Why Christians Must Oppose Zionism
Zionism is a political ideology which goes back to the late 19th century. It is an ideology based upon the belief that the Jewish people are entitled to their own homeland. Though other regions had been proposed in the 19th century as the desired place to become a nation for the Jewish people, the place that was chosen as the target region was the land of Palestine (which corresponds closely to Canaan and ancient Israel in the Bible). Palestine had been ruled by the Ottomans for about 400 years. Shortly afterwards, the Ottomans lost control of this region near the end of World War I and the area was put into the care of the British Government.
In late 1947 UN Resolution 181, which called for a partition of Palestine into two states, a Jewish state and a non-Jewish state, was passed. This plan essentially stole 50 percent of Palestine from Arabs who lawfully owned and inhabited it, raising Jewish control of the land from 6 percent to 56 percent. There was immense international pressure on the nations from powerful Zionists to accept this plan. Then US President Harry Truman said of this pressure. “The facts were that not only were there pressure movements around the United Nations unlike anything that had been seen there before, but that the White House, too, was subjected to a constant barrage. I do not think I ever had as much pressure and propaganda aimed at the White House as I had in this instance. The persistence of a few of the extreme Zionist leaders—actuated by political motives and engaging in political threats—disturbed and annoyed me.” Pressure was also put upon powers in the USA to further persuade other countries to vote in favor of the resolution through the threat of the loss of US foreign aid if they did not vote in favor of the resolution.
Arab authorities never accepted this plan (why would they accept mass theft of Arab land?) and the plan was never implemented. Rather, the Jews invaded the land and ended up with an even larger percentage than what was allotted them by the UN. A Jewish state was created in May of 1948 and subsequent conflicts have further increased Jewish control of the land and Jewish power over Arabs. The Jews themselves have not been subject to the United Nations and have increasingly demolished homes, displaced Palestinians, created new Jewish settlements, and have exercised extremely restrictive control in Palestinian areas which were not allocated to them by the UN.
All of this demonstrates the unrighteousness of the Zionists and the modern nation of Israel. They have proven that they were only seeking to use the United Nations to give credibility to an invasion which they planned upon doing anyways. Even before the 1947 UN resolution was passed, terrorist acts by Zionists upon the British authorities in Palestine were common, including the bombing of the administrative headquarters for Mandatory Palestine at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem in 1946 which killed 91 people. This bombing was done to destroy documents which provided evidence of other attacks upon the British carried out by Zionists.
We’re going to deal with the sense of entitlement displayed by the Jews as these things have unfolded. Our topic here is Zionism and why Christians should oppose it- because Zionism should be opposed regardless of how the Arabs have reacted as they have faced mass displacement and had the land which they lawfully possessed seized. Even though the Arabs have been far from angels, the Jews have acted like devils in this matter. If they had not been the instigators this would be a non-topic. The Arabs would never have been provoked and Zionism would be a concept which had never actually been put into practice. The focus here on the wickedness of the Jews is because the Jews are the instigators in this. And if you actually believe the Bible, they were driven out of the land of Israel by God for their rejection of Christ. Amazingly and tragically though, professing Christians, especially evangelicals, have been among the biggest supporters of Zionism when they ought to be its most outspoken critics, as well as the biggest defenders of the displaced and occupied Arabs.
One has to wonder how the Zionists could not fear God to the point where they would actually displace people from land which was lawfully acquired. The Scriptures which they claim to believe give many warnings about theft and about overall trampling on the rights of others.
Lamentations 3:35-36: “To turn aside the right of a man before the face of the most High, To subvert a man in his cause, the Lord approveth not.”
God thus rebuked a wicked king of Judah in Jeremiah 22:13: “Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong; that useth his neighbor’s service without wages, and giveth him not for his work.”
Those who do so much as justify and/or support Zionism and modern Israel better beware.
Psalm 50:16-18: “But unto the wicked God saith, What hast thou to do to declare my statutes, or that thou shouldest take my covenant in thy mouth? Seeing thou hatest instruction, and casteth my words behind thee. When thou sawest a thief, then thou consentedst with him, and hast been partaker with adulterers.”
This is that serious then. You could really go to hell for supporting Zionists in their theft and their oppression of the Arabs.
