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By Marc Turnage

The Golden Dome of the Rock provides one of the most iconic and recognizable images of any city’s skyline within the world. The Islamic shrine completed in A.D. 692 by the Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik stands upon the platform of the Temple Mount, which was constructed during the first centuries B.C. and A.D. The Temple Mount refers to the platform and complex upon which stood the Temple constructed by Herod the Great. This was the Temple known to Jesus, Mary, Joseph, Peter, and Paul. It stood on the northern end of the eastern hill of Jerusalem, what the Bible calls Mount Zion. 

Around 1000 B.C., David conquered the Jebusite city of Jerusalem and the stronghold of Zion, which sat on the eastern hill. He made this the capital of his united kingdom, Israel. When his son, Solomon, succeeded his father as king, he extended the city to the northern height of the eastern hill where he built his palace, administrative buildings, and the House of the God of Israel, the First Temple. This building remained situated on the height of the eastern hill until the Babylonians, under Nebuchadnezzar, destroyed it in 586 B.C. The Babylonians carried the Judeans into exile. When they returned to the land around Jerusalem, they rebuilt the Temple, under Zerubbabel. This building underwent renovations and additions in the subsequent centuries; however, our knowledge of this is limited due to the absence of clear descriptions within ancient sources and a lack of archaeological excavation in the area of the Temple Mount.

In the eighteenth year of Herod the Great’s reign as king of Judea, he began a massive remodeling and reconstruction of the Temple area, which ultimately resulted in the construction of the Temple Mount. The construction, which continued into the first century A.D., after Herod’s death in 4 B.C., created a series of four retaining walls that supported the platform, which covered the high point of the eastern hill turning it into the largest enclosed sacred space within the Roman world. The main portion of construction took nine-and-a-half years. Herod apparently oversaw the building of the Temple building, which stood twice the height of the golden Dome of the Rock, and the remodeling of the sacred precincts, an area of five hundred cubits square, during his lifetime. 

The heart of the Temple Mount was the Temple building and the surrounding sacred complex, which including the Court of the Women, the Court of the Israelites, the Chambers of Wood, Oil, Lepers, and Nazirites. Inside the Temple building was the Holy Place, which housed the golden lampstand (the menorah), the Table of Shewbread, and the altar of incense. Beyond the Holy Place was the Holies of Holies, which was entered only by the high priest once a year on the Day of Atonement.

The construction of the Temple Mount continued into the first century as the southern and northern portions of the platform expanded. The four retaining walls of the Temple Mount contained gates that offered access onto the Temple Mount platform. The northern retaining wall contained the Tadi Gate, which rabbinic sources claim was not used at all. The Shushan Gate stood on the eastern wall of the Temple Mount, of which portions seem to predate Herod, and it was lower than the other walls that surrounded the Temple Mount. 

The present eastern gate, known as the Golden Gate (or in Arabic, the Mercy Gate) was built much later than the first century. It was sealed, like most of the gates onto the Temple Mount by the Crusader, Knights Templar, who made the Temple Mount their headquarters. The western retaining wall had four gates. Two were upper and two lower, and they alternated lower and upper. The northernmost gate opened onto a street that ran alongside the western retaining wall. Today it is known as Warren’s Gate (named after the British explorer, Charles Warren, who found the gate). 

In the first century an arched bridge spanned from the western hill to the western wall of the Temple Mount. This bridge conveyed an aqueduct that provided water for the Temple worship. The bridge and the arched gateway that provided access onto the Temple Mount were identified by Charles Wilson in the nineteenth century and bear his name today. Today a portion of the western retaining wall serves as the prayer plaza of the Western Wall, a functioning synagogue, a site holy for Jews. In the women’s section of the Western Wall remains of a third gate can be seen. This gate, known as Barclay’s gate, after the American missionary, James Barclay, who discovered it, also provided access to the street that ran along the western wall. 

The fourth and final gate also offered another elevated access onto the Temple Mount platform. It was supported by a large arch with steps that ascended the southwestern corner of the Temple Mount. The arch, which was the largest arch in the Roman world at the time of its construction, is known as Robinson’s Arch, bearing the name of the American Edward Robinson who identified the spring of the arch, which is all that remains. The southern entrances of the Temple Mount served the majority of Jewish pilgrims who came to Jerusalem for the festivals of Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles. Two large double gates stood at the top of stairs providing access up a ramp onto the Temple Mount platform. Pilgrims entered on the right of the two gates and exited through the left two gates unless they were in mourning. If they were in mourning, they went the opposite direction in order to receive comfort from their fellow worshipers. 

The western and southern retaining walls were built in the first century A.D. Their construction enlarged the Temple Mount platform to the south, which created a large court outside of the sacred precincts. They also supported a large colonnaded structure that stood on the southern end of the Temple Mount known as the Royal Stoa. 

