Israel, Iran, and the Ishmaelites

By Bill Salus

As Iran’s nuclear development program nears completion, the rogue state draws dangerously close to possessing sufficient military power to control the OPEC Oil Cartel and the Islamic Crescent. Iran’s apparent quest to obtain overwhelming power in the Mideast region justifiably concerns Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz, who has recently ratcheted up his support for the destruction of Iran’s nuclear sites and implementation of his Saudi Mideast Peace Initiative of 2002. King Abdullah’s latest geo-political actions tell a timeline tale of sincere concerns the Middle East is about to go apocalyptic.

His present politicking evidences his fear that Iran’s nuclear aspirations are much more expansive than wiping Israel off the map, but also include forcing Sunni subservience of Shiite Islamic theology throughout the Fertile Crescent. Additionally, his haste to motivate Mideast peace seemingly demonstrates his awareness that Israel is preparing, pre-emptively or otherwise, to protect itself with Godspeed from all existential threats emanating out of Iran and / or its proxies, Hezbollah, Syria, and Hamas.

Listed below is a chronology of Abdullah’s recent geo-political actions evidencing his concerns that a shift in the balance of Mideast power could be forthcoming;

June 12, 2010 - Saudi Arabia opens up a thin strip of strategic airspace to Israel for a potential strike against Iran’s nuclear site(s). This was an extraordinary out of character development considering Saudi Arabia doesn’t even recognize Israel’s right to exist as the bonafide Jewish State. Both Saudi Arabia and Israel officially denied this airspace became available, but coincidentally about the same time the Saudi military conducted wide scale exercises intended to prevent friendly fire from striking Israeli bombers in the event they crossed Saudi airspace on route to attack Iran. In fact, it was reported about the same time Egypt independently conducted military exercises of a similar nature.

June 13, 2010 - The Israeli Air Force (IAF) reportedly landed aircraft in Tabuk, Northwest Saudi Arabia. Supposedly all Saudi commercial air traffic shut down at the time for the deployment of these Israeli aircrafts. Iran Fars News reported at the time that Israel intends to use Tabuk as a pre-emptive launch point to attack Iran’s nuclear sites. Interestingly, King Abdullah won't allow the existence of a Jewish synagogue anywhere in his kingdom, but now invites the IAF to deploy upon Saudi soil.

June 29. 2010 - Abdullah travels to Washington to discuss volatile Mideast events. Reportedly Obama enlisted Abdullah’s support to end the American – Afghanistan war. Abdullah promised he could exert such influence in the region and, in turn, requested Obama's assurance that Israel would accept his Saudi peace plan of 2002.

Supposedly, Obama said he would force Israel, if need be, to accept this entirely Arab initiated peace proposal. This peace plan, among many things, calls for Israel to forfeit land acquired in the aftermath of their 1967 war victory, allow the return of millions of Palestinian Refugees, and afford the Palestinians a state of their own with East Jerusalem as its capital. For more information on the Saudi Peace initiative accepted by the Counsel of Arab States in Lebanon in 2002 (click here).

July 28, 2010 - King Abdullah is scheduled to visit Egypt. Egyptian President Mubarak, recently diagnosed with cancer, has recently been actively encouraging direct peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. This is a significant meeting that starts a Mideast tour for the Saudi King. One of the expected goals of this meeting in Egypt is to pressure Palestinian President Abbas into engaging in direct peace talks with Benjamin Netanyahu. Abbas, has expressed serious reservations about direct talks without pre-conditions. Abbas wants Israel to freeze all settlement construction before he entertains any such talks.

July 29, 2010 – Abdullah then travels to Syria to meet with Israel’s arch enemy, President Bashar Assad. The Saudi king hasn’t paid a visit to Syria since 2002, the year the Saudi Peace Initiative was approved by the Counsel of Arab States. It appears at least one of the round table topics will be how Syria can reclaim title of the strategic Golan Heights, which is included within the stipulations of the Saudi Peace Initiative. Interestingly, Syria has bonafide war pacts in place with Iran and Hezbollah that came into being between 12/2009 and 2/2010. One can imagine these war-pacts are of serious concern to Abdullah who is vehemently opposed to Iran’s developing nuclear program. Additionally since 2004, Jordan's king Abdullah II has been warning of the formation of a coming Shiite Crescent through Iraq, Syria, and the Hezbollah of Lebanon.

