There is a vocal and growing minority in the Church that rejects the role of Israel in the Last Days. They say that Israel has disqualified themselves by rejecting their Messiah. The promises made to Israel have been transferred over to the Church. There are others in the culture at large that preach that Israel is a usurper nation. That the Land really belongs to the Palestinians. Israel must cease being a nation. That is what the phrase, “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free.” When the average Arab on the street is asked about it, they do not want a Two-State Solution; Israel & Palestine. They want Israel eliminated. We’ve taken these issues on from the scriptural perspective several times. This series will be a bit different. We will be looking mostly at the situation on the ground today. And we’ll start by looking at how we got there. The history of the Land.
“For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land.” (Ezekiel 36:24)
- The Jewish people entered Israel 3,300 years ago. If you disbelieve the biblical record, archaeology traces them back 3,000 years. That’s when their first commonwealth, the Kingdom of David came into being.
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Theodor Herzel The Jews were driven out and came back. The prophecy of that first return from Babylon can be found in Jeremiah 29:10. The prophecy is very specific and it was fulfilled precisely. “For thus says the Lord: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place.” Their time in Babylon was exactly 70 years. The second commonwealth of Israel was founded and lasted several hundred years. It was the Romans that destroyed it this time. Yet even then, a remnant of Jews remained in the Land. Many though, were scattered all around the world. And a large portion of those Jews prayed 3 times a day for their return to Israel. The phrase: “Next Year in Jerusalem,” became part of the Passover Ritual.
- Jews were persecuted, driven out of countries, suffered pogroms – this went on since AD 70 & AD 132 – when the Jews were twice driven from the Land. Then about 150 years ago, secular Jews, such as Theodor Herzel began driving the move for the Jews to return to their own homeland. Herzel led the political movement that led to the establishment of the Jewish state. [Now, some people say that Zionism is evil and that it engendered the artificial founding of a reborn Israel. But God uses the forces of men to establish His purposes.] After considering the history, Naftali Bennet points out: “The Jews are the indigenous people of the land of Israel.” This regathering was the beginning of the fulfillment of several Old Testament promises. Amos 9:14 is one example. “I will bring my exiled people of Israel back from distant lands, and they will rebuild their ruined cities and live in them again… they will plant vineyards and gardens; they will eat their crops and drink their wine.”
- So, let’s talk Palestine. There has never been a Palestinian State or a People called Palestinians. Palestine was a term coined by the Romans, to dissociate Judea to the Jewish nation. There was no Arab connection. The Arabs didn’t come to Palestine until 600 years after many of the Jews were first driven out. This was when the Islamic hordes were conquering the Christian countries of the Middle East.
- Now, the land called Palestine, was not an inviting place, as attested to by Mark Twain in his visit there. But more Arabs began arriving as the Jews came back into their homeland. They provided economic opportunity for the immigrant Arabs.
Jumping ahead a bit, the global community was looking for a solution. While controlled by the British Mandate after the First World War, the Peel Commission, in 1937, recommended the partition of the land into Jewish and Arab states. The Jewish population accepted the plan. But the Arabs did not. Fighting between the two groups continued.- In 1947, the UN offered a plan. Again, the Jews agreed and the Arabs said no. When Israel declared its’ independence, the surrounding Arab states attacked the reborn Israeli state and wanted to wipe out the entire population. Israel won that war and even gained more territory. During the conflict, 600,000 Arabs left the territory of Israel. Some left at the urging of the Arab countries who wanted clear fields of fire to kill Jews indiscriminately. Others were expelled by the State of Israel as trouble makers and terrorists.
- Now, in the State of Israel, despite several other attempts to destroy the Jewish nation, Arabs live, and are citizens, and vote, and serve in the Knesset (Parliament) and many serve in the IDF. The Arab population actually numbers about 2 million. That’s a huge proportion of the population. And all of them enjoy the equal rights of citizenship.[i]
The Khazar Hypothesis
So, all that said, there is this one lurking objection to Jewish legitimacy. It is that the European Jews, called Ashkenazi, that emigrated to Israel, are not Jews at all. The claim is that they are Khazars, a Turkish people, which a portion of its’ ruling class converted to Judaism in the 8th or 9th century. This is a theory that does not stand up to scrutiny. “Genetic and historical studies converge on the view that Ashkenazi Jews derive most of their ancestry from populations of the Middle East and Europe, not from a large-scale descent from the medieval Khazar Khaganate; several large genome‑wide analyses find no signal consistent with substantial Khazar contribution.”[ii]
One of my favorite prophecies regarding this matter is Isaiah 11:11. God promises a second regathering of the Jewish nation to the Land He set aside for them. The neat part of this, is that Isaish penned that prophecy before they were regathered the first time. “In that day the Lord will reach out his hand a second time to reclaim the surviving remnant of his people from Assyria, Egypt, from Patros, Cush, from Elam, Babylonia, and from the islands of the Mediterranean.”
[i] Naftali Bennet, The Story of Israel in 3 Minutes, Promethean Updates, September 2, 2026
[ii] What Do Genetic and Historical Studies Say About the Khazar Hypothesis for Ashkenazi Origins?, Factually, March 31, 2026
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