Church of the Holy Sepulchre and Garden Tomb have empty graves

On this holiest of holy days, Wesley Pruden writes of the one place in the entire Middle East where Christians, Jews, Muslims and believers in all religions are free and protected to gather together to worship in their own way, in Israel.

The Israeli Declaration of Independence, adopted in 1948, declares Israel to be a Jewish state, but further declares that the nation "will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants, irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions." It's a promise bereft of Jeffersonian eloquence, but it's plain and to the point.

In that long-ago day, in a burst of naive enthusiasm, certain idealists imagined that this example would spread to other places where religious freedom is understood to mean that you have the freedom to keep your head so long as you believe what the imams in the government tell you to believe. Israel has since enacted comprehensive legal codes to protect the hundreds of Christian, Muslim and Jewish monuments and markers and to guarantee universal access to them. Jordan, before the Six-Day War in 1967, controlled Jerusalem, and Jews were forbidden entry. Many Jewish holy sites were routinely vandalized.

Moshe Dayan, the defense minister who led the Israelis to victory in the Six-Day War, was clear about religious tolerance and protection in a radio broadcast the morning Jerusalem was captured. "This morning," he said, "the Israel Defense Force liberated Jerusalem. We have united Jerusalem, the divided capital of Israel. We have returned the holiest of our holy places, never to part from it again. To our Arab neighbors we extend, also at this hour - and with added emphasis 'at this hour' - our hand in peace. And to our Christian and Muslim fellow citizens, we solemnly promise full religious freedom and rights."

This clearly includes the right to disagree. Not every Christian regards the Church of the Holy Sepulchre as the site of Christ's burial. A tomb in a garden below Calvary was discovered in 1867 and, popularized by Gen. Charles George "Chinese" Gordon, an eccentric Bible scholar once assigned to the British military in Palestine, became known as "the Protestant tomb." The Anglican church once recognized it as the authentic tomb. Scholars are divided today on whether this is so.

The tomb fits the description in Matthew 27:58, when Joseph of Arimathea begged Pilate for the body of Jesus: "Then Pilate commanded the body to be delivered. And when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth. And laid it in his own, new tomb, which he had hewn out of a rock; and he rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulcher, and departed."

The stone is there today, and the track on which it was rolled away is visible in the rock. The tomb and the garden lie beneath a large stone outcropping, vaguely resembling a skull, marked by two gaping holes, as if eye sockets. Hence the name "Golgotha," or "skull," given to the site of the crucifixion.

The argument continues, as with so much about the meaning of the Scripture. But Christians agree on the Resurrection as the story of Easter, the central fact that gives the Gospel meaning. The pilgrims continue to make their way in peace to Jerusalem, scene of the holiest and most horrific events of history, watched over now with respect and reverence by Jews.

I was privileged to get the chance to visit Israel on a Holy Land Tour in 1979 and I visited both the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the Garden Tomb, the so-called Catholic and Protestant versions of the tomb of Christ. I have to say I felt no moving of the Holy Spirit in the Catholic church there but quite the opposite at the Garden Tomb. There was a flood of the Holy Spirit in that place which in my subjective opinion validates it as the genuine tomb.

So I agree with General Charles "Chinese" Gordon, photo above, who we were told discovered the Garden Tomb while strolling on top of the city wall one morning in his daily prayer walk.

Gordon had the Garden Tomb site cleared and sponsored its development as the holy site it is today, we were told. But I'm not trying to pick a fight with my Catholic brothers and sisters. The important thing is, wherever Jesus was buried, He didn't stay there long. He is risen!

Israeli Jews wake up to Obama's plan to abandon Israel

President Obama's approval rating here at home has sunk into negative territory, largely due to his Obamacare "healthcare reform" plans to socialize America's health insurance industry.

But there's one part of the world where his approval rating is down to single digits, nearing zero, in the nation which has been America's only faithful ally in the Middle East, Israel. There Obama has also managed to vastly improve the popularity of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who Israelis now see as a hero for standing up to Obama's demand that growth be immediately halted in all Jewish settlements under dispute by Palestinian Arabs.

Aluf Benn, editor at large of the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, pens an op-ed in the Noo Yawk Times to ask the question: Why Won't Obama Talk to Israel?

A Jerusalem Post poll of Israeli Jews last month indicated that only 6 percent of those surveyed considered the Obama administration to be pro-Israel, while 50 percent said that its policies are more pro-Palestinian than pro-Israeli. Less scientifically: Israeli rightists have — in columns, articles and public statements — taken to calling the president by his middle name, Hussein, as proof of his pro-Arab tendencies.

What went wrong? Several explanations come to mind.