Herod’s Temple and the surround complexes were destroyed by the Romans in A.D. 70. During the second and third centuries a pagan shrine stood on the Temple Mount. During the period of the Christian Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire, a couple of churches stood on the Temple Mount. With the coming of Islam in the seventh century, the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque were constructed. These two buildings stand on top of the Temple Mount until today.

Marc Turnage is President/CEO of Biblical Expeditions. He is an authority on ancient Judaism and Christian origins. He has published widely for both academic and popular audiences. His most recent book, Windows into the Bible, was named by Outreach Magazine as one of its top 100 Christian living resources. Marc is a widely sought-after speaker and a gifted teacher. He has been guiding groups to the lands of the Bible—Israel, Jordan, Egypt, Turkey, Greece, and Italy—for over twenty years.

 Website: WITBUniversity.com  
Facebook: @witbuniversity
Podcast: Windows into the Bible Podcast

It’s a story behind the headlines. With Russia’s invasion continuing to devastate Ukraine, thousands of Jewish refugees have fled to Israel, seeking safety in the Promised Land. The hardest hit have been poor families, children, and the elderly—most coming with very little.

In the face of this catastrophe, friends like you have been there for hundreds of Jewish refugees, through CBN Israel and our strategic partners. Donors offered vital assistance with their evacuation from Ukraine, and rescue flights to Israel. And once they arrived, they received food, clothing, shelter, and other essentials—as well as God’s love and encouragement. 

Caring friends were there for Olga and her husband—two 60-year-old Ukrainian Jewish immigrants, who recently became Israeli citizens. Their small apartment is in a rundown area of Beersheva. Olga is deaf, and works any job she can find. Her husband was recently laid off from his minimum wage factory job—and the couple has struggled to make ends meet.   

One day, their refrigerator and washing machine suddenly broke, and they had no way to fix or replace them. Thankfully, friends were there through CBN Israel. They were delighted to receive food and essentials—plus, a new refrigerator and washing machine! Olga exclaimed, “Your kindness has given us hope at a time when we were feeling depressed and alone!”

In these challenging times, your gift can give life-changing aid to terror victims, single mothers, Holocaust survivors, and more. And your support can be a lifeline to the hurting, while providing news and stories from the Holy Land. 

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“You are to count seven weeks, counting the weeks from the time the sickle is first put to the standing grain. You are to celebrate the Festival of Weeks to the LORD your God with a freewill offering that you give in proportion to how the LORD your God has blessed you. 

Rejoice before Yahweh your God in the place where He chooses to have His name dwell—you, your son and daughter, your male and female slave, the Levite within your gates, as well as the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow among you. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt; carefully follow these statutes” (Deuteronomy 16:9-12 HCSB).

Moses outlined for the Israelites the ordinances of the Festival of Weeks (Shavuot or Pentecost). This festival commemorated the harvest seven weeks and one day (50 days, hence “Pentecost”) after the first Sabbath following the Festival of Unleavened Bread. The festival was to be a celebration marked by a freewill offering—an offering “that you give in proportion to how the LORD your God has blessed you.”  

The festivals and rituals that God gave to the Israelites served as reminders of His participation in their daily lives. Agriculture did not depend upon the farmer and his ingenuity or the luck of the weather; rather, God Himself blessed and provided for the daily needs of the people. The rituals and festivals functioned as reminders of God’s nearness and called upon the Israelites to give thanks, to rejoice.

The Israelites celebrated Pentecost not only within their families but also with their communities. Three groups of people are specifically identified as participating in the celebration of the festival: strangers, orphans, and widows. These three groups lacked a legal advocate within ancient Israel, which is why God often describes Himself, the just Judge, as the defender of these three groups. 

In the midst of the celebration, God calls on the Israelites to remember those on the fringes of their society and to bring them into the festivities. The basis for this action is provided in Deuteronomy 24:18 HCSB: “Remember that you were a slave in Egypt.” You were once an outcast, someone at the bottom of the social world, so remember and bring those at the bottom of your world into your celebration of the Lord’s blessing. 

Do we see God’s care in every facet of our lives? Do we celebrate it and remind ourselves to rejoice at His provision? Do we share our blessings with those on the fringes of our own society? This was God’s expectation of the ancient Israelites when they celebrated Shavuot. He expects the same from us.

PRAYER

Father, thank You for Your daily provision in my life. As a sign of my thanksgiving, may I share Your blessings in my life with others. Amen.

By Julie Stahl

“Observe the Festival of Weeks with the firstfruits of the wheat harvest, and the Festival of Ingathering at the turn of the agricultural year. Three times a year all your males are to appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel” (Exodus 34:22-23).

