen, the guest of honor at the closing banquet was the former chief rabbi of Denmark.

Guess what? During the week, all the Iraqi religious leaders arranged for private meetings with said rabbi. Why? They’d looked at the map, and they knew that if things were going to be ok for them, they’d need help from the Jews in Israel. Andrew knew it too. He still knows it. That’s no doubt why he’s working in Jerusalem.

At this time of year we give thanks for all kinds of good things and great people. Andrew’s earned a high place on our lists.

Lire également
The ‘Vicar of Baghdad’ comes to Jerusalem. David Horovitz: "The Vicar of Baghdad loves the Jews and Israel. He studied in an ultra-Orthodox yeshiva in Jerusalem and at the Hebrew University. He and his wife Caroline named their two sons Yossi (Josiah) and Jacob. Now in his late 40s, he did his doctorate at Cambridge on the role of Israel in Christian theology. He also served for a time as the Kashrut officer at Cambridge’s Jewish Society, “though I was too frum for them.”  The Vicar of Baghdad is Reverend Canon Andrew White, and he is one of the most remarkable people you could ever wish to meet."

Israël est le seul pays qui ne persécute pas les Chrétiens au Moyen-Orient, pourquoi ne le dit-on pas?

Pas en notre nom. Pas en Israël.

On aura constaté que les experts, les gouvernements et les médias européens s'intéressent très tardivement, à peine depuis quelques jours, à la persécution des Chrétiens et d'autres minorités en Irak.   Ce qu'ils évitent pudiquement de dire est qu'Israël ne persécute pas sa population chrétienne où en 2011 vivaient 154.500 Chrétiens.

Christy Anatas, une chrétienne palestinienne de Bethléhem, co-fondatrice de l'association Emmaus, résume bien la situation de tolérance religieuse qui règne en Israël:  "Israël ne nous tue et ne nous menace pas en raison de nos opinions.  Les Palestiniens si."  On peut supposer qu'un journal comme La Croix, ne relayera pas les propos de Christy, devrait le savoir, au contraire La Croix ne fait que dénoncer Israël. (voir également: Des Israéliens arabes-chrétiens soutiennent l'opération d'Israël à Gaza et Chrétiens d'Israël, une prise de conscience historique: l'Etat juif les protège)

"[...] What saddens me is that again, the suffering of millions of Israelis is not being highlighted, as if they are not human beings. In the last week alone, over 750 rockets have rained on them yet the world, and my people, are not regarding this as a crime against humanity simply because no Israelis have been killed.

Under the Geneva Convention, firing missiles indiscriminately at civilian targets is a crime against humanity. They have not considered how Israel cares for her citizens by building a network of bomb shelters, reinforcing buildings and public structures and providing early warning systems for her people.

Amine Gemayel: "Si on ne les arrête pas ici, ils chasseront les chrétiens de tout l’Orient. Un jour, ils seront à vos portes, en Europe" (années 1980)

"Dans les années 1980, la France avait fait la même proposition d’exil aux maronites du Liban en guerre contre une coalition de circonstance associant la Syrie, l’Iran et des groupes islamistes. C’était l’époque où Roland Dumas, le ministre français des Affaires étrangères, estimait qu’il fallait «rogner les privilèges des chrétiens».  [...] J’ai encore en mémoire cette remarque d’Amine Gemayel, alors président du Liban, sur cette menace islamiste que le monde occidental découvrait, encore incrédule: «Si on ne les arrête pas ici, ils chasseront les chrétiens de tout l’Orient. Un jour, ils seront à vos portes, en Europe.»"

Peut-on espérer une vraie générosité de la part de l'Europe envers Israël quand on voit l'indifférence des élites européennes envers les chrétiens d'Orient?  On remarquera également le grand silence des grandes consciences juives qui s'expriment bruyamment sur tous les conflits pour autant qu'ils leur donnent une visibilité médiatique.

Frédéric Pons @ Valeurs Actuelles: La fausse générosité de l’Occident sur les chrétiens d’Orient

Les chrétiens d’Orient sont évidemment très sensibles à notre sollicitude ou à nos prières. Ils le disent et nous en remercient.

