Tomorrow’s Headlines about Russia, Israel and the Jewish Temple – Program 2

By: Dr. Jimmy DeYoung; ©2002

What does the Bible say about Russia and what she will do to Israel in the end times? What other nations will Israel have to face?

Contents

Russia in Biblical Prophecy

Introduction

Announcer: The Israeli-Arab conflict has been raging for 58 years. Suicide bombers, brutal attacks and reprisals are causing many people to wonder, is peace possible in the Middle East?

Jimmy DeYoung: I believe that we’re at a spot in history when there is no way there is going to be peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis. They want war.

Hal Lindsey: There are 1.2 billion Muslims in the world and there’s only one thing that unifies them. They disagree over many things but they all agree that they must liberate Jerusalem and destroy Israel.

Announcer: Today, Dr. John Ankerberg looks at world events in light of biblical prophecy.

Dr. John Ankerberg: Everywhere that I’ve gone in the last months of time, people are saying, How do the events that are taking place in the Middle East, how do they square with what the Bible is saying?

Lindsey: This is the first time in history that all of the prophetic scenario the prophets predicted would come together just before the return of Christ is actually in view.

Dr. David Breese: Jesus, when He delineated these things said, And when you see these things begin not end but begin to come to pass, then lift up your heads and look up because your redemption draws nigh.

DeYoung: Now, the Bible says all of that. I’m telling you what current events are in reality, but God’s Word prophesied over 2,500 years ago that’s the situation we’d be in the end times when all these nations, when all these people want to go against Israel and wipe them off the face of the earth.

Lindsey: I believe that the Bible is very clear that the last war of the world will start with a war over Jerusalem.

Ankerberg: My guests today are journalist Dr. Jimmy DeYoung who has lived in Jerusalem for the last 15 years and has known and personally interviewed many of the international leaders in the Middle East including every Prime Minister of Israel since 1991, as well as the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, the late King Hussein of Jordan, his son King Abdullah II, and many others. And second, author and professor of Biblical prophecy Dr. Renald Showers.

Announcer: What does the God of the Bible say will happen in the future? We invite you to join us for this very special program.

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Ankerberg: Welcome to the program. We are talking about the current crisis in the Middle East. And we are talking with news correspondent Dr. Jimmy DeYoung, who has lived in Israel since 1991, covered all the events and the major players that we are seeing on the news today; and Professor Dr. Renald Showers.

And, guys, I want to come back to one of the key players on the world scene today, and that’s Russia. President Bush continues to include President Putin in all the affairs that are taking place in the Middle East. And the Bible has a lot to say about Russia. It doesn’t say a lot about America. It doesn’t say anything about America or the United Nations, from what you said in the last broadcast, except if we are still there, the fact is, we will be part of the nations that come against Israel.

But it does say a lot about Russia. And Russia is in existence, Russia is strong militarily. And let’s start with the Bible this time. What does the Bible say? Identify Russia from Scripture, and then talk about what Scripture says. And then, Jimmy, I want you to tell us all of the illustrations from living in Israel, why Russia would want to come down to Israel? Rennie, start us off. Where is it mentioned in Scripture?

Showers: Basically in Ezekiel 38 and 39 would be the really major passage. And it’s described there as Gog in the land of Magog. And as we have already noted in some of the early sessions, according to the ancient records, the land of Magog was up between the Black and Caspian Seas, which would be in the southern part of what we have known historically as Russia or the Soviet Union.

In verse 14 of Ezekiel 38 it says that Gog will come from the farthest or remotest parts of the north, directly north of Israel. And again, if you put your finger on Israel on a map in the Middle East and go straight north, as far north as you can via land mass, you’d end up in the heartland of the Soviet Union or Russia.

So that’s indicating that Russia is going to lead this multi-national military force against the nation of Israel in the Middle East, we believe during the first half of the seven year tribulation period. And apparently, again, trying to annihilate Israel there. And we saw that, right now at least, those nations allied with it are Muslim nations.