“When the day of Pentecost had arrived, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like that of a violent rushing wind came from heaven, and it filled the whole house where they were staying. And tongues, like flames of fire that were divided, appeared to them and rested on each one of them. Then they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different languages” (Acts 2:1-4).

What’s the connection between God giving the Law to Moses on Mount Sinai and pouring out His Holy Spirit in the Book of Acts? They are both celebrated on the biblical Festival of Weeks or Shavuot, known in the New Testament as Pentecost.

Fifty days or seven weeks after Passover, Jewish people celebrate Shavuot (“weeks” in Hebrew). At the same time, Christians celebrate Pentecost (“fifty days” in Greek).

According to Jewish tradition, God called Moses up to Mount Sinai and gave him the Law—the two tablets on which the Ten Commandments were written—as well as the entire Torah on Shavuot.

Rabbi Welton adds, “Some Jewish people feel that the Torah is like the wedding ring between them and God in the spirit of the verse, ‘I will make you my wife forever, showing you righteousness and justice, unfailing love and compassion. I will be faithful to you and make you mine, and you will finally know me as the LORD’” (Hosea 2:19-20). 

He adds, “Each year on Shavuot we renew our nuptial vows to our Beloved. Many people have the custom to stay up all night, engaged in studying Torah to reenact the great excitement and love one has on their wedding night.”

Boaz Michael, founder of First Fruits of Zion, comments: “There’re so many beautiful parallels that take place for Shavuot. Imagine Mount Sinai with the mountains above it, the covenant given to the people of Israel. This reminds us of a chuppah [“canopy”] over a bride and a groom. It tells us that God is making a covenant with His bride, Israel. There’s a marriage that takes place.”

“Shavuot is the culmination of a series of events,” Michael continues. “We’ve finally been freed from slavery in Egypt, we’ve wandered through the wilderness, and now we’ve come to Mount Sinai. It’s here that we enter into an intimate relationship with God, through the giving of His commandments and then the covenant that He gives to us, the Torah.”

He concludes: “So this event links us to Acts chapter one verse eight, where Jesus tells His disciples that they’re going to receive the Holy Spirit and take His message to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Three times a year, God commanded the Jewish people to come up to Jerusalem, and one of those times was Shavuot.

“All your males are to appear three times a year before the Lord your God in the place He chooses: at the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the Festival of Weeks, and the Festival of Booths. No one is to appear before the Lord empty-handed” (Deuteronomy 16:16).

The New Testament records that Jews were gathered in Jerusalem from all over the world when the Holy Spirit was poured out on the day of Pentecost.

Many Jewish people stay up all night on Shavuot to study the Scriptures. The Ten Commandments are read, and in many Jewish communities, the Book of Ruth is also read. Before dawn, those in Jerusalem head to the Western Wall on foot where they pray and bless God.

Shavuot has become a time of eating dairy foods, chief among them cheesecake!

Julie Stahl is a correspondent for CBN News in the Middle East. A Hebrew speaker, she has been covering news in Israel full-time for more than 20 years. Julie’s life as a journalist has been intertwined with CBN—first as a graduate student in Journalism at Regent University; then as a journalist with Middle East Television (METV) when it was owned by CBN from 1989-91; and now with the Middle East Bureau of CBN News in Jerusalem since 2009. She is also an integral part of CBN News’ award-winning show, Jerusalem Dateline, a weekly news program providing a biblical and prophetic perspective to what is happening in Israel and the Middle East.

By Arlene Bridges Samuels

Decades of support for Israel among Democrats and Republicans in the United States Congress have created a win-win of countless advantages for both nations over the years. For example, in multilevel ventures ranging from intelligence sharing and technology to bilateral trade agreements that soar into the billions, cooperation is imperative for both nations. 

Although voting records have ebbed and flowed in Congress, they remain a steady pro-Israel reality as seen with an increase in foreign aid for Israel’s security, also a bonus for the U.S. within a more dangerous world. National elections in the last few years, though, have presented more hurdles within Congress for Israel’s safety and security.

In 2018, four female Democrats won seats in the House of Representatives: Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY), Ilhan Omar (MN), Ayanna Pressley (MA), and Rashida Tlaib (MI). All four freshmen women quickly made themselves famous once they were sworn in by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi the following January. They dubbed themselves the “Squad,” were reelected in 2020 for their second term in the House, and are campaigning for their third term.

The Squad is well known for their radical, progressive stance, their inflammatory opinions—often against their Democrat colleagues—and their social media stardom. Ocasio-Cortez once accused Israel of massacring Gazans, and Omar alleged that Israel “hypnotized the world” to ignore its “evil doings.”

Rashida Tlaib is the first Palestinian-American woman elected to Congress and enters with the most political experience on the Squad, having served in the Michigan legislature. Now running for her third term in Michigan’s newly drawn Congressional District 12, she is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, a group once committed to Israel but now supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. 