[...] Mais ces croyants attendent surtout de l’Occident qu’il se mobilise réellement, de façon politique, pour les défendre sur place et pas pour les pousser à l’exil. Leur attente va bien au-delà de la fausse générosité dont font preuve le gouvernement français et beaucoup de dirigeants de l’opposition. Que proposent-ils en effet aux chrétiens menacés ? De fuir leur pays, d’émigrer vers des terres plus clémentes. C’est sans doute généreux, mais c’est de la courte vue. Cela évite sans doute de se poser des questions sur l’absence en France, en Europe, aux Etats-Unis, d’une vraie politique de protection des minorités chrétiennes au Moyen-Orient. Il semble même que les dirigeants occidentaux ont plus d’idées et de détermination pour venir au secours de l’opposition syrienne noyautée par les islamistes que des communautés chrétiennes que ces mêmes islamistes menacent.

La France a renoncé depuis longtemps à cette politique qui fut longtemps l’honneur de notre pays. Ce ne sont pas des déclarations de circonstance liées à la pression médiatique qui peuvent faire illusion. A gauche, mais aussi à droite, on se contente trop souvent de mots sans aucune réflexion stratégique de long terme sur le rôle et la responsabilité de la France. «Quitter l’Irak n’est pas la solution», nous rappelle dans le Figaro du 2 août Mgr Louis Sako, le patriarche des chaldéens, président de l’assemblée des évêques d’Irak. Diplomate, il évite de dire tout haut ce que tant de chrétiens pensent tout bas : la proposition de Laurent Fabius d’accueillir en France des familles chrétiennes menacées n’est que l’habillage des renoncements de la France à exercer ses responsabilités historiques à l’égard des chrétiens d’Orient.

Des Israéliens arabes-chrétiens soutiennent l'opération d'Israël à Gaza

Quel bel hommage que les chrétiens israéliens rendent à leur patrie qu'ils aiment tant.  Des juifs israéliens se sont joints à la manifestation qui dénonce le Hamas et l'atroce persécution que subissent les chrétiens dans le monde arabe.  Le monde arabe qui s'est déjà débarrassé de ses juifs.  Il est clair que celle-ci ne sera pas rapportée dans les médias français ou belges.

Par contre, des association juives belges de premier plan dénoncent l'opération d'Israël à Gaza et se déchaînent contre Alain Finkielkraut, Elie Wiesel, André Glucksmann, Obama...  Tout en gardant le silence sur la persécution des chrétiens dans le monde arabe.

Source.  Israeli-Arab Christians Protest Against Hamas - A group of Israeli-Arab Christians marched in Haifa last night against the persecution of Christian Arabs in the world, against radical Islamic organizations such as Hamas, and in favor of Israel’s military operation. TLV1′s Lissy Kaufmann was there.

Click here to listen to the 5-minute podcast.

Related Reading:

Why Aren’t There Terrorists among Christian Arabs?

L’antisémitisme, c’est comme le cholestérol: il y a le «bon» et le «mauvais» (Jean-François Chemain)

Excellente analyse qui, pour une fois, va au-delà des reproches habituels, faciles et superficiels sur la responsabilité des médias et eux seuls dans la résurgence de l'antisémitisme.  Voir ce que Jean-François Chemain dit sur les enseignants qui "bouffent du Juif" et puis emmènent scrupuleusement leurs élèves à Auschwitz.

"Curieuse schizophrénie: certains enseignants – j’en connais - qui «bouffent du Juif» en salle des professeurs, emmènent scrupuleusement chaque année leurs élèves à Auschwitz, parce qu’il ne s’agit, évidemment, pas de la même chose! Comme si Israël n’avait pas été initialement fondé par des rescapés de la Shoah. Ils ne se posent pas la question: la droite est mauvaise, son antisémitisme est mauvais, la gauche est bonne, son antisémitisme est bon."

Tribune libre. Jean-François Chemain est professeur d'histoire en ZEP. A quarante ans, il quitte ses fonctions de consultant international et passe l'agrégation d'histoire. Il a publié Kiffe la France (éditions Via Romana) et Une autre histoire de la laïcité chez le même éditeur. Aujourd'hui il décrypte pour Valeurs actuelles les confusions qui existent entre l'antisémitisme et l'antisionisme.

