The Book of Jonah

April 3, 2025
Before we turn to the book of Jonah, turn very briefly please to the book of Acts chapter 2:24 and 27. 

"And God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power."

 

In verse 27 we have a quote from the book of Isaiah and the Psalms,

Because thou wilt not abandon my soul to Hades, nor allow Thy holy one to undergo decay.

It was impossible for death to hold Jesus in its power: it was a theological, spiritual and logical impossibility.

We are told in the book of Hebrews that Abraham was willing to sacrifice his only son – as a type of Christ – because even then he knew that God could raise his son up from the dead to fulfill his purpose. (Heb 11:17) It is an example of how God puts somebody in a “death situation”, with the assurance that his resurrection power is going to be found in it.

With these things in view turn with me to the book of the prophet Jonah.

The word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and cry against it, for their wickedness has come up before Me.” But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. So he went down to Joppa, found a ship which was going to Tarshish, paid the fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.

The Lord hurled a great wind on the sea and there was a great storm on the sea so that the ship was about to break up. Then the sailors became afraid and every man cried to his god, and they threw the cargo which was in the ship into the sea to lighten it for them. But Jonah had gone below into the hold of the ship, lain down and fallen sound asleep. So the captain approached him and said, “How is it that you are sleeping? Get up, call on your god. Perhaps your god will be concerned about us so that we will not perish.” Each man said to his mate, “Come, let us cast lots so we may learn on whose account this calamity has struck us.” So they cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah.

(Now in Proverbs 16:33 it says: the lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD.)

Then they said to him, “Tell us, now! On whose account has this calamity struck us? What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? From what people are you?” He said to them, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord God of heaven who made the sea and the dry land.”

Then the men became extremely frightened and they said to him, “How could you do this?” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them. So they said to him, “What should we do to you that the sea may become calm for us?”—for the sea was becoming increasingly stormy. He said to them, “Pick me up and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will become calm for you, for I know that on account of me this great storm has come upon you.” However, the men rowed desperately to return to land but they could not, for the sea was becoming even stormier against them. Then they called on the Lord and said, “We earnestly pray, O Lord, do not let us perish on account of this man’s life and do not put innocent blood on us; for You, O Lord, have done as You have pleased.”

So they picked up Jonah, threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped its raging. Then the men feared the Lord greatly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows. And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the stomach of the fish three days and three nights.

We're not told it was a whale. The Jews translate this literally as in modem Hebrew leviathan. Whales are not usually indigenous to the Mediterranean, we don't know what kind of fish it was, we just assume it was a whale. (Strictly speaking, of course, a whale is a mammal not a fish – it has no gills).

Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the stomach of the fish, and he said, “I called out of my distress to the Lord, And He answered me. I cried for help from the depth of Sheol; You heard my voice. For You had cast me into the deep, Into the heart of the seas, And the current engulfed me. All Your breakers and billows passed over me. So I said, ‘I have been expelled from Your sight. Nevertheless I will look again toward Your holy temple.’ Water encompassed me to the point of death. The great deep engulfed me, Weeds were wrapped around my head. I descended to the roots of the mountains. The earth with its bars was around me forever, But You have brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God. While I was fainting away, I remembered the Lord, And my prayer came to You, Into Your holy temple. Those who regard vain idols Forsake their faithfulness, But I will sacrifice to You With the voice of thanksgiving. That which I have vowed I will pay. Salvation is from the Lord.”

Then the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah up onto the dry land.

Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh the great city and proclaim to it the proclamation which I am going to tell you.” So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, a three days’ walk. Then Jonah began to go through the city one day’s walk; and he cried out and said, “Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown.”

Now the word here for overthrown is nechpakeh. It's the same word used in Genesis for the destruction of Sodom, the most terrible destruction and judgment on a city that the Jews had a record of in the Torah. By using that particular term nechpakeh it would have conjured visions of what God did to Sodom and Gomorrah. - -

Then the people of Nineveh believed in God; and they called a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them. When the word reached the king of Nineveh, he arose from his throne, laid aside his robe from him, covered himself with sackcloth and sat on the ashes. He issued a proclamation and it said, “In Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles: Do not let man, beast, herd, or flock taste a thing. Do not let them eat or drink water. But both man and beast must be covered with sackcloth; and let men call on God earnestly that each may turn from his wicked way and from the violence which is in his hands. Who knows, God may turn and relent and withdraw His burning anger so that we will not perish.”

When God saw their deeds, that they turned from their wicked way, then God relented concerning the calamity which He had declared He would bring upon them. And He did not do it.

But it greatly displeased Jonah and he became angry. He prayed to the Lord and said, “Please Lord, was not this what I said while I was still in my own country? Therefore in order to forestall this I fled to Tarshish, for I knew that You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, and one who relents concerning calamity. “Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for death is better to me than life.” The Lord said, “Do you have good reason to be angry?”

Then Jonah went out from the city and sat east of it. There he made a shelter for himself and sat under it in the shade until he could see what would happen in the city. So the LordGod appointed a plant and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head to deliver him from his discomfort. And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant. But God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day and it attacked the plant and it withered. When the sun came up God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat down on Jonah’s head so that he became faint and begged with all his soul to die, saying, “Death is better to me than life.”

Then God said to Jonah, “Do you have good reason to be angry about the plant?” And he said, “I have good reason to be angry, even to death.” Then the Lord said, “You had compassion on the plant for which you did not work and which you did not cause to grow, which came up overnight and perished overnight. Should I not have compassion on Nineveh, the great city in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know the difference between their right and left hand, as well as many animals?”

Now understand that this is a very arid climate – it's not that the air conditioning isn't working – this was a grueling situation to be in.

Now the idea of not knowing the difference between their right hand or their left hand in the Hebrew text is this: you'd have the term “yad”, right hand is “yemani”, as in If I forget thee, 0 Jerusalem, may I forget my right hand." Im eshcacak yerushalim tishcah yemani (the King James mistranslates it "my right hand forget her skill" – it's not what it says in the Hebrew).

The Right Hand of the Lord in the Bible

“The Lord will bring salvation with his night hand”. Isaiah has the same 'to whom has the arm - same Hebrew word yad - of the lord been revealed?' The Right Hand is a type of Jesus in the Old Testament. What it is basically saying is, "these pagans don't know the way of salvation, they don't know the difference between the right hand and the left hand they don't know how to save themselves." It's the right hand of the Lord that brings salvation. That would be the implication from the Hebrew term: the right hand.

Quite a story! It was probably written during the reign of Jeroboam, somewhere between 814 and 783 BCE. We also know from history that there was an Assyrian king who became a monotheistic king, his name was Adad-Nirari III who reigned roughly from 810 to 782 (there was actually one Egyptian pharaoh who became a monotheist and there were a couple of kings of Babylon who became monotheists – see the book of Daniel). It may have been this king who turned to the true God.

Jews were always called to be lights to the Gentiles – even in the Old Testament. They didn't do it the same way we do it now but if salvation was to come from the Jews, as Jesus said in John chapter four, they were still to be his witnesses to these nations and show them the true God. Today rabbis complain about "Christians" proselytizing Jews, forgetting that the Jews themselves, based on what Moses originally decreed, were supposed to be out trying to win people to believe in the true God! The very fact that they are not doing that, shows that they are no longer practicing a true Judaism.