First, in the 16 rosy years of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, Israelis became spoiled by unfettered presidential attention. Memories of State Department “Arabists” leading American policy in the Middle East were erased. The White House coordinated its policy with Jerusalem, and stayed out of the way when Israel embarked on controversial military offensives in Lebanon and Gaza. This approach infuriated America’s Arab and European allies, which blamed Washington for one-sidedness — something they were willing to forgive of Bill Clinton but not of George W. Bush.

Mr. Obama came to office determined to repair America’s broken alliances in Europe and the Middle East. One way to do this — to prove that he was the opposite of his predecessor — was to place some distance between Israel and himself.

Second, Mr. Obama’s quest for diplomacy has appeared to Israelis as dangerous American naïveté. The president offered a hand to the Iranians, and got nothing, merely giving them more time to advance their nuclear program. In Israeli eyes, he was humiliated by North Korea’s nuclear and missile tests. And he failed to move Arab governments to take steps to normalize relations with Israel. Conclusion: Mr. Obama is a softie, eager to please his listeners and avoid confrontation with anyone who is not Mr. Netanyahu.

Third, Mr. Obama seems to have confused American Jews with Israelis. We are close emotionally and politically, but we are different. We speak Hebrew and not English, we live in the Middle East and have separate historical narratives. Mr. Obama’s stop at Buchenwald and his strong rejection of Holocaust denial, immediately after his Cairo speech, appealed to American Jews but fell flat in Israel. Here we are taught that Zionist determination and struggle — not guilt over the Holocaust — brought Jews a homeland. Mr. Obama’s speech, which linked Israel’s existence to the Jewish tragedy, infuriated many Israelis who sensed its closeness to the narrative of enemies like Mahmoud Ahmedinejad.

Fourth, as far as most Israelis are concerned, Mr. Obama has made a mistake in focusing on a settlement freeze. For starters, mainstream Israelis rarely have anything to do with the settlements; many have no idea where they are, even when they’re a half-hour’s drive from Tel Aviv.

More important: in the past decade, repeated peace negotiations and diplomatic statements have indicated that larger, closer-to-home settlements (the “settlement blocs”) will remain in Israeli hands under any two-state solution. Why, then, insist on a total freeze everywhere? And why deny with such force — as the administration did — the existence of previous understandings between the United States and Israel over limited settlement construction? There is simply too much evidence proving that such an understanding existed. To Israelis, the claim undermined Mr. Obama’s credibility — and strengthened Mr. Netanyahu’s position.

I fear we're seeing the beginning of the end of America's future. As an evangelical Christian and a fundamental believer in the Bible, I firmly believe what the Bible says is true about the nation of Israel, whoever is a friend of Israel will be blessed by God. And the reverse, the nation that abandons Israel will be abandoned by God. The Israeli people have woke up and seen their abandonment coming. I pray the American people will realize the consequences of Obama's coming abandonment of Israel and speak out before it's too late.

Day 200: Obama's approval rating finally goes negative

Where's the 200-day headlines about President Obama's approval rating going into negative territory? There were none and I missed it until I ran across the latest chart and stole it from Gateway Pundit.

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday shows that 32% of the nation's voters now Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Thirty-four percent (34%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -2. That’s the President’s lowest rating to date and the first time the Presidential Approval Index has fallen below zero for Obama (see trends).

And over at the Contentions blog at Commentary, there's another poll report that Israelis are finally waking up and smelling the coffee about whose side Obama is on. And it is not Israel's.

The White House is atwitter after a new poll revealed a dramatic shift among Israelis regarding the administration’s policies towards Israel. The poll, conducted by Smith Research and commissioned by the Jerusalem Post, shows that only 6% of Israelis consider Obama “pro-Israel,” while 50% see him as “pro-Palestinian.” Compare this with the same poll from a month earlier, in mid-May, which had 31% responding that the Obama Administration is pro-Israel, and just 14% saying pro-Palestinian. What has changed in the last month? Not much, other than Obama’s dramatic Cairo speech, which described Israel as the product of centuries of Jewish suffering and the Holocaust; and Netanyahu’s no less dramatic response, which described Israel as the product of thousands of years of Jewish attachment to their ancient homeland.

There is a political calculus for the President here: As much as American Jews may have supported Obama without caring too much about his record on Israel, at the end of the day, American Jews tend to care deeply about Israel, and their sense of what’s happening with Israel is highly informed by what Israelis think (or, at least, Israeli elites). In other words, so dramatically lopsided a view of American policy towards Israel will not be lost on American Jewish voters. Midterms are not that far off.

What's going on? Is the kool-aid wearing off? Are voters finally waking up from the November nightmare? I sure hope so. One reason for the shift in polls -- in addition to the biggest reason, which is Obama's own performance, or lack thereof, as President -- is the law of unintended consequences. Obama got elected on the "Bush did it!" strategy. And since taking office, he has continued the "Bush did it!" excuse for all the ills of the world and his own administration.

