By Faith Abraham – Part 1

TimeWatch Editorial
December 28, 2016

According to “The Official Site of Pat Robertson,” M. G. "Pat" Robertson has achieved national and international recognition as a religious broadcaster, philanthropist, educator, religious leader, businessman and author.  He is the founder and chairman of The Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) Inc. and founder of International Family Entertainment Inc., Regent University, Operation Blessing International Relief and Development Corporation, American Center for Law and Justice, The Flying Hospital, Inc., and several other organizations and broadcast entities. On his site remains he transcript of a speech he delivered entitled “Why Evangelical Christians Support Israel.” In that speech, which is not dated, Pat Robertson celebrates the shared heritage of Christianity and Judaism and argues that a Palestinian state would mean the destruction of Israel.

He begins the speech by quoting a question asked by Queen Victoria of England, in the late 19^th Century of her Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli: "Mr. Prime Minister, what evidence can you give me of the existence of God?" Robertson then says that the Prime Minister replied: "The Jew, your majesty." This quoted conversation sets the stage for his explanation of the support that the Israelis enjoy from the Evangelical Christian Right. He continues his delivery by first describing the challenged history of the Jewish people and their miraculous survival.

“A people who in 586 BC were deported to Babylon, yet returned after 70 years to rebuild a nation. Who were again brutally massacred and dispersed by the Romans in 70 AD, yet after countless centuries of Diaspora, expulsions, pogroms, ghettos, and attempts at genocidal extermination, have clung to their faith, their customs -- and now after some 2500 years of wandering have returned to the land promised by God to their ancestors. A new nation began in that land in 1948 named after their ancestor Jacob, whose divinely appointed name Israel means "Prince with God."… Yes, the survival of the Jewish people is a miracle of God. The return of the Jewish people to the land promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is a miracle of God. The remarkable victories of Jewish armies against overwhelming odds in successive battles in 1948, and 1967, and 1973 are clearly miracles of God. The technological marvels of Israeli industry, the military prowess, the bounty of Israeli agriculture, the fruits and flowers and abundance of the land are a testimony to God's watchful care over this new nation and the genius of this people.” Pat Robertson, “Why Evangelical Christians Support Israel,” The Official Site of Pat Robertson

What the speech does not include is the fact that there was something called The British Mandate of Palestine. Christopher Sykes, in his 1973 published book “Crossroads to Israel” makes the political point that the British Mandate for Palestine was established by the League of Nations. It was the territory that had been formerly part of the Ottoman Empire. Eli E. Hertz, in his forty-six page study entitled “Mandate for Palestine: The Legal Aspects of Jewish Rights to a National Home in Palestine,” also expands the political basis for Israel’s existence.

“The “Mandate for Palestine,” an historical League of Nations document, laid down the Jewish legal right to settle anywhere in western Palestine, a 10,000-square-mile area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, an entitlement unaltered in international law and valid to this day. The legally binding document was conferred on April 24, 1920, at the San Remo Conference, and its terms outlined in the Treaty of Sèvres on August 10, 1920. The Mandate’s terms were finalized and unanimously approved on July 24, 1922, by the Council of the League of Nations, which was comprised at that time of 51 countries, and became operational on September 29, 1923.” Eli E. Hertz, “Mandate for Palestine: The Legal Aspects of Jewish Rights to a National Home in Palestine, “page 4.

Notice that Pat Robertson’s explanation is based upon the miraculous, but according to Eli E. Hertz in his study on the Mandate for Palestine, the existence of Israel began with the Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland in 1897. Note the following:

By 1917, the movement to reestablish a Jewish homeland in Palestine had steadily progressed. On November 2, 1917 Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour wrote a letter later described as the Balfour Declaration.

On November 2, Balfour sent a letter to Lord Rothschild, a prominent Zionist and a friend of Chaim Weizmann, stating that: “His Majesty’s Government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.”The History.com Website

It is clear then that the nations involved, Britain, The United States and France were operating in support of the Zionists. Their motivation had nothing to do with a prophetic element, simply to provide a home for Jews who longed for the return of the Jewish people to their homeland and the resumption of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel. As we shall see in our continuing look at this subject, according to Wesley Haddon Brown and Peter F. Penner:

“Christian Zionism is a belief among some Christians that the return of the Jews to the Holy Land , and the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, is in accordance with Biblical prophecy . The term began to be used in the mid-20th century, superseding Christian Restorationism.” Wesley Haddon Brown, Peter F. Penner, “Christian Perspectives on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict”, 2008    p. 131,

We shall continue this in our next Editorial.

Cameron A. Bowen