Newly-inaugurated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is wasting no time in laying out the existential threats facing Western civilization. In his first speech to the nation, as well as in various media interviews, he warned that Iran’s messianic, apocalpytic cult leaders will get their hands on nuclear weapons soon, and that if the U.S. won’t act decisively to stop Iran, Israel will.

“Iran is a composite leadership, but in that composite leadership there are elements of wide-eyed fanaticism that do not exist right now in any other would-be nuclear power in the world,” he said in an interview. “That’s what makes them so dangerous….Since the dawn of the nuclear age, we have not had a fanatic regime that might put its zealotry above its self-interest. People say that they’ll behave like any other nuclear power. Can you take the risk? Can you assume that?”

Today, Lt-General (ret.) Jerry Boykin and I will be addressing about 150 evangelical Christian leaders from all over southern California. We will be briefing them on the latest developments in Israel, Iran and the epicenter. We’ll be talking about the vital importance of mobilizing a global movement of Christians who will bless the people of Israel with everlasting love and unwavering support. We’ll answer their questions about the 2009 Epicenter Conference set for this Saturday, and share with them about the work of The Joshua Fund and our urgent mission — to “pray for peace, but prepare for war.” We’ll also be discussing some new projects and initiatives that I will brief you on soon, too.

“Israel seeks peace with the entire Arab and Muslim world, but continues to be threatened by the forces of Islamic extremists, Prime Minister-designate Binyamin Netanyahu said Tuesday evening,” reported the Jerusalem Post. “‘These are irregular times,’ Netanyahu told the Knesset plenum in opening marks to his speech….’Today Israel is faced with two tests – an economic crisis and a security crisis. The source of these crises are neither our past actions nor past mistakes… our [current] actions, however, will determine the results of these crises.’….Netanyahu pointed to the ’spread of extreme Islam in our area, and all over the world,’ warning against the nuclear armament of these extreme forces, hinting at the development of Iran’s nuclear activities. The Iranian leader’s plan to erase Israel falls on deaf ears around the world, and is almost accepted as ‘routine,’ Netanyahu said.”

Please continue to pray for wisdom for incoming Prime Minister Netanyahu and his new government. They face enormous challenges — the nuclear threat from Iran, the terrorist threat from Hamas and Hezbollah, and the global economic crisis which continues to have a serious impact on Israel. What’s more, they facing increasing isolation from the world community.

It is critical that followers of Jesus Christ make it clear to the people of Israel that our love is real and unconditional, and we will stand with them come what may. With unemployment growing in Israel and the global economic crisis affecting Israel in numerous ways, The Joshua Fund is working together with Israeli Jews and evangelical Christians to be a blessing. Unfortunately, negotiations for a Joshua Fund warehouse in Israel were not successful. We’ll continue to look for the right property or a more effective way to help and let you know the next steps.

As always, we will do our best to keep you up-to-date on the kinds of projects we are doing, and brief you on how those projects are proceeding. We will also let you know about the kinds of projects we are developing for the future. In no way do we want to pressure anyone to give financially. We fully believe the Lord will provide for the needs of the people we seek to serve. But if you or others wish to help, we welcome your support, and all financial gifts are tax-deductible.

If you would like to make a contribution to the on-going work of The Joshua Fund please make your check payable to “The Joshua Fund” and send to:

The Joshua Fund
18950 Base Camp Road
Monument, Colorado 80132-8009

Thanks so much and may the Lord richly bless you and your family as you bless Israel and Iraq in the name of Jesus — especially at critical moment in history of the epicenter.

How did Washington miss it? Will we miss the Radical threat again?

Joel Rosenberg
(San Diego, California, April 1, 2009)

It was thirty years ago today that the Ayatollah Khomeini declared Iran to be the world’s first “Islamic Republic,” that is, the first country in human history that would be governed by Sharia law, the laws of the Qur’an. Yet as I document in my new book, Inside The Revolution, the Carter administration at the time completely missed the explosion of the Islamic Revolution in Iran, the fall of the Shah, the rise of Khomeini, and later the seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran that led to 52 Americans being held hostage for 444 humiliating days.

Admiral Stansfield Turner, the director of the CIA under President Carter, would later admit in his memoirs, “We in the CIA served the president badly with respect to our coverage of the Iranian scene….We had not appreciated how shaky the Shah’s political foundation was; did not know the Shah was terminally ill; did not understand who Khomeini was and the support his movement had; did not have a clue as to who the hostage-takers were or what their objective was….We were just plain asleep.”

Thirty years later, the question is: Does the Obama administration understand who the leaders of Iran are today? Do they understand the eschatology — or End Times theology — held by the current Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and how such deeply-held religious beliefs are driving Iranian foreign policy and military doctrine? Do they understand that Iran’s current leaders believe they have been chosen by God to bring about the end of the world, that this is why they are hell-bent on acquiring or building nuclear weapons?

