Israel has been surrounded for years since her inception with fierce hatred by the nations surrounding her and by many of the Palestinians as well. The Hamas charter even officially calls for the destruction of the Jewish State in her Covenant: “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it”

Yasser Arafat, the PLO leader quipped in an interview with the Dutch paper ‘Trouw‘: “For us peace means the destruction of the State of Israel.”

Even now more than ever, Israel is still surrounded by fierce enemies, the cruel and defiant Hizbollah to her North in Lebanon, the Hamas in the South in Gaza and the ever increasing threat of a nuclear Iran on her East, as well as the utterly cruel and beastly men and women of the ISIS.

And what does Israel do while these deadly and genocidal threats to her existence continue? She sends her chosen President into jail as well as her chosen Prime Minister because of sexual and financial misconduct! She sends these men into jail for far less reason than many of the leaders of these enemy nations with whom the nations of this world tell Israel to make peace with. Leaders of nations themselves have no desire to equally hold their leaders to such moral standing. Even Members of Israel’s Cabinet and Knesset were prosecuted during these fateful years!

During war many negative and inhumane things happen – in any war – but Israel, even during her long and torturous road of wars, terrorist attacks and international abuse and condemnation, was always ready to judge herself in an amazing pursuit, even for her highest office holders, of righteousness and judgment.

How different this attitude is compared with the way the US Democratic Party whitewashed similar improprieties of the Clinton couple – first Bill Clinton’s sexual improprieties and then the many lies and cover-ups by Hillary in relation to Benghazi and beyond. Even Republicans in the end joined the chorus of the need for prosecuting President Richard Nixon’s Watergate cover-up for far less than present Democratic leaders. Many there seem to have lost their moral compass and do not have the moral fortitude of Israel to judge her most senior leaders worthy of prison!

Israel, under severe pressure from enemies and the nations of the world, is willing even in the face of all these pressures and continued threat to her very existence, to give half of her own divinely promised land to an enemy who, while insisting of being accepted as an independent Palestinian State, is not willing even till today to recognize what then will be left of Israel’s divinely promised land as a democratic Jewish State.

Make no mistake, Israel’s willingness to part with half of her own historic land is not because the majority of the Israelis do not believe it is their own historic land, but if it brings true peace they are willing even to part with a big part of their own divinely promised land to reach finally a peace for which all Israel has suffered and yearned for so long!

This also contrasts totally with the attitude and way of today’s nations, each not only claiming their historic rights and prepared to go to war for their claimed territories – like Britain in relation to the Falklands, China in relation to disputed islands in the Japanese sea and so on! Or should we add the unwillingness of any US government to give at least one State back to the poor destitute Indians or New Mexico and other States back to Mexico . In all this Israel shines as a nation that is willing to give up on her own historic land whereas the nations who continually judge and upbraid her are not even willing for peace to surrender pieces of land which did not even belong to them!!

But what can the honest, for Justice minded, American legislators and people still do to come to the same self-critical level as little Israel surrounded by nations who day and night are plotting their “final solution”? When the present US administration under Barak Hussein Obama has isolated herself against any such move for justice by making sure that the Obama Justice Department, first under Eric Holder, now under Loretta Lynch, remains firmly under his control and of the likes of Valerie Jarrett and Suzanne Rice and others. It is all laid out in the excellent book Mr. Christian Adams, himself a key member of the Department of Justice wrote: Injustice. Here he writes:

“This book has sought to begin the process of rectifying this problem by shining a light on the corruption, political extremism, and sheer unprofessionalism that I witnessed firsthand at the DOJ. But ultimately, exposing the problems in these pages is merely a first step. It must be followed by the empowerment of committed officials who have the courage to restore decency, balance, and fairness to the vital institutions that sustain our unique and brilliant constitutional system.”

So whatever accusations have been leveled against Hillary Clinton while she was a senior member of Obama’s entourage and against Obama himself have been successfully thwarted and muffled by his own chosen friend(s) in the Department of Justice. Israel, compared to this Injustice in high places in the US present government shines like a star!!

Justice and Mercy

Already in the Old Covenant or Tanach we find this amazing apparent contrast between the Justice required and the Mercy received, especially in the case of David’s sin in relation to Bathsheba and in extension to Uriah her husband. When God’s prophet Nathan held before the king the truth of this awful sin in the story he told of “the rich man having exceedingly many flocks and herds” went after the one sheep of his neighbor, David, not yet realizing he was this man called out:

“As the Lord lives, the man who has done this shall surely die! And he shall restore fourfold for the lamb, because he did this thing and because he had no pity,” 2 Samuel 12:5-6.

This is exactly what happened to David. He lost four of his sons, first his first child from Bathsheba, then Amnon, after that Absalom and finally his son Adonijah. But, as the Lord in His undeserved mercy said through Nathan, David own life was spared:

“So David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” And Nathan said to David, “The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die,” 2 Samuel 12:13.

Thus we see God’s judgment as well as His mercy in this story!

In His great, great mercy, God did not only forgive him and cleanse him for this grievous sin but he allowed the second child born out of Bathsheba to become the future King Solomon who was allowed to build the Temple of the Lord on this holy hill!

This then opens the door to any present or future leader, if he or she truly repents, not only to be forgiven but to be restored in leadership even as King David was. This is exactly what actually is happening even in today’s Israeli system of justice. Aryeh Deri, who after being the Minister of Interior, yes served his term of years in prison – but thank God for His undeserved mercy, he is today considered to be appointed back to be the Minister of Interior again.

It is the revelation of these two sides of the same divine coin, righteous judgment and mercy, which makes Israel stand forth in a unique and amazing way.

In this same vein we read how the Lord forgave and restored King Manasseh who, “when he was in affliction, implored the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers and prayed to Him, and He received his entreaty, heard his supplication and brought him back to Jerusalem into his kingdom,” (2 Chronicles 33:12-13), even as the Lord did this for King David, when he returned to Jerusalem.

Thus according to the Bible there is a demand by God for justice and at the same time, if there is true and deep repentance, then mercy can be extended even to leaders who failed! Thanks be to God!

 

~ Jan Willem van der Hoeven, Director
International Christian Zionist Center

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Newsletter of January 7, 2016.

Republished with the kind permission of Author Jan Willem van der Hoeven, Director of International Christian Zionist Center.

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