Today we are going to continue our study on the Mideast with part 2 of “The Middle East Crisis: Land for Peace?”. I’m constantly surprised and even disgusted by the news reports I see from major news networks presenting heavily biased, anti-Israeli accounts of what is occurring between Israel and her neighbors.
As I told you last week, I believe it is imperative for Christian to know from a Biblical perspective what is truly going on. The Bible has all of human history etched upon its pages from the very beginning to the very end. If we want to know what is happening in the world today and why, all we have to do is study this ancient text. It is just as relevant today as it was when it was first recorded.
Last week we began looking at the main point of contention between Israel and her Arab neighbors. That is the argument over who is entitled to a very important piece of real estate. And we went all the way back to the beginning of time and Genesis 1:1 to see that the first owner of the land was the One who created it, God. And only He has the right to decide who utilizes His land and how it is used.
Then about 2500 BC we read in Genesis 12 how God made a covenant concerning the land with a man named Abraham. It was an unconditional promise in which God said that He would give Abraham the land of Canaan and spelled out its borders in Genesis 15. He also promised Abraham a son, a mighty nation from his descendants, divine protection, and that the entire world would be blessed through him because the Messiah would come from his line.
We also saw that this promise was and everlasting one. That it holds true to this very day. So, therefore, we concluded that the land being fought over in the Mideast rightfully belongs to the Jews. And it always has since the very moment God promised it to Abraham 4000 years ago.
Today, we are going to turn our attention to Israel’s enemies in this dispute, the Arabs. If the Abrahamic Covenant that we looked at last week established the title deed as belonging to the Jewish people, where does that leave the Arabs? Well, believe it or not, God made a promise to them, too. I call it the Arabic Covenant.
I. The Arabic Covenant
If I were to ask you to name the descendents of Abraham, you’d more than likely tell me that Isaac was his son and Jacob his grandson. And if you really knew your Bible, you may even go on to list his great-grandson Joseph, and maybe even his great-great grandsons Manassah and Ephriam. And you would be correct. These men do make up the descendents of Abraham through his son Isaac, and are the first generations of the Jewish nation.
But many people would forget that Isaac wasn’t Abraham’s only son. In fact, Isaac wasn’t even Abraham’s first-born son. Abraham actually had several sons by two other women besides his wife Sarah, and the most famous of these sons was Ishmael. Ishmael was the first-born son of Abraham and Hagar, Sarah’s Egyptian maid. And even though he was not the son that God had promised to give to Abraham and Sarah, he did receive some promises from God.
In Genesis we find that God made a promise concerning Ishmael, first to his mother Hagar, and then to his father, Abraham.
First, let’s see what God said to Hagar in Genesis 16:10-12 (NIV). In this passage Hagar has run away from her mistress because Sarah was jealous of her and had been mistreating her. She is in the desert near a spring when the angel of the Lord appears to her and tells her to return to Abraham and Sarah. Verse 10 continues the story with, “The angel added, ‘I will so increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count.’ [11] The angel of the Lord also said to her, ‘You are now with child and you will have a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard of your misery. [12] He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”
Now, I also have a footnote in my Bible that tells me that the last phrase “toward all his brothers” has a second meaning. It could also mean, “to live to the east of all his brothers.” Either definition is fascinating and meaningful, as we will see in a minute.
God also makes a promise concerning Ishmael to his father Abraham in Genesis 17:20, “And as for Ishmael, I have heard you: I will surely bless him; I will make him fruitful and will greatly increase his numbers. He will be the father of twelve rulers, and I will make him into a great nation.”
Abraham is the father of the Jewish nation through his son Isaac. But what most people don’t realize is that the Arabs can lay claim to Abraham’s paternity as well. Abraham is also the father of the Arab nations through his son Ishmael. The feuding and hatred occurring in the Middle East today is an ancient family feud between brothers that has been going on for centuries.
The Arabs lay claim to the land as descendants of Abraham’s first-born son, Ishmael. And normally, they would have a legitimate right to it because in eastern society, the first-born was the rightful heir to his father’s wealth.
