By Bruce Wilson
Posted on March 1, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/wilson/48672/
US House minority whip Roy Blunt flew to San Antonio, last week, to pay tribute to Texas Pastor and apocalyptic nuclear war advocate John Hagee. In a "Christians United For Israel" [CUFI] mailing sent February 26th, Hagee wrote:
I am delighted to announce that Roy Blunt is a strong supporter of Israel and following our conversation about CUFI has offered to gather groups of Congressmen in his office any time I come to Washington D.C. in the future.
Blunt is not the only politician to have courted Hagee, who had a private meeting with Senator John McCain in late January to discuss Israel and "other matters". McCain has recently said, of US tensions with Iran, that the situation could be "armageddon"
John Hagee, one of several alleged religious influences on George W. Bush, has characterized liberal Jews who do not agree with his political views as "poisoned" and is a strong proponent for a "preemptive" ( or unprovoked ) US and Israeli nuclear attack against Iran. In "Jerusalem Countdown", Hagee's latest book that has so far sold over 1.1 million copies, Hagee says the Holocaust and historical persecution of the Jews is a divine punishment for the "disobedience and rebellion of the Jews, as is antisemitism... Their own rebellion [against God] had birthed the seed of anti-Semitism that would arise and bring destruction to them for centuries to come." ( Jerusalem Countdown, pages 92 and 93 ).
[image: The Holocaust, part of divine plan ?]
The Holocaust also served as a divine mechanism, suggests Hagee in the book, to scare Jews into moving to Israel where he seems to feel they properly belong, as a necessary, magical human precondition that must be in place before the Rapture, that will grant Christians physical immortality in Heaven, can occur. In Hagee's view, after Christians are "Raptured" to Heaven, Israeli Jews will be mostly killed in the End-Time apocalyptic conflict the Texas pastor has also formed a lobbying group to - apparently - encourage.
In a recent Charisma Magazine issue John Hagee, in a piece entitled "The Coming Holy War", wrote : "Israel and America must confront Iran's nuclear ability and willingness to destroy Israel with nuclear weapons."
On July 19, 2006, at a CUFI sponsored Washington DC event called "A Night to Honor Israel", with GOP Party head Ken Mehlman and US GOP Senators Sam Brownback, Rick Santorum, John Conyers, and Kay Bailey-Hutchinson ( President George W. Bush sent recorded greetings to the event ) , Pastor John Hagee declared :
"The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God's plan for both Israel and the West... a biblically prophesied end-time confrontation with Iran, which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation [...] and [the] Second Coming of Christ."
As recounted by Terje Langeland, reporting for the Colorado Springs Independent in 2003, one of Pastor John Hagee's CUFI board members, George Morrison, expresses his sense of how Israeli and Israeli Jews will fare in the apocalytpic scenario Hagee and others long for :
" Morrison, whose casual, folksy manner belies his apocalyptic beliefs, already sees signs that the End is approaching. The European Union, he says, might be the alliance of nations that according to prophecy will join the Arabs to wage war against Israel during the final days."Great wars will begin to take place" Morrison says in a matter-of-fact voice. "Those wars are going to involve nukes."
The extent of the destruction will prompt Jesus to return in order to stop it, Morrison believes. Unfortunately, he says, many Jews will be killed.
"It's another Holocaust, if you will" Morrison says. "
[image, above : Hiroshima survivor's drawing of the bombing's aftermath, from the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum]
Falwell said, in a December 2, 1984 sermon: "Millions of Jews will be slaughtered at this time but a remnant will escape and God will supernaturally hide them for Himself for the last three and a half years of the Tribulation, some feel in the rose-red city of Petra. I don't know how, but God will keep them because the Jews and the Chosen People of God." (December 2, 1984 sermon)"
From a pamphlet by Jerry Falwell entitled “Armageddon and the Coming War with Russia.” :“the stage is rapidly being set, even today in the Middle East, for the final conflict. Russia will invade Israel, communism will be defeated, the antichrist will appear and the ‘final holocaust’ at Armageddon will consume the Earth.” ( as quote by the The Oakland Tribune, October 23, 1984 )
"Who is this remnant [those who will survive] ?
God promises that by his sovereign grace a "remnant" would be saved by the grace of God, a group of survivors who have the opportunity to receive Messiah, who is a rabbi known to the world as Jesus Christ." ( Jerusalem Countdown, paperback edition, pages 192 and 194 )
What Secret "Other Matters" Did McCain Discuss With "Apocalypse Now" Hagee ?
and also these stories:
footnote: What is CUFI ?
Sarah Posner: Lobbying For Armageddon
Max Blumenthal : Israel, the US, and the Christian Right: The Menage a Trois From Hell
Bill Berkowitz : Holy Warriors Set Sights
on Iran
Esther Kaplan : Christian Zionism all juiced up
Richard Bartholomew : Armey: Bush Believes in Tribulation, but not Trying to Make it Happen
Bruce Wilson : Dick Armey Denies Bush Administration Trying To Provoke "End Times"
"As Bush's War Strategy Shifts to Iran, Christian Zionists Gear Up for the Apocalypse"
"Apocalyptic preacher John Hagee says McCain is 'on target'"
"Can Giuliani Be the Armageddon Candidate?"
Bruce Wilson writes for Talk To Action, a blog specializing in faith and politics.
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