The Story of Jonah

He was reluctant to go to Nineveh and not without good reason. These were, to say the least, not the nicest people in the world: they were “bad people”; they were total heathens! More than that, as a Bible-believing Jew, he would have read the prophecies of his predecessor the prophet Amos and he would have seen what God decreed and predicted through Amos about Nineveh. So he would even have had a biblical basis for not wanting to go there. It was not just that he knew God would have compassion on them but that they might kill him. He knew that, on the face of it, they were destined for judgment as the prophet Nahum had predicted (and this happened at a later point when they turned back to their pagan ways). He had good reason not to go.

But let's begin with Jonah's name. “Yonah”, meaning, in Hebrew, “a dove”. What images would this conjure up? One is in John 2:16. Jesus drove the people out of the temple who were selling doves. (This comes from Leviticus 14. A dove was an animal deemed suitable for sacrifice and as such it was a type of Christ – as all these animals were). In the Song go Solomon 1:5, he tells the lover that her eyes are like doves.

“Eyes” because doves are monogamous birds and they only have a relationship with their partners, they don't procreate with other doves. So too in Genesis 8, first Noah sends out a bird that the Torah would later decree to be “unkosha” – a raven, but the second bird he sends out is a dove. All these images would have been conjured up in the minds of Jews. In the New Testament Mathew 3:18, the Holy Spirit descends upon Jesus as a dove. All these images might highlight some aspect of Jonah and his character but probably the most important is found in the Psalm of David 55:4-6,

My heart is in anguish within me, And the terrors of death have fallen upon me. Fear and trembling come upon me, And horror has overwhelmed me. I said, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove! I would fly away and be at rest.

The idea is this: wanting to escape from the calamity that has come upon you; and Jonah was a man that wanted to escape

But what about this calamity? What does it mean for us? What we have to understand about Jonah is the first thing we have to understand about all the Hebrew prophets: every single Hebrew prophet is a type of Jesus, a type of the Messiah, every one of them foreshadows Him, who he would be and what he would do. There is no Hebrew prophet whose life does not foreshadow or typify the Messiah who would come after them to bring in the Redemption which they prophesied.

Let's Look at Jonah as a Type of Jesus

Turn with me please to 2 kings 14:25 . That's the first place we read about Jonah in the Bible.

He [Jeroboam] restored the border of Israel from the entrance of Hamath as far as the Sea of the Arabah, according to the word of the Lord, the God of Israel, which He spoke through His servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet, who was of Gath-hepher.

Notice that Jonah was sent to his own people the Jews first. Only after this was he sent to the Gentiles. In Matthew 15:24 we read the following:

But Jesus said, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. "

Jesus was first sent only to His own people, then only at a later point was He sent to the non-Jews. We are told that Jonah was from this particular area Gath-hepher. Gathhepher is in walking distance from Nazareth. Now there was something unique about Jonah in this.

Turn with me to John 7:52 – something here that the Sanhedrin overlooked!

They answered and said to him, "You are not also from Galilee are you? Search and see that no prophet arises out of Galilee." (or as they say in the same chapter, verse 41) "The Messiah is not going to come from Galilee, is he?"

No prophet comes from Galilee? They were wrong. Jonah came from Galilee! He's the only one except for Jesus who was from Galilee.

Jonah : 4-6, a terrible storm comes, and the word for “wind” in Greek in the New Testament is “pnuema” and in the Hebrew it is, of course,” ruach”, but in both it is also the word for “Spirit”. In this storm sent by God, during the storm Jonah sleeps in the boat and the other people are frantic about this, "How can you be sleeping in the boat during the storm?"

[We have a tape on this, The boats of the bible on Mark chapter 4 and 6, where we explain the typology of the boats in greater depth]

But let's look very briefly at Mark 4:37-38.

And there arose a fierce gale of wind, and the waves were breaking over the boat so much that the boat was already filling up. Jesus Himself was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke Him and said to Him, “Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?”

What happens to Jonah prefigures what will happen to the Lord Jesus. Jonah becomes a type of Christ.

Now let's understand this a bit more. Jonah 1:12, "Pick me up and throw me into the sea then the sea will become calm for you." Jonah, of his own choice, was willing to lay down his own life to bring salvation to others, including gentiles. John 10:17-18,

For this reason the Father loves me because I lay down my life that I might take it again, no one is taking it -from me but that I lay it down of my own initiative.

Jonah was willing to lay his life down to bring salvation and deliverance to others, so the Messiah, who Jonah prefigures, was willing to lay His life down so salvation would come to others.

Turn with me now please to Luke 11:30…

For just as Jonah became a sign to the Israelites, so shall the son of man be to this generation.

We know from Kings that Jonah was the son of Arytittai. He prophesied during the reigns of Jeroboam, both of them a very bad man and king. There were two Jeroboams: one was as bad as the other. At the preaching of Jonah the Gentiles repented when the Jews would not; at the message of Jesus the Gentiles accepted what He said at a time most Jews did not. Not all Jews rejected him – not all Jews rejected Jonahm, but basically it was the Gentiles not the Jews who repented in the days of Jonah and it was the Gentiles not the Jews who repented in the days of Jesus.

Jonah 1:17 tells us this: The Lord appointed a great fish.

The Lord Sent the Storm

Jonah prayed in the stomach of the fish…he said. “I called out of my distress…and He answered me”, etc.

The Lord appointed the storm, the Lord appointed the great fish. Now this was a “death experience”. Some argue from the Hebrew text that Jonah may have actually died biologically, from the implications of what “Sheol” could mean. But certainly the connotation would be there of a “death place”. It was the Lord who appointed Jonah to a place of death; the Lord consigned him to it.

In Acts 2:23 we read,

'this man, delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God.

Isaiah 3:10 it was the will of the Lord to smite him. Jonah was delivered up by the foreknowledge of God to a place of destruction, Jesus was delivered up by the foreknowledge of God to a place of destruction. Jonah “died” in the sea. He died, as it were – his death experience. (Whether he died or not people may debate but his death experience took place in the sea.)

Turn with me please to Psalm 69. This is of course a Psalm of David which is Messianic prophecy in the literary genre of Hebrew poetry. It is in this Psalm, for instance, we read in verse 21,

they gave me gall for my food and they gave me vinegar to drink,

…a prophesy of what would happen when the Lord Jesus was on the cross. However, this Psalm which looks ahead to the death of Jesus begins,

Hoshanna Elohim: save me oh God from the waters that have threatened my life.

Metaphorically then the death of Jesus is represented in Hebrew prophesy as a drowning experience.

Now we just sang this wonderful hymn, "When peace like a river attended my soul; when sorrows like sea billows roll". This was written by Mr. Stockwood but what many people don't know and what I didn't know until five or six years ago is that he composed it after his family drowned where, of all places, a building of the American colony hotel now stands in Jerusalem. It was after his family died that he actually wrote it in Jerusalem. The idea of “sea billows roll” is the drowning experience that happened to his family, but also in biblical typology particularly the Psalms you see, when people are under this kind of death experience, it is alluded to as drowning and points to Jesus.

Jonah 3:8,

But both man and beast in sack cloth and ashes repented after Jonah had told these people, "Repent, repent, repent, God will destroy this city in forty days."

And he goes on to say,

"perhaps if you repent God may turn back - (in verse 8) he may relent."