The congresswoman’s latest demonstration of staunch anti-Israel bias is her resolution—proposed just last week—to recognize Nakba Day. Nakba (Arabic for “catastrophe”) is how Arabs who call themselves Palestinians describe Israel’s Declaration of Independence as a sovereign nation on May 14, 1948. In their eyes, the re-establishment of the Jewish homeland was a catastrophic event. The likelihood that Tlaib’s resolution will pass is not high. However, it codifies the first inflammatory salvo into a legislative pursuit.

Lest you want to dismiss politics all together, it is wise to recognize the outright propaganda taking place among a small, confrontational, and growing Democrat segment of the U.S. House of Representatives. All members of the Squad signed on to the resolution. 

Tlaib leads the way in Congress with her boldly anti-Semitic opinions. The resolution, devoid of the facts, rests on a rewrite of Israeli and Arab history. It is just the latest in her consistent efforts to delegitimize Israel. She is completely in favor of the BDS movement, which is considered economic warfare against Israel. 

Two outsized fabrications fill her Resolution narrative. The first accuses Israel of forcing 290,000 Arabs to leave Palestine at the beginning of the 1948 War of Independence. The facts: Five Arab armies attacked Israel, sending out orders for the Arab population to get out of the way so the military could fight and win, and then the civilians could return. A Jordanian newspaper, Ad-Difaa, later published a refugee’s statement made on September 6, 1954, which claimed that the Arab government told them: “Get out so that we can get in. So, we got out, but they did not get in.”

An expulsion did indeed take place during Israel’s War of Independence, but not the one Rep. Tlaib claimed. Arab and Muslim countries forced out about 820,000 Jews, seized their homes and businesses, and confiscated their belongings. Israel—the new, modern Jewish homeland—welcomed 586,000 refugees. In opposite fashion, when Israel’s first Prime Minister Ben-Gurion read the Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948, it included an invitation to Arabs to stay in their homes and become equal citizens.

The entire Squad could have confirmed or changed their opinions in August 2019. In off-election years, every first-year representative of the U.S. Congress is invited on a geopolitical trip hosted by the American Israel Education Foundation (AIEF), which is affiliated with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). An invitation is extended to all freshmen regardless of outlook. It is an educational trip. 

Had the Squad joined the 32 other freshman Democrats in 2019, the four women’s schedules would have included briefings and meetings with both Palestinian and Israeli leaders—and thus considerable exposure to a highly diverse mixture of opinion and thought. The Squad decided not to take advantage of what would have been an excellent educational experience. Instead, they continued to maintain a brand of prejudice that keeps the anti-Israel narrative on high octane. 

The 2022 elections hold some hope. The Squad is creating waves with their anti-police/anti-ICE stance and by advocating the phasing out of federal prisons. Matt Bennett, executive vice president of the Third Way and cofounder of Shield PAC, helps moderate Democrats. He calls the Squad “deeply problematic for Democrats running in competitive districts and states.” 

Tlaib’s re-election campaign, for instance, is drawing some heavy hitters to halt her animosity against Israel, at least in the United States Congress. In December 2021, AIPAC finally inaugurated a political action committee that donates to Democrats, Republicans, and congressional candidates who are pro-Israel. The AIPAC PAC is supporting Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey, who hopes to unseat Rashida Tlaib. When the Detroit Free Press asked Winfrey about Israel, she responded, “I think we all know what terrorism looks like … and that war doesn’t benefit anyone. Of course, I support Israel.” 

Campaign monies and politics are distasteful to many of us. However, when it comes to issues like standing with Israel via bipartisan legislation in the U.S. Congress, it places us in a position to promote Israel’s national security and, in turn, ours. 

An AIPAC quote offers perspective: “Our goal is to make America’s friendship with Israel so robust, so certain, so broadly based, and so dependable that even the deep divisions of American politics can never imperil that relationship and the ability of the Jewish state to defend itself.”

In closing, political advocacy has spiritual precedence. Several of our biblical patriarchs and matriarchs were lobbyists. Moses appealed to Egypt’s Pharoah; Queen Esther to King Ahasuerus. Their advocacy saved their people. Daniel maintained his faith while holding a prominent position of trust in a foreign government. A day will come when Isaiah 9:6 is a reality: “And the government will be on His shoulders.”

Until that day, as believers, let us find expanded ways to interact with our government to stand with God’s chosen people and the Land He calls His own. 

Join CBN Israel this week as we pray for continued bipartisan support for Israel:

• Pray for the upcoming elections in November and that we will collectively vote for leaders who believe in supporting Israel. 
• Pray for Christians to become even more engaged, educated, and active in their political advocacy for Israel and the Jewish people.
• Pray that U.S. leaders will be wise and educated enough make decisions that are in the best interest of both Israel and the Palestinian people. 
• Pray for young people in the U.S.—especially in the Christian and Jewish communities—that they will be careful not to mindlessly accept biased views and policies against Israel.