There is dispute over how exactly the displaced Arabs were driven from their homes. Some claim that Arab leaders had told them to leave and said they would be able to come back after the Zionist forces were driven away. I don’t know for sure whether that ever happened or not, but if it did it was surely not the cause of the majority of the displacements (and even if it were, it doesn’t change the fact that the Zionists stole their land and didn’t even compensate them for their loss). If you look though at the Zionist friendly Wikipedia article on the 1948 expulsion and flight of the Palestinians (at least as of 04/13/23), you’ll see an admission by the Haganah (the Zionist militia which became Israel’s national army after Israel was re-established as a nation) that at least 73 percent of the Arab departures were caused directly by the Israelis. And we know that more than 700,000 Arabs were expelled or fled from their homes during this initial displacement (besides the many displacements which have happened since).
Again, how do these Jews not fear God? The Arabs were (at least for the most part) in the land lawfully. You don’t have to support Islam to support the Arabs, you just have to not be a respecter of persons (God testifies repeatedly in Scripture that He hates respect of persons or partiality). There were even Arab Christians driven out of their homes by the Jews.
What about Joshua leading Israel into the land and driving out the Canaanites when Israel took the land the first time? Wasn’t 1948 another edition of this? No, it was certainly not. Moses and Joshua were righteous men who feared God exceedingly and followed His Law very carefully as a guide to their righteous faith. They exceedingly feared making one wrong move in God’s sight. Moses was even denied the Promised Land because of one bad judgment which he made rashly in striking a rock instead of speaking to it as God instructed him to in order to draw water from it. That is how strictly God dealt with Israel when they initially conquered Canaan (and in the years leading up to that). Israel’s early leaders hated partiality, theft, and covetousness. The Canaanites whom they drove out were also a people ripe for judgment who committed exceedingly wicked actions- actions which God deputized Israel to judge them severely for. You just have to read the Law of Moses to see the horrendous things which the Canaanites were doing and to see how God warned Israel that the land would spew them out if they did such things and weren’t obedient to Him. And such warnings also rebuke the concept at the foundation of Zionism- the concept that God gave the land of Canaan to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob’s natural descendants on an unconditional basis. This is a blatant lie, yet this lie drives Zionism and is promoted at Zionist Bible colleges and seminaries to future preachers- who in turn parrot this Zionist propaganda in America’s evangelical churches. Ezekiel 33:24-29 and several other passages of Scripture directly prove that this concept of the ethnic Jews having an unconditional right to the land is a blatant lie.
From the very time that Israel was on the verge of entering Canaan, God drove the point home to Joshua, Israel’s leader after Moses had died, that He was not going to show Israel special favor and give them Canaan just because they are natural descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Joshua 5:13-15: “And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries? And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my Lord unto his servant? And the captain of the Lord’s host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so.” It is evident who this was that was speaking to Joshua. It is similar to how God appeared to Moses at the burning bush.
With a resounding no then, 1948 was not like Israel’s initial conquest of Canaan. God did not deputize these Zionists like He deputized Israel under Joshua. And even way back then, the Israelites spared those Canaanites who had separated from the evil of the Canaanites. The Jews in 1948 took no care to spare the Arabs they conquered, no matter how righteous they might have been. You just have to read about the leaders of the Zionists in 1948 to see that they were actually more like the Canaanites whom God used Joshua and Israel to destroy in ancient times. Murderers, thieves, terrorists, extortioners, manipulators, etc. who had no fear of God (and some of them eventually became Presidents of Israel too). And professing Christians who support Zionism should consider that justifying modern Israel is essentially saying that present day Judaism, in its rejection of Christ, is godly and in the grace of God. Are you willing to put Christ rejecting Jews in the place of Moses and Joshua, and displaced Arabs in the place of the exceedingly wicked Canaanites?
Proverbs 24:23-25: “These things also belong to the wise. It is not good to have respect of persons in judgment. He that saith unto the wicked, Thou art righteous; him shall the people curse, nations shall abhor him: But to them that rebuke him shall be delight, and a good blessing shall come upon them.”
Proverbs 17:15: “He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both are abomination to the Lord.”