Now interestingly, just within the last two weeks, demographers, these are people who are professional in studying population growth and everything around the world, have come out with a statement that right now, because the Russian people are not giving birth to enough children to maintain the Russian population, but the Muslims that are living there are giving birth to more than enough children to maintain their population, some demographers are saying if that doesn’t change, within two decades, within 20 years, Russia will be totally Muslim in rule and authority. Which is interesting in light of the fact that Ezekiel 38 and 39 is indicating that they are going to be allied with nations that at least today are Muslim nations coming against Israel in the Middle East in the future tribulation period.

DeYoung: There is another interesting thing about that as well. Ezekiel 38 talks about, brother will take up sword against his brother in that battle, when Magog leads the coalition of nations to come into Israel. When I moved to Jerusalem in 1991, that year alone there were 1.3 million Russian Jews who came to live in the land. They made Alyah, they immigrated to the land.

Look at Jeremiah chapter 16, chapter 23, chapter 31, the book of Zechariah, chapter 2, all refer to the movement out of the north coming into the land. And if indeed this Muslim growth in the former Soviet Union locations in Russia itself does take place, I believe it’s going to take place, that will play a key role in bringing all of these nations, these Islamic nations together led by Magog, Russia, to come in and brother will take up sword against his brother to try to defend themselves.

Ankerberg: Alright, the Bible also says that God’s going to give Russia a desire to come down to Israel. It is going to put a hook into the jaw of the Russian nation to draw them down. And I had a hard time understanding why would Russia want to go down to this little piece of land called Israel? Why would they get all upset about that? But you’ve got reasons, you’ve been living there and you understand this. Explain some of that.

DeYoung: Well, there are several of them. First of all, the most simple is the fact that Israel would provide for the Russian people a warm water port. They do not have that, they need that. And the land mass going up to Russia can take place, they can go right through Turkey, who is going to be one of the coalition partners, and go right into Russia. But they need that warm water port. And that is what Israel provides.

In addition to that they need monies. One of the problems that Vladimir Putin is having is the economic situation in Russia. He needs to provide the economic power so he can once again come to power as the former Soviet Union at one time in history was.

Well, there is a very unique project that is being put together between the Israeli government and the Jordanian government. It is referred to as the Red-Dead Project. What that is talking about? The Dead Sea, over the last couple of decades has been evaporating. Remember, it is the lowest spot on the face of the earth. It is some 1300 feet below sea level. The water is so down that there is a concern, Can we save the Dead Sea?

And they need to save the Dead Sea because the Dead Sea Works are indeed the number one economic producer for the state of Israel. The minerals they extract from there, the chlorides and everything else. Phosphate, there is enough phosphate in the Dead Sea to make fertilizer to fertilize the entire earth for 200 years without running out. But this water is disappearing, so they have to do something.

So in a recent economic forum that took place in Amman, Jordan, under the auspices of King Abdullah, Israel and Jordan had a conversation; and that has progressed to the point that they are now doing a feasibility study to see if it is going to be wise to take the water out of the Red Sea, which is at a higher level than the Dead Sea. They would pipe it down a conduit all the way down to the Dead Sea. And along they would set up recreational areas, they would set up water-driven generators to provide electricity, much electricity that is needed for Jordan and Israel. And then they would bring that water down to the Dead Sea.

Now, they won’t put it in at the southern end of the Dead Sea, because that’s where the Dead Sea Works is located and all the extraction of these minerals, etc., coming out of the Dead Sea. They will pipe it up to the northern end of the Dead Sea. At the northern end, the surface of the Dead Sea is 1300 feet below sea level. It is 1300 feet deep to the bottom of the Dead Sea at the northern end. They would drop this water there and then they would take the goop off of the bottom of the Dead Sea at the northern end, put it in a pipe going back.

Now, I don’t understand this, how it works; I’m not an engineer. But the engineers tell me that when you have two parallel pipes, one going north carrying sea water and the other coming south carrying goop, basically sea water, but a bit thicker, you can develop an electric magnetic field. That can be adjusted, and the Israeli government has investigated this, they agree that that can happen. And what they could do, according to the book of Ezekiel which says, That spoil will be gold and silver.