Last week, I met on Capitol Hill with a bipartisan group of nine current and former Members of Congress. They told me neither they nor their colleagues have been well briefed on such issues, nor has senior administration officials. Yet the President is embarking on a policy of direct contact and direct negotiations with a nation whose leaders he may not truly understand.

One leader who does understand the apocalyptic, cultish nature of Iran’s leadership is new Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was sworn in last night. “The Obama presidency has two great missions: fixing the economy, and preventing Iran from gaining nuclear weapons,” Netanyahu told The Atlantic magazine. The Iranian drive for a nuclear weapon was a “hinge of history,” he said, emphasizing that all of “Western civilization” was responsible for preventing an Iranian bomb.

“You don’t want a messianic apocalyptic cult controlling atomic bombs,” Netanyahu said of the Iranian regime. “When the wide-eyed believer gets hold of the reins of power and the weapons of mass death, then the entire world should start worrying, and that is what is happening in Iran.”

It is not just Iran’s leaders that should concern us. Al Qaeda’s leaders say publicly they want to annihilate us. Top CIA officials tell me they believe bin Laden’s forces are actively seeking nuclear weapons to annihilate entire American cities. And just this morning, the London Times quotes a Pakistani Taliban leader warning: “Soon we will launch an attack in Washington that will amaze everyone in the world … The maximum they can do is martyr me. But we will exact our revenge on them from inside America.”

Please pray the Lord protects our country and gives our President wisdom. Pray, too, that the Lord gives Prime Minister Netanyahu wisdom to protect the Jewish people at this critical hour, and that the Lord would use him to explain to world leaders — including those in Washington — who the leaders of Iran really are, what they really want, and how far they are willing to go to accomplish their objectives.

Washington, I fear, is “just plain asleep” again. It is time to wake them up.

(Washington, D.C., March 27, 2009)
The year 1979 was a game-changer in the epicenter for Radicals, Reformers and Revivalists alike.

* In January 1979, the Shah of Iran – not a Reformer, but certainly a long-time friend of the U.S. and Israel – was ousted from power.

* On February 1st, the Ayatollah Khomeini – the first true Radical of the modern era – returned to Iran after decades in exile and was met by millions of Muslims who greeted him as the possible Islamic Messiah, chanting, “The Holy One has come!”

* On March 26th, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat – the first true Reformer of the modern era – and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin signed the Camp David Accords at the White House, an historic peace treaty unprecedented in the annals of 4,000+ years of Jewish-Egyptian relations.

* On April 1st, the Ayatollah Khomeini declared Iran the world’s first “Islamic Republic,” putting the country under Sharia law and creating a Radical tyranny unlike any other at the time in the Middle East.

* By November of that pivotal year, Radical followers of Khomeini had seized the American Embassy in Tehran and began holding 52 hostages for 444 humiliating days.
Also in November, Radical Muslim gunmen led by a man claiming to be the Islamic Messiah known as a the “Twelfth Imam” seized a key mosque in Mecca and triggered an enormous crisis for the Saudi government (Saudi troops eventually had to storm the mosque, leaving hundreds dead and wounded)

* In December of that year, the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, a move that would lead to the rise of Osama bin Laden and the birth of al Qaeda, the Radical terror network, and later the dissolution of the Soviet empire.

* Curiously, it was also in December of 1979 that Warner Brothers and an evangelical Christian ministry called Campus Crusade For Christ released the JESUS film, a drama of the life of Jesus of Nazareth based on the Gospel According to Luke. It has since been translated into more than 1,000 languages and dialects, has been seen by more than two billion people worldwide, and has become a key tool used by Revivalists to reach Muslims with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Something was clearly crackling in the spiritual realm that year.

The question now is: Where are we thirty years later ??

Also: Joshua Fund blessing needy families in Israel for Passover

Israeli Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu sealed major deals with new coalition partners this week, including his long-time political rival, Ehud Barak and the Labor Party. He is expected to wrap up coalition negotiations over the weekend and announce his new government as early as Tuesday.

Please continue to pray for wisdom for the new government. They face enormous challenges — the nuclear threat from Iran, the terrorist threat from Hamas and Hezbollah, and the global economic crisis which continues to have a serious impact on Israel.

With unemployment growing in Israel and the global economic crisis affecting Israel in numerous ways, The Joshua Fund is working together with Israeli Jews and evangelical Christians to be a blessing.

For Passover, which is coming up very soon, TJF will invest $20,000 in a special relief project. These funds will augment $10,000 already raised by our Israeli allies. Combined, this will provide $50 in Passover food supplies for each of the 600 needy Jewish families we are helping this year.

This project is on top of the $30,000 a month The Joshua Fund is normally investing to purchase food in Israel for distribution to low-income families, particularly in northern Israel and in the southern border town of Sderot. Much more, however, needs to be done, and we would be grateful for your prayers and your help so that we can expand these efforts and bless more people in need.

