Hello Staga,
Originally posted by Staga
Seagoon;
is your church officially supporting apartheid or is your blind support to the state of Israel your personal opinion?
No, our church and our denomination do not take stands on matters of politics. The opinions I express here on matters outside of religion, are merely my opinions - I do not intend to imply that there is any hint of official sanction to these opinions.
And as far as "blind support" for Israel goes, you've missed my point entirely. I do not support everything the Israeli government or individual Israelis do by any stretch of the imagination. Neither am I a Dispensationalist Christian, who believes Israel must be supported as a religious duty. However, my personal assessment of the situation based on what little I know of world history and in particular the history of Islam through to the present day, as well as my unavoidable contact with the guys actually fighting America's "war on terror" leads me to certain conclusions.
Israel acts as a check on terrorism, if only because they catch a lot of the hatred that would be directed at the West, and in particular Europe and the United States. Sadly, a bomb that goes off in Jerusalem is a bomb that isn't going off in England, the USA, or Baghdad. They are also one of the only countries in the world with the Chutzpah to be willing to simply remove the ability of their Arab neighbors to create Nukes.
I am also under no illusions that a Palestinian state would be a better friend to me or mine than Israel, and having grown up in the crucible of Jihad, such a Palestinian state would almost certainly continue to export, encourage, and nurture it. Even if the state did not do so, groups within the country are not going to stop. Even the Palestinian version of Sesame Street encourages the growth of the Martyr brigades.
I view Israel from the perspective of one who sees us as confronting a resurrgent Islam as the greatest threat to the west since the fall of Communism.
Now I realize that despite the fact that the Jihadist keep telling you via websites, and books, and CDs, and pamphlets, and sermons delivered by Imams, that they will not stop the struggle until the great Satan is defeated and the world is "at Peace" via having one Caliph, one Religion, and one Shariah law, you believe that
"if we just give them this concession, and that concession, and withdraw here, and withdraw there, they'll stop the worldwide Jihad and become secular humanists just like us." But I happen to believe that they are serious, and I believe they are sincere when they say they will not stop. Their track record confirms this. They've been at this since 611 AD, and they aren't going to be weened off it by giving them what they want. Historically, only defeating and then forcibly sitting on them "calms" them down for a while, but that methodology is obviously out of favor in the West.
- SEAGOON