Recently I actually had a long email from somebody trying to justify people who predict things that don't happen. He was trying to justify Rick Joyner, Gerald Coates and these guys by saying, "Well, was Jonah a false prophet? Look at what Jonah predicted and it didn't happen." That was his argument to justify these false prophets! However, the text of Jonah makes it very clear that it was a conditional prophecy that says "if you don't repent this is what's going to happen." He never said that it was going to happen full-stop. It was conditional. It's an unfit comparison, but they always have to pervert the Bible out of context.

Nonetheless we see that Jonah gave a direct message of “repentance because the judgment is coming.” In the Gospel of St. Matthew 4:17, Jesus began to preach, "repent because the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Jonah gave a message of repentance so that judgment could be averted, so it was with Jesus and his disciples. "Save yourself from this wicked generation."

Jonah 2:4,

So I said, "I have been expelled from thy sight from before Thine eyes. "

The Hebrew says that Jonah was expelled “from before the presence of God”. God could not look upon him, God wouldn't look upon him, he was cast away from before God's eyes. We look at the Gospel of St. Matthew 27:46, "Eli Eli Lama Sabachthani" - "my God, my God why have you forsaken me". Jonah was cast away from the presence of God's sight, God would not look upon Jonah, so God would not look upon Jesus.

Jonah 1:17, he was three days and three nights in the stomach of the great fish and, as Jesus of course tells us in Matthew 17:39-40, that's a picture of the resurrection. As Jonah was three days in the stomach of the great fish, so Jesus would be three days in a tomb. Jonah is, like all of Israel's prophets, a type of Jesus. He teaches about the Messiah who would come after him; every Hebrew prophet does. When you read their lives carefully, they teach something about the Messiah and Jonah is no exception.

Jonah is given over to this death experience but there were things in Jonah's life that were blocking him from being conformed to what God wanted him to be.

  • He resisted God's will. He didn't want to do what God wanted him to do and, again, not without good reason: he knew what Amos had said about this nation that he was been sent to, he knew these people were bad. Who wants to be sent to a place like that where you might get killed?
  • Secondly, he lacked the compassion of God. He understood the judgment and anger of God but he lacked the compassion of God and he was very good at something which we say in Yiddish: treching, complaining. Trech, trech, trech, complain, complain, complain. Somebody who with good reason doesn't want to do what God wants them to do. What God was asking him to do was very difficult, to go to a people he didn't even like, a people who were going to hate him because he wasn't one of them. In terms of the ancient world, he was from the West they were from the East.

Just by virtue of the fact that he was a Hebrew, a believer in the true God – not a pagan – and that he was from the West of the known world and they were from the East, that made him a target just by going there. His complaint was not without good reason. The things he was concerned with were valid points, humanly speaking. It was difficult for him to understand how God could have such compassion on such barbarians.

 

You know for me it would be like, I suppose, going to fundamentalist Muslims who put a bomb on an airplane at Lockerby, or who want to kill my Israeli family, or perhaps like a Jew being sent as an evangelist to the generation of Germans who carried out the Holocaust. There were good reasons, humanly speaking, why he could not feel or experience the compassion of God for these people. These were bad men.

The Jonah within Us

It says the word of the Lord came twice to Jonah. Now the word for “word” in Hebrew is “davar”, but in Greek its “logos”. It doesn't mean a message so much as it means a person. Jesus is the Logos/davar in the Old Testament.

In the Old Testament the Holy Spirit was only for certain people at certain times: high priests, kings and prophets, But the Holy Spirit still communicated Jesus to them the way He does us. It was only Jesus' identity that was not there but it was still Him: "the word came", it means "the Lord Jesus came", it was a christotological encounter with Christ in Old Testament terms. Again, when Adam heard God walking in the garden, that was Jesus. When Jacob wrestled with the Metatrone (angel of God), it was Jesus. Jesus was in the Old Testament the same as in the New. When the word of the Lord came, it was an encounter with Christ.

When the Lord asks you or me to do things we don't want to do, or when there are things in my character or your character that are blocking what God wants, the Lord's not going to give you just a message, he's going to come to you. Jesus is going to stand in front of you, you're going to “see” Him. The message is going to be obvious once He comes and you'll know what's wrong with you! It's the encounter with the person, not just the word or the message or a letter or a telegram, a fax, an Email – it's the person. When Jesus comes to us we'll know where we stand, when we stand in front of Him.

The Name of Jonah

In the Hebrew part of the world today Jews normally name their children after dead ancestors but in the Bible they named them after biblical characters in Israel's history. In Hebraic thought, “son of” does not simply mean offspring – biological descent or pedigree – it means “in the character of”. Turn with me please to Matthew 16:17. Jesus said, "Blessed are you Simon bar Jonah" – that's of course Aramaic and not Hebrew. The Hebrew would be “ben Jonah”. Now why is Jesus calling him by his surname as well as his first name? True his father's name was Jonah but there's more to it than that: it's providential that Peter's name was “Bar Jonah”. He's in the character of Jonah – and so are you and so am I.

Here they go to the place Caesarea Philipp,: a place where the Greeks had worshipped Pan and a place where the Romans worshipped Caesar Augustus. Here in Matthew 16:22 Peter was very angry and wanted Jesus to deal with and judge these pagan Gentiles for defiling the holy land just as Jonah wanted the Lord to judge the Gentiles. Jonah didn't want to go to the Gentiles did he? Neither did Peter – in the character of Jonah. In Acts I0, the story of Cornelius and the “non-kosher” food, Peter did not want to go to the Gentiles just as Jonah didn't. "You are Bar Jonah"; "Peter, you are in the character of Jonah, you don't like these Greeks and Romans, you're in the character of Jonah, he didn't like the pagans either, you're in the character of Jonah. He didn't want to go where I wanted him to go."

Look at John 21:18,

“Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to gird yourself and walk wherever you wished; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you, and bring you where you do not wish to go.”

Peter, in the character of Jonah who didn't want to go.

Look at Galatians chapter 2:11-12. Jonah had an attitude…

But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For prior to the coming of certain men from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles; but when they came, he began to withdraw and hold himself aloof, fearing the party of the circumcision.

Jonah didn't want to get involved with these Gentiles, nor did Peter bar Jonah want to get involved with Gentiles!

There are a lot of people I don't want to get involved with. As a younger believer I went through terrible, terrible battles of hatred and I mean hatred. I remember I saw the film The Hiding Place - Corrie ten Boom and what the Nazis did to these Christians, these believers in Holland who protected Jews: how they murdered the old man and raped the women and so forth – and I was so angry. I began praising God for creating hell not just for Nazis but for Germans - I hated Germans. When we take our tours to Israel and go to Yad vashem [the Holocaust Memorial] I stay in the bus. I don't go in there. I remember once I visited the Nazi death camp at Dachau where the Germans did the experiments on the Jewish children. I just think of my own children. I think even of that little girl hiding in the movie Schindler's List. I could just picture my son Eli in that situation. I battled with hatred towards Germans.

My father was in the American military in the second world war. His family was from Merseyside. His mother was from there. (She left before the war and came back after the war) When my father came with the American navy, he saw what the Germans did to Liverpool, how they destroyed everything including where his mother was from. And I had this hatred of German people. It took me a long time through the Lord bringing German people into my life – whom I love and who are believers – to lose this hatred.

There were some people who hated gypsies: "these people were crooks, they're connivers", but there was someone along the road who had the compassion of the Lord for the gypsies and now they're the fastest growing church in the United Kingdom, lives radically changed.