Arlene Bridges Samuels pioneered Christian outreach for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). After she served nine years on AIPAC’s staff, International Christian Embassy Jerusalem USA engaged her as Outreach Director part-time for their project, American Christian Leaders for Israel. Arlene is an author at The Blogs-Times of Israel, a guest columnist at All Israel News, and has frequently traveled to Israel since 1990. She co-edited The Auschwitz Album Revisited and is a volunteer on the board of Violins of Hope South Carolina. Arlene has attended Israel’s Government Press Office Christian Media Summit three times and hosts her devotionals, The Eclectic Evangelical, on Facebook.

“My parents had no money, and so I found a way to make money myself,” Claudia said, remembering back to her impoverished childhood. At the age of eleven, she taught herself to sew and began making dolls to sell. 

But her life continued to be an uphill battle after her mother tragically passed away, followed soon by her grandmother. Claudia struggled to find a career that could support herself. 

Life improved for Claudia when she met her husband and start a family. She desired to stay at home with her three young daughters—but she knew she still needed an income, and starting a business felt daunting. 

Thankfully, friends like you were there. Through CBN Israel’s business development program, Claudia was able to get all of her questions answered through one-on-one mentoring while being guided through the process of starting her own business.

Today Claudia is successfully selling her handcrafted dolls throughout Tel Aviv. “Thank you … for all of your help,” she says, “I greatly appreciate your expert guidance and for helping me better understand how to successfully run my business. May God bless you!”

The needs are great in the Holy Land. You can give help and hope to aging Holocaust survivors, terror victims, lonely refugees, and others who are struggling. 

Your support can provide a lifeline for those in need across Israel—offering groceries, housing, financial aid, medical care, and more. 

Please join us in reaching out to others

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By Marc Turnage

The discovery at Qumran of the first seven Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947 required a suitable place to house them. The American Jewish architects Armand Bartos and Frederic Kiesler were tasked with designing a home for the scrolls at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem. On April 20, 1965, the Shrine of the Book was dedicated. 

This landmark of modern architecture incorporated elements of the story of the scrolls as well as the community responsible for them to create a special building that symbolized a sanctuary. The architecture of the building seeks to convey the spiritual meanings of light and darkness and rebirth. The Shrine of the Book sits on the campus of the Israel Museum, which is next to Israel’s Parliament, the Knesset, key government offices, and the Jewish National Library at the Hebrew University’s Giv’at Ram campus. Its location among institutions of government, history, art, and learning, give it a national importance. Moreover, it acknowledges the Bible and ancient Judaism and their importance to the State of Israel. 

The buildings architecture incorporates several features that seek to tell the story of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. The unique white dome of the Shrine of the Book embodies the lid of the jars in which the first scrolls were found. Opposite the whited dome, under which is housed the Dead Sea Scrolls, stands a black wall. The contrast, white and black, symbolize light and darkness two themes that play prominently within the sectarian scrolls of the Dead Sea Scrolls. 

One must walk through the black wall to make your way to where the scrolls are housed under the white dome, passing through a tunnel that looks like a cave, but also symbolizes a birthing canal. The idea being that one passes from darkness to light in an act of rebirth. Cases line the walls of this tunnel with scroll fragments and other artifacts discovered at the site of Qumran, which sits on the northwest corner of the Dead Sea. This display seeks to convey daily life at Qumran. 

Passing through the tunnel, one enters underneath the white dome. At the center of the hall, in a case built to represent the handle of the rod used for rolling and unrolling a Torah scroll while one reads, sits a facsimile of the Isaiah Scroll. This scroll, found in Cave 1 at Qumran, contains the complete book of Isaiah. The manuscript of this scroll was written around 100 B.C. In cases around the room are portions of actual Dead Sea Scrolls, the Community Rule, Thanksgiving Hymns, Habakkuk Commentary, and Isaiah from Cave 1, and the Temple Scroll from Cave 11. 

Below the display of the Isaiah Scroll is a lower level that houses a display of the Aleppo Codex. The Aleppo Codex was originally written in Tiberias, Israel in the 10^th century A.D. The Aleppo Codex is the Old Testament-Hebrew Bible in book form. Prior to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, it provided the earliest Hebrew text of the Old Testament. Its text contains traditions of pronunciation, spelling, punctuation, and cantillation handed down within the Jewish community and formalized in the codex by scholars known as “Masoretes.” The Aleppo Codex traveled from Tiberias to Egypt, and then later to Aleppo, Syria. It was smuggled into Israel in the 1950s. 

The Dead Sea Scrolls provide the single most important archaeological discovery of the 20^th century. They offer an unparalleled window into the world of ancient Judaism, as well as the history and transmission of the Hebrew Bible-Old Testament.