But the land promised to Abraham and his descendants didn’t pass to the first-born. Look what God says in Genesis 17:19 and 21. “Then God said, ‘Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him. [21] But my covenant I will establish with Isaac,…”
So God confirms that the land will bypass the first-born and be given to Isaac and through him to the Jewish people. But He didn’t totally forget Ishmael and the Arabs. Let’s look at exactly what God promised Ishmael.
A. Twelve Sons
First, God promised that Ishmael would be the father of twelve sons in Genesis 17:20. We’re all familiar with the twelve sons of Jacob that became the heads of the twelve tribes of Israel, but Jacob’s uncle, Ishmael, was also promised twelve sons. Genesis 25:13-16 confirms that this promise was fulfilled.
Genesis 25:13-16, “These are the names of the sons of Ishmael, listed in the order of their birth: Nebaioth the firstborn of Ishmael, Kedar, Adbeel, Mibsam, [14] Mishma, Dumah, Massa, [15] Hadad, Tema, Jetur, Naphish and Kedemah. [16] These were the sons of Ishmael, and these are the names of the twelve tribal rulers according to their settlements and camps.”
B. Numerous Descendants
Second, God promised that the descendants of Ishmael would be too numerous to count in (Genesis 16:10). This promise has likewise been fulfilled. There are approximately 200 million Arabs in the world today.
C. A Great Nation
The third thing God promised was to make Ishmael a great nation (Genesis 17:20). This fulfillment can also be seen today. The Arabs constitute a great nation composed of twenty-one separate states.
D. Land East of Canaan
Fourth, Ishmael was promised the land east of the land promised to Isaac’s descendants. Remember, this was the second meaning of the last phrase of Genesis 16:12. In Genesis 25:18 we find that Ishmael’s sons “…settled in the area from Havilah to Shur, near the border of Egypt, as you go toward Asshur.” This is the land that the present day Arabs still populate – south and east of Israel. In fact they occupy 5.3 million square miles of oil rich land in this region.
E. Live In Hostility
And fifth, God said that Ishmael would have a personality like a donkey and because of his stubbornness would live in hostility and contention with everyone around him, especially his brothers (Genesis 16:12). This attribute of hostility toward everyone, especially their Jewish brethren, is easily seen in today’s Arabic peoples and has been a part of their nature from the very beginning. Genesis 25:18 says that Ishmael’s sons “…lived in hostility toward all their brothers.”
II. The Palestinian Problem
So, as you can see, God has faithfully kept his unconditional promises to Ishmael and his descendants. But what about the Palestinian people? What about those who were displaced from their homes when Israel was given the land they were living on in order to form a Jewish nation? Don’t all those displaced refugees deserve a state of their own? Let’s see if we can answer those questions.
A. Palestinians Are Arabs
Before we talk about the land, however, let’s try to get a better understanding of the Palestinian people themselves. One of the first things that you need to comprehend about the Palestinians is the fact that they are Arabs. If you listen to the news or read the papers you would probably come away thinking that the Palestinians were a unique group of people with their own history, culture, language, and land. In fact, one of the strongest lies that the late Yasser Arafat promoted fervently among his people was that today’s Palestinians are descendants of the ancient Philistines.
1. Of Semitic Descent
Nothing could be farther from the truth, (though at one time, I myself did not know this). Webster’s dictionary defines the Philistines as a “non-Semitic people who lived in southwestern Palestine.” Non-Semitic means that they did not descend from Noah’s son Shem. They descended from one of his other sons, Ham.
The Jews are considered Semitic because they are descendants of Shem through their father Abraham. Thus we have the terms “anti-Semitic” and “anti-Semitism” to describe a hatred for the Jewish people. Interestingly enough, because Abraham was Semitic, this also makes the Arabs Semites. So therefore, the Arabs in Palestine could not be descendants of the ancient Philistines, because they are Semites and the Philistines were not.
2. No Unique “Palestinian” Culture or Country
Another truth you won’t hear about in the media is the fact that there is no unique “Palestinian” culture or country.
