Saturday, July 16, 2022

Boring, bland but important: 4 reasons Biden was right to visit Israel this week – All Israel News

Boring, bland but important: 4 reasons Biden was right to visit Israel this week – All Israel News

Joel C. Rosenberg is the editor-in-chief of ALL ISRAEL NEWS and ALL ARAB NEWS and the President and CEO of Near East Media.

Here’s my take on what Biden accomplished for America, Israel and the Democratic party

Joel C. Rosenberg | July 15, 2022 AIN

Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid greets U.S. President Joe Biden upon his arrival to Israel, July 13, 2022 (Photo: Haim Zach/GPO)

U.S. President Joe Biden’s trip to Israel this week didn’t really make much news in the United States or around the world. The truth is, Biden’s trip was boring and bland, but it was important for four specific reasons:

First, Biden did what Bernie Sanders never would have done. Biden’s visit to Israel immensely reinforced bipartisan support for the U.S.-Israel strategic alliance. It’s hard to picture U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders making a state visit to Israel if he had won the Democratic nomination and the presidency. 

Those are two big ifs, but Sanders certainly was a major player and remains a major player in the Democratic Party. Even though Sanders is Jewish, he’s been hostile to Israel in many ways and has formed close working ties with Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and other very hostile anti-Israel Democratic progressives. 

Thus, it is difficult to imagine a Sanders state visit to Israel, had he, in fact, been elected president – or that it would have been bland or boring. But Biden really is the best pro-Israel Democrat in his party. 

I have many criticisms of Biden on policy – certainly domestic policy, but also foreign policy. His handling of the Iran nuclear deal comes to mind. His disastrous handling of the Taliban and Afghanistan also comes to mind. And his handling of Vladimir Putin and Ukraine has not been very encouraging either.

Even still, Biden is avowedly pro-Israel. He describes himself as a Zionist, even though he’s not Jewish, and he is the best that the Democratic Party has. 

Biden has successfully pushed back the anti-Israel progressives in his party, even pointedly criticizing them this week during his trip to Jerusalem. 

That Biden decided, of all 192 countries in the world, to visit Israel; that he would have a very respectful trip; that he would shower praise on the Israeli people and government; that the photo ops would be warm and encouraging; that he would visit Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem, and make moving remarks there and sit with two Holocaust survivors – all of this was very, very positive. 

There was certainly some substance, as well, but nothing particularly newsworthy for Israel or the Middle East. 

Biden reaffirmed that he is against Iran getting a nuclear weapon. Well, that’s good. But he’s not doing an awful lot to stop Iran from getting the bomb. So far, the president seems absolutely determined to make some sort of insane nuclear deal with the Iranian regime, with no more guarantees that Iran would keep the deal than they had last time. 

Still, with all that, the trip was important because Biden’s visit reinforced the bipartisan nature of the support for the U.S.-Israel strategic alliance.

And that is important. 

Israel needs Democrats as well as Republicans to stand with Israel, support Israel, fund Israel, to work with the Americans to develop joint strategic weapons systems, including missile and rocket defense systems.

Second, Biden just gave the Democrats a “Good Housekeeping” seal of approval to the Abraham Accords by dramatically affirming bipartisan support for the historic era of Arab-Israeli peacemaking started under former President Donald Trump. This, too, cannot be over-emphasized. 

It really is an important knockout punch of the “peace industry” in Washington, which said that no peace deal could be made between Arab countries and Israel if the Palestinians didn’t make a deal with Israel first or if Israel did not make a deal with the Palestinians. 

But we’ve just seen, at the end of the Trump years, that the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain and Sudan and Morocco all were Arab countries that decided to normalize relations with Israel, despite the Palestinians’ continued rejection of normalization with Israel. 

That could have been seen just as a Republican initiative, and there was some risk early in Biden’s presidential term that Democrats wouldn’t fully embrace how important the Arab-Israeli peacemaking deals that Trump brokered were. 

Obviously, Trump didn’t win a Nobel Peace Prize, and for a while, the Biden team didn’t even want to use the term “Abraham Accords,” but this latter slight has been corrected. Biden has, to his credit, really embraced the Abraham Accords. 

On his trip this week to the Middle East, Biden affirmed that Democrats do support the Abraham Accords and want to build on them, as well. 