I have lived there since 1991. I know of no silver mine or gold mine in Israel, except what’s in the Dead Sea. They project that gold and silver has drifted down, drained down in the Dead Sea, the lowest spot on the face of the earth over these last many, many years. And there’s enough gold and silver in the Dead Sea, they project, to take care of every national debt in the world’s nations as they are in trouble economically. That could be one hook.

In addition to that, Jordan, at the northern end of the Dead Sea, found oil. And Israel, now the Israeli government is working on a dig, or a drilling, down at the southern end the southwestern end, Jordan is at the northeastern end, at the southwestern end of drilling down for oil, they have come down to a salt plateau and they believe that below that is that oil.

They say that it is the best oil in the Middle East. It’s called deep stick oil. And what really amazed me, and I am really happy about this whole thing, you know we’ve got a cup here and if I take this cup that has liquid in it and put a straw in this cup and started to suck through the straw, the level at the top would go down, but I would be getting everything down at the bottom.

Can you just imaging Israel putting a drill in there and taking the oil out and all the oil in Saudi Arabia and Iraq and Iran and everything else draining down to the lowest spot on the face of the earth? Wouldn’t it be just like God to do that? That could be the hook that would bring them down. Russia has a lot of oil, but they don’t have the technology to get into the ground and get the oil out of it. And that would, I believe, be that hook that would draw them down.

Ankerberg: Alright, we are going to take a break. And when we come back, I want to talk also about what you know about the leadership in the Palestinian areas, okay? You have interviewed in the past, Yasser Arafat, and you knew the inner circle there. You were there, you saw it all. I want to know what’s happening now with the new Palestinian leadership and where things are going in creating a second or a Palestinian state next to Israel. Is that going to take place? We will talk about that when we come right back.

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Ankerberg: Alright, we are back and we are talking with news correspondent, Dr. Jimmy DeYoung, who has lived in Israel since 1991, covered all the major players there; and Dr. Renald Showers, professor of biblical prophecy.

And, Jimmy, I remember the times when you came to the studio here, and you had just interviewed Yasser Arafat. And you told us all about what the Palestinians were planning at that time and all of the problems through the years. And I haven’t talked with you since the new leadership has gone in. And obviously, in the Middle East crisis that we are facing, the fact is that there has got to be an answer for what is happening to the Palestinians. Where is the leadership at? What have you heard? What do you think is going to happen? What is the world is going to do with the Palestinian question?

DeYoung: We will get to that in just a second, but I have got to catch you up, John. Because after that time that I spent with Yasser Arafat, we had one more opportunity to interview him. I was doing some television over there and we were in Ramallah at his compound. And they offered us the opportunity to go upstairs in that, basically, what was a cell for him there in his compound in Ramallah. He was very, very sick.

We went to the Prime Minister’s office and they told me at the Prime Minister’s office that within a couple of days they thought he would pass from the scene. He did do that. And his number one man, the number one assistant, a guy named Mahmoud Abbas, who had been serving him for the 40 years of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, came to power as the leader of the Palestinian people. He was elected to be that by the Palestinian people.

Yasser Arafat had his own individual member of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, which is a conglomerate of these Palestinian groups, these militant groups. His organization was called Fatah. He founded it, and of course, the number two man of course, Mahmoud Abbas. Well, Mahmoud Abbas on the wave of Arafat’s popularity, his death, so the sympathy from that, and the fact that Fatah were the major players, he came to power as the leader.

Meanwhile, corruption was running rampant now. Every one of us has reported Yasser Arafat’s death left his widow one of the richest widows in the world, with probably somewhere in the area of 6 billion, with a b, 6 billion dollars. They are still trying to find that. That was money that the European Union, the United States, and other countries of the world had given for the needy Palestinian people. But it went into the coffers of Yasser Arafat; and so that money never ended up where it was intended to go.

Somebody has made the statement, and I would agree with this statement, that Mahmoud Abbas is Yasser Arafat in a business suit. You might remember that Arafat always wore a military uniform. Mahmoud Abbas tried, endeavored, at the beginning to put it together; meetings with President Bush, meetings with the Prime Minister of Israel, Ariel Sharon. He met there in Jordan with King Abdullah. So they were trying to put something together, but he could never grab a hold of it, because of the corruption. They would not reform, they would not get rid of the corruption.