Marc Turnage is President/CEO of Biblical Expeditions. He is an authority on ancient Judaism and Christian origins. He has published widely for both academic and popular audiences. His most recent book, Windows into the Bible, was named by Outreach Magazine as one of its top 100 Christian living resources. Marc is a widely sought-after speaker and a gifted teacher. He has been guiding groups to the lands of the Bible—Israel, Jordan, Egypt, Turkey, Greece, and Italy—for over twenty years.

Website: WITBUniversity.com
Facebook: @witbuniversity
Podcast: Windows into the Bible Podcast

“Those who trust in the LORD are like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved, but abides forever. As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the LORD surrounds His people from this time forth and forever” (Psalm 125:1-2 NKJV).

Psalm 125 is the sixth psalm of the Psalms of Ascent (Psalms 120–134). Pilgrims sang these psalms as they approached the Temple at times of pilgrimage, especially the festivals of Pesach (Passover), Shavuot (Pentecost), and Sukkot (Tabernacles).

The psalmists often used realities that people knew to illustrate and articulate what God or people were like. The Bible and the biblical mind functioned in concrete ideas and images instead of abstract ones, as we tend to do. The psalmist in Psalm 125 described those who trust in God as unmovable as Mount Zion. What provided such surety?

When David conquered Jerusalem and made it his capital, the city resided on a hill known as the eastern hill; the Bible refers to the northern part of this hill as Mount Zion. The eastern hill is surrounded by hills higher than it. People settled on the eastern hill instead of one of the higher hills due to a water source, the Gihon Spring, a karstic spring that continues to produce water, at the base of the eastern hill. The city remained on the eastern hill until the eighth century B.C. 

The population grew and began to settle on the western hill—what today is referred to as Mount Zion—which was included in the walls of the city toward the end of the eighth century B.C. At that time, the western hill rose above several of the surrounding hills. Thus, Psalm 125 was written when the city only existed on the eastern hill, for only then did the mountains surround Jerusalem. 

It sounds beautiful. “As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the LORD surrounds His people.” That is, until you stand on the eastern hill and realize that strategically all the other hills look down on you. The position is vulnerable. Attacking armies could position themselves on the higher hills looking down into the city. In such a vulnerable position, what made Mount Zion unmovable; what would protect it? God served as its protection, and therefore, Mount Zion cannot be moved. He defends Jerusalem—and those who trust in Him. 

Trusting God sounds easy. Our world often makes it difficult. The question gets asked to us many times a day, “Has God really said?” “Can God truly protect and deliver?” “Can I really trust God?” 

The inhabitants and pilgrims to Jerusalem when it sat on the eastern hill were confronted by similar questions. It seemed too vulnerable. Yet, God protected. He takes care of those who do good and choose to obey Him. Trusting in God is not a mere mental exercise. It means that we do what He commands, confident that He will prove true to His word. 

PRAYER

Father, we trust in You. You are our defender and protection. You repay those who obey You and choose to do good. Amen.

By Julie Stahl

“I have set watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem; they shall never hold their peace day or night. You who make mention of the LORD, do not keep silent, and give Him no rest till He establishes and till He makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth” (Isaiah 62:6-7 NKJV).

For centuries, the Jewish people had been in exile. For a generation, they had been without access to their ancestral city. Yet for six unforgettable days in early June 1967, surrounded by enemies, Israel stood alone and changed history forever.

By 1967, Israel had already fought two major wars, and in May of that year, Arab nations joined together with a stated goal to wipe Israel off the map. Less than 20 years after the birth of the modern Jewish nation, Israel was on the verge of extinction.

Israel, along with Jewish people around the world, thought they were facing another Holocaust. In Tel Aviv and Haifa, they had turned parks into potential graveyards and dug mass graves. But God had other plans.

After only six days (June 5-10, 1967), Israel had tripled in size—beating the combined armies of Syria, Egypt, and Jordan to win the Golan Heights, the Sinai Desert, and biblical Judea and Samaria. Perhaps the pinnacle of their success was reuniting the city of Jerusalem under Israeli-Jewish sovereignty for the first time in nearly 2,000 years.

It was on the third day of the war that Moshe Kempenski, an Orthodox Jewish author and Jerusalem shop owner, said he realized that he wasn’t just reading and studying the Bible, but he had actually experienced the fulfillment of prophecy. A Canadian teenager at the time, Kempenski said he knew on that day he would one day become a Jerusalemite.

“When I fully began to realize the significance of being here and my child playing in a Jerusalem park 30 years later, I recall wondering if my son, Yoni, was one of the children that Zechariah saw in his vision,” says Kempenski.

Kempenski is referencing the passage in Zechariah where God promises, “Once again old men and women will walk Jerusalem’s streets with their canes and will sit together in the city squares. And the streets of the city will be filled with boys and girls at play” (Zechariah 8:4-5 NLT).