I personally don’t think that Biden has done enough to strengthen those accords, but he did speak of them glowingly this week; he did hold a video summit to meet with Israel, India and the new UAE president, Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan – all of which was good. 

Third, Biden’s decision to fly from Israel to Saudi Arabia on a direct flight was important, because it tacitly acknowledges that Biden needs to improve relations with the Saudis proactively, something that we at ALL ISRAEL NEWS and ALL ARAB NEWS have been saying for the last 18 months. 

Biden is laying the foundation for a groundbreaking Israeli-Saudi normalization, which is exactly what the region needs and needs soon. Biden’s direct flight to Saudi Arabia was important but not an easy decision, because the president has been so hostile to Saudi Arabia and the Saudi crown prince, the next king, Mohammed bin Salman (MBS). 

Biden deserves credit for making the hard decision to say no to those in his party who are vociferously anti-Saudi Arabia and don’t see Saudi Arabia as a strategic American ally. Biden has communicated that the U.S.-Saudi alliance is important, that it should be bipartisan and it should be built upon. This helps both Israel and the U.S. 

I will talk more in a different column about the Biden trip to Saudi Arabia, but it’s important to note that, even though Biden’s trip to Israel itself was boring and bland – without huge, groundbreaking news stories or major initiatives announced that no one had expected – the trip was still important. 

In part, this was because Biden became the first U.S. president to fly Air Force One directly from Israel to Saudi Arabia. In part, it was because he has been talking often and optimistically about helping Israel and Saudi Arabia normalize their relations. 

Fourth, Biden’s decision to meet with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Bethlehem sent an important signal that the plight of the Palestinian people is important and that it has not been forgotten by Washington or the American people. I do give Biden credit for this. 

I have many criticisms of Biden on many issues. But I think it is important for any American president, Biden in this case, to signal to the Palestinian people that they have not been forgotten, and to begin a direct conversation with Abbas that communicates that he needs to change his ways, that he is “a lion in winter.”

It’s late in the game for Abbas. He will not be the leader of the Palestinian people much longer, just because of his health and because he has been serving a four-year position for 17 years. That’s not sustainable. It’s time for a change. 

Biden has a lot more opportunity to build trust with Abbas and encourage him to make some very needed reforms inside the P.A., to deal with corruption, to improve security relations with Israel, to improve the economy, to reduce hostility toward Arab-Israeli normalization, and to confront the practice that’s known as “pay-for-slay,” that is paying a salary to Palestinian prisoners who have killed or tried to kill Israeli civilians. 

This is a horrible practice; it should be changed. And Abbas needs to stop funding it. It’s wrong. Biden has the opportunity to say these things behind closed doors, while still affirming publicly that the Palestinian people matter and they need a better life. 

I think this is important. And I say that as an Israeli. But I also say that as an Evangelical. Jesus told us to love our neighbors. The Palestinians are our neighbors. And I think that it’s not healthy when Christians act as though we only support Israel and the Jewish people, and we show little respect, love or compassion for Palestinians. I have a lot of problems with the Palestinian leadership, but I also believe that God is sovereign and that things can change.

There are enormous tectonic changes going on in the region, as I have described in my book, “Enemies and Allies.” Arab attitudes, in general, towards Israel, towards peace, towards Jews and towards Christians are changing. Attitudes of Arab leaders towards Jews, Christians and Israel are also changing.

And I believe that the Palestinian leadership can change. 

I think it’s also important that Biden and his team use not only this opportunity, but also, in the days and weeks and months ahead, other occasions to strongly urge the Palestinian leadership to stop the incitement in the mosques, schools and Palestinian media against Jews, against Israel. 

The only way to lay the groundwork is for long-term normalization, peace and quiet, and cooperation between Israelis and Palestinians is to end the incitement and the visceral, anti-Semitic and anti-Israel teachings and rhetoric that are disseminated throughout Palestinian society and begin to say, “Hey, we might not like one another, but we have to live together.” And that’s a role that Biden can and should play. 

Is he doing all of this well enough? No, not in my view. But these are four reasons why I think his trip to Israel, while bland and boring, was, in fact, important. 

Let’s see what the follow-up will hold.

