RELIGION AND FOREIGN POLICY

Israel lifts veil of silence over Syria strike by Jacques Pinto Tue Oct 2, 10:23 AM ET

JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel lifted its official veil of silence over last month's strike in Syria on Tuesday as army radio said that the Jewish state carried out the attack deep inside its arch foe's territory. The Israeli military censor lifted a blackout on publishing the information on the September 6 strike, in which Syria had said its air defences fired on Israeli warplanes that dropped ammunition deep inside its territory.The military censor has authorised for the first time the publication of the fact that Israeli combat planes attacked a military target deep inside Syrian territory on September 6, the radio said.It is the only element that the censor allowed to be published, it added.Israeli officials have up to now refused to make any comment on the strike and on Tuesday the army and the prime minister's office stuck to this line, even after the military censorship was lifted.

Amid the Israeli blackout, most of the speculation on the raid has come from foreign media, with one version saying that Israel bombed a suspected nuclear facility in its northern neighbour that was allegedly being built with the help of North Korea, reports denied by both Damascus and Pyongyang.In an interview aired by the BBC on Monday, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad identified the target of the strike as an unused military building and said that the warplanes had hit nothing of consequence.In his first public reaction to the strike on northern Syria, the president said in the rare interview with a foreign journalist that it showed Israel's visceral antipathy towards peace.The BBC quoted Assad as saying Syria reserved the right to respond to the attack.Retaliate does not mean missile for missile and bomb for bomb. We have our means to retaliate, maybe politically, maybe in other ways, said Assad.But if we want to retaliate militarily, this means we're going to work according to the Israeli agenda, something we don't look for in the runup to the US-sponsored Middle East peace conference expected in November, he said.Syria has filed a formal complaint with the United Nations over the strike, which has raised tensions between the two neighbours who remain in an official state of war.Amid the tension, Israel scrambled fighter planes three times in a space of a week after concerns were raised about activity over Syrian airspace, with all of the incidents turning out to be false alarms -- the first one sparked by migratory birds appearing on Israeli radar near the Syrian border.

Syrian Vice President Faruq al-Shara said on Saturday that the raid was meant to provide justification for future aggression against his country.Those who continue to talk about this raid and to invent inaccurate details (about it), are aiming to justify a future aggression againt Syria, he said at a press conference.
Peace talks between Israel and Syria collapsed in 2000 over disagreements over the Golan Heights, the strategic plateau Israel captured from Damascus in 1967 and annexed in 1981.

Putin eyes prime minister's job OCT 2,07

Mr Putin has made it clear that he intends to stay active in politics - Russian President Vladimir Putin has raised the possibility of becoming a future prime minister by agreeing to enter the December parliamentary polls. Mr Putin, who must leave office as president next year, said suggestions he might seek to become Russian prime minister were entirely realistic. He said he accepted the proposal by the United Russia to head the party's list - without becoming a member. By being on the list he is guaranteed a seat in the next parliament. The BBC's Mike Sanders says Mr Putin's announcement comes as a shock, but is the clearest indication yet that he is determined to stay at the centre of power in Russia. According to the Russian constitution, he is not allowed to run for a third consecutive term as president in March.

Radical change

As far as heading the government is concerned - this is a quite realistic suggestion but it is still too early to think about it, Mr Putin told the congress of the United Russia. We can forget our favourite cliche that the president is tsar in Russia Gleb Pavlovsky Russian analyst

Press excited by Putin hint Putin seeks new role Should Putin be Russian PM?

Two conditions must be met first - United Russia must win the election and a decent, capable and modern person with whom I work as a team should be elected as president, he added. His announcement follows years of speculation about what he might do after his last presidential term ends. Pro-Kremlin political analyst Gleb Pavlovsky described it as a radical change. We can forget our favourite cliche that the president is tsar in Russia, Mr Pavlovsky told AFP news agency. It's the most politically logical solution to the problem of what Putin does when he leaves office, he said. Andrei Ryabov from the Carnegie Moscow Center told the BBC he sees Mr Putin's decision as a tactical step:

It's hard to imagine Putin would become prime minister after being a super-popular president. The dual system is bad for Russia - Putin must be worried... he would not want to be junior to the president, he said. For Putin to be the most senior figure, the constitution would have to be changed. And Putin has always made it clear he wants no changes to the constitution, he added.

