The evangelical Christian leaders who handed over the votes to President Trump now press him to declare that Israel can claim the ownership of the West Bank, based on a promise made by God to the Jews of the Bible.
They seek a way to get a path to the annexation of the territory, which is widely seen internationally as a future Palestinian state. Israel took the territory as part of a war between her, Jordan, Egypt and Syria in 1967 and has been occupying her since. In recent years, the right-wing government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has encouraged Jewish settlers to build houses at an increasing rate.
The prominent evangelical supporters of Mr. Trump are preparing a multiprongit approach to pressing the President, making appearances in Israel, petitating the White House, promoting his ideas at a key evangelical conference and building a congressional support.
Some of the main evangelical in America, including Ralph Reed, Tony Perkins and Mario Bramnick, visited Jerusalem on Tuesday to publicly retreat the Sovereignty of Israel in West Bank.
« I feel literally that God is giving Israel a blank control, » said Bramnick, the President of the Latin Coalition of Israel and the Shepherd of a church in Florida The profile of which increased after prayer calls in support of the claims of the 2020 presidential election were stolen to Mr. Trump.
These evangelical leaders are part a movement Called Christian Zionism and believes that the Earth was given to the Jews of the Bible.
They refer to the West Bible with the biblical names of Judea and Samaria. Believe that Christians help Fulfilling this biblical promise is blessed and that the establishment of the state of Israel indicates another Will follow biblical prophecies. For some, though not all, includes above all an apocalypse that will lead to a second coming of Jesus Christ.
« Christians are asking our beloved President Trump and his team to aggressively eliminate all the barriers to Israel’s sovereignty over the whole earth, including Judea and Samaria, » he said Terri Copland Pearsonsan influential shepherd who produced his father’s television program, the TV television Kenneth COPELANDand now serves as president of his name Bible school In Texas. She made the observations At the National Convention on Religious Convention in the State last Thursday.
The event’s organizers promoted a resolution sponsored by North -American Christian leaders by Israel who Rejects « all efforts » to press Israel to give up the territory of the West Bank. This group, a decade ago, is described as a network of about 3,000 Christian leaders « representing tens of millions of North -American Christians » who defend « biblical truth » and firm support in Israel. The organizers of the Convention said that they would file the petition at the White House shortly after the conference. The sponsors did not respond to a comment request on how many people signed the request and if it was submitted to the President.
Demand aims to help create support for a controversial effort promoted by some in Israel to annex land that is Home of approximately three million Palestinians And now about half a million Israeli settlers.
Much of the world considers the settlements of the West Bank of Israel, which have rapidly expanded in recent years, a violation of international law. Israel disputes this characterization.
The Christian Zionist Zionist Defense in the West Bank comes when the perspective of an independent Palestinian state has become especially faint since the attack by Hamas in Israel on October 7, 2023, lit a war on the enclave and also led to an increase in stresses in the West Bank, about 55 kilometers away.
Those who request Mr. Trump to support the Israeli annexation of the West Bank say that they expect this statement to end with another discussion on a future Palestinian state.
Its resolution occurs when the far -right government of Mr. Netanyahu has had a green light in the construction and expansion of the settlement in the West Bank at a rate faster than in the past and in the midst of the intense military raids in the Palestinian cities since January. The raids have Dozens displaced from thousands of residents.
The petition also joins a wave of similar initiatives by influential conservatives and Christians, in Congress and beyond, with the aim of swinging politics in Trump’s second term.
Days before the North -American leaders of Israel announce the request, the representative Claudia Tenney, a New York Republican, who is identified as a presbytery. Letter to Mr. Trump With another five members of the Congress « Friends of Judea and Samaria Caucus », it began this year. He asked his administration to « recognize the right of Israel » to declare sovereignty over the territory, saying that it would be integral to defend « Judeo-Christian heritage on which our nation was founded. »
Asked in February at a press conference with Mr. Netanyahu about his position on the Israeli annexation of the West Bank, Mr. Trump said that « people like the idea » and that there would be « an ad probably on this specific topic for the next four weeks ».
Mr. Trump’s comments also helped the fuel enthusiasm for a resolution on Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank, adopted last month at the conservative Political Action Conference, an annual conservative meeting that forms an agenda.
Trump has supported other Israeli right -wing initiatives: last month approved the massive Palestinian displacement of Gaza, and in January he annulled an executive order of Biden that had allowed sanctions for the West’s cisosition settlers who were considered to have violated human rights.
He has selected Israel’s evangelical Christian supporters for key positions in his administration, including the TV Paula White-Cain as Senior Adviser at the newly created white house of the white house that is vocal over it Support to Israel for religious reasonsand Mike Huckabee, from Arkansas, former governor and baptist minister who has it for a long time aligned with Israeli settlersAs a candidate for the ambassador to Israel.
In 2017, Mr. Huckabee participated in a ceremony in a West Bank settlement and told cnn He believes that « Israel has an act of title in Judea and Samaria », adding that « there is nothing as the West Bank » or « an occupation ». Last year after being named by the role of the ambassador, he told the Israeli army radio that the annexation was “certainly« A possibility.
Ms. Tenney recently introduced a bill that would replace government references in the West Bible and use biblical names. Representative Brian Mast, the Florida Republican chaired by the Chamber’s Foreign Affairs Committee, has commissioned employees to call Judea and Samaria, according to a note from the Internal Committee. reported by axios Last Wednesday. (Nor did the legislator respond to comments applications.)
Christians are far from uniform, but many support a solution of two states to the long -term conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. The position of evangelical leaders does not reflect the opinions of the entire community, much less the perspective of all Christians or all North -Americans, as widely, as Support for Israel has fallen In the midst of his war with Hamas in Gaza, while support for Palestinians has increased and promoted a protest movement on the university campuses.
« This is a long and lasting tension that Palestinian Christians have with our brothers in the United States, especially the evangelical ones, » he said Daniel BannouraA doctoral candidate for theology at Notre Dame, which houses a podcast on faith and social justice called « through the division ».
Bannoura, the son of a Baptist Minister, grew up in the West Bank and then attended the University and the Postgraduate School in the United States. Said that because his community in the West Bank was « very small and diminishing » 50,000 people According to some estimates, and because their identities complicate predominant narratives, « Palestinian Christians have not been given voice. »
In contrast, many evangelicals have a direct line with the White House. Larry Huch, a Christian Zionist Minister and host of television programsHe boasted of the press conference promoting the request for the annexation of the West Bank that Mrs. White-Cain from the White House Office was in contact.
« The current administration is well aware that white evangelical Christians voted in a large number and are deeply motivated to support Israel, » said David Katibah, who directs communications and Christian commitment to Telos in Washington, a group made up of two Christian Americans in 2009, a evangelical and the other of the Palestinian descendant support for a resolution to a resolution to a resolution to a resolution. Israel-Palestinia through education and « peace ».
Katibah said he had been raised in a North -American Evangelical Community and said that there is no monolithic perspective on the annexation. Increasingly, younger evangelicals are adopting « a more expansive view » that emphasizes mutual flowering, justice and human rights on both sides.
Some investigations go back to this point. A 2021 measure Commissioned by the University of North Carolina in Pembroke found A strong change of attitudes Between the younger evangelicals between 2018 and 2021, their support for Israel fell from 75 percent to less than 35 percent along with an increase that accompanies the desire to see the politics of the United States, which reflects a Palestinian perspective.
Leave a Reply