Jews Must Convert or Die; The anti-Semitic Face of Christian Zionism

CUFI Leader John Hagee confirms Christian Zionism is anti-Semitic

Ben Norton

CUFI leader John Hagee speaks to Israel supporters at a rally at the Jerusalem convention center in 2008 (Photo: AP)

Evangelical pastor John Hagee, the leader of Christians United for Israel (CUFI), the US’ largest pro-Israel organization and the most powerful group in the Christian Zionist movement, has adamantly insisted that Christian Zionism is anti-Semitic.

WorldNetDaily (WND), a far-right website published an article in March 2015 about the “Blood Moon Prophecy,” an end-of-times theory that lunar eclipses are a sign that the world is on the brink of destruction and that the Second Coming of Jesus Christ is near. The lengthy piece is about Hagee’s film Four Blood Moons, which endorses the eschatological theory. Toward the end of the article, WND quotes a spokesperson for Hagee:

“WND falsely claimed that Hagee does not believe that Jews need Jesus to be saved. In fact, Hagee never made such a claim and years ago directly denied assertions that he holds a dual-covenant theology,” he wrote. “In addition, while WND acknowledges that Hagee rewrote sections of ‘In Defense of Israel’ to clarify his relevant position, WND failed to note that the associated video promotion was also changed to accurately reflect his theology.”

Translated: WND claimed that Hagee believed the Jewish people could be saved by God without abandoning Judaism and converting to Christianity. Apocalyptic Christian Zionist John Hagee censured the publication for spreading a lie and defensively clarified that he does indeed believe that the Jewish people are going to burn in Hell for all of eternity unless they abandon Judaism and convert to Christianity.

In short, Hagee firmly insisted that Christian Zionism is anti-Semitic, and that the reason CUFI so obsessively and blindly defends Israel is not because they care about Jews (who, in their mind, will face eternal damnation unless they renounce their religion and become Christians) but rather because they genuinely believe the world is on the verge of total annihilation and the Bible supposedly tells them they must do so.

Christian Zionism

Christian Zionism is the belief that God gave the Jewish people the land of Israel in historic Palestine. Christian Zionists hold that this is part of a biblical prophecy, and is a necessary prerequisite before the Second Coming of Jesus Christ and the ensuing Day of Judgment.

This is not a view shared by all Christians, yet is very common among Evangelicals and conservative Protestants. In recent years, it has gained prominence in the US, particularly in the Bible Belt. A late 2013 Pew Research study found 82% of white evangelical Christians in the US believed God gave the land of Israel to the Jewish people, while only 40% of US Jews believed the same.

John Hagee is the leader of CUFI, the most powerful Christian Zionist organization in the US, and likely in the entire world.

Some Jewish and Zionist organizations have criticized Hagee and the Christian Zionist movement. Eric Yoffie, former president of the Union for Reform Judaism, publicly proclaimed that, vis-à-vis “Israeli-Palestinian politics, John Hagee and the CUFI are extremists.” Yoffie “called for Reform congregations to not participate in CUFI’s events and to continue to call for public condemnation of inflammatory and bigoted statements from Christian Zionist leadership.”

Many Jewish and Zionist organizations, however, see Hagee and CUFI as important allies. At the CUFI 2013 Summit, Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations—a coalition of 51 US Jewish groups, including some of the most prominent—voiced support of biblical Christian Zionist prophecies. “The prophets were not prophets of doom but prophets of hope; you just have to read it right,” he told them. “Here’s my advice: Don’t bet against the Jews. And the ‘Jewish lobby’ is a myth, but it’s our job to make it a legend.”

Israel itself has been more than happy to support CUFI. Ron Dermer, Israeli Ambassador to the US, spoke glowingly of the organization at its 2014 summit. Prime Minister Netanyahu has also enthusiastically supported the group, and has spoken at several of their annual summits.