As always, we will do our best to keep you up-to-date on the kinds of projects we are doing, and brief you on how those projects are proceeding. We will also let you know about the kinds of projects we are developing for the future. In no way do we want to pressure anyone to give financially. We fully believe the Lord will provide for the needs of the people we seek to serve. But if you or others wish to help, we welcome your support, and all financial gifts are tax-deductible.

If you would like to make a contribution to the on-going work of The Joshua Fund please make your check payable to “The Joshua Fund” and send to:

The Joshua Fund
18950 Base Camp Road
Monument, Colorado 80132-8009

Thanks so much and may the Lord richly bless you and your family as you bless Israel and Iraq in the name of Jesus — especially at critical moment in history of the epicenter.

Obama and Liberals Shouldn’t Be “Shocked”

American Issues Project highlights the hypocrisy of “change” amidst AIG bonuses and overall spending.

Washington, DC – March 24, 2009 – American Issues Project launched a major television advertising campaign today, highlighting how the Obama administration and Congressional leadership protected the American International Group (AIG) bonuses and faked shock after the fact. The ad also reveals that Sen. Chris Dodd and President Obama each received more than $100,000 from AIG in 2008. It will air on FOX News, CNN, CNN Headline News, CNBC and FOX Business Network.

“Our elected officials are feigning shock over schemes that they themselves have overseen,” said Ed Martin, the organization’s president. “While it’s a clever PR stunt in the face of sharply declining approval ratings, two-faced politicians are not helping the American economy—and, more importantly, the American people—recover.”

The ad also criticizes Congressional liberals for voting to spend $1 billion per hour and passing legislation without reading the full text of the bills.

“American Issues Project will not rest until this reckless spending spree comes to a halt,” said American Issues Project President Ed Martin. “History shows us that increasing government control and accruing unsustainable amounts of debt does more harm than good. Washington is out of control and we owe it to our children, the heirs of this irresponsibility, to hold power-hungry politicians accountable.”

The ad urges concerned citizens to text ENOUGH to 97180 if they want to join the organization. An electronic version of the ad, plus full documentation for all statements made, is available at American Issues Project’s website.

About American Issues Project
American Issues Project is a 501(c)4 organization representing a coalition of conservative activists committed to raising important issues that deserve deeper examination given their impact on policy and politics. In accordance with federal law, American Issues Project only solicits and accepts contributions from individuals and not from any business corporation.

Line By Line, Or Lie After Lie

March 26, 2009 | by: Matt Margolis

Does anyone remember the promises made by Barack Obama during the campaign and after he won? Let’s refresh our memories…

During the final presidential debate last year, Obama said, “We need to eliminate a whole host of programs that don’t work. And I want to go through the federal budget line by line, page by page, programs that don’t work, we should cut. Programs that we need, we should make them work better.”

This wasn’t just rhetoric from a presidential candidate. This was a promise he made again as president-elect, a few weeks after the election:

“We cannot sustain a system that bleeds billions of taxpayer dollars on programs that have outlived their usefulness, or exist solely because of the power of a politicians, lobbyists, or interest groups. We simply cannot afford it. This isn’t about big government or small government. It’s about building a smarter government that focuses on what works. That is why I will ask my new team to think anew and act anew to meet our new challenges…. We will go through our federal budget, page by page, line by line‚ eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way.”

He made the same claim during his press conference yesterday.

And we will continue to go line-by-line through this budget, and where we find programs that don’t work, we will eliminate them.

Line by line.

So, Barack Obama said he would go line-by-line through the budget as a candidate, as president-elect, and said he’d continue — not start, but continue — to go through his budget line by line.

So why then, were there over 8,500 pet projects in his budget?

Why does his budget put our country into $9.3 trillion in debt in ten years?

He said he’d go line-by-line through the budget… with a scalpel.

Would Obama’s teleprompter care to explain?

* “Mother of Revolution” dead at 93
* Unemployment surging in Israel
By Joel C. Rosenberg

(Washington, D.C., March 23, 2009)

Thirty years after the Revolution began — and twenty years after the death of her husband — the wife of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini has died at the age of 93, reports the Associated Press. Khadijeh Saqafi was known as the “mother of the Islamic revolution.” She died Saturday in Tehran. “Thousands of people, including Iran’s president and supreme leader, attended her funeral at Tehran University on Sunday,” according to news reports.

The death of Khomeini’s widow will now open the door to renewed and more pointed analysis of the impact of the Islamic Revolution inside Iran. President Obama released a video on Friday reaching out to the leaders of Iran and holding out an olive branch I am convinced won’t be accepted and which reflects the administration’s disturbing lack of understanding of the eschatology — End Times theology — of the current Ayatollah and the President of Iran. Yet, in an extraordinary development, as I report in my new book, one of the Khomeini heirs is denouncing his grandfather’s and grandmother’s legacy and is calling for the creation of a pro-American democracy in Iran. What’s more, this grandson is siding with pro-democracy forces against the re-election of Ahmadinejad in June.

