The Rise of Antisemitism – Why Do People Hate the Jews? - Part A

Why do people hate the Jews?

That's the question Skip Heitzig will address today. The rise of anti-Semitism is occurring at an alarming rate on college campuses, at the United Nations, and across the globe. This week we are presenting a special series of messages by Skip about Israel at War. On this edition, Skip will trace the origins and trajectory of hatred for the Jews and the nation of Israel. Increasingly visible today, let's join Skip now as he considers the question, why do people hate the Jews? We just need to say it, we wholeheartedly, unequivocally stand for Israel. As a church, we stand for Israel.

And I need to add to that a little bit. There are some sensible Iranians who live in Iran and they denounce the leadership of the Ayatollahs. And they don't agree with it. They feel like they're victims in that country in which they live. They have written me letters.

I got one this week. And so they are decrying the regime of Iran, just as there were sensible Germans in World War II who denounced Adolf Hitler, and there are sensible Palestinians who live in Gaza and in other parts of the area who have denounced Hamas. And for them we pray. But by and large, the world denounced the terrorism, but not everyone.

And that is the troubling point that I want to dive into. Not everyone. If we just go back a couple of decades to our big event of terrorism, September 11, 2001, the nation was galvanized, churches were packed, the world was on our side. But you may also remember that some said this was the fault of the United States of America because of their policies with Israel especially and their policies in the Middle East in general. And when the towers fell on September 11, 2001, there were celebrations in Gaza, celebrations in many Muslim communities around the world, just like last week there were celebrations in many of these same communities because of what happened in Israel. Last Friday, the former chief of Hamas, Khaled Mashal, declared a global day of rage.

Everybody around the world was crossing their fingers, hoping nothing bad would happen. He called for Muslims around the world to take action, to send a message, a message to the Zionists and to the Americans. A national day of rage. This past week, there have been demonstrations in cities around the world, London, Paris, Berlin, to name a few, Chicago, New York, every major city, very, very pro-Palestinian, very, very anti-Israel, anti-Jewish, and very Nazi-like in the rhetoric that was used.

And I don't use the term lightly. In fact, in Berlin, one German official warned and I am quoting, I would not advise anyone to make their Jewish faith visible. This is in Berlin, Germany, decades after the Holocaust. I would not advise anyone to make their Jewish faith visible.

Those who wear the kippah, the head covering, already face the prospect of being spat on or insulted in quieter times. Isn't it sick that such things have become normal in Germany? There have been Hamas celebrations on universities, college campuses around the country. This week, at New York University, NYU, pro-Palestinian students walked up to the pictures of the families that have been taken hostage, the missing women and children that are presumably in tunnels or hidden by Hamas. Their pictures were put up for people to see who they were.

Students at NYU came and ripped those pictures down in our country. Well, I traveled to the Middle East quite a lot, not just to Israel 41 times, but I've been to Saudi Arabia, to Egypt, to the United Arab Emirates, to Jordan, to several different countries. And on some of the trips that I took, I went with a man who has spoken here before. He is going to be interviewed. The full interview will be on our website.

This is just another snippet like last week. But Johnny Moore is the one that I interviewed, and I will introduce his accolades as I begin to interview him. So we're going to show that taped interview. Well, I'm with Johnny Moore. Johnny is an evangelical leader. He's a businessman. He is a commissioner for the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. He's the president of the Congress of Christian Leaders.

I met Johnny Moore first at the White House, and I have been impressed with him ever since. Johnny, you play a unique role diplomatically, spiritually, and I want to get your take on what has happened in this past week since the first incursion of terrorists into Israel happened about a week ago. There has been a response that I did not expect. I expected the press to have a response that would be against Hamas and pro-Israel.

That's lasted for a minute or two. But there are demonstrations in cities, on college campuses, that are pro-Palestinian, very anti-Israel, very anti-Jewish, some very extremely hateful speech, even advocating for the death of Jewish people. Does that concern you, and why is that happening?

Yeah, it concerns me. I think people have missed the timeline of exactly what happened here. On Saturday, October 7th, we had the most horrific slaughter of the Jewish community since the Holocaust. And by the way, not just Israelis. Many of these people had dual citizenship, so this affected citizens of at least 43 countries. The hostages are from dozens and dozens of countries. And Israel says that they're going to retaliate, but the protests began before Israel began to retaliate. And so it demonstrates that all over the world is this network of pro-Hamas, pro-Islamist supporters of the terrorist activities of Hamas. And when they say things like, from the river to the sea, that happened in Dearborn, Michigan, by the way. Thousands of people marching down the street saying, from the river to the sea, that's a call for the genocide of the Jewish people.

Explain the river to the sea. It's the position of Hamas. It's not the two-state solution. It's the final solution. Is it from the Euphrates River to the Mediterranean Sea, eradicate the Jewish people from the Middle East?

Is that the idea? It's from the Jordan River to the sea. So the state of Israel wiped them all out. So Hamas, this is the position of Hamas.

