April 28
Olmert's Crazy Idea
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is said to be willing to give back Syria 's Golan Heights in return for peace with the Arab state. No, this is not some belated April Fool's joke. Several sources have confirmed this as a fact.
According to government officials, Israel is very serious about returning the land as part of a peace pact. There are several conditions that Syria would first need to meet. Israel made clear that any peace agreement would necessitate Syria ending its support for Hamas and throwing Hamas political leader Khaled Mashaal out of Damascus; ceasing support for Hezbollah; and distancing itself from Iran .
Olmert gave clues to Israeli newspapers two week ago when he said that the two nations had exchanged messages clarifying what each would expect from a peace deal.
"They know what we want from them, and I know full well what they want from us," Olmert told the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot. " Israel is open to peace with Syria," he told another paper, Maariv.
Syrian President Assad told officials of Syria 's ruling Baath party that the exchange explored the possibility of resuming
peace talks. Israel "knows well what is accepted and not accepted by Syria ."
The Golan Heights was seized from Syria in the 1967 Mideast War. The territory was successfully defended in the 1973
Yom Kippur War and a sizable portion was later returned to Syria in the 1980s.
The Golan Heights is of strategic importance because it is a plateau and mountainous region that lies between Israel and Syria . Without this buffer zone, much of Israel 's northern population center would be within visual range of Syrian artillery and rockets.
A return of the whole of the Golan would bring the board right down to the shores of the Sea of Galilee . The city of Tiberias would have to worry about attacks from Syrian gun boats.
Another important thing about the Golan Heights is that much of Israel 's water comes from the Golan Mountains. The headwaters of the Jordan river are set in the Golan.
Leaders from Israel 's Likud Party wasted no time condemning the plan. Lawmaker Yuval Steinitz accused Olmert of "unprecedented recklessness" in a the message exchange. "Without the Golan, Israel will be hard-pressed to defend its existence." Likud Party Whip Gidon Saar said Olmert is "gambling irresponsibly with Israel 's national and strategic assets, (and there is) no public support to do so."
In my view, Israel would be signing its death warrant in giving up the Golan Heights . The fiasco that resulted from the
turning over of the Gaza Strip to the Palestinians should have convinced Olmert that this is a dumb idea. Once Israel
pulled out of Gaza, Islamic terrorists quickly moved in, and now everyday rockets are being fired into southern Israel from the Gaza board.
I don't see why Israel thinks it's required to give back this land. Syria lost the Golan Heights as result of a surprise attack it launched against Israel . If history is any guide, the aggressor in any war is always out of luck when it comes to redrawing the map. Germany lost a large part of its western territory to Poland as a result of World War II. Japan lost several islands in the conflict.
In 1981, Israel had already decided to annex the Golan Heights. It got cold feet when the international community refused to recognize its claim to the Golan. By acknowledging that it holds territory that rightfully belongs to its neighbor, Israel has made itself look like an unjust occupier.
I would hope that the Israeli people will never agree to such a crazy idea. Unfortunately, the promise of peace has caused the
public into supporting equally foolish decisions in the past.
Just by making this proposal, the chance of war with Syria is made all the more likely. If the Golan territory is given back,
militants could easily move into these rugged mountains and launch hit-and-run terror attacks against Jewish settlements. If
Israel fails to follow through on its decision to give back the land, Syria has already promised it will launch a war to
liberate its territory.
-- Todd
Not-So-Distant Hoofbeats
One doesn’t have to listen too hard to hear the distant hoofbeats if attuned to issues and events of our time in a biblically prophetic way. The horsemen of apocalypse outlined in Revelation chapter 6 are mounted. The world can’t yet see them upon looking across terrain littered with the hills and valleys of everyday life. But the spiritual ear can hear them rumbling beyond the immediacy of these quickly waning days of the age.
The first horseman is riding forward and will be in position to dismount and take over the reins of world government sometime after the disappearance of those who are living at the time of rapture. He will step from his white steed of prestige and promise to sign the covenant of peace that apparently will already be in place. Israel will believe this “prince that shall come,” and sign on to the covenant with the thought that now there will be peace and safety.