Excerpts from Chapter 16, “The Defector,” in Inside The Revolution:

On September 26, 2003, the grandson of the Ayatollah Khomeini — a highly respected Shia cleric in his own right — calmly stood up before an audience in Washington, D.C. He looked out over the crowd, took a deep breath, and then, speaking through an interpreter, denounced the Islamic Revolution, said it was time to usher in a new era of freedom and democracy in his country, and urged the Bush administration to mobilize the American people to overthrow the Iranian regime much as Winston Churchill had mobilized the British to destroy Adolf Hitler.

“As you know, the history of Iran in the nineteenth century was the history of a country under dictatorship,” Hossein Khomeini, then forty-four, told the gathering at the American Enterprise Institute, just blocks from the White House. “But the Revolution and Mr. Khomeini promised to change the Iranian situation and bring democracy to Iran. But, unfortunately, as things turned out, Iran[1] again became . . . [an] even worse dictatorship after the Revolution.”

WORLD LEADERS CONSIDERING

SINGLE CURRENCY AMIDST SEVERE GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS

Will Barak join Netanyahu’s government by Sunday ??
By Joel C. Rosenberg

(Washington, D.C., March 19, 2009)
Amidst the global economic crisis in which upwards of 45% of the world’s wealth has been lost in the last 18 months, talk of radically restructuring the global economic system is growing. In recent weeks, leaders in Europe, Africa and the Middle East have proposed scrapping the current economic order and going to a single common currency.

A story in yesterday’s Moscow Times is creating quite a stir in particular. At the April 2nd meeting of world leaders in London (the G20), the Kremlin is reportedly set to propose a new global common currency system to replace the U.S. dollar as the international currency of choice.

The story notes that “the Kremlin’s call for a common currency is not the first in recent days. Speaking at an economic conference in Astana, Kazakhstan, last week, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev proposed a global currency called the ‘acmetal’ – a conflation of the words ‘acme’ and ‘capital.’ He also suggested that the Eurasian Economic Community, a loose group of five former Soviet republics including Kazakhstan and Russia, adopt a single noncash currency – the yevraz – to insulate itself from the global economic crisis….”

“Nazarbayev’s proposal…garner[ed] support from at least one prominent source — Columbia University professor Robert Mundell, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1999 for his role in creating the euro. Speaking at the same conference with Nazarbayev, he said the idea had ‘great promise.’ The Kremlin document also called for national banks and international financial institutions to diversify their foreign currency reserves. It said the global financial system should be restructured to prevent future crises and proposed holding an international conference after the G20 summit to adopt conventions on a new global financial structure.”

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad last week called for a single regional currency for 400 million Muslims in the Middle East. “The process of obtaining one single currency in the trade and exchanges among members, and in the next stages with other countries and neighbors, should be designed,” the Iranian leader said March 11th.

Libyan leader Muammar Ghadafi, recently elected leader of the African Union of states, is calling for a single continental currency for all of Africa and has persuaded 200 tribal leaders to call him the “King of kings.” The BBC reported in February that Ghadafi “envisages a single African military force, a single currency and a single passport for Africans to move freely around the continent.”

Now comes a new story on this morning on the Reuters news wire: “U.N. PANEL SAYS WORLD SHOULD DITCH DOLLAR.”

“A U.N. panel will next week recommend that the world ditch the dollar as its reserve currency in favor of a shared basket of currencies, a member of the panel said on Wednesday, adding to pressure on the dollar,” the story noted. “Currency specialist Avinash Persaud, a member of the panel of experts, told a Reuters Funds Summit in Luxembourg that the proposal was to create something like the old Ecu, or European currency unit, that was a hard-traded, weighted basket. Persaud, chairman of consultants Intelligence Capital and a former currency chief at JPMorgan, said the recommendation would be one of a number delivered to the United Nations on March 25 by the U.N. Commission of Experts on International Financial Reform. ‘It is a good moment to move to a shared reserve currency,’ he said.”

The “Euro” is the model many are looking to, in part because 20% of the world’s foreign exchange reserves are already held in euros. Last year, the EU celebrated the 10 year anniversary of the creation of the “euro.”

These are curious developments given that scholars of Bible prophecy have long noted that according to the Scriptures, in the “last days” the world will see the emergence of an entirely new international financial architecture, complete with a single common global currency created and mandated by the leaders of Europe. The Bible indicates that eventualoly no one on earth will be able to engage in commerce without “buying in” to the new cashless system. The prophecy is found in Revelation 13:16-17, which reads: “And he [the world leader that emerges from a revived Europe] causes all, the small and the great, and the rich and the poor, and the free men and slaves, to be given a mark on their right hand or on their forehead, and he provides that no one can buy or to sell, except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name.”

