I (Kerry) have often wondered, since October 7, 2023, how Hamas thought their heinous invasion of Israel was going to play out and what they expected to accomplish. Even though they badly misunderstand the God of Israel who strengthens His people, they clearly could not have thought that 3000 terrorists were going to overrun all of Israel, or that most Israelis would flee from fear. What could their end-game have been? I now believe it was their leaders’ goal to turn the world against Israel and the Jewish people in a very clever way. As you will read below, Hamas has successfully married progressive ideologies that it opposes, with anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism that it embraces, creating a new generation of anti-Semites.
Within Israel, Hamas temporarily united the nation after its yearlong descent into disunity over governmental judicial reform and other internal issues. So far, they have helped us to realize that our war for national survival has been renewed, and that in this existential crisis we have to lay aside our bickering and join together for victory. In truth, there is still plenty of bickering in Israel, but most Israelis agree on three things as stated by PM Netanyahu early on. We have to destroy Hamas militarily and governmentally. We have to rescue the hostages, and we have to make sure that nothing like this can ever happen again. Afterwards, we can go back to our internal bickering, while confronting Hezbollah and/or Iran in due season, although that season appears closer than ever before.
Anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism are not new. We all know that. However, it was shocking to realize that the greatest zeal for Hamas was found in the West. The enthusiastic response that greeted the Hamas invaders and their massacre of Israelis was greatest in what we refer to as the free world – the US, Europe, Australia – and in the most esteemed institutions of higher education. It did not take long for college campuses to be overrun with pro-Hamas, anti-Israel, and anti-Semitic rhetoric and violence.
Keeping in mind that Israel did not mount a major military offensive into Gaza for three weeks after the October 7 invasion, how is it that by October 8, Harvard University student organizations had already published their manifesto favoring the Palestinians and blaming Israel for the invasion, to be followed quickly thereafter by organizations on other major US universities?
The volcano of anti-Semitism that has been lying dormant ever since the Holocaust in the West has now erupted, spewing its lava throughout the world. Though not exclusively the purview of Muslims, clearly the large amount of Islamic immigration to Europe and the West has served as a detonator for this explosion.
This triumph of brazenly pro-Islamic rhetoric in the West is not being done in hiding, but while openly declaring their aspirations to kill all the Jews – from the river to the sea. “Death to Israel, Death to America” are being chanted on college campuses and international capitals throughout the world without fear. How can this be? How can students on American campuses and people in American cities chant “Death to America”? Is it that they have no fear because they know they do not stand alone? They have seen this before in the recent past (George Floyd/Black Lives Matter/Defund Police) and know that there will be no consequences. Indeed, they have found many who stand with them, holding up their arms as it were. This is because they stand with very powerful progressive, communist, anarchist and anti-Christ partners on the left. Hamas has tapped into this river of hate.
Even though progressive leftist groups surely can not agree with jihadist principles, sharia law, and Islamic theology that would remove female rights and kill homosexuals, they do agree on the abundant hatred of the US, the West, and the religious Judeo-Christian foundation that fuels their anarchist viewpoints. This is what seems to be a bizarre alliance, but I submit it is an alliance whose first goal is to single out the Jews. Why? Because God chose Israel as His first-born and loves her as a special treasure above all the peoples of the earth. (Deut. 7: 6) Since God chose and loves the Jews, there is no better way to oppose God than to hate what He loves. Since Jesus will return to Jewish Jerusalem only when Israel welcomes Him back, anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism are Satan’s best plan to insure opposition to God’s plan for world redemption. With no Israel and no Jews in Jerusalem, there will be no second coming.
Anti-Semitism has always been an extraordinary tool for political mobilization. If there is a problem in society – inflation for example – it is always easier to blame it on an easily identifiable group of people than it is to solve. So, if politically you want to get people to follow you without actually having to solve anything, it is always easiest to blame all the problems on a small group of people and say they are the cause. The Jewish people have always served well in this regard. All one needs to do is study the history of the great civilizations of Europe and find Jews either expelled or exterminated from all of them.
This is how Hitler mobilized people to genocide. It is how Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and so many Arab and Muslim regimes explain their failures to be able to bring basic services to their people. Blame the Jews and Israel.
Modern Israel, which is the target of anti-Semitism internationally, has long been blamed for the ills of the Middle East, such as Sunni-Shia discord, Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, and the Iranian threat to all Sunni Arab nations. Many believe if we just get rid of Israel, all the problems will be solved. Even former US Secretary of State John famously blamed Israel for the rise of ISIS.