Modern Jews who reject Christ are gentiles or heathens in a spiritual sense. This is actually stated plainly in the Bible in Revelation 11:8 where Jerusalem near the end of time is said to be spiritually called Sodom and Egypt. To believe, as some do, that these have the land of Canaan promised to them is ridiculous. They have forfeited their part in the promises to Abraham’s seed. The Jews as a whole are out of line with their own Scriptures and opposed to the God who raised Israel up as a nation. When the Jews rejected Jesus and delivered Him up to be crucified, they said (recorded in Matthew 27:25), “His blood be on us, and on our children.” Those who believe the Bible must acknowledge that the Jewish nation had been guaranteed God’s judgment and dismantling if it were to reject its Messiah. The Temple’s destruction itself by the Romans ultimately sealed this. It was a judgment which Jesus and other men of God had warned would happen. They had been given much opportunity to repent. Jesus said in Matthew 23:37-39: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Behold, your house is left unto you desolate. For I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.”
There is no good reason at all to believe that God’s attitude has ever changed towards the Jewish nation; and no reason to believe that His wrath has departed from Jews who reject their Messiah. His blood is still upon them. So is modern Israel, a nation composed mostly of unbelieving Jews, a nation under God’s favor? Of course not. Is it any more proper to bless Israel now than it was in AD 70 when God was pouring out His wrath upon them through the Romans for their disobedience to Him and their cruel rejection of their King? Of course not. As a people they continue to harden themselves against their King and reject His reign over them. Natural Jews now, in order to be in God’s favor, must renounce this hideous choice of the vast majority of their ancestors by bowing to worship Jesus Christ from the heart. Hence, they must go contrary to their own people in a very real way in order to partake of God’s grace. And closely related to this, Christ’s church, His true people, are the true Israel in God’s eyes. The church did not replace Israel because the Christian church is built upon the Jewish Scriptures and its foundation stones are Jewish people- since the earliest Christians were faithful Jews. We can’t rightfully say that the Christian church replaced Israel, but it is right to say that the nation of Israel itself was rejected by God and the spiritual Israel remains. Natural Jews who don’t believe in Christ are not part of that spiritual Israel. Faithful Christians, whether they are natural Jews or gentiles, are indeed part of the spiritual Israel.
Some will cite Psalm 122 which talks about praying for the peace of Jerusalem to justify support of modern Israel. Yet praying for the peace of Jerusalem in this Psalm is connected to the house of the Lord in Jerusalem. But God rejected Jerusalem in AD 70, His house is no longer there, and Jerusalem is no longer the center of His worship. It’s good to pray for any and every city, but the circumstances related to the call to especially pray for Jerusalem in Psalm 122 do not exist now. Regarding Jerusalem in its present spiritual state, we have an appropriate rebuke in Isaiah 57:20-21: “But the wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.”
Some will say that the Arabs in Israel ought to just go back to the country that their ancestors have come from. Sadly, many have been forced to do so due to Jewish oppression and theft (many of these live in cramped quarters and extreme poverty). And really, what an elitist thing to say! Try applying that logic to any other group of people who lawfully inhabit a land (we’re not talking about illegal immigrants here, that would be different). Imagine being told that the former inhabitants of the land you live in, who were driven out a multitude of centuries ago, want to come back, so you must now move back to the place that your ancestors left centuries earlier themselves. That is insane, this logic is impossible to carry out to its logical end, it is impossible to justly arbitrate, and nobody wouldn’t be outraged if such a thing were said regarding themselves in their present living arrangement. To say such about the Arabs giving place to the Jews is nearly, if not totally, a statement implying that Jews are inherently more important than Arabs and ought to be treated as superior to them. No one should tolerate such a thought and expect to be deemed a righteous person by God.
Some will say that we should support Zionism because Israel becoming a nation and the Jews coming back to the land en masse is a fulfillment of Biblical prophecy. Well then maybe we should applaud and justify the people who crucified Christ. They were definitely fulfilling Biblical prophecy in doing so. It is not man’s job to try to fulfill Biblical prophecy regarding the future; and those who do evil which fulfills Biblical prophecy are certainly still evil. Evil is evil. Yet if you look at the actual prophecies in the Old Testament which talk about Israel’s restoration and its kingdom at the end of the age, you will notice several statements and implications that God will purge Israel and Jerusalem before He delivers them and dwells among them. It’s obvious that no natural Jew is going to have any part in this in this who does not in truth repent, turn to Jesus Christ, and serve Him faithfully in this age. Just because the Bible indicates that there will be Jews in the land near the end of time before Christ returns doesn’t warrant support for modern Israel the slightest bit. And besides, there are Scriptures like Deuteronomy chapter 28’s prophecy of the terror which will come upon the Jewish people if they are not obedient to God. And to prove the point that it is not up to man to fulfill Biblical prophecy about the future, we should also not be cruel to individual Jews to fulfill such threats from God’s Word. We should rather love our neighbors as ourselves and do what is just. And that is all that is being advocated in this call to reject Zionism and stand against the injustice involved therein.