July 30, 2010 - King Abdullah is slated to travel to Lebanon, which is another country he hasn’t visited since the Saudi Peace Plan of 2002 was sanctioned there. He is scheduled to meet with Lebanese president Michel Suleiman who has publicly hinted in the past that his armed forces will support Hezbollah in the event of another Israeli – Hezbollah conflict. Meanwhile, around July 8, 2010, Hezbollah reportedly deployed approximately 20,000 troops along the southern borders of Lebanon.

Current Middle East events are extremely alarming and observably King Abdullah appears to be gravely concerned. His proactive involvement in Mideast affairs underpins a sense of urgency and desperation. Abdullah has pulled his peace plan of 2002 out of the archives and is seriously promoting it in both Washington and the Middle East. It seems evident his enthusiasm to bring about Mideast peace is driven by selfish, secular, and spiritual motives.

Abdullah, the head of the house of Saud, has reigned over the largest and wealthiest Arab State since his half brother King Fahd had a major stroke in January of 1996. His Kingdom presently possesses the number #1 ranking in OPEC and one-quarter of the world’s oil reserves. Additionally, his country hosts Islam’s two most sacred holy sites located in Mecca and Medina.

He presides over an untold fortune driven by oil production and mandatory Muslim pilgrimages to Mecca. According to Bible prophecy Saudi Arabia will not dwell in this status quo condition indefinitely. Someday soon Saudi Arabia will be involved in Psalm 83 and subsequently burdened by Ezekiel 38 & 39. These are two distinctly different end time’s Israeli War prophecies that many eschatologists believe are soon and sequentially forthcoming.

Saudi Arabia appears in the climatic concluding Arab – Israeli War prophecy of Psalm 83 under the banner of the Ishmaelites. Ishmael was promised to father a nation in Genesis 17:20 and many bible scholars recognize him as the father of the Arabs and thus the predominant patriarch of the modern day Saudis.

Ezekiel 25:13-15 states the Saudis and several of their Psalm 83 Arab cohorts are defeated by the Israeli Defense Forces. Ezekiel alludes to the Saudis as Dedan, which was located in Northwestern Saudi Arabia in ancient times. Coincidentally the Tabuk airfield, presently hosting the Israeli aircrafts alluded to above, is relatively nearby ancient Dedan.

In the subsequent massive invasion of Israel described in Ezekiel 38 & 39 the Saudis lift their voice in apparent protest as a contingency from Dedan (Ezekiel 38:13). The Ezekiel invaders, inclusive of Russia, Iran, Turkey, Libya, Ethiopia and several others, form a coalition seeking to destroy Israel and capture plunder and great spoil. Due to Iran’s and Turkey’s hatred of Israel, many end time’s experts believe Ezekiel 38 & 39 is about to find final fulfillment.

For some reason the Saudis, Yemenites, and a group of merchants from Tarshish, possibly parts of Europe and America, abstain from enjoining the Ezekiel confederacy. Some speculate that the Saudis along with the merchants seek to conduct international commerce with Israel and publically protest the genocidal motives of the Ezekiel 38 invaders.

In conclusion, Saudi King Abdullah’s present haste to create peace in the Middle East could be another indicator that the days of Mideast diplomacy are winding down and the Holy Land is about to go apocalyptic in fulfillment of Psalm 83 and Ezekiel 38 & 39.

When Diplomacy Ends Holy War Begins!

By Bill Salus

On April 19, 2010 Israel celebrated 62 years of independence. On that same day American president Barrack Obama announced the United States may leverage its veto power in the United Nations against Israel in the future. His threatening statement, which represents a major departure from previous U.S. foreign policy, was designed to coerce Israel into Obama’s vision for Middle East peace.

The very next day the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion occurred in the Gulf of Mexico killing 11 workers and injuring 17 others. This explosion created what is being touted as the world’s largest oil spill and is still ongoing today. Estimates are that hundreds of millions of gallons of oil have already seeped into the gulf and no definitive end to the seepage is presently in sight.

Approximately one week earlier on April 14, 2010 the UK watchdog agency called the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) banned Israel from including pictures of the Western Wall in promoting tourism to citizens of the UK. The ASA is the UK’s independent regulator of advertising across all media including TV, internet, sales promotions and direct marketing. The reason given is that it implied Israel possessed legal sovereignty over East Jerusalem, something the Arab League and apparently even the UK government contests.