12 NATO countries have war game in Croatia
Published: 1, 2007 at 12:24 PM

Croatia, Oct. 1 (UPI) -- Military, naval and air forces of 12 NATO countries Monday began a 12-day exercise in Croatia and the Adriatic Sea.The Noble Midas ’07 war games are the largest of its kind being organized by a country that isn't member of the alliance, Croatia’s Nova TV television channel reported Monday.
The exercises started when war ships left the area around the Croatian Central Adriatic port city of Split and sailed toward open seas.Croatia is a candidate for NATO membership and its leaders expect the country might join the alliance by the end of this decade.About 8,000 troops -- including 800 U.S. Marines -- 40 vessels, six submarines, 29 war planes and 23 helicopters were taking part in the exercises.In the meantime, in the Croatian capital Zagreb, about 100 activists of non-governmental organizations staged peaceful protests against the war games, displaying banners reading, We want tourists, not terrorists. United Press International.

Gaza's place in Bible's prophecies
By Hal Lindsay September 28, 2007 - 1:00 a.m. Eastern

The Jerusalem-based Institute for Contemporary Affairs recently released a report authored by Lt. Col. Jonathan Dahoah-Halevi that concludes, to nobody's particular surprise, that the Gaza Strip has become a haven for al-Qaida terrorists. Gaza, part of the biblical land of the Philistines was the place where Samson toppled the Temple of Dagon on his enemies, giving his life in the process. Gaza was first conquered for Israel by King David and subsequently fell to the Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Babylonians, Persians and Greeks. But in the days of King David, it was part of Israel. In Jesus' day, it was part of the Hasmonean Kingdom that ended with Herod the Great. In 1967, Gaza again became part of Israel when Egypt lost it in the Six Day's War.

In September 2004, Ariel Sharon announced his controversial disengagement plan under the title, Gaza First. Sharon intended to turn Gaza completely over to Palestinian rule, hoping to accomplish two goals in the process. The first and official goal was contained within its slogan, Gaza First. Israel would allow Gaza to govern itself, then use Gaza's success or failure as a template for future negotiations over the West Bank. Israel pulled out of Gaza Sept. 12, 2005, leaving behind 1,000 Israeli settler greenhouses to spare the jobs of the 4,000 Palestinians who worked in them. Before that day was over, the Associated Press was reporting that: Palestinians looted dozens of greenhouses on Tuesday, walking off with irrigation hoses, water pumps and plastic sheeting in a blow to fledgling efforts to reconstruct the Gaza Strip.As the Israeli settlers were being dragged from their homes, the Palestinians torched the 19 synagogues left standing. Within sight of the smoking synagogues, in a somber farewell ceremony, Gen. Aviv Kochavi, the Gaza commander, expressed his hope the pullout would be a step toward peace. The gate that will close behind us is also the gate that will open, he said. We hope it will be a gate of peace and quiet, a gate of hope and goodwill, a gate of neighborliness.As the gate closed, Kassam rockets began roaring out the abandoned settlements and into the homes and shops of the Israeli cities on the other side.

Within a year, the residents of Gaza elected Hamas on their foundational platform that calls for the destruction of Israel and its replacement with an Islamic state. A year after that, finds the Halavi Report, The declared policy of Hamas to provide sanctuary to any jihad fighter invites additional terrorist groups associated with al-Qaida to plant themselves in the Gaza Strip.
Here's the amazing part. I believe that this is exactly what Ariel Sharon expected to happen. His only miscalculation was in thinking that, having seen a preview of what a Palestinian state would look like, the world would come to its collective senses. Sharon underestimated two things: the almost palpable fear among Western governments to do anything that might offend Islam, and the depth of nascent global anti-Semitism. The world fears Islam, but it despises Israel on a level so deep that it is defies logical explanation. Seen at that level, if Islam destroyed Israel and then went back into hibernation, it would be a fair trade. Maybe it would, maybe it wouldn't, but for some, especially at the U.N., it's worth the risk. All they have to lose is Israel. It is almost impossible to fathom, but, barring that explanation, how does one account for the fact the world is still clamoring for the creation of a Palestinian state? In every possible area of measurement, the Palestinians have failed the test for statehood. As a people, the formerly Egyptian residents of Gaza immediately declared independence from the government run by the formerly Jordanian residents of the West Bank and launched a civil war. They are not one people, but two. As a government, the only thing the Palestinian Authority has proved consistently efficient at is looting the national treasury.