Cynics and skeptics have long dismissed such talk as the province of “religious nuts” and “prophecy buffs.” But the discussion is now being advanced by major world leaders. It’s too soon to say where this will all lead, but these are certainly developments worth watching.

By Joel C. Rosenberg

U.S. and Israeli experts increasingly believe Iran could have its first nuclear weapon by the end of 2009 or early 2010. President Barack Obama has all but ruled out military force to stop Iran, preferring instead to pursue direct negotiations with Tehran.

Last week, however, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameini, dismissed such talk. “Negotiations with whom?” asked Khameini. “With an occupying and bullying regime [Israel], who does not believe in any other principle other than force?….Or negotiations with America and Britain who committed the biggest sin in creating and supporting this cancerous tumor [the Jewish State]?”

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also dismissed his American counterpart’s desire for direct talks, saying they could only happen if the U.S. abandons her “satanic, coercive and aggressive ways.”

Yet even as the leaders of Iran talk about annihilating Israel and the U.S., and feverishly try to build, buy or steal nuclear weapons, a growing chorus of “experts” in the U.S. foreign policy community are actually suggesting a nuclear-armed Iran might not be such a terrible thing.

Barry R. Posen of the MIT Center for International Studies wrote an op-ed for the New York Times on February 27, 2006, entitled, “We Can Live with a Nuclear Iran.”

Journalist Paul Starobin, in a column published in National Journal on May 19, 2006, argued that “Iran’s acquisition of a bomb would probably improve the chances of the U.S. and Iran renewing a dialogue after all these years” because, as one Mideast analyst told him, “they see acquisition of a nuclear weapon as a precondition of having talks with the U.S.” (emphasis added)

Ted Koppel, the former host of ABC’s Nightline, suggested in a 2006 op-ed in the New York Times that the world should allow Iran to get the Bomb. “Washington should instead bow to the inevitable,” he insisted. “If Iran is bound and determined to have nuclear weapons, let it.”

CNN founder Ted Turner went even further. “They [Iran] are a sovereign state—we have 28,000 [nuclear warheads]—why can’t they have 10?” he argued in 2006. “They aren’t usable by any sane person.”

In the fall of 2007, former CENTCOM commander John Abizaid said publicly, “There are ways to live with a nuclear Iran. I believe we have the power to deter Iran if they go nuclear,” just as we deterred the Soviet Union and China. “Iran is not a suicidal nation,” he added. “Nuclear deterrence would work with Iran.”

Throughout the 2008 presidential primaries, deterrence and containment were the themes of the Democratic contenders. Then-Senator Barack Obama dismissed the seriousness of the Iranian threat during his campaign, saying it was nothing compared to the threat the Soviet Union posed during the Cold War. Former U.N.

Then-Senator Hillary Clinton was even more explicit during an interview on ABC’s Good Morning America on the morning of the Pennsylvania primaries. She threatened to wipe Iran out after an Iranian nuclear attack, hoping that such strong language would deter the Iranian regime from launching such an attack.

“You said, ‘If Iran were to strike Israel, there would be a massive retaliation,’” noted host Chris Cuomo. “Scary words, Mrs. Clinton. Does ‘massive retaliation’ mean you go into Iran, you would bomb Iran? Is that what that’s supposed to suggest?”

“Well, the question was if Iran were to launch a nuclear attack on Israel, what would our response be?” Clinton replied. “And I want the Iranians to know that if I’m the president, we will attack Iran, and I want them to understand that, because it does mean that they have to look very carefully at their society. Because at whatever stage of development they might be in their nuclear weapons program, in the next ten years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them. That’s like a terrible thing to say, but those people who run Iran need to understand that because that perhaps will deter them from doing something that would be reckless, foolish, and tragic.”

Clinton is now the Secretary of State, responsible for orchestrating direct negotiations. But there are two serious flaws in Clinton’s thinking.

First, by offering a reactive rather than a proactive military strategy vis-à-vis Iran, she is allowing for the possibility of another Holocaust. If Iranian leaders acquire nuclear warheads and can attach them to the high-speed ballistic missiles they already have, Ahmadinejad could kill some six million Jews in about six minutes. What good would it then be to say that the U.S. would obliterate Iran after Ahmadinejad or a successor accomplishes another Holocaust?

Second, Clinton and her like-minded colleagues hope their tough talk will deter Iran’s leaders from launching a nuclear attack against Israel. But will it?

Consider events through the lens of Shia eschatology, or End Times theology. Ahmadinejad and his colleagues have publicly stated that the end of the world is near and that the return of the Islamic Messiah known as the “Mahdi” or the “Twelfth Imam” is “imminent.” To bring about the conditions optimal for the Mahdi’s return, Iran’s leaders must – according to Shia scholars – create global chaos and carnage.