Read more: JOE BIDEN | US ISRAELI RELATIONS | ANALYSIS

Joel C. Rosenberg

Joel C. Rosenberg is the editor-in-chief of ALL ISRAEL NEWS and ALL ARAB NEWS and the President and CEO of Near East Media. A New York Times best-selling author, Middle East analyst, and Evangelical leader, he lives in Jerusalem with his wife and sons.

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Friday, July 15, 2022

There is a whole lot of shofaring going on in heaven! Steve Martin, Love For His People Ministry

 

There is a whole lot of shofaring going on in heaven! Steve Martin, Love For His People Ministry

Blow the shofar! Terry Kelson and Steve Martin (far right) at the MorningStar Harvest Fest in Fort Mill, South Carolina (2009)
July 14, 2022 Charlotte, North Carolina

Greetings to my family and friends of Love For His People Ministry.

Sometimes we have mixed emotions when our loved ones pass on to their eternal reward. We want to rejoice and celebrate because they sure are now having a great time. While those left behind, family and friends, rightly grieve for the loss they feel when the one who used to sit in their favorite chair is no longer there.

Life in this world comes to an end for all of us at some time. I hope you read my thoughts on Shofaring in Heaven below, based on the lives of our two friends Ahava Hadassah (Terry Kelson Wallach) and Nita Brown. They are blowing their shofars in heaven!

Ahava and shalom,



Steve Martin, Love For His People Ministry

Photos below: 1. Terry Kelson Wallach (Ahava Hadassah) and Steve Martin (far right) at the 2009 MorningStar HarvestFest in Fort Mill, South Carolina

2. Nita Brown 2022

3. Nita Brown’s shofar and talitt, with artwork displayed at her memorial service



Shofaring in Heaven by Steve Martin 

“All you inhabitants of the world, you who live on the earth: when a banner is hoisted on the mountains, look! When the shofar is blown, listen!” Isaiah 18:3, Complete Jewish Bible 

Anyone who knew Nita (Frances Juanita) Brown and Ahava Hadassah (Terry Wallach) could tell when they were present in the gathered meeting. Their two shofars blew. And they each were very good at it! Within a year of each other, with Ahava passing on to glory in August of 2021, and Nita in June 2022, they left this earth, and are now sounding their shofars in the glory of their Redeemer, their Messiah, the Glorious One, Jesus Christ, Yeshua HaMashiach.

How do I know? The Bible tells me so.

“Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His godly ones.” Psalm 116:15, NASU

These two precious women of God were not only joyous in their worship of the Lord, but they were warriors who knew when to battle and used the shofar to call forth the rest of us. They had many victories over the enemy and his cohorts, and they weren’t afraid to get in the thick of it and stand while pressing forward in the victory of the Lord.I met both in 2001 at Cornerstone Church in the wee town of Pineville, North Carolina. The church itself had maybe 30, 40 people at most, but with a wonderful worship team, the presence of the Lord was known often.

Nita would give praise on the keyboard, using the 9 fingers she had. (The only other musician I knew with nine fingers was guitarist Phil Keaggy). Terry would wave colorful flags. And together they would sound the blast of the shofar, declaring victory for our families and nation.

My good wife Laurie and I had the joy of being with Ahava (Terry) after she made aliyah (immigrated as a Jew) to Israel by her 70th birthday, for a day trip into the Golan in 2019. We were going to be with her again in 2021, but covid shut the world down, and that time never occurred. We miss her to this day.

David Peterman and I were last with Nita at her home in Waxhaw, North Carolina, a few weeks before her passing on June 26, 2022, to share time with her and pray for the Lord’s goodness upon her head. Up through the week when she went from this world to the next, she was proclaiming the Lord’s faithfulness and her hope in His upcoming promises.

Her sister Mary Brown told us this fascinating story after Nita’s memorial on Wednesday, July 23, 3033 at Antioch International Church in Fort Mill, South Carolina. I truly believed it when I heard her speak.

“The day after she passed, I was sitting in our living room. Then I sensed both Nita and Terry (Ahava) dancing on the streets of heaven and blowing their shofars. What a wonderful sight!”

And rightly so. The One they served so continuously and through it all had given them their heavenly reward and they have now joined with the numerous other saints preceding them. And all others who call upon the Name of the Lord in this life will also follow to receive their promised rewards.