As a society, the moment they were handed a working infrastructure, they looted it out of existence. They exercised their first opportunity at self-government by electing the terrorists who walk among them as their leaders. Ariel Sharon handed them everything they demanded in Gaza, and they turned Gaza into Afghanistan. Evidently satisfied with the results, the Quartet is now pressuring Israel to allow the PA to turn the West Bank into Saudi Arabia and Jerusalem into Mecca. Even blindness can't account for such widespread ignorance of the danger. It goes beyond blindness, skids right past ignorance, and stops squarely in front of delusional.Why would the world side with an openly terrorist entity – in the midst of a war on terror – at the expense of the only reliable Western allied democracy in the region, leaving it adrift in a sea of rapacious Islamic dictatorships? Try, for a moment, to substitute some other Western representative democracy instead of Israel into this scenario in your imagination. Israel is an ally to every nation fighting the war on Islamic terror. Those same allied nations are advancing a policy of granting statehood to terrorists sworn to the destruction of that ally ... never mind. The more I try to explain it, the crazier it sounds. And that's the point. This is exactly the scenario outlined by the Hebrew prophets as signs of the soon coming of Israel's Messiah.

The prophet Zechariah predicted the whole world would be united against Israel over the Jerusalem Question (Zechariah 12:1-3); the prophet Daniel (Daniel 9:27) predicted an agreement that seemingly settles the Temple Mount Question; and the prophet Ezekiel predicts that, in the end, Israel will still face a massive Islamic invasion reluctantly overseen by Russia and led by Persia (Iran) (Ezekiel 38:5). Think about this for a second. Since it is absolutely illogical, and yet it is also exactly the situation we find ourselves witnessing, do you really believe it was all just a really good guess? It would be amazing enough if the prophets had forecast a scenario that made sense and it came to pass. But the scenario they predicted defies all natural explanation – and yet is coming to pass as literally as it was forecast. The fact is the Bible is true, and the setup for the fulfillment of Bible prophecies for the final seven years of Tribulation are almost complete. There is only a short time left to choose where you will spend eternity. Jesus Christ purchased a pardon on your behalf with His own blood at Calvary's Cross. He extends it to you now. All you need do is accept it. Allow Jesus Christ to come into your life and He will transform it forever. The choice is yours.

OPERATION EPICENTER
Evangelicals to offer $120 million in relief supplies to Israel and her neighbors as Ahmadinejad says Mahdi's arrival imminent.
By Joel C. Rosenberg

(Washington, D.C., September 27, 2007) -- How close is war in the Middle East? It's hard to say for certain, but Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is certainly ratcheting up the rhetoric. In the summer of 2005, the newly-elected Ahmadinejad told followers the end of the world was just two or three years away, and that the way to hasten the coming of the Islamic Messiah known as the Mahdi or the Twelfth Imam was to annihilate Israel and the United States. Since then, his anti-American and anti-Israeli rhetoric has intensified dramatically. Now, two years into his cryptic but apocalyptic countdown, Ahmadinejad is telling the Muslim world that the return of the Mahdi is imminent.In an address to the International Seminar on the Doctrine of Mahdism in Tehran last month (August 25-26), Ahmadinejad warned that the West's day is almost finished and the preparations for the Hidden Imam will soon be complete. In a speech translated from Farsi by MEMRI.org, Ahmadinejad said: The current situation in the world has led the nations to reject in disgust the rule of the oppressors. Now is the time to invite people to accept the rule of the righteous, and [especially that] of the most righteous of [rulers] -- the Hidden Imam....The oppressors and tyrants are responsible for all the difficulties and problems currently faced by the nations, and the only way to establish justice is through popular uprising and determined resistance in the face of these oppressors....[the day] of these aggressors...who are oppressing and controlling the nations, is now coming to an end....The time of the righteous rulers will come, and the most righteous of rulers, [i.e. the Hidden Imam], will form a government and thereby instate the monotheism of Abraham [throughout the world]. That day is not far away....Our enemies naturally feel threatened by the call to [believe in] the Mahdi, for they do not want people to think about justice. But our reply to them is that the era of the aggressive [powers] has come to an end. We believe that it is time for the righteous to rule.