To take another example: I've been attacked by Muslims even in England – physically attacked by gangs on Speakers' Comer for preaching the gospel – and it's not a racial thing: I love Asian Christians: they're great people. But when I read what the Muslims do in Pakistan to Christians or what they do to Christians in Saudi Arabia I get angry. I look at the Amnesty International website and I just get so angry. One of the great blessings of my life, one of the great thrills of my life, was when I spoke about Islam in Auckland, New Zealand and some Iranians, who had just come to New Zealand from Iran, Shia Muslims, repented and accepted Jesus and renounced Mohammed and the Koran and became believers. I know people who were anti-Semitic before they got saved: some crooked Jewish landlord did something to their aunt Milly thirty years ago and so they hated Jews. But after they got saved the Lord gave them a love and a burden for the Jews they couldn't explain and they couldn't even understand.

There's things in us, things that are not irrational, things that have some logical basis – sometimes even an apparent biblical basis. There were reasons Jonah didn't like these people. He had read what Amos said about them, he had read what God was going to do, so it was not totally irrational. In fact, it was totally rational. There were good, logical reasons humanly speaking. But he could not see and understand the compassion of God. No matter how bad these people are, when the word of the Lord comes to us and we stand before Jesus, we see that no matter how bad they are (even compared to us); we're all infinitely bad compared to Jesus. You know the sort of thing.

"Single mothers on council estates be warned: you've got five kids from three different yobbos and we're having to support them. Why do I have to pay taxes and support my family? To pay for these kids? Why don't these yobbos that you pick up in the pub support their own kids? Why should I have to?" It's rational but where's the compassion of Jesus for these single mothers? When I see them on the news doing these things, throwing bottles at football games, they don't care about football – they just care about getting drunk and throwing bottles. It's tribalism. "Please beat their heads in", that's me! Not altogether irrational but where's the compassion of Jesus? I've known yobbos who've got saved, I've known Muslims who've been saved, and I've known prostitutes who've been saved, and I've known drug addicts who've been saved: I used to be one! Where is the compassion of Jesus?

So Jonah gets plunged, God creates a storm, God appoints a death and there he finds himself buried in the guts of a fish, underneath the Mediterranean somewhere between Turkey and Tel Aviv. Now this particular experience is one of the things in the Bible which theologically teaches about life after death. But it also is one of the things that reveals something about what will happen to Jesus. When He died on the cross for our sin, when His Father couldn't look upon Him, when His Father's voice went into the depths of Sheol and raised Him from the dead. We are told in Acts 2:24 that death itself could not contain Jesus Christ, the grave was not strong enough to contain him, death itself was not strong enough to control Jesus or to hold him in.

Turn with me please to 2 Corinthians 4:8-14 

we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death works in us, but life in you. But having the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, “I believed, therefore I spoke,” we also believe, therefore we also speak, knowing that He who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and will present us with you.

As the prophet Hosea puts it in chapter 6:2, the resurrection of the Lord Jesus is our resurrection because his death is our death. Look at what Hosea says, He will revive us after two days; and the third day he will raise us up that we may live before him.

Because Jesus’ death is our death. His resurrection is our resurrection, could death contain Jesus? No! Can death contain you or I? Because of Jesus, no! There are no shortage of things in my life that block what God is wanting me to be and things in my life that are blocking me from really doing what God is wanting me to do. Sometimes I feel like I am being put to death when I complain about my neck, when I complain about being rejected by so much of the popular church because I won't go along with what's going on. Then I get a copy of Brother Andrew's News Letter and I read of Christians living in almost sub-human poverty, imprisoned and their families unable to support themselves. My kids have a roof over the' head – what do I have to complain about? Yes my neck hurts but I have pills. There are people whose necks hurt and they don't have the money for a pill. I have a pill in my pocket if my neck goes into spasm, I carry it around with me. All that bothers me. Why am I being put to death?

Why is it that ministries who teach the truth are always struggling for money but the ones who are corrupt rake it in? Because they struggle for money too, only they are expanding their corruption! Honest ministries are trying to expand the truth; they have to struggle and trust God. Death works in me. Why, Lord, if I am teaching the truth? I was only upholding the Trinity yet people who were part of Moriel began using my name a few weeks ago to endorse people who denied it. When I took the stand, they slandered me, they said I was mentally unbalanced from my automobile accident. Maybe I am unbalanced, but not from my automobile accident. Who needs this. What those people did was wicked but the real question is why did God allow it? What is God saying to me in this? God will deal with them but what is He saying to me? When my neck hurts the way it does today, (I am going to have to take a pill pretty soon!) what's God saying to me? What's God saying to you, when you are in the fish's guts? Remember Jesus said He's like Jonah. It seems like God himself banishes us from his presence. We are behaving in a way we think is reasonable and at least it's not irrational. We had reason on our side but we are in this bad situation. Sometimes lousy employment, sometimes no employment, financial hardship, health problems, problems in the church, problems in the ministry, problems in the family, problems in the marriage – problems, problems, problems. It seems like the Lord has banished us from His presence. He put us in a tomb, h=He left us in a grave. Oh! not the Ninevites, not the Mormons or the Muslims, not the yobbos or the prostitutes! He puts us in the grave.

He's banished us from His sight. But death could not contain Jesus and death cannot contain you either. I've said a thousand times the test of a true Christian is not that they don't have trials. On the contrary, if you don't have trials you're not a Christian. You have tribulation in the world. The test of a Christian is not that you don't go into the fish's guts, the test of the trial is what happens when you're inside of it.

Turn with me to Psalm 18:4-6. There are direct parallels in the Psalm to what happened to Jonah in that fish's gut.

The cords of death encompassed me, And the torrents of ungodliness terrified me. The cords of Sheol surrounded me; The snares of death confronted me. In my distress I called upon the Lord, And cried to my God for help; He heard my voice out of His temple, And my cry for help before Him came into His ears.

We may have been banished from his sight but not from his ears. Psalm 42:7,

Deep calls to deep at the sound of thy waterfalls and all breakers and waves have rolled over me

Just like Jonah.

Psalm116:3-9

The cords of death encompassed me And the terrors of Sheol came upon me; I found distress and sorrow. Then I called upon the name of the Lord: “O Lord, I beseech You, save my life!” Gracious is the Lord, and righteous; Yes, our God is compassionate. The Lord preserves the simple; I was brought low, and He saved me. Return to your rest, O my soul, For the Lord has dealt bountifully with you. For You have rescued my soul from death, My eyes from tears, My feet from stumbling. I shall walk before the Lord In the land of the living.

Even if you die there is a resurrection, there is a millennial kingdom.

(verse 15) Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his godly ones.

Even if we die we see him not in the land of the dead but in the land of the living. What does Job say? (Job 19:25-27)

“As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, And at the last He will take His stand on the earth. “Even after my skin is destroyed, Yet from my flesh I shall see God; Whom I myself shall behold, And whom my eyes will see and not another. My heart faints within me!

Even if we die we will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. "Out of the depths I cry to thee O Lord", wrote David. (Psalm 130:1)

When you're in the depths you've been banished from God's own presence. Your arguments are rational – at least to your own mind, certainly they are logical and even to a degree biblical. There you are in the stomach of the fish, the waves have overtaken you, you are not only drowning but are perhaps drowned. The bars of Sheol give you no way out and you can't even see the Lord: He has banished you from His presence. But these Psalms don't tell us He looks upon us, they say he hears. Then and only then did the fish regurgitate Jonah out onto the beach. He must have looked a mess and smelt even worse but he was ready for action! When you go through a mess like this you might not look so good.