I look forward to heaven. I look forward to personally meeting Messiah Yeshua, the saints of old, and the many families and friends that have gone on ahead. Having proclaimed the goodness of the Lord, with His saving grace and forgiveness received in this life, eternal life will never end.

“Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1-2, NKJV

Ahava and shalom,

Steve Martin, Love For His People founder

Message #91 in this series – in the year of our Lord 07.14.2022 – “Shofaring in Heaven”,  Thursday, 5:05 pm in  Charlotte, North Carolina, USA




Watch the video: HOPE IN THE LORD with David Peterman and Steve Martin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTjlaYYrg-s&list=PLlRsYroaU_0CyZNv7LlYBU99oZ163mozX&index=15



Encouragement – first from Jerusalem, Israel, and then from Charlotte, North Carolina, USA
by Steve Martin (published May 25, 2022)

In April 2022 my good friend David Peterman of Lancaster, South Carolina, and I took an Ahava Adventure (“love” in Hebrew) back to Jerusalem as soon as the skies and the Land of Israel opened up again. During those 10 days the Lord Yeshua, Jesus Christ, gave me words to share, which I wrote down each day to share with others. These make up the first part of this book.

In April 2022 my good friend David Peterman of Lancaster, South Carolina, and I took an Ahava Adventure (“love” in Hebrew) back to Jerusalem as soon as the skies and the Land of Israel opened up again. During those 10 days the Lord Yeshua, Jesus Christ, gave me words to share, which I wrote down each day to share with others. These make up the first part of this book.

The next section is comprised of messages inspired by the Holy Spirit from our home in Charlotte, North Carolina, beginning before and after the Israel trip. As the Lord would give me a prophetic word, I would start writing and He would further expand on it. Thus those words are written in the major section of this book.

Everyone needs encouragement. Every day. All the negative news spewed out from social media platforms and airwaves needs to be offset by the good news the Lord Jesus (Yeshua) brings to us. From the time He walked the streets of Jerusalem in the first century, to today in this 21st Century, He shares love from heaven and from this home in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Until He returns soon, may these messages uplift your spirit, reveal more of His heart, and sustain you as you walk daily in the direction the Holy Spirit gives with the grace and provision that comes with His presence.

Steve Martin July 2022Charlotte, North Carolina USA

To purchase on Amazon: Encouragement – from Jerusalem, Israel and then from Charlotte, North Carolina – Paperback $12.95 E-book $2.99

SPECIAL NOTE: Our ministry’s mobile app is available for iPhones and Androids. This is a free app download. Look here: Love For His People free phone app You can sign up for my email messages: Love For His People. The sign-up form is on our ministry website: ministry newsletter E-mail: loveforhispeople@gmail.com Please share this message with your friends through your email, on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, LinkedIn, Gettr and more.  Others will be thankful you did. And I thank you too.  

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Steve Martin

STEVE & LAURIE MARTIN - LOVE FOR HIS PEOPLE FOUNDERS My good wife Laurie and I (45 years in October 2022!), through the ministry of Love For His People we founded in 2010, give love and support for our friends in Israel and in other nations with friendship, humanitarian aid, and social media support, along with Steve's messages, and our Ahava Adventures trips to Israel. Steve has also authored and published 34 books. We live in the Charlotte, NC area. We have four adult children, spouses, and eight grandkids.

Charity Gayle – Endless Praise (Live)

 

Charity Gayle – Endless Praise (Live)

July 15, 2022 Charity Gayle 222K subscribers

“Endless Praise”‘ by Charity Gayle (Live) | Written by Charity Gayle, Ryan Kennedy, Crystal Yates, Steven Musso, David Gentiles Produced by Kyle Lee | Directed by Chase Condon Tag: Agnus Dei by Michael W. Smith © 1990 Sony/ATV Milene Music (Admin. by Sony/ATV Music Publishing)

Steve Martin

STEVE & LAURIE MARTIN - LOVE FOR HIS PEOPLE FOUNDERS My good wife Laurie and I (45 years in October 2022!), through the ministry of Love For His People we founded in 2010, give love and support for our friends in Israel and in other nations with friendship, humanitarian aid, and social media support, along with Steve's messages, and our Ahava Adventures trips to Israel. Steve has also authored and published 34 books. We live in the Charlotte, NC area. We have four adult children, spouses, and eight grandkids.