A few days later, during a speech he delivered on August 28, Ahmadinejad went a step further, saying the Mahdi's return is imminent.The current problems faced by the world result from [the rule] of unworthy rulers. The ultimate solution is to replace these unworthy regimes and rulers, and to establish the rule of the Hidden Imam....Those who are not versed in [the doctrine of Mahdism] believe that the return [of the Hidden Imam] will occur only in a very long time, but, according to the divine promise, [his return] is imminent.Perhaps this is why Ahmadinejad opened rather than closed his speeches at Columbia University and at the United Nations this week with a prayer for Allah to hasten the Mahdi's arrival, because he is more convinced than ever that this apocalyptic moment is close at hand. Political leaders in the U.S., Europe and the Middle East who believe we should negotiate with Iran are missing the big picture. Ahmadinejad is not operating by the norms of conventional, civilized behavior. He is actively trying to bring about the end of the world. He believes it is his mission, his divine calling. We should not expect any amount of diplomatic logic to dissuade or distract him.

The sad but sobering conclusion we must draw is that war is coming to the Middle East. Either the U.S. or Israel will soon launch an attack to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear-armed nightmare, or Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas and al-Qaeda will launch a cataclysmic war against the Jewish State, and possibly against U.S. targets and/or interests. When? No one knows for sure, but millions of innocent Israelis, Palestinians, Lebanese, Syrians and Jordanians are likely to be caught in the crossfire either way.
In light of this mounting threat, The Joshua Fund -- a humanitarian relief organization my wife and I formed in the summer of 2006 -- has just launched a three-year initiative known as OPERATION EPICENTER. The goal is to form a global alliance of evangelical Christians, Messianic Jews, Arab and Iranian believers, and other people of goodwill around the world who will join together to send $120 million worth of humanitarian relief aid into the region over the next three years. This aid will be used to bless the poor and needy in Israel and the Muslim world and to pre-position relief supplies ahead of coming wars. We have been working around the clock this summer to develop strategic allies with whom we will work to get the job done as quickly and efficiently as possible. We working closely with local believers and relief organizations in the region, helping them acquire warehouse space, buy trucks, buy forklifts, hire staff, train staff, and fill those warehouses with urgently needed relief supplies. To find out more about OPERATION EPICENTER, including our primary strategic allies, specific projects, and the initial budget, please visit our web site at www.joshuafund.net (see the links below). There you can also learn more about the first year operations of The Joshua Fund.

By God's grace and the generosity of people throughout North America, we have already raised more than $600,000 to get started on the most urgent elements of this effort. We are currently seeking to raise $1 million by December 1, 2007 to help finance the acquisition of a major warehouse in Israel and to begin loading a ship in the U.S. with relief supplies to be sent to Israel early next year. If you would like to make a tax-deductible contribution to The Joshua Fund for this effort, please visit our website where you can give securely on-line or send a check to our P.O. Box in Colorado. Also, we would be grateful if you would pray faithfully for us and our strategic allies as we seek to bless Israel and her neighbors in the name of Jesus in every way we possibly can before the next war breaks out. Thanks so much.

This Week with Rabbi Eckstein
September 27, 2007
Dear Friend of The Fellowship

At sundown on Wednesday, September 26, Jews began the celebration of the festival of Sukkot. In contrast to the solemnity and introspection of the High Holy Days that just ended, Sukkot brings an atmosphere of gladness and joy, following the biblical commandment to Be joyful at your feast (Deuteronomy 16:13-15).
As described in Leviticus 23:33-44, Sukkot is both a harvest festival celebrating God’s blessings and a time during which Jews remember their Exodus from Egypt. Recalling this pivotal event, Jews build sukkot (booths for temporary dwelling) that resemble the booths in which Israelites lived in the desert. Because of this, Sukkot is known as the Festival of Booths. The sukkah (the singular form of sukkot) is built of improvised walls and a roof covered with branches or leaves, so that its interior is partially exposed to the sky. Decorated with flowers, fruit and paper chains, it becomes our temporary shelter during the seven day holiday, and serves as a colorful gathering place for family and friends.