Oddly on the very same day the Eyjafjallajokull Iceland volcano erupted grounding all flights and about one-million people from the UK and much of Europe. The apparent reward for the ASA’s potential adverse affect on Israeli tourism was that all tourism departing from or arriving to the UK remained at a complete standstill. All flight traffic remained grounded for approximately 2 weeks until the volcanic dust settled.

Meanwhile, as the ashes were falling upon the UK creating a nauseous odor over parts of Europe, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, “Yom Hashoah”, ceremonies were concluding in various parts of the world. These ceremonies commemorated the millions of Jews reduced to ashes from being incinerated during the Holocaust. Many in Europe still recall the horrific smell of those charred Jewish ashes. Dust for dust and ashes from Auschwitz might best describe the irony.

Interestingly, on July 1, 2010 I landed at Heathrow airport in the UK for a three week TV and speaking tour and was surprised to see almost as many Muslims in their religious garb as there were westerners. The Muslim population is rising 10 times faster than the rest of UK society. Presently the Muslim community has grown to about 2.5 million inside of the entire U.K. population of approximately 62 million. Islamic (Sharia) law has been adopted and is being integrated into various municipalities within the UK. (image of a previous Muslim protest in London)

Apparently the growing number of Muslims in the UK has shaped the ultra liberal politically correct thinking of the ASA. As such, it seems the God of Israel may have punished the UK by temporarily grounding all flights, which caused the loss of millions of dollars in tourism and other related revenues.

My delightful UK tour host, Pastor Bob Waughman an associate of Prophetic Witness Movement International, (PWMI) informed me of this recent ASA incident. He and many of the end time’s experts in the UK are correlating the coincidental timeliness of the Iceland volcano and the BP oil spill with the curse for curse in kind clause of Genesis 12:3. For those of you not familiar with how God’s Gentile foreign policy toward Israel is finding application today, Bill Koenig’s “Eye to Eye” book is a must read.

The obvious lesson to be gleaned by humanity from these seemingly coincidental episodes above is “do unto Israel as you would have done by Israel’s God Jehovah unto you”. However, is there an even greater lesson to be learned? If there is a connection to be made between mistreatment of Israel resulting in an almost instantaneous repercussion to the perpetrator, then one might safely assume that God is warning the world that it’s time to bless the Jew or else! Perhaps the days for Mideast diplomacy have ended.

Underhanded political dealings with inherent potential for harm to the nation of Israel seem to be the order of the day. A case in point occurred recently on June 29, 2010 when President Obama beseeched Saudi King Abdullah to help America win the war in Afghanistan. Abdullah sought compensation for this favor in the form of Israel accepting the Saudi Peace Initiative of 2002. Obama informed Abdullah that, if necessary, he would force Israel to accept this Arab initiative. The centerpiece of this Arab initiative is the territorial withdrawal of Israel back to its pre 1967 borders.

However, on July 6, 2010 Obama met with Netanyahu in Washington and no mention of this important discussion with Abdullah was alluded to during their photo op statements to the public. This seems surprising considering the powerful imposing implications to Israel should Obama pressure Israel in the near future toward this end. Additionally, Obama briefly mentioned the sticky topic of Nuclear Non Proliferation during the press conference with Netanyahu but didn’t elaborate upon his position about the subject. Obama simply acknowledged that Israel has unique security needs.

This surprised many of us familiar with the announcement made by Obama in May of 2010 that he wanted Israel to “come clean” on its nuclear program and come into compliance with Nuclear Non Proliferation. Reportedly, Netanyahu was infuriated with Obama’s flip-flop in this nuclear matter at the time. This represented a dramatic change from the former Bush administration’s position with regard to Israel and Non Nuclear Proliferation. Israel has adamantly shunned all past Arab demands to come clean about its nuclear program.

Amidst the backdrop of all the above, Iran enriches uranium, Hezbollah procures more rockets, Hamas still reigns in Gaza, and Syrian President Bashar Assad warns “no peace can be achieved with the present Israeli government”. Stepping outside the political spin and rumors of war hovering over Mideast matters, one gets the startling impression that the time for politically brokered land for peace deals has expired.

It is historically understood when diplomacy ends war begins. Conversely it is prophetically understood the stage appears to be set in the Middle East Theater for the Israeli war prophecies described Isaiah 17:1, Psalm 83, and Ezekiel 38 & 39 to occur soon and sequentially. The question is can a temporary peace be achieved prior to the fulfillment of these Israeli war prophecies? I think the fact that the cursing aspect of Genesis 12:3 is fulfilled almost instantaneously evidences that war, not peace, is coming next in the Holy Land.