Hamas is an anti-Semitic organization that came to kill Jews. We actually now have the instructions that they were carrying with them in the attack. And one of the pieces of instructions says, kill as many civilians as possible. They actually had maps to know where the schools were.

Somehow, not probably, from Iran, they got the intelligence most likely in order to do this attack. But it is a genocidal organization, an anti-Semitic organization, that wants to see the elimination of every single Jew on earth. And this is why I am very hesitant to compare anything to the Holocaust.

But very, very early on, the Jewish community started using this phrase. This was the worst slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust. But there's a difference between the Nazis and between these Hamas terrorists.

Because the Nazis would sometimes, very often, in fact, they would hide their crimes. And yet Hamas, openly, live-streamed their torture of children. This isn't just about Hamas. As they say in Israel, it's not about the arms of the octopus.

You have to get to the head of the octopus. And that's the Islamic Republic of Iran. It seems like our governments around the world have it come to their senses. And these protesters, this is not about Palestinians and Israelis. This is about Israel and Hamas, a terrorist organization. And if people are in the streets, sharing what Hamas did to the Jewish community, that is a national security issue. And our governments need to be paying attention to it. Johnny, in this war, in this response by Israel, they are warning the population of Gaza to get out, flee south.

We'll give you safe corridors and able to do that. Hamas has been blocking some of those corridors to not let people, they would rather see people in their own city killed, so they can have footage to show the world of the atrocities of Israel. So here is Israel trying to do everything they can to get people before they target Hamas leadership there. What do you think the next move of the Israelis is going to be? Israel is not going to stop until they totally destroy Hamas entirely, and the United States should not tell them to stop, and the European Union should not tell them to stop. I was in a conversation the other day with a woman who was speaking to us on Zoom from her bomb shelter in the north of Israel. And she said, in the past what has happened with this terrorist organization, when they send their thousands of rockets, is the international community demands that we stop.

And then she said, they ask us to stop so that they can kill us again, and this time we're not stopping. Johnny, you wrote a book, and you came out to our church and even talked about it. You did Fox's Book of Martyrs, and you talked in your book about, you know, what has been going on in terms of Christian persecution since Fox wrote his book, Up Till Modern Times.

You did such a great job in that. Where I'm going with this is, are there believers, are there missionaries in Gaza? Has the Lord been using people to reach that people group? Yeah, there are, and just like there are in Iran, we have people everywhere, and that's the hardest part in many ways about all of this, because if Christian history is any prediction of the future, we will have incredible stories of these moments of believers who sacrificed their lives to save others, and maybe even people who find Jesus through all of it. You know, I always say the best evangelist in the entire Muslim world is the Ayatollah in Iran, because he so defamed his religion and his culture that millions and millions and millions of Muslims went looking for something else, and this is why in Iran, we have the fastest growing evangelical movement in the entire Muslim world. So yes, God is at work, and Hamas persecuted the Christian community as soon as they took over the Gaza Strip.

Very, very small Christian community left there, and right now they're huddled up in churches. God expects us to recognize that he works through persecution, but we're supposed to pray for these people to be saved from evil, including the evil of terrorism. The book of Psalms says that we are to seek peace and pursue it, and then it says, justice, justice we shall pursue, and this is the juxtaposition. God hates what these Hamas terrorists did to people made in his image, and God loves peace.

Much thanks to Johnny Moore. You can get that whole interview. It's much longer than that on our website, but let's look at Revelation chapter 12. I'm going to begin in verse 1. Now a great sign appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland of 12 stars. Then being with child, she cried out in labor and in pain to give birth, and another sign appeared in heaven, behold, a great fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns and seven diadems on his heads. His tail drew a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth, and the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to give birth to devour her child as soon as it was born. She bore a male child who was to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, and her child was caught up to God and his throne.

Then the woman fled into the wilderness where she has a place prepared by God that they should feed her there 1,260 days. And war broke out in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world. He was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now salvation and strength in the kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren who accused them before our God day and night has been cast down. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death. Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them.

Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and sea, for the devil has come down to you, having great wrath, because he knows that he has a short time." Now that passage mentions war in heaven. I'm guessing the last place you expect a war is in heaven. Most of us don't think of heaven as a war zone. Heaven is a worship zone. Heaven is where the angels and the saints around the throne, the elders cast their crowns and give glory to the Lamb and to the one who sits on the throne.

But here, there is a rebellion. Satan rebelled, and when he rebelled, we know the story. He managed to rebel with a third of the angels in heaven, or as the text puts it metaphorically, he drew a third of the stars with him. Now the conflict that is outlined in chapter 12 of Revelation is all centered around a woman, a pregnant woman, a woman who is about to give birth to a male child. And she is described as clothed with the sun and the moon and having 12 stars. The question has been asked throughout the centuries, who is this woman? What is this a picture of?