The rider on the second horse canters not far behind the self-aggrandizing prince on the first. This rider, on his red horse, will await his time for only a brief moment. Already, he makes noisome saber-rattling that tells us he and his war horse are chomping at the bits to inflict violence upon the earth like that which was present in Noah’s day, during the antediluvian era leading up to the worldwide flood.
Behind the second rider is a skeletal rider beneath a black hood, his fleshless grin foreshadowing his plans for the inhabitants of Planet Earth. The black horse of famine snorts its determination to carry his balances-and-scales-wielding rider to his destination. That destination is the last seven years of human history leading up to the second advent of Jesus Christ. The rider is called famine; his intention is to destroy through starvation.
The not-so-distant hoofbeats are heard coming at this generation as an agglomerate rumble of portentous news. We will try to isolate one particular set of thundering, pounding hooves--that of this third rider. Actually, this horse of the apocalypse has within the last few weeks been rather easy to detect. Some of us who watch and analyze issues and events we think might have prophetic relevance have for years believed that petroleum–particularly oil in the Middle East—might be the catalyst that will bring the world powers to conflict at Armageddon. God himself has said He would put hooks in the jaws of one leader to draw him into the Middle East. He will then, prophecy tells us, bring all nations into the region for the final battle of man’s most horrendous war: “I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land” (Joel 3:2).
Petroleum is in the news as never before, as we know. The price per barrel has topped anything even the most pessimistic economists might have projected. The gas pump prices reflect the price-per-barrel rises in America, with more than $4 per gallon not far distant as the national average. Some are predicting much worse.
Within the past weeks, the skyrocketing oil prices have brought home the troubling reality that is already affecting the most basic need of man: food supply.
Regions of the world such as the Sudan, Ethiopia, and many others have long since heard the rider of the third horse of apocalypse approaching. But, the most blessed nation on earth--in terms of material goods, which includes hosting the breadbasket of the world—can, without listening too carefully, here the black horse’s hoofbeats. The beast that will carry its deadly rider of starvation, it seems, has broken from its cantering gait into a gallop.
The stories of the petroleum-based food problems are anywhere one cares to look. An example involves some quite familiar names that have contributed to America’s lifestyle of relative luxury, compared to the rest of the world: “Top retailer Wal-Mart's Sam's Club unit said Wednesday it is limiting the amount of rice individual shoppers could buy at one time, as rice prices hit new records around the world” ("Wal-Mart unit limits rice purchases," Breitbart.tv, April 23, 2008).
Wal-Mart sources assured that other commodities were “currently” in no danger of being affected. Despite the attempt at reassurance, this is a most profound matter. Only in war time has food been rationed to any extent. Rumbling from the hooves of the black horse of apocalypse might be detectable in the following:
The U.N. chief warned Sunday that the world must urgently increase food production to ease skyrocketing prices and pledged to set up a task force on a crisis threatening to destabilize developing nations.
The cost of food has increased by around 40 percent since mid-2007 worldwide, and the strain has caused riots and protests in countries like Cameroon, Burkina Faso, Haiti and Egypt.
"We must make no mistake, the problem is big. If we offer the right aid, the solutions will come," U.N. Secretary-General Ban K-Moon said at the opening of a five-day U.N. conference on trade and development in Ghana's capital, Accra.
"One thing is certain, the world has consumed more than it has produced over the last three years," he said.
Ban blamed a host of causes for the soaring cost of food, including rising oil prices, the fall of the U.S. dollar and natural disasters ("U.N. chief warns world must urgently increase food production," www.news.yahoo.com, April 25, 2008).
The secretary general mentioned, but didn’t dwell specifically upon, the rise in oil prices, but blamed, in large part, the dollar’s falling value. Make no mistake, however, that devaluation is linked inextricably to oil in the Middle East.
The black horse and its rider with the balances and scales in his hand will one day be at full gallop upon an incorrigibly wicked world of earth dwellers. From the tide of events inundating the news today, that time cannot be far distant.
***Prayer request: I ask my Rapture Ready Brothers and Sisters to pray for Eric. Thanks much.***
--Terry