 

How AI is transforming defensive capabilities against drones

October 12, 2026
Written by - Rubin Rothler LLB, LLM Examples abound in history of how the responses to innovations in technology that disrupted and transformed the nature of warfare have taken a delayed time to be adapted. Chain mail and armour had to be altered and bolstered to repel arrows from the English Longbow in Medieval Europe, but this didn't occur in time to the dismay of the French at Agincourt. It took the Spanish decades to redesign their cumbersome Galleons that lay prey to the swifter English ships. Napoleonic era field tactics were still being employed during the American Civil War, with mass charges mowed down by the Gatling barrel machine gun. Trench warfare was only later embraced during WWI. With the cheap manufacture of drones and the advances in AI a new chapter has opened in how war is waged in our own time. The conflicts in Ukraine and Iran have demonstrated how asymmetric warfare has become as much an economic calculation as a game of cat and mouse. Drones (and relatively cheaply manufactured ballistic missiles by Iran) are being shot down at great expense. AI which has been extensively deployed for target identification in Gaza is also proving to be a vital tool in hunting incoming drones. But as in the delayed development of military countermeasures historically, drones are ahead of AI in the battlefield. This is reflected in the enormity of Russian military casualties that have fallen victim to Ukrainian drones. AI is able to cut through the 'background noise' of distracting projectiles, birds and other debris to home in efforts to eliminate the actual drone target. The magic formula is speed and precision. Humans can detect and assess a threat, but AI can process radar, cameras and other sensors almost instantly, and with increasing accuracy predict where a drone intends to strike. When swamped with a wave drone attack, AI acts to identify and track the multiple threats. AI can also help decide how to respond. Depending on the system, the response could involve electronic warfare, an interceptor drone, a missile or a gun-based system. Ukraine has installed automated machine gun turrets instructed by AI to protect Kiev. In some cases, humans still make the final decision to engage, while AI handles the calculations and tracking required to make that decision quickly. More broadly, drone warfare is becoming a contest between autonomous systems. The challenge is no longer simply building a better missile or a better drone. It is building a system that can see the threat first, understand it quickly and respond before the drone reaches its target. In that sense, AI is becoming a critical part of air defence. The advantage may increasingly belong to whoever can make the fastest and most accurate decisions—not necessarily whoever manufactures the most expensive weapons. AI's pace of progress is exponential. It is beyond comprehension what capacity could be realized in even the next 2-3 years. The combination of drones, robotics and AI may render the traditional military hardware of tanks, frigates and fighter jets almost functionally obsolete. The development of AI's course of military application will be largely directed by the conflicts where it is deployed. In the pre-AI world of 1987, the black Friday market crash during the Reagan Administration saw a dangerous drop in the Dow, where computer analysis issued sell orders against a background of Reagan's massive budget deficits. Amidst Reagan's budget deficits this created an environment where social security was looted to fund defence spending. A supposed conservative President ran a fiscal policy with simultaneous increases in the Pentagon budget, coupled with tax cuts. The computer generated sell off was beyond the functional control of brokers and market makers, while the Soviets attempted to engineer market irregularities affecting the American economy which had further global ramifications due to massive American trade deficits with Japan under Reagan. The current Securities exchange environment is at best no less complex now. Given the spectre of what transpired in 1987 with computerised over control of stock exchange trading, and a shadow hanging over the bond market we are left to ponder could another such scenario be triggered in the age of AI? And even more illuminous prospect over shadows us now with the question can AI gain a decision-making operational capacity over command-and-control decisions. Certainly, for tactical weapons systems or even a doomsday scenario with Russia, China, India or Pakistan placing nuclear launch control in the hands of AI that could result in an exchange that either the US, Britain, France or Israel would be forced to react to. Without scaremongering it is necessary for strategic planners to prevent the nuclear powers that be from arriving at the precipice of such an abyss.

Interconnected Conflicts: The Risk of a New Thirty Years' War. By Rubin Rothler - LLB, MLB

September 21, 2026
The interlinked nature of third-party involvement in the ongoing conflicts in Iran and Ukraine has increasingly come to the fore in recent weeks. It emerged that China has not only been providing Iran with radar systems, navigation tools, and electronic warfare technology, but also high-resolution satellite imagery and geospatial data to direct its rockets. The same great-power relationships that are shaping the Middle East are affecting the conduct and constraints of the war in Ukraine. It is apparent that a reciprocation in kind is dictating Russia's conduct towards the US in Iran. Intelligence and targeting support mirror similar U.S. assistance to Ukraine. But this picture becomes murkier when considering the backroom accommodations Trump is willing to give Putin. Recently, Trump pressured Zelensky to stop targeting Russian diesel infrastructure, saying the attacks were causing a shortage of the fuel that is "hurting the world." The U.S. national average price for diesel, which is used by trucks, trains, ships, and farm equipment, rose above six dollars a gallon for the first time last Thursday. Such interventions demonstrate how developments on the battlefield in Ukraine can no longer be considered independently of wider economic and geopolitical calculations. China has been using tankers that are already at sea, when that runs out the American blockade will create shortage problems for the Chinese economy, as China no longer gets Venezuelan oil and is reliant on Iran and international spot market prices. The war with Iran is now spreading to Yemen, with the Houthis attempting to replicate the Iranian chokehold model perfected in the Strait of Hormuz. The strategic importance of controlling or threatening critical maritime chokepoints is central to the wider contest. What happens in the Gulf can therefore have consequences for shipping, energy markets, and military calculations far beyond the immediate theatre. So far, the US has declined Saudi requests to slow the Houthi advance. Neither Turkey nor Egypt seems inclined to come to Saudi Arabia's aid. This is despite the signing of a very recent mutual defence pact between Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Pakistan. More developments can happen in these conflicts on an average day than can be afforded mention, but they should be increasingly understood as interconnected parts of a wider geopolitical confrontation. Assistance in one theatre triggers reciprocal action in another. Consequently, these cease to be discrete, containable conflicts and are extending into prolonged multinational conflicts. There is a distinct possibility that these may become frozen conflicts over time. A more terrifying eventuality is something more akin to the Thirty Years' War, which was fought in the first half of the 17th century in Europe. It is important to remember that this calamity, which ravaged Europe, began as a localized rebellion that gradually drew in more and more powers. The initial religious nature of the fighting gave way to political struggles. The mechanism by which a localized conflict becomes a multinational struggle offers a historical warning worth considering. The danger today is that a collection of individually distinct conflicts could become sufficiently interconnected that containing any one of them becomes increasingly difficult. Iran, Ukraine, Russia, China, the United States, and the conflict involving the Houthis are already linked by military assistance, intelligence, energy, trade, and strategic competition. The question, therefore, is no longer simply how any one of these conflicts ends. It is whether they can remain separate conflicts at all.  (Author is an Israeli American lawyer academically qualified in British and in U.S.A. law, and a graduate of the School of Oriental & African Studies, London. He is a Jewish believer in Jesus and is currently based in Israel).