L’antisémitisme, c’est comme le cholestérol: il y a le «bon» et le «mauvais». Chacun peut en effet constater que le discours antisémite est, aujourd’hui, complètement banalisé. Un grand quotidien du soir s’émouvait, pas plus tard qu’hier, de la cohabitation, au sein de la «Génération Gaza#», de «trentenaires n’ayant jamais manifesté», de «bobos muslims» et de «vieux antisémites». Touchant spectacle, en effet. Dans les dîners en ville, comme dans les salles des profs, on se lâche, ainsi qu’au bon vieux temps.

On nous ressert pourtant toujours, ad nauseam, des discours convenus sur «les heures les plus sombres de notre Histoire», l’époque de l’Occupation, de Pétain et de Xavier Vallat. Sans oublier, bien sûr, l’affaire Dreyfus… En quoi, diantre, l’antisémitisme de ces temps-là différait-il de celui du nôtre? J’interroge, naïvement, on me répond, doctement et un brin agacé: «il ne faut pas confondre antisémitisme et antisionisme!». Il y aurait donc de bonnes raisons de détester les Juifs, et de mauvaises? Que ne leur a-t-on pas reproché, aux Juifs! «Déicides» (les catholiques, jadis), «capitalistes» (l’extrême-gauche, au XIXe siècle), «apatrides» (l’extrême-droite, fin du XIXe siècle et début du XXe), «inférieurs et parasites» (les nazis), et maintenant «sionistes». Voltaire, notre icône nationale, leur attribuait tous les défauts, sauf un: «Pourquoi les Juifs n’auraient-ils pas été anthropophages? C’eût été la seule chose qui eût manqué au peuple de Dieu pour être le plus abominable peuple de la terre» (Dictionnaire philosophique, article «anthropophagie»).

"Si Israël cédait et venait à être submergé, ce serait le début des pogroms contre nous", Didier Bourjon

"Si Israël cédait et venait à être submergé, ce serait le début des pogroms contre nous, le signal de la fin en ce qui nous concerne, chez nous, ce serait le passage d’une guerre à bas bruit et polymorphe à une guérilla généralisée pour l’achèvement de la soumission de nos pays. Ce pourquoi notre ligne de front passe aussi par celle que défend Tsahal. Il faut en tirer toutes les conséquences."

Dans un article, Didier Bourjon @ Boulevard Voltaire, décrit avec beaucoup de lucidité quelles seraient les conséquences pour la France, l'Europe et le monde occidental "si Israël cédait et venait à être submergé".  S'il ne fallait lire qu'un seul article sur la lutte d'Israël contre "l’islamisme, consubstantiel à l’islam" qui veut le détruire ainsi que ses implications et ramifications hors Israël, c'est bien celui de Didier Bourjon. Il a raison: "Notre ligne de front passe aussi par celle que défend Tsahal" - et nous tous devrions en être conscients:

"Grosso modo, on constate trois types de réactions dans cette nouvelle crise israélo-palestinienne:

- Antisémitisme rabique entraînant une réaction arabophile, la collusion des haines recuites et des ressentiments obscurs ne reculant devant aucune compromission ni aucune incohérence, quitte à divaguer théoriquement pour le vernis justificateur – donc, accusation d’un Israël spoliateur et terroriste et commisération pour les malheurs des prétendus «emprisonnés» de Gaza (et la frontière égyptienne?). C’est le fonds de commerce de bien des «anciens» du FN, J.-M. Le Pen en tête. Marine n’a sans doute pas envie de soulever le couvercle après la récente algarade que l’on sait, et de fragiliser encore une formation beaucoup moins cohérente et monolithique qu’il n’y paraît. C’est un tort.