As I document in my new non-fiction book, Inside The Revolution, Ahmadinejad believes he has been chosen by Allah to annihilate the U.S. and Israel and export the Islamic Revolution. The only way that is remotely possible, humanly speaking, is for Iran to acquire nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them against America and Israel. How then could the West successfully deter or contain Iran’s messianic, apocalyptic leaders? If they die, these Radicals believe they are going directly to Paradise. What could we possibly offer them as either carrots or sticks that would keep them from what they see as their God-given duty when their failure to obey could be, in their minds, disobedience punishable by an eternity in the fires of hell?

Yet many in Washington do not see the problem. Vice President Joe Biden, for example, said during the campaign, “My concern is not that a nuclear Iran some day would be moved by messianic fervor to use a nuclear weapon as an Armageddon device and commit national suicide in order to hasten the return of the Hidden Imam. My worry is that the fear of a nuclear Iran could spark an arms race in the Middle East, with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria, and others joining in.”

A nuclear arms race is certainly a very real concern. But based on the evidence, why would Biden be so quick to dismiss the messianic fervor of Iran’s leadership? Ahmadinejad, after all, is not just another power-hungry dictator in the mold of the Soviet or Chinese leaders of yore. Neither is Khamenei. They are not Communists. They are not atheists. They do not believe that this world is all there is. They are devout Shia Islamic extremists. They believe they are Shia “John the Baptists,” forerunners of the soon-coming Islamic messiah. They believe their life mission is to kill millions of Jews and Christians and usher in an Islamic caliphate. If they die, they are convinced they know where they are going.

But they do not really believe they are going to die—not at the hand of the infidels, at any rate. They believe instead that they have been chosen for a divine appointment and that nothing can stop them. That is what makes them so dangerous. Unfortunately, too many Washington politicians—Obama, Clinton, and Biden included—do not yet understand this.

To misunderstand the nature and threat of evil is to risk being blindsided by it. To misunderstand the nature and threat of Iran’s End Times theology could be the prelude to genocide. Dare we be blindsided?

———————–

Joel C. Rosenberg is the New York Times best-selling author of books about the Middle East such as Epicenter and The Last Jihad. This article is adapted from his new non-fiction book, Inside The Revolution (Tyndale House Publishers), releasing Tuesday, March 10, 2009)

GLENN: From Radio City in Midtown Manhattan, third most listened to show in all of America.

There’s a couple of things I want to talk about. You know, I’m going to have to get back to this Christian Science Monitor article, The Coming Evangelical Collapse: An AntiChristian Chapter in Western History is About to Begin. Michael Spencer writes, this collapse will herald the arrival of an anti-Christian chapter of the post-Christian West. Intolerance of Christianity will rise to levels that many of us did not believe possible in our lifetimes. I want to switch gears here. He gives several reasons and they’re all tree. They’re all true and we’ll get back into that tomorrow, in tomorrow’s program in Hour Number 2, but I want to switch gears here because there’s something here on the mail online, the London Mail, and it is amazing because we’ve called Sky Television and there were no television cameras here. Surprisingly the press has dropped the ball on this one over in London. There are only camera shots of this. It is the troops coming home from Afghanistan and a Muslim preacher ridiculing the soldiers during the homecoming parade. Now, it’s this preacher and he’s got all kinds of other people and they’re protesting and they’re holding signs. They are the butchers of Basra. They were taunting them. They were yelling and screaming that they were cowards that had an uncanny knack for death by friendly fire. They also said that they had an amazing skill at murdering and torturing thousands of innocent people, women and children. They called them a vile parade of brutal killers. They were shouting that they were Nazis. These guys also, this group of people also want Britain to be an Islamic state ruled by Sharia law. Let me see what else they’re saying. The parade was an insult, cowards, killers and extremists. That’s what they said.

All right, here’s the interesting thing. The police arrested a couple of them. Gosh, not the Muslims that were screaming these things. No, no, no. People that were screaming things back to this preacher and his flock. They couldn’t even print it. It was so horrible for the English papers that they couldn’t even print what was said. It was just this. Words came as police charged a man who allegedly shouted abuse at the war protestors. Later is says police were already out in force to protect the antiwar group and arrested two men among the soldier supporters. You cannot say a word in England against that kind of speech! They can be shouting it but you can’t shout it back because yours is hate speech; theirs is not. This is what’s coming, gang. This is what’s coming. And you’re going to see it. You already see it in small doses. The extreme left already says the most vile, vicious, awful things. They are standing up in our churches, in front of our children screaming hate speech. And what does anybody do about it? Is that even on television? And yet you can’t say marriage should be between a man and a woman, and civil unions is fine. You can’t have Barack Obama’s position without being torpedoed, without being a hater, unless you’re Barack Obama.