Prayer Request

By David Passmore • September 12, 2026
Moriel & Jacob Prasch request prayer for our sister in Jesus - Wendy Blomkamp, widow of Brother Fred Blomkamp (now with The Lord), the founder of Moriel South Africa Branch (not to be confused with Moriel's Ebyown Aids Children's Mission in South Africa founded by David Royle). Wendy, (an equestrian rider of all things) is originally from West Yorkshire, England but has lived most of her life in South Africa and is currently in retirement in the USA. Unfortunately, Wendy is diagnosed with inoperable pre terminal cancer with cardio pullmonary complications. The Lord will either intervene supernaturally or call her home. We request prayer for Wendy and her beloved family and wisdom for her physicians. In Christ, All at Moriel

What would happen to Israel if the House is controlled by Democrats, and if the Republicans lose control of the Senate?

By David Passmore • September 7, 2026
The US midterm elections are around the corner and the results could have profound effects on US foreign policy concerning Israel. Much has been said about this vote being a referendum on Trump's unpopular war with Iran. But it can equally be said to be about Trump's other foreign policy engagements that are viewed rather more favourably like the overthrow of Maduro in Venezuela and his replacement with a pro-American regime. With Israel the picture is less clear. It used to be a given that Israel enjoyed bipartisan support on the Hill. You could count on the fingers of one hand the number of politicians opposed to supporting Israel - the occasional fringe Democrat representing a singular Michigan constituency with a high Arab origin demographic, or a rare odd ball Republican preaching strict isolationism. This dynamic has shifted quickly in the last decade. The Democrats have all but abandoned any inclination of a pro-Israel position. Even establishment figures like Chuck Schumer have been pressured to side with the Party's radical left wing. With 60-80% of Democrats now anti-Israel, Israel can no longer rely on Jewish Democrats to oppose anti-Zionism or antisemitism. The most outspoken Democratic member of the Senate advocating a pro-Israel position, Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania is being pressured to resign and leave the party even by Pennsylvania's Jewish Governor Shapiro and Soros sponsored Philadelphia Prosecutor Krasner. This is happening concurrently with mass endorsement from 170 leading Hollywood Jewish actors writing a letter of support for Mark Ruffallo - despite his antisemitic comments naming Jewish investors supporting a Hollywood studio mega merger as being associated with apartheid genocide. However most shocking, were the comments by Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel who stood before an audience of Jewish Democrats last weekend telling them they may need to sacrifice the safety, and even the future, of their own people in exchange for saving the rest of humanity. Such rhetoric is contrary to basic human instincts of survival and self-preservation. If any other nation were suggested this course of action, I wonder what their response would be? On the Republican side the foreboding sense of an altering course towards Israel no longer seems so distant. The anti-Israel faction in the Republican party led by Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens and Nick Fuentes are now being supported by Vice President Vance. Jewish kingpins in the Trump Administration such as Witkoff and Kushner have been tied to business dealings in N.Y. with the Muslim Brotherhood controlled Qatari government through its business holdings. Should Republicans lose control of the Senate while Democrats take the House, Israel could find itself having to drastically re-access its relationship with Washington. We wouldn't see an immediate break in ties. American military, intelligence, technological and strategic cooperation with Israel is too integrated into the core of US institutions and corporations that would take a protracted period to dismantle. However, the power of Congress is in no way feeble. Congress controls funding, foreign-assistance legislation, sanctions, arms-related legislation and, perhaps most importantly, the political milieu in which an administration operates. A Democratic House combined with a Senate no longer controlled by Republicans could place enormous pressure on Trump to alter his attitude towards Israel. Practically this could entail demanding further accountability from Israel over military operations in Gaza, and the West Bank Settlers causing civilian casualties and property damage. Military aid could face more conditions or restrictions, but an immediate cutoff is unlikely. Israel has historically depended upon the presumption that regardless of who was President, there would be a robust enough bipartisan coalition in Congress to prevent a major deterioration in the relationship. Now the opposite appears true. Israel is taking the gamble of solely relying on a friendly President like Trump getting elected to maintain cordial relations. With the erosion of even much of Jewish American support for Israel and the hijacking of the Democratic party by a pro Islamist socialist left seen in Mamdani and others, Israel is forced to confront the inescapable reality that the last strong bastion of support for it is the Republican Party's evangelical base. But even younger voters in this key demographic are beginning to question support for Israel. The hostility displayed by the Haredim in Jerusalem and elsewhere against Christians including evangelicals, is to say the least counter-productive to the national interest. To attack the one friend Israel has left with a proven track record of loyalty and is vital to pro-Zionism internationally, is particularly detrimental to the national interest. It is Iran with its Mahdiist interpretations of jihad and sharia as a religious ideology that drives its hatred of Israel and the USA, and The West, to the detriment of the interests of the majority of the Iranian populace who want non hostile co-existence.  Such religious fanaticism and ideologically fuelled hatred ought not be given place in Israeli Judaism. It too, will generate adverse consequences for the majority of Israelis, including religious moderates, who desire an ongoing friendship with Evangelical Christians whose theology is not one of anti Semitism, but of proven Philo-Semitism and pro Zionism.

Don't bit ethe hand that feeds you - Irish hypocrisy towards Israel

By David Passmore • August 21, 2026
Don't bite the hand that feeds you - Irish hypocrisy towards Israel Rubin Rothler LLB, LLM Amongst European nations, Ireland in recent years has gained the reputation as being the leading anti-Zionist country. The Irish Republic has never been favourably inclined to Israel. It only established an Embassy in Tel Aviv in 1996. In poll after poll the vast majority of the Irish public have indicated hostility towards Zionism and strong support for Palestinian Statehood. The curious aberration to this is that in British Ruled Northern Ireland support is demarcated along sectarian lines. Catholic Republican areas predictably tend to ardently support the Palestinian cause, while Protestant Unionist communities are overwhelmingly pro-Israel. Perhaps some credence can be given to sentiments of traditional Catholic antisemitism hardwired into the Irish psyche as contributing towards this disposition. It was certainly odd that the Irish government promptly sent a delegation to the Nazi German Ambassador in Dublin to convey condolences after news of Hitler's suicide broke at the end of WW2. But more concretely if you were to ask the average Irish protester on a pro-Palestine march the basis of their empathy for the Palestinian cause, they would point to the ostensible parallels between the Irish experience of fighting for independence from British colonial oppression to the plight of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation. Further remonstrations on a diplomatic level concern the actions of the IDF interreacting with Irish Peace Keepers in Southern Lebanon that have caused the deaths of several Irish Peace Keepers over the decades in friendly fire incidents. Ireland has contributed the most peace keepers to this mission per capita and the government has condemned Israel for these deaths that they view as avoidable. This animosity towards Israel is unbalanced. There are reasons to consider that Ireland and Israel have a shared experience of national liberation. Both countries fought the British in the pursuit of independence. Both countries made great efforts to resurrect their ancient languages for modern wide scale use. Both the Irish and Jews form major diaspora communities in New York. Despite all this Ireland ranks as Israel's second largest export market after the US. The preponderance of Israeli exports to Ireland comprises electronic integrated circuits, micro-assemblies, and tech manufacturing components. American multinational colossal tech corporations like Intel are substantially engrossed in this trade through the chain of supply. Ireland and Israel are hubs for design and manufacture of high-tech hardware components for US corporations. So, due to the nature of the most prosperous and competitive sectors of their respective economies, Israel and Ireland are inextricably bound in bilateral trade ties. Resolutions from the Irish government to impose sanctions on West Bank originating produce is merely perfunctory rhetoric. Such actions amount to a drop in the bucket in terms of impact to overall trade. The stark reliance of Ireland on advanced Israeli aviation equipment recently caused a spectacle when Ireland's new government jet struggled to land in heavy fog due to it being ordered without an advanced Israeli made navigation system. This was directly due to a short-sighted government decision not to buy Israeli military technology. There is a marked disparity between the official position of the Irish government designed for domestic public consumption and the economic policies that it actually pursues towards Israel. The government is acutely aware that the US is massively invested in the Irish economy and they don't want to do anything to jeopardise this. Washington demands that their enterprises in Dublin are intertwined with operations in Israel. The Irish government dare not even prevent US military supply flights refuelling at Shannon Airport on their way to Tel Aviv. The Irish government knows that times change and now the gripping social issue is the anti-immigrant/anti-Islam popular street protests. Soon the anti-Israel protests could become a mere side show only really promoted by Sinn Fein given the pressing ramifications of mass migration. So, in the meantime certain politicians will rile against the occupation, purported genocide and pass paltry sanctions against insignificant produce from the West Bank. All the while making hand over fist in money with the Israelis where it really matters in tech.  (Author is an Israeli American lawyer academically qualified in British and in U.S.A. law, and a graduate of the School of Oriental & African Studies, London. He is a Jewish believer in Jesus and is currently based in Israel).