We also see it internationally on a much bigger scale. When the International Criminal Court (ICC) issues arrest warrants for Israeli leaders for defending the nation, it is paving the way for being able to do this against other countries. When the International Court of Justice (ICJ) insists that Israel cannot continue to protect itself against attacks from other nations, it is actually paving the way for her destruction. If the ICC and the ICJ get away with this with Israel, what will be the next nation not allowed to defend itself from invasion: Estonia, Latvia, Ukraine or Taiwan?
So, what has all this got to do with anti-Semitism in the US? After all, only a relatively small percentage of its population is Jewish. Blaming and eventually dispossessing the Jews is also a good way of whittling away at democracy. If a society is successful in dehumanizing a sector of it, then it normalizes the concept that no longer does everyone have the right to be represented in government or in society. For example, if in America one successfully blames economic problems on the banks, which are allegedly controlled by the Jews, while failing governmental economic policy is allegedly, disproportionately determined by Jews, then the Jews must be causing these things. Is is said their motivation must be loyalty to a foreign power – Israel. Therefore, they must be removed from institutions of authority for the good of the nation. This may seem like fantasy, but it is being taught in universities and fed digitally to the masses. Take away their rights, they say, such as the Nazis did with the Nuremberg Laws, and the nation will be better off. (Note, last week the country of Maldives decided holders of Israeli passports would no longer to be allowed to visit. It is happening today.)
Whatever, wherever and whenever this begins with the Jews, it represents a shift towards tyranny. Historically, what begins with the Jews typically doesn’t end with the Jews. Once they have been successfully targeted, bigger and better targets will follow. What about pro-life groups in the US or those that stand against homosexuality? What about Evangelical Christians?
So why are the progressive movements standing arm and arm with pro-Hamas protesters so supportive of Islamic and jihadist rhetoric? Consider, for example, diversity, equity, and inclusion movements (DEI) which seek to promote the fair treatment and full participation of all people, particularly groups who have historically been underrepresented or subject to discrimination on the basis of identity or disability, whether qualified or not. Sounds fair. Sounds good. Who isn’t for equality? But that is not the same as equity. Never mind the qualified part.
The DEI movement in the US is born out of the notion that the US was founded in slavery, is forever tainted by that sin, and that that sin is still appropriated today upon large swaths of the population via racism. The only way America can be fundamentally transformed is by transforming fundamentally the mindset of the American people to believe that there is something inherently wrong with their country and their race. There is a belief that people are divided into the fundamentally privileged and the fundamentally dispossessed, and the privileged are fundamentally evil.
For example, white people are said to be privileged, therefore white people are said to be evil. DEI is being taught by the educators in the US as immutable fact. Yet, the things we think of as bring immutable, like gender, are being considered mutable. How far we have fallen! On April 28, 1963, Martin Luther King boldly proclaimed “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” Sadly, DEI and its progressive siblings are the antithesis of his dream.
From the logic of DEI, it is not a far leap to think Jewish people are immutably bad, Israel was born in sin and therefore has no right to exist. Since October 7, especially when looking at college campuses, we see how many people ascribe to this view. In order to protest the Jewish state, they are naively willing to march next to people that would happily see them dead in other circumstances. One example is the near universal support for Hamas by the LQBTQ community, who themselves would likely be killed by the very Islamic regime they are supporting. This is quite an achievement on the part of Hamas! They have accomplished their goals well. They have successfully linked their own ideologies with sympathetic, confused, and anti-God anarchists.
As a result of the above, Israel is isolated as never before. Its leaders are war criminals in the eyes of the world. It finds itself on the UN list of offenders that harm children. It is even being condemned for rescuing hostages from Gaza. Jews throughout the world fear for what their future holds.
I pray not just for Israel. I also pray that the US and the world will recognize that because of extreme ideologies, whatever happens to Israel and the Jews might eventually happen to them. May they recognize that they have invited these fundamental changes in their society through policies that seek to remove any and all moral absolutes and abandon the principles of God.
When Israeli PM Netanyahu spoke on the eve of Israeli Independence Day recently, after President Biden had cut off the large scale munitions that will be needed to further insure Israel’s security, he said “Israel will stand alone if it has to, but it will stand.” He was speaking as a political leader attempting to encourage his nation. In truth, Israel will never stand alone, because He who keeps Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps. (Psalm 121:4) His plans for the return of His Son to His Kingdom on earth will not be thwarted, regardless of the plans of the enemy.
Please join me in praying that God will be glorified through the nation He has chosen as His inheritance and in the place He will again establish holy throne. Pray that your nation will not succumb to the progressive ideologies of today but will return to the Judeo-Christian values upon which it was founded, for all of our sakes.
It is God who arms me with strength… (Psalm 18:32a)