An article that was found in a Middle Eastern paper said this, “Everyday I hear about Palestinians, and as it was not clear to me who they are, I decided to try and discover at least one of them. In East Jerusalem I met a man who identified himself as a Palestinian. When asked if he spoke a Palestinian language, he answered that he spoke Arabic. Then I asked him if he wrote Palestinian letters. “No, I write with Arabic letters and numerals.” I continued questioning him, and he answered that he did not know of any Palestinian king, president, or prime minister. Finally, I asked him if his religion was Palestinian, and he replied he was a Muslim. I gave up, and now I am convinced that there is not and never has been a ‘Palestinian people.’”
Neither has there ever been a “Palestinian Nation.” Almost without exception, politicians and theologians accept the identification of Israel’s territory as Palestine. Just look at the maps in the back of your Bibles. I bet you’ll find at least one map with “Palestine” in the title. Maybe something like “Palestine in Christ’s Time” for example. Yet, when you look at historic documents, you will see that Palestine, as a separate country or nation, never existed. It was originally the land of Canaan and then became the land of Israel.
The word “Palestine” was never used even once in the Scriptures. You will find the land in question referred to as Canaan, Israel, Galilee, Judea, Judah and Samaria, but you will never find it called Palestine. Palestine was actually a name given to that region by the Romans as a slur to the Jewish people, but there was never a country of Palestine.
It would be like a person from Kansas claiming to be a Midwesterner and demanding that a separate country be carved out of the US and declared a Midwestern state or nation. Kansas is considered part of the American Midwest, but the Midwest is not a separate country with a separate history, language, and culture from the rest of the United States. The Midwest is simply a term used to describe a certain region of our country. Likewise, Palestine is simply a term used to describe a certain region of the Middle East.
So, keep in mind as we continue this study that there is no unique group of people that are “Palestinian.” Those who claim such a title are Arabs who at one time had ancestors living in the land of Israel.
B. How Did the Palestinian Problem Come About?
How, then, did the Palestinian problem come about – this problem of Arab refugees with no place to call home? Well, to put it bluntly, the Arab refugee problem is self-inflicted and pure propaganda. I’m going to greatly simplify the facts this morning because I want you to get the gist of what really happened.
When Israel became a nation on May 14th, 1948, over night the Arabs declared war on Israel and with that declaration, the Arabs created two problems.
1. Created Arab Refugees
The first problem was that they created the Arab refugee problem. No matter what others may lead you to believe, Israel did not create the Arab refugee problem.
When they declared war on Israel the Arab states encouraged all the Arabs living in Israel to flee their homes temporarily so their armies could come in and destroy Israel. They said to their people, “Get out so we can get in” and purge the land of Jews! But we know from history that the Arabs never did get in. They were soundly defeated.
This is what created the major refugee problem for their people. Almost overnight 1000’s of Arabs were homeless, but not because of the Jews. The Jews didn’t ask them to leave their homes. The Arabs did that.
And then those 500,000 Arab refugees who were told by their leaders to leave their homes were denied any place to go. The Arab states refused to allow them in because they wanted to use them as pawns to orchestrate world public opinion against Israel. Jordan, Syria, Lebanon and others, herded their own people into horrible refugee camps and let them live like rats.
The whole refugee problem could be over probably in a matter of months if some of the richest nations on earth, the Arab nations, would begin to put money into this problem. But they won’t, because they are determined to make the world think that it is Israel causing the horrible living conditions of the camps.
Also, I’d like you to know that in 1967 when Israel won the West Bank territory from Jordan, one of the first things they did was to move the refugees out of the camps and into towns where they were given decent jobs and social care. The Israelis bulldozed the refugee camps. The Palestinians were provided new hospitals and new schools, and they ended up with a standard of living that was three to four times higher than any of their Arab neighbors.
2. Created Jewish Refugees
By declaring war in 1948 the Arabs also created Jewish refugees. Jews living in Arab countries fled because of the Nazi-like treatment being done to them. This burst of brutality was unthinkable and unbearable and resulted in hundreds if thousands of Jews returning to Israel.