The tide has Changed

By David Passmore • July 31, 2026
The Tide Has Changed Rubin Rothler LLB, LLM The America that Netanyahu touched down on is a changed America. The death of Lindsey Graham represents a changing of the guard. Graham was a staunch Israeli ally who will most probably become an increasingly rare breed in Washington. Sixty percent of Americans now hold a unfavourable view of Israel which politicians are finding difficult to ignore. It was once unthinkable to believe that New York City with such a strong Jewish electoral base and influence on all sectors of economic and cultural life would have a mayor that is so hostile to Israel to such an extent that he is calling for the arrest of its Prime Minister. From all accounts Netanyahu was cordially welcomed at the White House. The official press release stated that the talks were constructive. What is more telling is what was left unsaid particularly concerning the proposed sale of F35's to Israel's new regional adversary -Turkey. Trump is keen to find a swift resolution to the Iran War, while Netanyahu is opposed to a premature departure. When the US and Israel initiated their attacks on Iran over five months ago, Trump and Netanyahu appeared united in the War's goals and purpose. But as the protracted conflict has staggered to topple the Iranian regime fractures have emerged. Much has been said about the imminent political realities both leaders face. The Republicans could take a big hit in the November midterm elections should the war continue and global energy markets be negatively impacted. Netanyahu is anxious to demonstrate a big win to the Israeli public with the upcoming October election. In Israel, the Iran War is not viewed in isolation, but rather as an extension of the response to the colossal disaster of the October 7th massacre. Netanyahu must rehabilitate his reputation as a competent steward of national security having had the greatest loss of civilian life in an attack happening under his watch. Aside from the Iran issue, Trump is being pressured by Erdogan to insist upon Israeli withdrawal from Syrian territory pre-emptively seized by Israel following the toppling of Assad. Trump has also indicated disapproval of the extent of continuing Israeli measures against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, questioning the proportionality employed. Netanyahu is not in an envious position. Throughout his tenure and political career, he lauded his ability to engage successfully with the American public by zealously advocating Israel's position. Yet under his government Israel's reputation has plummeted in the US. Trump may be the last US President to extend such overwhelming bilateral support to Israel. The days of politicians like Lindsey Graham are fast ending. While John Fetteman and Marco Rubio appear to be remaining more solid, even some of the most warmly inclined leading Republican and Democrat voices like Donald Trump and Rahm Emanuel have nuanced their support for Israel. The tide has shifted and will at best level off if not continuing to shift further.  (Author is an Israeli American lawyer academically qualified in British and in U.S.A. law, and a graduate of the School of Oriental & African Studies, London. He is a Jewish believer in Jesus and is currently based in Israel).

The Saudi Nuclear Deal: An attempt to alter the Regional Balance of Power

By David Passmore • July 24, 2026
The Saudi Nuclear Deal: An attempt to alter the Regional Balance of Power Rubin Rothler LLB, LLM The initiative to develop a civilian nuclear program in Saudi Arabia with US assistance isn't new. There were concrete plans discussed towards these ends during the first Trump Administration. The recent announcement to actualize this deal follows the geo-political regional tumult in the wake of the Iran War. Several dimensions of motivation underlie the US decision. An overarching US strategic agenda is to keep the Saudis firmly in the American sphere of influence. Washington knows all too well that the Chinese and Russians are eager to offer their nuclear technical assistance to the Saudis in order to draw them closer to their camp. On a personal note, the nuclear agreement is a significant achievement for Bin Salaman. The Saudis have long had designs to diversify their energy supplies. Having a civilian nuclear program also adds prestige to Saudi Arabia as an emerging market economy. For the US, a monopoly on contracting companies for the requisite construction offers lucrative economic opportunities. Although the Civilian Nuclear deal does not allow the enrichment of Uranium, the Saudis will be in a position to do so if Washington gives the green light. This will act as a counterbalanced threat hanging over the Iranians. After the recent flare up of renewed fighting with Iran due to their lack of adherence to the moratorium of understanding, something had to budge in Trump's estimation. A reconfiguration of the power balance in the Gulf by introducing the potential of Saudi Arabia to be able to acquire nuclear weapons shifts the dynamic and places further pressure on Iran to strictly abstain from nuclear proliferation. Despite Israeli concerns about the agreement, Trump sought to assuage their alarm by making it contingent upon Saudi Arabia normalizing relations with them. Given the inherently unstable nature of an autocratic Saudi regime Israel views a diplomatic relationship with the Saudis as being on precarious footing in the long term. Israel is already forced to contend with the implications of one nuclear armed Muslim state - Pakistan and it will further weaken its own deterrent capability if another similarly capable hostile neighbour were to emerge in the future. The roles of Turkey and Qatar in all this foray are a wild card. Officially Turkey is served under the NATO nuclear umbrella for defence that is subject to US control. However, its civilian nuclear program remains in its infancy. Now with the Saudi deal, Erdogan may be inclined to exert pressure on the US to help accelerate his own nuclear program. Just as Erdogan's efforts to acquire F35 fighter jets from the US greatly disturbed Israeli military planners, a heightened Turkish nuclear ability will intensify this fear. Qatar views itself as pursuing its own independent foreign policy that has managed to remain rather neutral during the current war, thereby escaping the ire of Iran's strikes on US regional assets. Overall, the Qatari government has grown closer to the Turkish vision for the region and so likely isn't particularly amiable to the Saudi agreement. Ultimately the Saudi deal is a gamble. Many will see it as throwing more fuel on the fire which will further imperil the tinder box region and heighten tensions. But Trump finds himself at a continuing impasse with a stubborn regime in Tehran that is leveraging their geographic hold on the straits of Hormuz to inflict damage on the global energy markets. Iranian strikes upon US Arab regional allies have underscored the de facto alliance between Israel and the Arabs against Iran and its Shia proxies. The US hopes to use the Saudi nuclear deal as a means of making this alliance official by having Saudi Arabia joining the Abraham Accords as a pre-condition.  (Author is an Israeli American lawyer academically qualified in British and in U.S.A. law, and a graduate of the School of Oriental & African Studies, London. He is a Jewish believer in Jesus and is currently based in Israel).