Our time spent in the sukkah serves a deeper purpose as well. By spending time there we give up, at least temporarily, the physical comforts of our well-built homes. Thus we are forced to become more mindful of the transitory nature of material things and ultimately to remember that God is our refuge and strength (Psalm 46:1). We are reminded that, in times of plenty and times of need, we must recognize our dependence upon and place our trust in God, the ultimate source of both our material and our spiritual blessings.During Sukkot, I often think not only of the exiled Israelites whose story is told in the Bible, but of the Jews in modern times who have endured great hardship and deprivation to come to Israel, many of whom we have assisted through The Fellowship’s On Wings of Eagles program. I recall one story of a family of Iranian Jews who arrived in Israel penniless after having their life savings seized by Iranian authorities while leaving their country. I think of the thousands of Ethiopian Jews who risked their lives to make the long journey to Israel on foot during the time when they were greatly oppressed in their own country and aliyah (immigration to Israel) was prohibited by Ethiopian authorities.

And yet, even among those who have made aliyah in the harshest of circumstances, I have seen the deepest gratitude for the opportunity to at long last be in the land of Israel. Though stripped of their material possessions, these olim (immigrants) have held fast to God’s promise, and can see His hand at work in their return. What a wonderful lesson for us all -- one very appropriate to this Sukkot holiday.My friends, today I hope you will continue to support the ministry of On Wings of Eagles that helps Jews return to Israel. By doing so, you’ll not only be funding aliyah for Jews from the four corners of the earth, you’ll be providing them critical klitah (resettlement) assistance in the form of food, shelter, medical care and other essentials to help ensure they will become full, productive citizens in their new home. Thank you for your generous heart for these suffering people -- may you be blessed, even as you have blessed God’s children

With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President International Fellowship Of Christians and Jews.

David's Comment: Bush & Olmert Are Committing Israel to National Suicide - Why Are So Many Silent ?

Jeremiah 30:7 Alas! For that day is great, so that none is like it; and it is the time of Jacob's trouble, but he shall be saved out of it. (NKJ)

This is an extremely difficult and painful comment to write. Fifteen years ago I came to live in an Israel that was growing physically and spiritually towards the day that King Yeshua will return to reign over the Kingdom of His Father. It is only the promise of that day that offers any hope for the future of the planet Earth. And for all our sake, the sooner the better ! But according to Acts 3:21 Yeshua will only be released from Heaven once the words of the prophets are fulfilled.I believe we are approaching the most decisive time in history for both the Jewish people and the people of all nations. As I sit on Mt Carmel closely monitoring all that is taking place in the Middle East and the rest of the world, I can clearly see the Time of Jacobs Trouble approaching with alarming speed. On one hand I am encouraged and strengthened by the promises of God's protection over the Land of Israel - His Land, but on the other hand I see the Muslims and the Nations hovering like vultures ready to finish off a rapidly failing nation. And I see the leader of the USA pressuring the unbelievably weak leader of Israel to bow down and give into the Muslim pressure. Just a few days ago, former president of the US Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan, revealed Bush's real motivation behind his Middle East policy - the oil supply from Saudi Arabia. Bush has lied to the whole world. Andf now he expects Israel to pay an extremely high price for the promise of continued oil supplies.

The following quotations are from an article titled WE HAVE BEEN WARNED! by Elyakim Haetzni, a former Israeli government minister.
Some day we'll recall these tranquil months of headlines devoted to road accidents and minor scandals ­ the headlines of a society free from existential cares -- as a fool’s paradise whose fools turned a blind eye to the erupting volcano threatening to bury us all. There was another summer like this one preceding Yom Kippur in ’73, but this time the surprise attack is being readied from within, and the calamity will be diplomatic.I’m referring to the ritual sacrifice that the Bush administration is preparing for us this November that goes by the name of a peace conference. The role of the sacrificial lamb will be filled by Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, hundreds of Jewish communities, and hundreds of thousands of Jews that will become refugees in their own land ­ all this on the backdrop of national, societal, and diplomatic collapse.

I agree that unless God intervenes, ( and I believe He will ) Israel's future is in serious jeopardy. Judea and Samaria is the heart of the country. Jerusalem is in the centre of both areas. Understanding the future of Jerusalem as the capital of the Kingdom of God and the location of the throne of the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, it is no wonder the enemy wants to steal it. Satan knows well that if he can tear the heart of the nation away, the nation will die.Josie and I are astounded that most Israelis are not prepared to stand up and if necessary, physically remove Olmert and the others who are preparing to give away the Lord's land from their offices. Most of the nation is silent. Last week a religious woman, Ruth Matar, called for Israelis to come to Jerusalem to protest outside the location of the meeting between Olmert & Condalesa Rice. She expected thousands to come, but only 150 people turned up. This dismall show of support for those opposed to giving the land away, gives the leaders a green light to move ahead. Even more astounding is the fact that most Messianic Jewish believers are also silent. There are only a few other ministries in the Land who take a stand against this godless government and the manipulation of the Bush government. We, the local believers, should be the most vocal, as we know what the scriptures say about the Land and how precious it is to our Heavenly Father.

