By Josh Ahrens - May 8, 2019
This has been an extremely difficult week for Israel as the terror organization Hamas has launched seven hundred deadly rockets from Gaza into Israeli communities.
Most in the international community and mainstream media have chosen to do what they do every time Hamas attacks Israel. They take the opportunity, not to call on Hamas to stop firing rockets at innocent civilians, but to report on the conflict in a way that demonizes Israel for responding to these acts of terror.
After Hamas relentlessly bombed Israeli communities, this is how Sky News chose to report on that... "5 Dead in Gaza amid Failed Israel Ceasefire Talks." They left out Hamas, and the Israelis Hamas has killed. I would suggest wording it like this... "Oppressive Terror Organization Hamas Breaks Ceasefire with Israel, Renews Rocket Attacks, Causing Deaths on Both Sides."
Words matter.
Adding fuel to the fire, the New York Times chose to publish this antisemitic cartoon (which looks lifted straight out of 1940’s Nazi propaganda.)
Jeremy Corbyn, the leader (!!) of the British Labor Party, recently did the same, endorsing a book which repeats Nazi tropes about Jews controlling the media.
Indifference to such careless words has helped spread the agenda of Hamas to nearly every area of life in the West. French Jews are leaving France in record numbers because of antisemitic attacks. American university campuses continue to perpetuate incidents against Jews, rising in frequency year after year. Canada has seen its third straight year of record-breaking antisemitic attacks. It's the same story in Sweden. In this article written by IC alum Jeff Walton, we see the Presbyterian Church (USA) continue to unfairly malign Israel.
Could we have imagined this list of events ten years ago? Will we rise to the challenge and share the truth and beauty of Israel with those in the audiences God has trusted us with? Will we be counted among those who saw the warning signs early and spoke up? Are we willing, as Jesus followers first and foremost, to pay a cost if necessary?
There is a correlation between these cartoons, the biased news reporting, and the false teaching pervading some Christian denominations: It all leads to violence (or tolerance of that violence) against Jews.
You, the Israel Collective, leaders of the next generation, are the key. We must educate our audiences on what antisemitism is, and how to respond to it with love, courage, and truth.