A New Outbreak of Terrorism and War in Israel and Palestine

Last Saturday, the Islamic terrorist group Hamas carried out a massive attack on Israeli territory, using advanced technology to disable and breach the wall surrounding Palestinian Gaza and invade Israeli territory to murder hundreds of men, women, and children in Israeli villages. At the same time, rockets were fired from Hamas outposts in Gaza against Israeli targets.

Taken totally by surprise, Israel declared war on Hamas and began relentlessly bombing Gaza. The awful fact remains that the barbaric Hamas terrorists are indistinguishable from the rest of the 2+ million civilian inhabitants crowded into the confines of 365 square kilometers of the Eastern Mediterranean shore. Gaza’s Palestinian people—including women, children, and the elderly—are inevitably the victims of an ongoing Israeli bombardment of their region as they try to seek out and destroy Hamas.

The present tragedy is that “war against Hamas” (as an effort of self defense) is indistinguishable in fact from war against the entire population of Gaza. This kind of indiscriminate “total war” is never justifiable and can never bear fruit. The dynamic of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a generator for hatred and violence that has passed from generation to generation. It has been a constant feature of world news for my entire life.

I have not so much as a hint for how to resolve these conflicts. War rages in the ancient land that is so specially loved by God, where He began to dwell with the human race and—by the events of His crucifixion and resurrection—won for the human heart an ineradicable destiny of union with Himself. God permits this terrible war, however, foreseeing that it will ultimately lead to a peace that glorifies His mercy.

But my heart finds no consolation, right now, in mere words. I weep for the homeland of Jesus. I mourn the awful deaths of so many of my Jewish, Muslim, and Christian brothers and sisters and the corresponding afflictions brought down upon perpetrators and victims alike.

I weep and pray.