And then there is the Church ! Sixty years ago, the majority of the Church, sat silently in their pews as six million Jews were reduced to smoke and ash in the Holocaust. Not much has changed. Today most of the Church is silent again as the Devil carries out his latest plan to destroy Israel and the Jewish people, to ensure the Messiah remains in Heaven and he remains the god of this world. When was the last time your pastor taught on Israel's right to the Land, or when did your church last pray for Israel's victory over her ememies ? Praise the Lord that is changing. Over the last 40 years an ever increasing number of Christians have had a revelation of God's plans and purposes for Israel. I even know of a few churches that give Israel priority in their prayer life and in their missions giving. But it is a mere remnant that has had this degree of revelation. The primary reason I write these comments each week is to motivate and inspire as many Christians as possible to take action against the plans of the enemy. To take action in prayer and intercession. To take action in the media, and wherever possible to openly stand with Israel's right to occupy all of the land that God promised to Abraham. And to take action in prayer against all those opposed to God and His chosen nation. There are many scripture verses we can pray against Israel's enemies - for example Psalm 83, Psalm 9: 19-20 - Arise O Lord let not man triumph - let the nations be judged in your presence. Strike them with terror, O Lord, let the nations know they are but men. Habakkuk 3:2 - Lord I have heard of your fame, I stand in awe of your deeds O Lord renew them in our day in our time make them known . In wrath remember mercy. Isaiah 8:9-19 - Raise the war cry, you nations and be shattered - Listen all you distant lands, Prepare for battle, and be shattered. Prepare for battle and be shattered ! Devise your strategy but it will be thwarted, propose your plan, but it will not stand, for God is with us. There are many, many more.

Please do not be like the majority of Israelis, Messianic Jews and Christians. Do not be SILENT but dare to be different - Be like Esther and SPEAK UP. Father I pray that you will anoint everyone reading this email message with a new and greater level of boldness, wisdom and authority to stand up for Israel - In the name of Yeshua I pray. The Lord bless you as you bless Israel by standing in defense of her right to exist on the land given to the Jewish people by the God of Israel . Lets pray that Israel will turn back to their God. Do not be silent, but share this with your fellow Christians, share it with your pastors, and with anyone you have a chance to speak to. Lets also pray for that breakthrough to the Muslims, and please remember to pray for our son Jordan, and all of his fellow soldiers in the IDF.

Shabbat Shalom ... David & Josie

Politics By Other Means
Religion and Foreign Policy
By CONN HALLINAN OCT 2,07

Religion, sometimes, is a continuation of politics by other means, notes Jon Alterman, director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies Middle East division, and it was hard to avoid that thought about last month's conference of Christians United for Israel (CUFI) in Washington D.C.There was Gary Bauer, former head of the right-wing evangelical Christian organization, the Family Research Council, bringing a crowd of 4,000 conventioneers to their feet with a prayer that the people of Israel-even under American pressure-never give up even one centimeter of land in the Occupied Territories.According to the weekly Jewish newspaper, The Forward, a choir struck up Blow the Trumpets in Zion, Zion, while delegates danced between the rows waving Israeli and American flags; some people wept.

If there was something slightly bizarre about apocalyptic Christians weeping over the fact that Israel might trade land for peace, there was nothing fringy about the foreign policy heavy weights CUFI has gathered under its wing. On hand to address the convention was Senator Joseph Lieberman, Republican heavy weight Newt Gingrich and the man who will quite likely to be the next prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu.The force behind CUFI, Texas Pastor John Hagee, counts President George Bush, Republican Presidential hopeful Senator John McCain, and the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee among his supporters, as well as a number of Democratic legislators, including U.S. Rep. Eliot Engel of New York.Hagee's organization-active in all 50 states-is currently pressuring Congress to confront Hezbollah in Lebanon, increase aid to Israel, and toughen sanctions on Iran, although the Texas minister himself doesn't think Teheran will respond to anything but war: It is time for America to adopt Senator Lieberman's words and consider a military pre-emptive strike against Iran. Hagee also advocates attacking Syria and the Palestinians.