Hagee’s History of Extreme Views

Hagee, who thinks we are the last generation of humans, is no stranger to controversy. In late 2014, he claimed that Ebola (along with the civil rights protests in Ferguson and elsewhere) was God’s way of “punishing” America, because Obama was trying to “divide” Israel.

The pastor has even gone so far as to essentially defend Adolf Hitler.  In a 2005 sermon, Hagee asserted that God sent Hitler as a “hunter,” in order to “hunt them [Jews] from every mountain and from every hill and out of the holes of the rocks … to get them to come back to the land of Israel.”

Once again, these are the views of the leader of, in CUFI’s own words, “the largest pro-Israel organization in the United States with over two million members and one of the leading Christian grassroots movements in the world.”

The Washington Post indicates that CUFI “can boast that it has members from every congressional district in America.” Foreign Policy included John Hagee in its list of the 50 Republicans with the most influence on foreign policy. The evangelical Christian Zionist was a much sought-after figure by the Republican Party in the 2008 presidential election. He ended up endorsing John McCain.

WND’s founder and CEO Joseph Farah responded positively to Hagee’s firm insistence on his Christianity-rooted anti-Semitism. “I’m happy to hear that Hagee no longer subscribes to those anti-biblical positions,” he said. “But we never asserted what Hagee believes, only what he said on videotape. I’m gratified he has repudiated all of that. It’s time for him to clean up another mess.”

Like Hagee, Farah resolutely maintains that Christian Zionism is, in its very essence, an anti-Semitic ideology, as, in his view, it is an “anti-biblical position” to claim that Jews are not automatically damned to eternal suffering in a lake of fire merely by virtue of their being Jewish.

 

Christian Zionist Fraudster and Fake “Ex-Terrorist” Walid Shoebat Claims Jewish Ancestry

Another self-serving, thoroughly discredited con man lauded by the American Religious Right, one Walid Shoebat, is now also trying to pass himself off as of Jewish Ancestry. Seems he’s milked and bilked the dirt dumb crazies of the American Religious Right and now angling to lure and sucker the Jewish community to hand over their hard-earned dollars! 

See here:-

Walid Shoebat: Fake Terrorist Busted!

And see here:-

‘Ex-terrorist’ Rakes in Homeland Security Bucks

And here:-

Shoebat Watch: “Ex-Terrorist” Fraud Sucking Up Taxpayer Money

http://www.walid-shoebat.blogspot.com.au/

Walid Shoebat Claims Jewish Ancestry “On Both Sides”

Posted by Richard Bartholomew

A particularly strange exchange between self-described “ex-terrorist” Walid Shoebat and Christian Zionist radio host Sid Roth:

Sid:… you also told me that on both sides of your family there’s Jewish ancestry and you went a bit further; most of the Palestinians you tell me have Jewish ancestry. Why do you say that?

Walid: Well, because I researched the archives of my family heritage, the Shoebat clan comes from Harris Ben Cobb, a Jew who converted to Islam. Before him he knew Harris Ben Cobb comes from a Ashomel Ben Adaya, no Muslim has the name Shomoel in fact if you look at Wikipedia Shomoel Ben Adaya was a Jew who created [sic] to Islam in Yemen.

This makes little sense. First, Samaw’al ibn ‘Adiya was a pre-Islamic Arab poet in Yemen who was either a convert to Judaism or of Jewish descent, not a Jewish convert to Islam (as “Shmu’el Ben Adaya”, he has a street named after him in Jerusalem). Second, “Cobb” is an English surname, and “Harris” is an English first name. Perhaps there’s a Jewish “Ben Cobb” surname of which I am unaware, but either way, it seems unlikely that a person with such a name would be the origin of the Palestinian Shuaybat clan, or that the family of such a person could be traced back to a sixth-century Yemeni poet.

It’s also not clear how he would have Jewish ancestry on his American side. According to his own account in Why We Left Islam (blogged here), he states that (pp. 19-20):

My maternal grandfather, F.W. Georgeson… was a great friend of Winston Churchill.