Joel Rosenberg has been watching these stories for a while. He’s with us now. He’s got a new book out called Inside the Revolution. Joel, are you familiar with these guys in England?

ROSENBERG: I am, and I write about this in one of the chapters in terms of how many Muslims. According to research done by the Pew Foundation, for example, 15% of Muslims in the U.K. believe suicide bombings against civilian targets are sometimes or often justified. 15%. 16% of Muslims in France believe suicide bombings against civilians are justified.

GLENN: Let me go here, Joel, I saw this story, this stat reported the other day. In England one out of seven say it’s okay to beat your wife if she’s wearing something too sexy. Where’s that one coming from?

ROSENBERG: Well, try this one. Again we cite this in the book from Pew Research. 5% of Muslims in America admit that they have a favorable view of Al-Qaeda. Now, what’s interesting is almost 30%, 27%, 27% refused to answer the question whether they have a favorable view of Al-Qaeda. Now, we’re talking about roughly 2 1/2 million Muslims in the country, 2.3 roughly. So we’re talking about if you look at these specific numbers and in terms of suicide bombings, you are talking about 9% refuse to answer the question of whether they support suicide bombings against civilian targets. 13% said they believe suicide bombings are sometimes, often justified. Now, to put that in real numbers, 23,500 Muslims in America believe suicide bombings against civilians are justified, and 164,000-plus — I’m sorry, 211,000-plus Muslim Americans refuse to answer the question. Now, the vast majority of Muslims in the U.S. and Britain aren’t radical but that’s not the question. The question is how many radicals are there and how serious a threat to they pose. And that’s what I’m trying to do in this book is take people inside the thinking, what they’re saying, what they’re teaching, what they believe and how far they are willing to go to get it.

GLENN: Okay. Here’s a question, Joel. I want to stray off the path just a little bit from the Muslim extremists and flip it around. I think there are anti-God forces as well that are aligning themselves with — I mean, you’re seeing it over in Europe. When you are such a coward and you can’t say, “Excuse me?” That’s hate speech without being shut down. And you are argue people who are speaking out against it, that’s not about freedom of speech. That is kowtowing to a special interest. And there is also, there are forces from the left that want to destroy religion as we understand it in the West, and these forces are getting stronger and stronger. Am I wrong or am I right? Please tell me I’m wrong.

ROSENBERG: Glenn, unfortunately you are right. And this is a battle of ideas. This is literally a war of ideas, and the left has been saying for a long time that religion is bad but now they seem to have discovered that one religion is fine. Radical Islam in the view of the left, not so bad. People who believe in Jesus, that’s the problem. And so this is becoming a huge divide. At least if the left were consistent, then that would be a useful marker, you know, that all religion is bad. About you that’s not actually what they think. They are protecting the hate speech and the actions around them.

GLENN: But they are consistent. They are consistent in this way, Joel. They are consistent in the way of not really standing for any real principle. They are only standing for the principle of their power. And help me out on this. Try this thought line out. Just as — and the premise is that kind of thinking will destroy them in the end because of this. What we’ve done is we have shut up the silent majority of America that wants to mean what they say and mean what they say and without any hate or malice toward anyone, just say the truth. These people are haters. These people hate the way we live and want to destroy our way of life. These people are teaching their children what God wants you to blow yourself up so you can get virgins. That’s an abomination and a perversion of anything that could possibly ever come from God. That is the truth. But because we have just said, well, you know what, we don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings, we don’t want to do anything, what’s happened is we have given all of this power to the left and the left is like, oh, yeah, yeah, just keep quiet, just keep quiet, and we’re losing our religion. We’re losing our way of life. As they coopt the extremists, what they don’t understand is you can’t coexist. It’s like us coexisting with the extreme left. You can’t coexist because they want to destroy you. They don’t want coexistence. The same thing: The extreme left gets in bed with these crazy radical Islamicists. They are going to lose in the end because the Islamicists want to kill everyone including Hollywood and the left.

ROSENBERG: So many Americans don’t believe that. I was just in the last — just in the first couple of days of this particular book tour, I’m getting people on shows, one particular one I’m thinking of who was saying, “Oh, come on, Joel, you are completely distorting the views of people like President Ahmadinejad in Iran. They’ve never said they want to annihilate America. They’ve never said that they want to destroy the United States and Israel. That’s all being misconstrued.” And, of course, I quote them directly and it’s all backed up. But the point is the left doesn’t want to hear it and they really think we who are trying to defend our Constitution and our culture and our, at least our freedom to believe what we want to believe and share what we want to share with our friends and neighbors, it’s up to them whether they want to agree with us, the left doesn’t even want to hear it and it’s interesting, just again in the first 48 hours of this tour how this inside the revolution discussion even, discussion about what the radical Muslims really want in their own words from their books, from their websites, from their speeches. That infuriates the left. They don’t even want to hear it. They don’t believe it. They just believe that we are the enemy.