Lieberman and Hagee are not the only ones talking about attacking Iran these days. President Bush recently told the American Legion convention, Iran's actions threaten the security of nations everywherewe will confront this danger before it is too late. According to an informal poll taken by ex-Middle East CIA field officer, Robert Baer, The feeling is we will hit the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps within six months. The Sunday Times reported Sept. 2 The Pentagon has drawn up plans for massive air strikes against 1200 targets in Iran, designed to annihilate the Iranian military capacity in three days.Are Christian evangelicals, in what is arguably the most religious administration in U.S. history, driving the Bush Administration's agenda in the Middle East and Africa? Or is the religious content of U.S. foreign policy politics by other means? Is the current culture war against Islam by people like historian Bernard Lewis, philosopher Francis Fukuyama and Pope Benedict XVI, a return to the religious mania of the First Crusade, or does it have more in common with TV evangelists whose concerns are the contents of their parishioner's wallets rather than the state of their souls?

Certainly the Bush Administration has appointed religious activists to key policy positions. Long-time religious activist and neo-conservative Elliot Abrams, former chair of U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom, has helped focus U.S. foreign policy on religious persecution in Sudan, Russia and China. According to Newsweek, his co-chair, right-wing Catholic activist Nina Shea, made Christian persecution Washington's hottest topic.
The Bush Administration's Special Envoy to the Sudan, Robert Seiple, is the former CEO of World Vision, a Christian aid and advocacy organization. According to John Eibner, chief executive officer of Christian Solidarity International, pressure from Christian groups played an important role in pushing the U.S. to get involved in Sudan.But is U.S. Africa policy driven by religious activists, or by the fact that by the year 2015 some 25 percent of U.S. oil imports will come from that continent?

Christian evangelicals have also made deep inroads into the American military.Lt. Gen. William Boykin, currently a deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, argues that the fight in Iraq is between a Christian nation and Satan, and can only be won if we come against them in the name of Jesus.The Pentagon is a strong supporter of Operation Straight Up (OSU), which delivers entertainment and sermons to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. OSU describes its mission as a crusade-an incendiary word in the Middle East-and distributes a left behind video game where players fight the Antichrist represented by the United Nations. Former Air Force Academy graduate Mickey Weinstein, who heads up the Military Freedom Foundation, describes OSU as the Christian Taliban. According to a 2006 study for the U.S. War College by Col. William Millonig, Christian evangelical influence in the armed forces began during the Vietnam War. He concludes that conservative Christian and Republican values have affected the military's decision making and policy recommendations, warning that America's strategic thinkers, both military and civilian, must be aware of this and its potential implications on policy formulation.Again, however, are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan driven by a religious agenda, or the fact that 65 percent of the world's remaining oil reserves are in the Middle East?

Religion has long played a role in the West's relationship to the rest of the world, but more as a way to divide populations than convert them. Ireland and India are cases in point.England invaded Ireland in 1170, but for the first 439 years it was a conquest in name only. In 1609, however, James I founded the Plantation of Ulster, imported 20,000 Protestant settlers, and introduced religious strife as a political tactic. By favoring Protestants over the native Catholics in politics and economics-the so-called Ulster Privilege-the English pitted both groups against one another.The tactic was enormously successful, and England used it throughout its colonial empire. Nowhere were the British so successful in transplanting the Irish model than in India.But in India's case it was unnecessary to import a foreign religion. The colonial authorities had India's Muslim and Sikh minorities to use as their wedge. As the historian Alex von Tunzelmann argues in Indian Summer, it was the British who defined India's communities on the basis of religion: Many Indians stopped accepting the diversity of their own thoughts and began to ask themselves in which of the boxes they belonged.