Frederick W. Georgeson was the mayor of Eureka, California; according to is a 1915 biography here, he was born in Scotland, and his wife was from Iowa and named Thompson. However, elsewhere he names Georgeson as his “Great Grandfather”, and from the birth date (F.W. was born in 1858) it seems likely that there is at least one intermediate generation (Incidentally, Georgeson’s supposed association with Churchill appears to have eluded the attention of historians and biographers).

Shoebat’s more general point of a genetic link between Jews and Palestinians has some scientific validity, although it’s a strange point for him to make, and in his case his argument is based on a supposed special access to knowledge:

…in all Palestinian homes you will find the Star of David in front of every home. The Star of David you will find Palestinians who still observe many things Jewish. Eating the lamb standing up comes from Exodus.

That “in all Palestinian homes you will find the Star of David” is a new one to me.

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• Walid Shoebat Claims Jewish Ancestry “On Both Sides” (barthsnotes.com)

Rick Perry Courts Jewish Taliban

Perry held a press conference  with pro-Israel hardliners in New York City. | AP Photo Close

 

By MAGGIE HABERMAN | 9/20/11 4:19 PM EDT   Updated: 9/20/11 8:18 PM EDT

No one running for president in 2012 has been to Israel more often than Rick  Perry—and that includes Barack Obama. The Texas governor has not only  traveled there frequently, he’s written about protections for the Jewish state and denounced Obama for his  Mideast policy.

Never was his longstanding connection to Israel clearer than Tuesday, when he held a press conference with pro-Israel hardliners in New  York City, against the loaded backdrop of the coming push at the United Nations  for Palestinian statehood.

“It is time to change our policy of appeasement toward the  Palestinians to strengthen our ties to the nation of Israel, and in the process  establish a robust American position in the Middle East characterized by a new  firmness and a new resolve,” Perry said, criticizing President Obama as lax in  his approach.

“As a Christian, I have a clear directive to support Israel, so from my  perspective it’s pretty easy,” he said when asked about any theological  implications of his support for Israel. “Both as an American and as a Christian,  I am going to stand with Israel.”

Yet if Perry has essentially become a Zionist over the years, he’s one  without many American Jews surrounding him.

At best, he’s had a minimalist relationship with national Jewish groups,  multiple sources said: until he began meeting with top Jewish leaders over the  past week, his outreach had rarely gone beyond Texas borders. At a moment of  intense focus on the small Jewish vote and an influential group of Jewish  donors, Perry is still struggling to translate his interest into Jewish votes as  he seeks to explain his views on both Israel and his own faith.

“The Jewish community often has had questions about some things he says,” said Alan Sager, a former county GOP chairman in Texas who is Jewish and who has  known Perry for years. That includes, he said, things like the massive August  day of prayer Perry set up long before he decided to run for  president.

“My wife, both of [us]…don’t see any problem with what he’s done. It’s fine  with me. He can be whatever he wants about his religion,” Sager said. “But  that’s obviously not the prevailing feeling in the Jewish community.”

Perry’s focus on Israel is a reflection of the small nation’s ever larger  role in Republican politics—evangelical Christians and defense hawks care deeply  about Israel’s well being, enough to make a pilgrimage there an  all-but-requisite stop in a GOP presidential primary. Yet the governor’s  interest in the issue predates his presidential ambitions, tracking back two  decades to early in his career when he made trade missions to Israel as Texas  agricultural commissioner.

He referred to those trips, which began in 1991, on his first outing in New  Hampshire in August when he was approached by a pro-Israel voter.

“I love Israel,” Perry said, lingering on each word. “I lead trade missions  to Israel.”

During a 2009 visit there, he focused on his personal history in the Jewish  state.

“We have a connection that goes back many years,” Perry said at the time,  according to the Jerusalem Post. “And Israel has a lot that we can learn from,  especially in the areas of water conservation and semi-arid land – Israeli  technology has helped us a lot in dealing with drought.”

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0911/63970.html#ixzz1YXjffHfz

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