Meanwhile there is Hamas, and Sheik Yassin who was the religious founder of Hamas, putting everything together. They were reaching out to the Palestinian community. They were meeting the needs educationally, health wise, and every other way, community wise. And when the Israeli government decided to take out Sheik Yassin, they took him out; and that then, in the eyes of the Palestinian people, gave more credibility to Hamas and what they were doing.

Now, you add to that the withdrawal by Prime Minister Sharon’s disengagement plan, the evacuation of all of these Jewish settlers, over 9000 of them, displaced from out of their homes for over 30 years, and giving that to the Palestinian people. They rushed in there, they took some of those sites which were Jewish settlements, and they set up training camps. They also set up launch locations for these Qassam rockets which would be fired into Israel. But they continued their relationship-building among the Palestinian people.

So it came time for an election. Hamas, who had claimed the victory over the Israeli Defense Force, they said, we are the ones that pushed them out. They just came to power quickly, and they then had the mass majority of the Palestinian Authority’s parliament. And that gave them the opportunity to name the Prime Minister and to name the cabinet. They named the man Prime Minister Abbas.

And the thing about Hamas is, they are not economically or financially motivated as Fatah was. They are religiously motivated to do what they are doing. They believe they are the power that will lead the Palestinian people to reach their ultimate goal of taking back all of Israel; not simply eastern section of Jerusalem, but all of Jerusalem, all of Judea and Samaria, all of the Gaza strip, all of Tel Aviv, Haifa and Tiberius. They want it all.

Sheik Yassin said, This land is Islamic land and we are going to live in it and the Palestinians will do it. Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran, said, The Palestinians will play the key role in taking out the Jewish people. And we will assist them in every way possible. That stage is set and the conflicts that we have been watching going on in the Gaza strip are evidence that that is soon to be coming to pass.

Ankerberg: Alright, so what is going to, I mean, this has got to be a part of the solution coming up here. I mean, you can’t have Hezbollah with a peacekeeping force blocking them and allowing the struggle to continue down in Gaza. So are we going to have a Palestinian state? Is this going to be part of the solution? And what are going to be the demands that the United Nations, or whoever is imposing it, what are they going to make here, and what is Israel going to accept?

DeYoung: The quartet says, and the quartet would include the United States, European Union, the United Nations and Russia, the quartet, who set the roadmap to peace plan in operation, they want that restarted. They wanted to kick start it so it comes back on the table, the negotiation will go on for the establishment of a Palestinian state. In fact, Mahmoud Abbas forced the issue when he said, I will go to a referendum among the Palestinian people if Hamas is not willing to name all the pre-requirements for this Palestinian state.

Every best guess from all of the political pundits that I know in Israel say that there will be a Palestinian state. It says that, in fact, the present leadership of Israel, Ehud Olmert is saying that he is going to withdraw out of the Jewish settlements, another disengagement plan. In Judea and Samaria, 90% of those people that live up there are going to lose their homes, their businesses, so that the Palestinians will have a continuous Palestinian state.

The issue is going to be, are they going to be able to come to a conclusion or a resolution on whether Jerusalem will play a part as their capital city? All of this has, and by the way, Mahmoud Abbas, when they are talking about putting a United Nations peacekeeping force in the buffer zone at the northern border of Israel, Mahmoud Abbas traveled throughout the Arab world saying, we need a peacekeeping force in the south as well. That means the armies of the world would be surrounding Israel, which is a part of the scenario for Bible prophecy as well.

Ankerberg: Guys, I want to say thank you for being with us, and for all of this information that puts us back into Scripture, that ties to the current events. I appreciate all of the study that you’ve done and just want to say thank you.

We ask you folks to look at this and consider it seriously and realize that our Lord Jesus is coming back soon. First the Rapture, and then the terrible time during the tribulation then Christ comes in the end to come and rule here on earth. Look at it in your Scripture and see if you don’t see these thing. And then, if you haven’t found Christ as your Savior, if you haven’t believed in Him, believe in Him right now. If you are a Christian, it should influence the way you are living. Thanks for being with us.

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