What does the metaphor mean? There have been many guesses. The cultic group known as Christian Science believes that the woman is Mary Baker Eddy, who was the founder of Christian Science, who they say gave birth to Christian Science. The dragon to them is the carnal mind that rejects science and health and the doctrines that she wrote about. That is a cult, but that's how they interpret this. The Catholic Church, as you can probably guess, interprets the woman as being the Virgin Mary.

And their art reflects that. The famous paintings of Spain dating back to the 1600s and 1700s, an artist by the name of Bartolome Murillo is the one who first drew the Virgin Mary with her feet on the moon, sunbeams emanating from her face, and around her head 12 stars. He was taking this passage and interpreting it artistically to be the Virgin Mary. Some Protestants will interpret the woman as being the church because the Bible speaks of the church in the New Testament as the bride of Christ, or the bride, the Jewish bride is the motif, engaged to Christ. So it's the church, the bride engaged to Christ. The problem with that is twofold.

Number one, she's pregnant. And the virgin bride of Christ showing up pregnant is a problem theologically. And the second problem is this can't be a picture of the church giving birth to Christ, as some interpret it, because the church didn't give birth to Christ. Christ gave birth to the church. That's where we came from, from His work on the cross. So who is the woman? Well, we don't really even have to guess at who it is.

We are told in the Bible who it is, and I'm going to show you that. There's only one other place in the entire Holy Writ where you have sun, moon, and 12 stars used metaphorically besides this passage, and it's in Genesis 37. In Genesis chapter 37, Joseph, who is the son of Jacob, has a couple of dreams. You remember the story? He goes to his brothers, who hate him anyway, and he very naively says, Hey, guys, I had a dream. And it says they hated him because of his dreams. When I tell you the dreams, you'll know why. The first dream, he said to his brothers, In my dream, we were out in the field binding sheaves, and then my sheaf stood erect.

It stood up. And then all of your sheaves stood up and bowed down to my sheaf. And they said, What? Do you think we're going to bow down to you? Do you think you're going to rule over us?

We will not have you rule over us. Now, you'd think if he had another dream, he would probably not tell them after that reaction. But not Joseph. He's just kind of naive, and then he says, Well, I had another dream. And in this dream, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars bowed down to me, my star. Joseph's dad, Jacob, interpreted the dream.

He knew exactly what the dream meant because this was his reaction. He said, Shall your mother and I and your brothers bow down to you? So in that story, Jacob interprets sun, moon, and stars as Jacob, his wife, and the sons who would become the tribes of Israel. So now you have a woman clothed with the sun and the moon and the twelve stars. You go back to the only other passage where it is interpreted as being the forebears of Israel, and we have to conclude this is a picture of Israel, the woman is the nation of Israel. And what is she doing? She is birthing the Messiah. That was the aspiration of every Jewish girl to perhaps be the one who would bring Messiah into the world.

This is a picture of the nation birthing Israel. Verse 2, Being with child, she cried out in labor and in pain to give birth. The dragon in the story is poised before the woman in a very hateful stance.

Why? For one important reason, to get at the child. To get at the child who is going to be born. Why the child?

Because the child is going to be the one who is going to crush the dragon's head, his dominion, and rule the world. He rules, it says, with a rod of iron. Back in Genesis chapter 3, the first prediction of Messiah, the seed of the woman will come and bruise the heel of the serpent, crush the head of the dragon of the serpent. And then Isaiah chapter 9 talks about his rule, for unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. The government will be on his shoulder.

Of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no end. So it's a very appropriate picture of Israel birthing the Messiah, Satan ready to destroy that child as soon as he is born. With that from Skip Hitek, our teaching time draws to a close for today's broadcast. We will present part two of Why Do People Hate the Jews?

on our next edition of Connect with Skip Hitek. This important message is part of our week-long Israel at War update. For this series, here's information about a resource package that coincides with our theme of messages. When events on earth become increasingly confusing and disturbing, we need to understand what the Bible says about the days we live in and what's ahead. The book of Revelation speaks strongly about both of these issues, but many are reluctant to consider the Bible's final book.

As part of this special Israel at War series, we're offering Skip Hitek's book, You Can Understand the Book of Revelation. The signs that we're dealing with are signs of that future period, the tribulation period, seven-year period, whereas the rapture is a sign-less event. In other words, it can happen at any time. But future events often cast their shadows before them. You can understand the book of Revelation, and you need to.

Only God can accurately predict the future. We aren't told everything, but we need to understand what is revealed. Also included in this package is Skip's booklet, Are We Living in the Last Days? Get this booklet and the book, You Can Understand the Book of Revelation, when you make a donation of $50 or more to support Connect with Skip. Your gift will go toward the financial costs of this teaching program. Request your package online at connectwithskip.com or by calling 1-800-922-1888.

That's 1-800-922-1888. And join us next time on Connect with Skip Hitek for the conclusion of the message, Why Do People Hate the Jews? Make a connection, make a connection at the foot of the cross and cast all burdens on His word. Make a connection, connection. Connect with Skip Hitek is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.