US support for young evangelical Christians in Israel changes Israel-Palestine conflict News
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Following the recent conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, American television presenter John Hagee gave it to his congregation the following Sunday at Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas.
“Helping Israel is not a political issue. It’s a biblical problem, ”Hage proclaimed in a May 23 sermon in what he called the“ struggle for Jerusalem ”.
Hagee is the founder of pro-Israel Christian United, an umbrella group of 10 million members, a supporter of Israel who recently said former Israeli ambassador Ron Dermer is perhaps more important than Jewish Jews.
“Every time Jesus returns, Israel will be the leading nation in the world,” Hage said, touching on the belief that among many evangelists Jesus will soon return to save his followers from this earthly world.
Jews are God’s chosen people and the direct owners of all of Palestine, through a “blood covenant,” Hage noted and warned, “It’s a gentle support that Americans have for Israel; in the soft media and soft in Washington, DC.”
In fact, the United States is a political supporter of Israel increasingly distributed. Newly elected more progressive Democrats in the U.S. Congress strongly condemned the killing of 254 Palestinians and the 11-day Israeli bombing campaign. 200,000 in need of help.
“It’s basically a commitment to Israel”
Now, as Israel increasingly focuses on U.S. evangelical right to aid, younger evangelists who are more diverse and less connected to Zionist theology have moved away from the Jewish state and turned to the Palestinians, polls and some church leaders have said.
St. Louis, Missouri, pastor Brian Zahnd of Miss Life Church is one of the new mega-church ministers who are rejecting Christian Zionism in favor of a more balanced view of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Christian Zionism “has theological flaws” and does not take into account the teachings of Jesus and the Hebrew traditions. “Anyone who takes the Bible seriously cannot use the Bible as an excuse for injustice against other people,” Zahnd told Al Jazeera.
What is “that drives people away from the dualism reflex” is that Israelis are good boys and Palestinians are bad “… Stories of the Palestinian people“About life that was under Israeli occupation,” Zahnd said.
Motti Inbari and Kirill Bumin, a couple of political science professors at the University of North Carolina, recently released a survey of younger evangelicals, which showed major changes in how the evangelical community perceives Israel.
“Young evangelicals, especially those between the ages of 18 and 29, did not help Israel any less than their elders,” Bumin told Al Jazeera.
“The concepts of justice and righteousness among the younger evangelicals, as they relate to the conflict, are on the side of the older ones,” Bumin said.
According to the survey, nearly 45% of young evangelical Christians are in favor of forming a Palestinian state, and a 42 percent plurality does not support either side of the conflict.
Bumin and Inbari’s analysis showed that the opinions of the youngest evangelicals are not so much influenced by biblical beliefs that believe that the second coming of Christ and the end times are near. Instead, if a young evangelical respondent believes it Israel treats Palestinians unfairly, are significantly less likely to express support for Israel.
Moreover, the socialization of the opinions of the elderly does not necessarily become the support of Israel. For young evangelicals, the more there is discussion about the importance of Israel to the evangelical community, the less they see Israel.
“The theological premises that have been so prevalent among evangelical pasts are now changing and moving on to something new,” Inbarik told Al Jazeera.
The University of North Carolina survey was conducted among a panel of 700 evangelical Christians between the ages of 18 and 29 from March 22 to April 2. The percentage margin was 3.7 percentage points more or less.
The importance of evangelicals for the cause of Israel
U.S. evangelicals are an important constituency in Israel $ 3.8 billion a year in U.S. military aid.
Evangelicals are “most passionate” and “unquestionable” in favor of Israel and are far more “Jewish” than American Jews because they are “disproportionate” sources of “harsh criticism,” Dermer said in a recent conference.
“It is very rare for evangelical Christians to see criticism of Israel. We should do more outreach, ”Dermer said.
The effort to counter the U.S. Boycott Divest Sanction (BDS) movement, which has led to anti-BDS legislation in more than 32 states, is led by evangelical Christians, Dermer said.
BDS has relied on bottom-up pressure to end the occupation, and in part to restore the basic rights of Palestinians, has called on consumers to boycott Israeli products, investments and businesses, especially those that exploit Palestinian people and land.
Evangelicals fully supported former President Donald Trump’s decision to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem and voted 81 percent in favor of Trump in the 2020 election.
Certainly, the findings of the University of North Carolina show that 71% of young evangelicals accept that Israel is the capital of all of Jerusalem, and 58% of the majority still believe that Israelis come out of God’s biblical covenant with the Jews.
But the findings about shifting the margins to the Palestinians are in line with initial research by researcher Shibley Telhami and a professor of politics at the University of Maryland.
From 2015 to 2018, “there was a significant and significant reduction in Israeli support among young assessments,” Telhamik told Al Jazeera.
In 2015, 40% of the youngest evangelists wanted the U.S. to turn to Israel in the conflict with the Palestinians, with only 21 percent surveyed by the University of Maryland in 2018 saying the same thing.
Only 3% of young evangelicals wanted the U.S. to side with the Palestinians in 2015, a figure that rose to 18% in 2018, Telhamik said. According to the latest North Carolina poll, 28 percent said Palestinians should be the capital of East Jerusalem.
Among the reasons for the change are young evangelicals who often see what is happening to Israel and the Palestinians through a prism of social justice in the face of biblical prophecies believed by older evangelicals, Telham said.
At the same time, Trump’s presidency accelerated the intergenerational gap, Telham said.
“There is evidence that the young evangelists were terribly horrified by the support of the Trump leaders and … we evangelicals thought Trump was too pro-Israel,” he said.
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