- Renvoi dos à dos plus ou moins sincère des deux camps, considérés comme étrangers et comme «cousins» entre eux – donc refus de prendre parti dans cette affaire, ce qui permet de mieux protester contre ladite «importation» du conflit en France, qui est en vérité une extension du domaine de la lutte aux territoires européens, par importation massive de populations qui n’avaient rien à y faire, qui n’ont guère depuis des lustres que l’attractivité de notre assistanat pour raison d’y venir coloniser (ou conquérir enfin) des pays à eux étrangers et par eux détestés. C’est, semble-t-il, la position, moins acrobatique mais insuffisante, d’une grosse minorité des soutiens du FN.

- Soutien à Israël plus ou moins franc et solide, malgré la pression médiatique, au motif du rejet du bazar arabo-musulman tel qu’il se développe en cancer jusqu’au sein de notre propre société, et par crainte justifiée et de mieux en mieux consciente de l’islamisme, consubstantiel à l’islam. C’est sans doute le sentiment de fond d’une grande majorité de nos concitoyens, bien au-delà du FN et même de la droite, mais qui peut malaisément s’exprimer, ne trouvant guère de relais ni de points d’appui. Encore une occasion politique forte manquée par ceux qui devraient être en première ligne à ce sujet.

Aucune de ces positions n’est tout à fait satisfaisante.

Définition du martyre chrétien par le Père Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange

"En eux apparaît l'acte principal de la vertu de force, qui ne consiste pas à attaquer mais à supporter les choses plus pénibles sans défaillir, et en priant pour les persécuteurs."

En ces temps où l'on parle tant des martyrs musulmans, il convient de rappeler ce que représente le martyre pour les chrétiens tel que le décrit remarquablement le Père Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., qui était professeur de Dogme à l'Angelico, Rome.

"La patience et la douceur chrétiennes, qui resplendissent dans les vrais matyrs, font supporter les maux de la vie présente avec égalité d'âme sans se laisser troubler.  La patience supporte un mal inévitable pour rester dans le droit chemin, pour continuer son ascension vers Dieu.  Les martyrs sont au plus haut degré maîtres d'eux-mêmes et libres; en eux apparaît l'acte principal de la vertu de force, qui ne consiste pas à attaquer mais à supporter les choses plus pénibles sans défaillir, et en priant pour les persécuteurs".

L'Éternelle Vie et la Profondeur de l'Âme, Desclée de Brouwer, 1945, p. 39.

Le bienheureux João Baptista Machado de Távora, prêtre Jésuite et martyr

Demain à Bruxelles: des chrétiens évangéliques manifestent leur soutien au peuple juif et à Israël

Festival pour la paix - Evénement culturel pour Israël

Musique, Gospel, Animation pour enfants, expo photos, restauration, peintures, livres, stands

1er juin 2014 - 14h00 - 18h00

Place d'Espagne, (entre la Grand-Place et la Gare Centrale)

1000 Bruxelles

Une initiative de

- la Coalition Belge pour Israël,

- Koinonia,

- ORT Belgium,

- Anet,

- Chrétiens pour Israël,

- Beautiful Israel

Interventions du groupe Osseh Shalom Kineti de 15h35 à 16h00 et de 16h40 à 17h10 

Chers frères et sœurs,

Les yeux du monde entier sont rivés actuellement sur Israël. Le peuple et la terre du Livre sont aujourd'hui un enjeu majeur. Et pourtant le Seigneur a répondu à cette question, des siècles avant que quelqu’un l’ait posée: «Je te donnerai et à tes descendants après toi, le pays que tu habites comme étranger, tout le pays de Canaan, en possession perpétuelle, et je serai leur Dieu.» (Gén. 17:8)

Pendant que le monde ne tient aucunement compte du droit biblique d’Israël à sa terre, les dirigeants du monde et les gouvernements exercent la pression pour qu’il cède des morceaux de Jérusalem et sa petite terre. Les pays arabes refusent même de reconnaître l’identité et le droit d’existence d’Israël, la question reste pour nous chrétiens croyant en la Bible:

Comment tenons-nous face au peuple juif et face à Israël? Quelle position prenons-nous, sachant que nos racines et l'origine de notre foi se trouvent dans le judaïsme? L’histoire et la Bible témoignent que l’indifférence peut être fatale... Devons-nous ignorer ceci ou allons-nous les aider en cas de besoin, en nous mettant à côté d’eux et parler en leur faveur?