During all those years of exile, the Jewish people always ended their holiday prayers with “Next Year in Jerusalem!” The Holy City, though far away and unattainable to most for all those years, was still in their hearts and minds.

So, when Commander Motta Gur uttered those famous words, “the Temple Mount is in our hands” (Har HaBayit B’Yadeinu), Jewish people around the world knew something miraculous had happened.

But despite Israel’s clear win in a war it hadn’t asked for, the international community never recognized Israeli sovereignty over united Jerusalem. After the war, Israel returned religious authority over the beloved Temple Mount to Jordan, who still manages it.

To this day, only Muslims are permitted to pray on the site where two Jewish Temples once stood in biblical times.

In 1980, the Israeli Knesset (parliament) passed the Jerusalem Law, which stated that all of Jerusalem (including the eastern part) was Israel’s united capital. Thirteen countries removed their diplomatic missions from Jerusalem after the UN passed a resolution declaring Israel’s law null and void. (Costa Rica and El Salvador moved their embassies back to Jerusalem in 1984 and then returned to Tel Aviv in 2006.)

In December 2017, in a historic move, U.S. President Donald Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, and on May 14, 2018—70 years after U.S. President Harry Truman recognized the State of Israel—Trump moved the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem. Guatemala moved its Embassy to Jerusalem shortly thereafter.

Jerusalem Day is celebrated in the city with a giant parade of Israeli flags that winds through downtown Jerusalem and ends at the Western Wall.

Julie Stahl is a correspondent for CBN News in the Middle East. A Hebrew speaker, she has been covering news in Israel full-time for more than 20 years. Julie’s life as a journalist has been intertwined with CBN—first as a graduate student in Journalism at Regent University; then as a journalist with Middle East Television (METV) when it was owned by CBN from 1989-91; and now with the Middle East Bureau of CBN News in Jerusalem since 2009. She is also an integral part of CBN News’ award-winning show, Jerusalem Dateline, a weekly news program providing a biblical and prophetic perspective to what is happening in Israel and the Middle East.

 By Arlene Bridges Samuels

Comparing the Palestinian Authority (PA) disinformation and United States’ First Amendment is a lesson in dictatorship versus democracy. The contrast also includes Israel’s freedoms, which are set out in its Declaration of Independence to be “based on the precepts of liberty, justice, and peace taught by the Hebrew Prophets.”

Unfortunately for the Palestinian people at large and for Israelis, the policies of 87-year-old Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas are a lesson in what happens when a small group of people with an anti-freedom or a jaundiced agenda are in charge. Despite Palestinian “elections,” Mr. Abbas has governed Palestinians since 2005. An election was due to be held in 2009 for another four-year term, but the Palestinian Central Council decided instead to extend his term indefinitely. Thus, he has now been serving for 17 years. 

Abbas has not languished financially in his years as president. Corruption is unbridled. Worth more than $100 million, Abbas has built a 13-million-dollar mansion in Ramallah, a thriving Palestinian city of around 40,000 residents. Luxury hotels, bars, businesses, foreign diplomatic missions, and a state-of-the-art cultural center mark the more liberal society and business atmosphere of what is considered the de facto capital of “Palestine.” It is good to know that Ramallah is doing well. Nevertheless, Palestinians are growing more discontent since Abbas is denying them the right to vote and to possibly elect younger, more progress-minded leaders who want the betterment of all Palestinians. However, embedded internal conflicts between Hamas and the PA are nearly impossible to overcome. 

On the Palestinian deception front, in a 2008 presidential decree, Abbas merged the General (state) Information Service and the Palestinian News Agency into one institution called the Palestinian News & Information Agency (WAFA). Thus, Abbas’s disinformation agency is WAFA, which is a direct conduit for him. Twisting words into disinformation or speeches with best-selling conspiracy theories, though, is not new among Palestinian leaders. 

Disinformation includes an extensive list of lies about Israel based on the 1964 Palestinian Authority Charter calling for the obliteration of Israel. The Charter still contains the destruction of Israel as its goal. This encompasses not only glorifying terrorism and shahids (martyrs) but also broadcasting media disinformation and inciting emotion—with deadly results. 