Some might say that opposing Israel is supporting Hamas. Yet that is silly. None of this justifies Hamas. Hamas oppresses too. They are not the solution. Hamas has arisen as a false solution to a real problem. If Zionism had never been put into practice, Hamas would not have come into being. Modern Israel and its oppression have actually contributed to the spread of Islamic fundamentalism.
Some say that being opposed to Zionism aligns one with wickedness on the Left since the political Left is generally much more opposed to Zionism than the political Right is. Yet a broken clock is right twice a day. To be a faithful, honest judge you must judge the broken clock to be right and agree with it for 2 minutes of the day while disagreeing with it the other 1,438 minutes. There are some who would be against Israel no matter what they do, yet these are no worse than those who support Israel no matter what evils they do. Opposing Zionism does not, and should not, mean being opposed to Jews on a personal level nor justifying evil perpetrated against Jews. We should not have partiality. The case set forth here is that not having partiality means opposing Zionism and standing up in a lawful manner for those whom the Zionists have oppressed. And besides, in advocating and/or defending Zionism one is aligning with some of the most wicked false teachers in the realm of professing Christianity, especially Prosperity Gospel teachers who teach that gain equals godliness and Dispensationalist teachers who teach that wicked Jews are in covenant with God (and who also teach the wicked unconditional eternal security doctrine).
Supporters of Zionism frequently try to equate being against Zionism with antisemitism. Yet anti-Zionism and being antisemitic are not necessarily connected. There are even ethnic Jews (some who are secular, some who are religiously Christian, and even some who are religiously Jewish) who oppose Zionism. There are extremely harsh rebukes throughout the Bible aimed at the Jewish nation and/or a great mass of Jewish people- spoken by faithful Jewish people. You could accuse those who have a problem with the Book of Isaiah of being antisemitic too. Jesus Christ in His incarnation was the essence of a faithful Jew who lived in utter alignment with the Jewish Scriptures- yet He was rejected and crucified by the Jewish people. Crucifying Him was the ultimate act of antisemitism if He was indeed the Jewish Messiah whom the Jewish Scriptures constantly pointed to. Yet many want the honor and advantages of a Jewish heritage while not having the surrendered, obedient faith which fears God and works righteousness before Him (which is the essence of the Jewish forefather Abraham’s faith; the essence of being a faithful Jew). This heritage is a convenient thing to hide behind and a good way of manipulating others who stand in one’s way. We know that respect of persons, which in the Jews’ case has often been expressed in thinking that they are inherently better than non-Jews, is a concept which Jesus rebuked frequently in the Gospels. Such a rebuke actually directly resulted in Him almost being killed by the inhabitants of His hometown Nazareth in Luke chapter 4.
Many in the Bible were spiritually destroyed by trying to please the Jews in the sense of compromising to get their favor (Pilate, Felix, the Galatians were at least on track for this and the recipients of the letter to the Hebrews were also evidently in great danger of this). Why do Christians tiptoe around the Jews and are so extra careful not to displease them? What are we so scared of? We know that Zionist Jews are extremely powerful, but Proverbs 29:25 says: “The fear of man bringeth a snare: but whoso putteth his trust in the Lord shall be safe.” We are also instructed to be wise as serpents (so we’re not going to post this message on Zionist Jew controlled YouTube or Facebook). Did not God Himself see to it that the Jews were driven out of the land in AD 70? Who gave them the right to come back? Imagine the prodigal son going back to his father’s house acting like he had never really done much wrong and acting like he was just entitled to come back whenever he wanted (only in the Jews’ case it is worse because they were driven out of the land by God’s judgment; the prodigal son left his father’s house willingly). Do not the Zionist Jews and modern Israel blaspheme Jesus Christ? Consider how improper supporting Zionism is seeing that these things are so.
2 Chronicles 19:1-2: “And Jehoshaphat the king of Judah returned to his house in peace to Jerusalem. And Jehu the son of Hanani the seer went out to meet him, and said to king Jehoshaphat, Shouldest thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate the Lord? therefore is wrath upon thee from before the Lord.”
Aaron’s email is: [email protected]