Muslims and Sikhs were favored for the few civil jobs and university slots open to Indians, a favoritism that generated tensions among the three communities, just as it had in Northern Ireland. The colonial regimes exploited everyone in both countries, but for some the burden was heavier. When communities in both countries fell to fighting over the few crumbs available to them, the British authorities stepped in to keep order, sadly shaking their heads about the inability of people in both countries ever to govern themselves.While Sir John Davis was describing the Irish as degenerate with the heart of a beast, Lord Hastings was arguing that the Hindoo appears a being nearly limited to animal functions and even in them indifferentwith no higher intellect than a dog.Lest one dismiss the above characterizations as typical 19th Century colonial racism, Winston Churchill once commented, I hate the Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion.Churchill's intolerance, however, had a very practical side to it. As prime minister he once said that he hoped that the tension between Hindus and Muslims would remain A bulwark of British rule in India.The British were not alone in using religion as a tactic to divide and conquer. The French employed it quite successfully in Lebanon and Vietnam. In the former, Paris favored Maronite Christians over Muslims (and Sunni Muslims over Shiite Muslims), and in the latter, Catholics over Buddhists.

No colonial tactic is successful forever, however, and in the aftermath of World War II the empires collapsed. But the use of religion as a device to divide and conquer leaves considerable wreckage in its wake.The current peace between Catholics and Protestants in Ulster is holding, but it took countless lives and almost 400 years to achieve.The partition of India on religious grounds cost more than a million lives and displaced some 12 million people. Pakistan and India have fought four wars since 1947, and the last one came distressingly close to going nuclear.
And tensions between communities in India are still high. The right-wing Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party led nationwide riots over a 16th Century mosque in Ayodhya, and five years ago, 2000 Muslims were massacred in Gujarat by Hindu extremists.

Exploiting religious differences hardly ended with the demise of the great colonial empires.The French continue to exploit religious divisions in Lebanon, and the U.S. is currently trying to cobble together a Sunni united front to confront Washington's three opponents in the Middle East: Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. Syria is mostly Sunni, but Bashar al-Assad's regime is dominated by Alawites, a variety of Shiism. Some 60 percent of Lebanon is Shiite.But Shiites only constitute about 12 percent of Islam, and while Washington talks of a Shiia crescent as if it constituted some kind of united front, in fact there are enormous differences between Arab Syria and Lebanon, and non-Arabic speaking Iran.

Islam is a polyglot of cultures and ethnicities-the largest Muslim country is Indonesia- but that point gets lost in the current culture war directed at Islam.Historian Bernard Lewis recently told the Jerusalem Post that Muslims seem about to take over Europe because Europeans have surrendered to Islam in the name of political correctness and multi-culturalism. Philosopher Francis Fukuyama argues that France's opposition to the Iraq War was in part to appease Muslim opinion, and Omer Taspinar of the Brookings Institute claims that European Muslims are becoming a more powerful political force than the fabled Arab street.But as Jytte Klausen of Brandeis University points out, since only 10.25 percent of the Muslim population in Europe can vote, there is very little cost for political parties to ignore the concerns of Muslim communities.Researchers Jonathan Laurence and Justin Vaisse, who studied France's Muslims, conclude there is no such thing as a Muslim community, and polls found that French Muslims listed economic inequality as their first concern. Foreign policy came in twelfth.Indeed, as Patrick Weil of the Sorbonne points out, the myth that Muslims somehow influenced France's foreign policy is the same argument as saying the Bush decision to go to Iraq was because of the Israeli lobby. Muslims did oppose the war, as did most Europeans.If religion influences foreign policy, it is because it dovetails with the policies of powerful economic interests, which is not to say that religion always defers to secular self-interest. Once conjured up, it can take on a life of its own.

In Les Blancs, Lorraine Hansberry's edgy play about colonial Kenya, the play's central character, Tshembe, points out that while concepts like race and religion are indeed instruments which men use to rule over one another, those contrivances create their own reality. Men invoke the device of religion to cloak their conquests, Tshembe tells a clueless American reporter. You and I may recognize the fraudulence of the device, but the fact remains that a man who has a sword run through him because he refuses to become a Moslem or a Christianis suffering the utter reality of the device. And it is pointless to pretend that it doesn't exist-merely because it is lie.In the Middle East and Sudan, religion certainly appears to be the continuation of politics by other means. Whether it is President George Bush invoking the threat of a world-wide Muslim Caliphate, or Pope Benedict XVI warning that Islam promotes violence, religion is increasingly being used to ramp up the fear factor in international politics. But as with Europe's great religious wars, in the end religion in foreign policy is a device that allows the strong to seize the resources of the weak in the name of a higher power.Conn Hallinan is an analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus, a winner of a Project Censored Award, and did his PhD dissertation on the history of insurrectionary organizations in Ireland.