One solution against such disinformation is Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), founded in 1996. An Israeli nonprofit, the PMW focuses on translating Palestinian speeches, education, books, and policies into English. Staffed by eleven native Arabic speakers, the group achieves its mandate for truth, translating as much as possible as an asset against Palestinian lies for governments, legislators, and media worldwide to correct false narratives about Israel itself and the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The Biden administration favors re-starting discussions about the two-state solution, yet negotiations are a relic of a failed past for both U.S. presidents and Israeli prime ministers. For example, Mr. Abbas has refused direct negotiations with Israelis since 2009 despite over-the-top concessions being offered—which he then rejected. Without a reliable Palestinian leader willing to sit down with an Israeli prime minister, any restart of peace talks is pointless. Here’s why:

Abbas’s goal is not peace. It is incitement for power through deception—much like Joseph Goebbels, who served as Hitler’s Reich Minister of Propaganda. At least, Goebbels’ title was an honest one to describe the mixture of lies against the Jewish people leading to the Holocaust. Let us examine a few of the thousands of pieces of disinformation and incitement uncovered through PMW’s skilled Arabic translators.

School children are taught to honor suicide bombers and see them as role models. A high school in Tulkarem planted a garden for them. Twenty-eight schools are named for terrorists and three for Nazi collaborators. Here’s an example of how that is done: In August 2000, a suicide bomber was led by a female accomplice, Ahlam Tamimi, to the Sbarro pizza shop in Jerusalem. Fifteen Israelis were murdered in that bombing, including seven children. Yet in 2014, a Palestinian Authority TV host sent her “best wishes” to “our glorious” prisoner. The greeting was part of a visit called In a Fighter’s Home, where the TV host visited the family of Muhammad Wael Daghlas, who planned the earlier attack, recruited Tamimi, and is currently serving 15 life sentences. 

In 2020, the Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Religious Affairs (which decides content for Muslim sermons) condemned the Abraham Accords, saying, “There is nothing that harms Palestine … more than making an alliance with the Jews” and that “obedience to the Jews … will lead the nation to weakness, lawlessness, humiliation and shame.”

On Holocaust Remembrance Day, the Palestinian media again took the opportunity to describe Israelis as Nazis and as being akin to Hitler in their treatment of Palestinians. Incredibly, they equate Zionists with Nazis.

Paying the families of terrorists (the “pay to slay” program) is still alive and well. An opinion piece in Newsweek reported that a 2019 Abbas speech given at the United Nations included these words: “Even if I had only one penny, I would’ve given it to the families of the martyrs, prisoners and heroes.” In just the first five months of 2019, the Palestinian Authority paid $66 million to terrorists and their families! I daresay the money would have benefitted the ailing Palestinian healthcare system.

Abbas’s masterful use of disinformation began early. He earned his Ph.D. in Moscow during the Cold War. The title of his dissertation was “The Other Side: The Secret Relationship Between Nazism and Zionism.” His mentor was Egyptian-born Yassar Arafat, who manipulated the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and Palestinian Authority with such an effective use of propaganda that he shared the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize with former Israeli Prime Ministers Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin “for their efforts to create peace in the Middle East” after the 1993 Oslo Accords agreement. 

Peace was not part of what motivated Arafat. The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis (CAMERA)—another excellent resource for exploring disinformation—reports that, with Abbas as his sidekick for 40 years, Arafat engineered the 1972 murders of 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics. Often called the “Modern Father of Terrorism,” Arafat planned airline hijackings; bombings; the 1973 murder of the American ambassador to Sudan, Cleo Noel; and the 1985 takeover of the Achille Lauro cruise ship, where wheelchair-bound Leon Klinghoffer, an elderly Jew, was shot dead and thrown overboard. Later, he instigated the Second Intifada, where more than 1,000 Israelis were murdered. He died on November 11, 2004, in Paris. And who should succeed him in the PA? None other than his collaborator in terror, Mahmoud Abbas. 

Palestinian disinformation is disastrously effective. Anti-Semitism is marching across the world in jackboots of propaganda, in lockstep with the Nazi past. 

Do Christians have a role? Absolutely. When the world’s six hundred million evangelicals commit to educating themselves, taking a political stand, and speaking the truth about Israel and the Jewish people, we can one day stand before our Lord Jesus, a Jew, and declare that we did what we could. 

Please join with CBN Israel this week in praying that truth will prevail:

• Pray that Christians in the U.S. will stand boldly for Israel and the Jewish people. 
• Pray that we will have vigilance in spotting purveyors of lies and speak out against them. 
• Pray that more media will be convicted to disseminate the unbiased truth. 
• Pray that believers will find the courage to be political advocates for Israel. 
• Pray for the safety of media and commentators who are truth-tellers. 

Arlene Bridges Samuels pioneered Christian outreach for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). After she served nine years on AIPAC’s staff, International Christian Embassy Jerusalem USA engaged her as Outreach Director part-time for their project, American Christian Leaders for Israel. Arlene is an author at The Blogs-Times of Israel and has traveled to Israel since 1990. She co-edited The Auschwitz Album Revisited and is a volunteer on the board of Violins of Hope South Carolina. Arlene has attended Israel’s Government Press Office Christian Media Summit three times and hosts her devotionals, The Eclectic Evangelical, on her website at ArleneBridgesSamuels.com.