Israel is Becoming the Burdensome Stone

Israel is caught in a very difficult position in the world. Israel is becoming a burdensome stone for all who gather against it. Like the Bible says in Zech 12:2-3:

And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.

Though the scripture talks about Jerusalem, this sentiment applies to the entirety of the nation of Israel. The Jews are, as the descendants of Abraham, God’s chosen people. Yes, many of the promises concerning how God deals with the nations has passed to the church, yet the Promise to the land can never be revoked because in Genesis 15 God gave the land to Israel with an unconditional covenant.

And it came to pass, when the sun went down and it was dark, that behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a burning torch that passed between those pieces. ¹⁸ On the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying:

“To your descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the River Euphrates— ¹⁹ the Kenites, the Kenezzites, the Kadmonites, ²⁰ the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, ²¹ the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.”

While it is true that God deals with the nations through the Church instead of Israel, the descendants of Abraham remain God’s chosen people, and they remain the kinsmen of Jesus Christ. Remember that the Genesis 15 covenant is one sided. Abram promised nothing to God when God promised the land to Israel. This means there is no level of rejection of God complete enough, no abomination severe enough, and no sin vile enough to abrogate God’s promise.

Israel will become a burdensome stone for all who gather against it because most of the world rejects God. In rejecting God, the world will reject and hate God’s chosen people just because God chose them.

We have recently witnessed the October 7th attack by Hamas on Israel and the subsequent conflict that resulted from it. The world now accuses Israel of committing Genocide against the Palestinians, of being war criminals, of committing all kinds of atrocities against the defenseless civilians who live in Gaza. Let’s take a closer look at the situation Israel finds itself in. However, let’s remove the lens of hatred the rest of the world uses to view anything having to do with Israel and try to get to the truth.

Hamas rules Gaza, and it’s a terrorist organization that vows to destroy Israel. Hamas also enjoys the moral and material support of surrounding Arab nations who also have the destruction of Israel as their goal.

When attacking Israel, Hamas hides behind their own civilian population hoping Israel will kill them. If there aren’t enough civilian casualties among the Palestinian population, they often resort to inflicting casualties on their own civilians in order to blame it on Israel. Hamas wants their people to starve and will confiscate and divert whatever aid does come to the Palestinian people. This way, they can use civilian suffering and death as a political weapon against the nation of Israel in an attempt to turn the whole world against them.

Because Hamas is recognized as the legitimate government, they use the schools and media to teach this same Jihadist attitude to the people, especially the children. At this point, most of their populace hates Israel and supports anything Hamas would do to inflict harm on Israel. Additionally, anytime Palestinian civilians are harmed, either by Hamas or by the Israelis trying to get at Hamas, it’s always because of Israel and never Hamas. Hamas is free to attack Israel at will, yet anything Israel does to defend itself increases the hatred of Israel by the Palestinian population and the rest of the world.

Most world opinion is now against Israel. The general attitude is that Israel shouldn’t do anything to protect itself regardless of how grievous the harm Hamas does to them because they might harm Palestinian civilians. They accuse Israel of committing Genocide.

Hamas can do anything it wants to Israel, and they get a pass. Hamas purposely hides under the skirts of their women and children hoping they’ll be caught in the crossfire when Israel retaliates.

Is Israel responsible for harming Palestinian civilians? Of course they are! WAR IS LIKE THAT! And although Israel doesn’t target civilians, they do get caught in the crossfire when Hamas uses them as human shields.

Yet we also have the example of Hamas. Do they target civilians? YES! They almost always target civilians because they don’t shoot back (well not as much). They use bombs to blow up weddings, schools, busses, markets, restaurants, etc. They strap bombs to little children because they are less suspicious and more likely to get close to Israeli military personnel. Israeli soldiers don’t actually want to shoot children, and, because of that, they hesitate.

Psychologists know that bad people, people with ill intentions, will often accuse others of what they secretly intend to do. This is what is at work here, except their intentions aren’t really so secret. Hamas accuses Israel of Genocide against the Palestinian people. Yet it’s Hamas and the surrounding Arab nations that are actually intending to destroy Israel, to wipe its existence from the face of the earth. Just to be clear, they don’t just want to destroy Israel, they want to kill every Jew in Israel from the best of Israel’s soldiers, to the smallest and weakest of children.

When you hear the chant “from the river to the sea,” what they’re saying is that they want to “Cleanse” the land between the Jordan and the Mediterranean sea of all Jews. THEY WANT TO KILL ALL THE JEWS! What’s that but Genocide? But somehow, in many people’s eyes, the definition of Genocide changes if they’re talking about Israel.

Most of the world hates Israel. Because of the increasing level of sin and rejection of God in the world, most of the world will also reject all the things of God. This means that, as we approach the end times, the hatred of God’s people will continue to grow, and Israel will continue to become the burdensome stone for all who gather against it.. And yet the entire world will not suffice to overcome them.