GLENN: Tonight you are going to be on television with me. Would you bring some of the actual quotes with you? Let’s get some of the quotes, from their own websites, from their own things about us and what they are really trying to accomplish.

ROSENBERG: Absolutely.

GLENN: We have the video now that somebody took. It wasn’t a TV camera. I mean, how much time do you spend over in England, Joel?

ROSENBERG: No, I spend time in more radical Muslim countries than that one but I guess I need to spend more time there.

GLENN: But over in Europe you spend enough time.

ROSENBERG: No, it’s a problem. It’s a very big problem.

GLENN: They have kowtowed for so long, they are on the verge of losing their country. Do you know — I mean, this amazes me. We played this on television because I said this in a meeting and everybody said, no, that’s not true. And I said, go look for it but if it’s true, put it on television. But I’m telling you I read it in the New York Times in a little blurb. They always have a Christmas message over in England. Do you know who delivered the other Christmas message? Now they have to have a point/counterpoint message. The queen delivers the Christmas message. Do you know who delivered the other side for the queen this year?

ROSENBERG: I’m guessing an Imam but I did not see it myself.

GLENN: No, sir. Think again. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

ROSENBERG: Oh, my gosh. Wow.

GLENN: He followed the queen to present the other side for the Christmas message!

ROSENBERG: Wow.

GLENN: I mean, that’s how crazy Europe and England has become.

ROSENBERG: Now, get this one, Glenn. This just in the last couple of days. You know, as I’m making the case in this book, Ahmadinejad is bringing Iran and the world to the most dangerous moment in the Islamic revolution. We’re 30 years into the Islamic revolution now. But this is the most dangerous moment and you and I have talked about why. But what’s interesting is to me is that just this past weekend the moderate Muslim country of Morocco whom I spend two chapters on in this book — these are good guys — they have just severed all diplomatic ties with Iran because Iran has gone over the edge in their belligerence, the radicalism. And yet the United States, under President Obama, has decided to engage the radical belligerent, you know, “We’re bringing about the end of the world” leadership. How is Morocco more sane on this issue than our own government?

GLENN: You know, let me tell you something, because they don’t understand it. They are living in a place of denial on this. Let me ask you this: How do you sit down and negotiate and have open talks with somebody who says I’ll have open talks at the table. When you –

ROSENBERG: Give up your Satanic ways?

GLENN: Give up your Satanic ways.

ROSENBERG: Yeah, that’s a hard negotiating position for Secretary Clinton — how do you look someone in the eye and say, list me the Satanic ways so we could work on this. I mean, you know, how do you –

GLENN: Right. They don’t believe — because the people on our side don’t believe in Satan. They don’t believe in God. So they don’t think that people actually mean those things. You know, they have such disregard for religion that they think, “Oh, he’s just saying. He doesn’t mean really Satanic ways. That’s just bluster.” He means it!

ROSENBERG: You know what’s interesting in the heart of it, I totally agree with you, Glenn. One of the things I found over the last couple of years of crisscrossing the Islamic world is as you just alluded to with Morocco, because Moroccans are Muslim, they do understand.

GLENN: I know.

ROSENBERG: They are living inside the region and they understand it. What we’re finding is mass defect shun by the millions, really by the tens of millions of Muslims from Islam.

Now, some of them, many millions, are becoming followers of Jesus Christ. Not all, and I wouldn’t even say most. But it’s extraordinary the soul-searching that’s going on inside the Muslim world as Muslims are watching radicals kill other Muslims and saying, if that’s it, if that’s what it means to be a pure Muslim, I’m out. I can’t do this anymore.

GLENN: Joel, I tell you, there’s soul-searching going on in the entire world. I really truly believe that an enlightened period is coming. A great, great vast darkness but also a great miraculous enlightened period is coming as well because sides are being chosen.

ROSENBERG: Yes.

GLENN: And there is no middle ground. You are either going to be engaged with darkness or with light, and I think people are starting to feel that and they’re starting to say, you know, they’re starting to feel callings on, “Well, wait a minute.” And those who don’t — those who dismiss it, those who don’t root themselves in the truth I think are going to be in very, very deep trouble. I just, maybe this is me.

ROSENBERG: I’m with you on that. And I tell you, you know, there’s a guy I need to introduce you to, literally, physically introduce you to. He is the Glenn Beck of the revivalists. He is an Egyptian Coptic priest named Father Zakaria Botros. I profile him inside this book in the revolution. And he reaches 50 million Muslims a day. They are watching him now by satellite television in the Muslim world. Because he’s taking on Islam verse by verse, chapter by chapter, hadith by hadith and he’s deconstructing it. Then because he’s a believer in Jesus, he explains now this is the truth. Now, people call in to his show and they’re furious.

GLENN: Okay. Joel, I’m sorry to cut you off. I have a network break but I have to tell you we’ll talk more about this tonight on television.