And guess what? Former Bush administration officials, President George W. Bush himself and even his mild-mannered father, President George H.W. Bush, have finally responded after former Vice President Dick Cheney showed the way. All I can say is it's about time.

The Washington Times tells us who's on first among the Bush administration members who have finally found their voice after Cheney led the charge.

It's not just former Vice President Dick Cheney.

As former President George W. Bush offered his first public - though veiled - criticisms of his successor's administration last week, a growing number of his senior aides and advisers are also speaking up to defend Mr. Bush's record and take on the Obama White House.

A few of them are marrying their insider's policy knowledge with modern technology to critique, in detail, President Obama's economic program.

The day Mr. Obama left for the Middle East earlier this month, former Bush official Tony Fratto launched a broadside against the White House claim that it had "created or saved" 150,000 jobs with economic-stimulus money.

"What causes the jaw to drop is not just the breathtaking deception of the claim, but the gullibility of the Washington press corps to continue reporting it," Mr. Fratto, an economist who served in the Treasury Department and the Bush White House press office, wrote on a blog run by CNBC, where he is now a paid contributor.

When Mr. Obama returned from his trip, the jobs "created or saved" claim was front and center. The White House message of the day - that the stimulus would "create or save" 600,000 more jobs in the next 100 days - ran into a public relations buzz saw.

Perhaps I was wrong when I predicted President Obama's "Bush did it!" strategy would work well enough to see him through his first term and into his second. I sure hope so. C'mon 2012! And perhaps we won't have to wait for the inauguration of President Sarah Palin's first term to see some "change you can believe in." Midterm elections in 2010 would be a fine time to take the reins of power from Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and return it to the sick-and-tired voters.

'The Death of America' may be looming upon us

Prophet Joe Biden has been right on exactly one thing since Obama picked him as vice president. He predicted shortly after winning the election, foreign despots would challenge the rookie President with an international crisis. But Biden should have used the plural instead of the singular.

Here on this Memorial Day, there's enough international crises on America's plate to feed a hog. We're still in the middle of the war on terror with troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. Iran's working on building a nuclear bomb, this morning North Korea tested a bigger bomb than the last one they set off, and what is Obama doing about it? He'll probably pull out all the stops and -- make another speech. That'll show 'em not to mess with Barack, won't it?

But as worrisome as North Korea is, and it's bad, what Iran will do if allowed to get the bomb is just unthinkable. They will destroy the nation of Israel on day two after they get the bomb.

And what is Obama doing about this threat to our nation's only true friend in the Middle East?

Worse than nothing. He and his administration are trying their best to force Israel to meekly submit to their own destruction under his watch. Dick Morris and Eileen McGann have the low-down in their report today, which is chillingly titled The Death of Israel.

From Caroline Glick, deputy editor and op-ed writer for the Jerusalem Post, comes alarming news. An expert on Arab-Israeli relations with excellent sources deep inside Netanyahu's government, she reports that CIA chief Leon Panetta, who recently took time out from his day job (feuding with Nancy Pelosi) to travel to Israel "read the riot act" to the government warning against an attack on Iran.

More ominously, Glick reports (likely from sources high up in the Israeli government) that the Obama administration has all but accepted as irreversible and unavoidable fact that Iran will soon develop nuclear weapons. She writes, "...we have learned that the [Obama] administration has made its peace with Iran's nuclear aspirations. Senior administration officials acknowledge as much in off-record briefings. It is true, they say, that Iran may exploit its future talks with the US to run down the clock before they test a nuclear weapon. But, they add, if that happens, the US will simply have to live with a nuclear-armed mullocracy."...

All this means is that Israel's life is in danger. If Iran gets the bomb, it will use it to kill six million Jews. No threat of retaliation will make the slightest difference. One cannot deter a suicide bomber with the threat of death. Nor can one deter a theocracy bent on meriting admission to heaven and its virgins by one glorious act of violence. Iran would probably not launch the bomb itself, anyway, but would give it to its puppet terrorists to send to Israel so it could deny responsibility. Obama, bent on appeasement, would likely not retaliate with nuclear weapons. And Israel will be dead and gone.

And if America abandons Israel, God will abandon America. I didn't say that, God did. Long ago, God called a man named Abram, who God later renamed Abraham, to leave his pagan past behind and begin a journey to he knew not where, to become the founder of a new nation.

¹ The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you.

² "I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you;
I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.

³ I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you."

America was founded on religious freedom and from the refounding of Israel in 1948 to the present, America has been a friend of that nation. But if under the leadership of Barack Obama, America abandons Israel, God will abandon America, just as He promised Abram so long ago.

Pray hard for our country this Memorial Day and pray hard for the nation of Israel also. God has a plan and Israel will not be destroyed, which the Bible makes very clear. But there's nothing that I can find in the Bible that points to the nation of America having a role of any type in the great conclusion of recorded history which I believe is upon is. Perhaps Obama's curse is why.