“Arise, shine; for your light has come,
And the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.
“For behold, darkness will cover the earth
And deep darkness the peoples;
But the Lord will rise upon you
And His glory will appear upon you.
“Nations will come to your light,
And kings to the brightness of your rising.”
Isaiah 60:1-3
As Christians who love Israel, we hold fast to the Biblical truths that God loves Israel and the Jewish people and that His plans and purposes for them are for the benefit of the world.
We also understand that Satan’s plan is to undermine the things of God. His mission is to rob, steal, kill, and destroy. Sadly, Satan and his minions have been hard at work for millennia trying to wipe out the Jewish people. One of the tools Satan has is to turn hearts against them using lies and deception. This incites hatred against Jews and inverts reality. Many think that Israel and the Jewish people themselves are evil, while those seeking their destruction are the ‘good guys.’
A number of things have been revealed in recent weeks that prove Israel is a light unto the nations. They are the good guys fighting against evil. And even though we know from the Bible that many are going to be deceived, we will spread the truth to anyone who will listen.
One incredible story of showing the difference between Israel and Hamas is that Hamas’s new leader, Yahya Sinwar, who was the mastermind behind the 7 October attacks was actually saved by Israeli doctors in the 1990s.
Sinwar was at the time a prisoner in an Israeli jail when he was diagnosed with a brain tumour.
“He arrived at the hospital, the diagnosis was that he had an abscess in the brain and he was operated on that day, thus saving his life because if it had exploded, he would have died,” said Dr Yuval Bitton.
Following his recovery, Sinwar told Bitton that he owed him his life – a sentiment he repeated when he was released in the 2011 prisoner swap, which saw Sinwar and more than 1,000 other Palestinians freed for Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
“He also told me that on the day he was released in [Gilad] Shalit’s deal in 2011, that he owed me his life, and one day he will repay it.”
But years later that connection meant nothing.
“And as you understand, he made up for it on October 7 in that he was also directly responsible for the murder of my nephew in Kibbutz Nir Oz,” said Bitton.
That’s right, the doctor’s nephew was murdered on 7 October and his body is still being held by Yahya Sinwar’s terror group.
Israel shows kindness to their enemies, to the point where they save their lives. Hamas, on the other hand, show no humanity to Israel or to anyone who is Jewish.
Another story showing the difference between Israel and Hamas was in the rescue of Israeli citizen Farhan al-Qadi, a 52-year-old Bedoin. This Muslim Arab Israeli is a headache for those who hate Israel. They claim that Israel is apartheid and that Arabs living in Israel are treated differently. This was totally debunked when Israel rescued him and the whole of Israel celebrated his release.
Hamas on the other hand showed that they have no compassion for anyone, not their own people, and certainly not Israelis. Farhan said, “I saw that there are hostages. It doesn’t matter if they are Arabs or Jews, they have family waiting for them who also want to be happy. So I hope and pray that this thing comes to an end. I don’t wish on anyone to be in the place I was.”
Farhan was working as a security guard in a Jewish kibbutz on 7 October. He was a Muslim protecting Jews and he was kidnapped and treated just like them. And when Israel’s forces rescued him from inside a booby trapped tunnel in Gaza, they treated him exactly the same as they would any other Israeli.
The IDF is smeared as being an evil organisation that ‘murders Palestinians’ and commits ‘genocide’ against them. In truth, the IDF is the most moral army on earth, proven by statistics, they have the lowest combatant to civilian death ratio of any modern army.
How does Farhan see the IDF? “Suddenly I hear someone outside the door speaking in Hebrew, I didn’t believe it, I didn’t believe it. Thank you so much. This is thanks to our army, they do sacred work, they risked their lives,” Farhan said.
That’s right, an Israeli Arab Muslim man sees the Israel Defence Forces as doing “sacred work.” And as his family celebrated his return, so did all of Israel. They celebrate whether it is a Jew or Arab being rescued from Hamas. Why? Because Israel is not an apartheid state. It is the only country in the Middle East where all citizens have equal treatment by law.
Finally, another demonstration of the difference between Israel and Hamas is how they deal with the Palestinian population. Hamas has been stealing from the Palestinians for decades. The leaders of Hamas are all billionaires through syphoning money from international aid organisations. They do not care about their own people, they use them as pawns and human shields. While Yahya Sinwar says that Hamas is willing to sacrifice themselves for the cause of jihad, he himself is holding up negotiations by demanding that Israel promise not to kill him.
Israel, on the other hand, halted its operations in Gaza in order to facilitate the shipping of polio vaccines into Gaza. Why? One Palestinian child was diagnosed with polio, the first person to be infected in the past 25 years. Israel ensured that over 1 million polio vaccines were delivered to Gaza this week so that the population could be inoculated.
“It is too small a thing for you to be my servant to restore the tribes of Jacob and bring back those of Israel I have kept. I will also make you a light for the Gentiles, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.”
Isaiah 49:6
Israel is proving itself time and time again to be compassionate to those who seek their destruction. Israel is a light in the Middle East and as the Bible says, a light unto the nations. Christians especially have received the greatest gift of all through the Jewish people. One day the entire world will recognise this blessing. Until then, we will not keep silent about the good that Israel brings to the world and to its neighbours.