Circling the Wagons

By David Passmore • July 14, 2026
Circling the wagons Ruben Rothler LLB, LLM Israel is a society riddled with tension and division. It is sociologically, if not politically miraculous that a country drawing Jews from all over the world is able to exist at all. The army affords a degree of integration as a melting pot. But this is only a marginal source of national unity in the overall scheme of things. More so are the myriads of external threats that face this small country. In the former generation the Ashkenazi (Jews of European descent) - Sephardic (Jews of Oriental descent) divide was far more pronounced. The dominant Ashkenazi establishment held the reins of political and economic power which was resented by the Sephardim. However, due to a combination of inter-marriage and political accommodation much of the chasm that separated these distinct groups was forged. Menachem Begin (an Ashkenazi politician) in 1970 successfully ran on the Likud Party ticket with a campaign that brought Sephardic Jews under his conservative political umbrella. Later the immigration of Russian Jews following the end of Communism would add a whole new dimension to the Israeli demographic milieu. The younger generation of these immigrants tended to adapt well to Israeli society and contributed much to the economy. The wider division in Israeli society that crosses ethnic lines concerns that between religious and secular Jews. This can be further bifurcated to the clash between the secular and specifically ultra-orthodox Jews (Haredim) as distinguished from the national religious Jews (Dati Leumi). The Secular and the Religious generally part on what they envisage a Jewish State to entail. Religious Jews desire the State to strictly adhere to the stipulations of Jewish Law (Halacha), while at present Halakhic influence is largely limited to certain areas of Family Law concerning Jewish citizens. Wider considerations of promoting a socially conservative political agenda would also be forefront amongst the religious mindset broadly. Secular Jews view the imposition of such proposed measures as a serious infringement of their civil rights. With regard to the Haredim, the bone of contention looms larger, in that this group is fundamentally opposed to participating in society at large. This is acutely manifested in diminished contribution to the work force and a refusal to be conscripted into the army. The 2023 judicial reform protests posed a significant threat to social civil order. The nation appeared to be bitterly divided into two opposing camps. This split reflected broader divisions concerning visions of how the country should be governed. The judicial reforms would have weakened the Supreme Court's ability to render the Executive branch accountable. However, the Supreme Court was also accused of using its considerable powers to promote a socially liberal agenda. Left wing secular Israelis tended to oppose the proposed reforms while those on the right (which included the majority of Religious Jews) supported the reforms. Every weekend droves of protesters were brought onto the streets causing major disturbances to traffic. The polarising nature of this impasse threatened the future of Israeli democracy. It was the October 7th attack that brought a swift end to this public debate and civil strife. The nation instinctually united in response to this common existential threat. The judicial reforms were shelved for a future point when the urgent security threats subsided. However, as the war dragged on the enduring issue of Haredi refusal to conscript into the army became more pronounced. Mounting casualties combined with ever increasing manpower demands to field troops on the multiple theatres of action on which the IDF is engaged has depleted the ranks, and the army is now in much need of fresh conscripts. Haredi belligerent refusal to participate in the pressing national defence has escalated from being a political debate to a matter of very practical vital importance. Overall we can observe that the challenges to national unity in successive generations since the establishment of Israel has recurrently been ameliorated by the common necessity of defence towards outside threats. Most recently we can see this happening with regard to the global anti Semitism and anti-Zionism that has been raging since the October 7th atrocities. These hostile attitudes have paradoxically acted as a force which promotes nationalism and a sense of national cohesion in Israel that otherwise might not functionally exist.  (Author is an Israeli American lawyer academically qualified in British and in U.S.A. law, and a graduate of the School of Oriental & African Studies, London. He is a Jewish believer in Jesus and is currently based in Israel).

A Divided Nation

By David Passmore • July 8, 2026
A Divided Nation Rubin Rothler LLB, LLM The Haredi community has had a complicated, paradoxical relationship with the State since its founding. Rooted in a Talmudic precept that the Jews are forbidden to resettle the land of Israel en masse by force before the coming of the Messiah, the secular democratic State of Israel presents itself as blasphemous by its mere existence. Yet due to practical considerations such as the need to obtain funding for its religious academies the Haredi leadership reached a settlement with the State's founders that exempted Haredi men from being conscripted for military service. This was at a time when the Haredi population in Israel was relatively small. Over the past decades this demographic ballooned until the point that soon the majority of Jewish children in Israel will be born into Haredi families. Such a situation is clearly unsustainable. Recently the Knesset's (Parliament's) Haredi parties have pressured their coalition partners in government to codify Torah Study as part of the Country's Basic Laws. This was purposefully done to elevate the status of their institutions to be on parity with service in the IDF. Israel is yet to promulgate a written Constitution, so legislation classed as a Basic Law holds Constitutional status for all intents and purposes. These moves by the religious parties represent a back door power grab to enshrine in law very significant hurdles to prevent the enlistment of Haredi men. The burden of Israel's defence is comparatively massive for a country its size and it is vastly disproportionately shouldered by the secular population. Until now there have been political initiatives to conscript the Haredim. But given the huge manpower shortages emerging in the wake of near continual conflict on multiple fronts since the events of October 7th this matter has become urgent and not merely a theoretical discussion of what is fair and equitable. It is important to draw a distinction between the Haredim and national religious Jews (Dati Leumi). The Haredim adhere to a lifestyle entirely committed to observance of Jewish Law and Talmudic study. This is embraced to the exclusion of gainful employment and participation in wider society. They are either outrightly opposed to Zionism or consider themselves non-Zionist. Conversely, followers of the national religious movement in Israel although being observant of Jewish law and learning would alongside this pursue secular professions. Furthermore, they are ardently Zionist and disproportionately serve in IDF combat units. This is often done within the framework of a program called Hesder Yeshiva that combines religious learning with military service. Efforts to cater a similar model for accommodating Haredi participation in the IDF have so far failed to make substantial gains. Such measures designed to override Haredi objections to service based upon modesty concerns by strict segregation of the sexes in these specially formed units have failed to appease the Haredi leadership. For them, any form of military service is considered a dereliction of their duty to fully devote themselves to a Torah lifestyle. They argue that their Talmudic learning and prayers are in itself a form of national service and act to protect the Jewish people spiritually from enemy attack. It is as if two parallel societies exist within Israel. And the trajectory of separation between the two is only growing. The Haredim are cloistered away in their Yeshivas, immersed in lives devoted to adhering to the stipulations of Jewish law. While the particulars of actually running the State is left to the Secular. The Haredim desire all the benefits of subsidizing their lifestyle without contributing to society. What we really have going on here at source is two profoundly different and opposing ideological visions of what is important in life and what is the purpose of a Jewish State. At the State's founding these divergent perspectives were more manageable. Ben Gurion only had to contend with one religious party –the National Religious Party. Later in 1970 Begin aligned with the NRP to form a coalition government that also brought Sephardic Jews under the Likud umbrella which had the effect of bringing unity to the country by bridging the Ashkenazi-Sephardi divide. However, over time Israeli politics has seen a proliferation of religious parties, gaining further leverage as king brokers in forming governments due to the proportionate representation voting system which secular Israelis not uncommonly view as political blackmail. (Author is an Israeli American lawyer academically qualified in British and in U.S.A. law, and a graduate of the School of Oriental & African Studies, London. He is a Jewish believer in Jesus and is currently based in Israel).

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