A View from the Nest

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By Don Costello

There is much talk in the news lately about the formation of a Palestinian state. It has become a major goal of President Bush. I believe that he is making the worst mistake of his Presidency. Biblically the West Bank, as it is called today is part of the land that Almighty God covenanted with Abraham to give his descendants through Isaac. Even more important is the fact that one of the reasons Jesus Christ is coming back at Armageddon is to destroy the people trying to steal the land of Israel away from Him and Israel. Although the Golan Heights are included in that Covenant, I want to focus on the area of the West Bank because that is the area the whole world is trying to make an independent Palestinian state.

A crucial element of this debate for the Bible believing Christian is that the West Bank as it is known today is referred to in Scripture as “Judea” and “Samaria” or “the mountains of Israel”. In 1999, the magazine “Christians for Israel” published an article documenting this entitled, “The Mountains of Israel”, by Karel van Oordt and Pee Koelewijn. There is also a book entitled, “The Mountains of Israel” by Norma Archbold that refers to this.

According to scripture, from the time when Lot and Abraham separated until after God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham lived on the plain of Mamre, which is present day Hebron in the West Bank. The events of Genesis 15 of the cutting of the covenant and the giving of the land occurred at that very place. In these scriptures we see the elements of the ancient Middle Eastern covenant. In Genesis 15:9, the animals are chosen, in verse 10 they are divided and laind against one another and in verses 17 and 18 the participants pass through the divided animals. The purpose for this according to Unger’s Bible Dictionary was to confirm the covenant, “by slaughtering and cutting the victim into halves, between which the parties passed, to intimate that if either of them broke the covenant it would fare with him as with the slain and divided beast.” The element not mentioned in the Genesis passage but most definitely took place at the time of the oath in Ezekiel 47:14 (NIV) where God, “swore with an uplifted hand”, to give the land to Israel. We get that impression from Jeremiah 34:14, which says the LORD will punish those, “which have not performed the words of the covenant which they made before me, when they cut the calf in twain, and passed between the parts thereof.” The picture we see when all these elements are included is when the LORD was passing through those pieces, He was swearing with an uplifted hand He was going to give Israel the land.

According to Isaiah 62:4, God is married to Israel and the land. The New American Standard Version says, “It well no longer be said to you “”Forsaken”" Nor to your land will it any longer be said, “”Desolate”"; But you will be called, “”My delight is in her,”" and your land, “”Married.”" It is no wonder then that the first three verses of Ezekiel 36, which deals with the mountains of Israel, i.e. the West Bank, are laced with a very stern warning from God in the spirit of a jealous husband. Ezekiel 36:5 says the LORD is speaking, “in the fire of my jealouslyagainst the rest of the nationswho appropriated my land for themselves as a possession with wholehearted joy and scorn of soul.” The LORD God in Jeremiah 12:14 (NIV) calls those nations “wicked neighbors” who would “seize the inheritance I gave my people Israel.” View full article »