How many Jewish refugees are we talking about? The number of Jewish refugees that fled 10 Arab nations after 1948 is close to 1 million – twice the number of Palestinian refugees. And Israel, one of the smallest nations in the world, (about the size of the state of New Jersey) absorbed them. For every one Arab Palestinian refugee there were two Jewish refugees that also deserve our sympathy.
The Arabs in Israel were treated with respect and honor with full rights as a citizen. But in most Arab nations the Jews were tortured, beaten, and heavily taxed.
William Hull, a journalist and author, was a witness to this period in history and puts it into perspective for us. “The Arabs fled [Israel] because their leaders had left, and because God put fear in their hearts. In Bakaa and other parts of Jerusalem they left food on the tables, silverware, jewelry, money and other valuables in their drawers. Their leaders told them that they should leave now and that they would be able to come back in a few days, after the Arab armies had defeated the Jews. These Arabs had laid in large supplies of oil, food and other supplies in anticipation of the war. Each Arab house had a large cement cistern under it, full of water. These supplies and water were literally a Godsend to the starving and thirsty Jews in Jerusalem. It almost seemed as though God had provided all this to meet their needs.”
3. Already a Palestinian State
And finally, one last important fact that many people don’t know is that there already is an established Palestinian state, and it is four times larger in area than Israel. It is called Jordan.
At the end of WWI, the British gained control of the Holy Land, and because no other peoples had ever established a national homeland in “Palestine” since the Jews had done it 2,000 years before, the British looked favorably upon the creation of a Jewish National Homeland throughout ALL of Palestine.
The Jews had already begun mass immigration into Palestine in the 1880’s in an effort to rid the land of swamps and malaria and prepare for the rebirth of Israel. This Jewish effort to revitalize the land attracted an equally large immigration of Arabs from neighboring areas who were drawn by employment opportunities and healthier living conditions. There was never any attempt to “rid” the area of what few Arabs were there or those Arab masses that immigrated into the area along with the Jews.
In the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the British promised the entire Palestinian Mandate to the Jews as a national homeland. This land reached from the Mediterranean Sea on the east to the western border of present-day Jordan. (See Map 1) But in 1922, the British broke their promise by using 77% of the Mandated land to create the Arab Palestinian State of Jordan leaving the Jews with only 23% of the land they were originally promised. (See Map 2)
III. The True Arab Goal
So, if a Palestinian State already exists, then why do the Arabs demand the creation of a Palestinian state within the boundaries of current day Israel? The answer is simple. The real Arab goal is not the establishment of another Palestinian State. The true goal is the destruction of Israel.
The Middle East Conflict was never a war between the Israelis and the Palestinians. It has always been a war by Arabs against the Jews. The war was repackaged as a conflict between the Jews and Palestinians as a public relations gimmick by the Arab fascist regimes. These regimes had never had any interest in “Palestinians,” in creating a “Palestinian” state, or in “Palestinian nationalism” before 1967. That is because Palestinian nationalism did not and DOES NOT exist. The Palestinians were a regional group of Arabs having virtually no cultural nor national distinctive traits separating them from Syrians, Lebanese, and Jordanians. They are all basically Arabs. Palestinian nationalism is nothing more than genocidal hatred of Jews.
God did not forget the Arab descendants of Abraham. He made promises and provisions for them, and fulfilled every one of them to the letter. The land that the Arabs are demanding from Israel does not belong to them, nor did it ever. And the creation of a Palestinian state is not the answer to the age-old conflict between brothers. Nothing but the return of Christ will ultimately bring an end to this family feud.
We’ll continue this series next week.
Sermon Sources:
Froese, Arno. “Palestine or Israel?” News From Israel. June, 2007. pp. 11-21.
Kinney, Dave. “The Palestinian Problem (Parts 1 and 2).” Sermoncentral.com
Reagan, Dr. David R. “The Middle East Crisis in Biblical Perspective.” Lion and Lamb Ministries.
Reagan, Dr. David R. “The Land of Israel, To Whom Does It Belong?” Sept., 1998. Lion and Lamb Ministries.
Reagan, Dr. David R. “The Palestinians: Victims of Jewish Oppression or Pawns in an Arab Conspiracy?” Lion and Lamb Ministries.
www.masada2000.org/historical.html
