January 2003 Personal Letter

Dear Friends:

I learn quite a bit when I travel and meet believers. And I always learned a lot from the everyday folks who called in to my radio talk show in the ’70s and ’80s, and now again when I meet those who attend our tours or the churches in which I speak. My emphasis in speaking to congregations is, of course, on End Times prophecy and the situation in Israel. And since 9-11, many people I meet want to know about our war on terrorism and the threat of Moslems to us as a nation and as Christians.

When I arrived in Florida recently to lead tours to the Holy Land Experience in Orlando, the news about a rash of cruise ship sicknesses seemed to be popping up nearly every day. Of course, the cruise industry is big here, and any negative press about it causes a major economic impact on thousands employed in this industry.

Our ministry has been invited for these Caribbean cruises to teach the Bible to groups of interested Christians who also enjoy a bit of the sun. Fortunately, these kinds of incidents have never occurred in the many years of our Greek cruises. The phenomena we are seeing today seem targeted on the United States and one of its largest travel industries. Are they all coincidences?

I don’t have contacts in the CIA, but I’m not the only one considering the possibility of terrorism aboard these ships. Think about it. These companies have been in business for decades, usually providing a wonderful experience for millions of vacationers. How is it that all of a sudden they can’t keep their ships free of disease? We’ve been hearing for the past year that al Qaida continues to threaten our citizenry with terror. Is this part of their strategy? Are the food suppliers infiltrated by Islamic terrorists? Are there repeat passengers who conveniently find access to the food on board these ships?

A couple of years ago in the state of Washington, a woman came up after a church service and told me an interesting piece of information about the area where she lived. She worked as a PR nurse, and her job was to recruit doctors to move to the area and work for the county medical center. She said that at one of the get-togethers she hosted, 24 doctors and their wives showed up, and all of them were Moslems. It hadn’t occurred to her until she heard my talk about what was happening in the world that the Moslems could be subtly infiltrating our land and taking positions of trust and authority.

It wouldn’t be the first time. Remember, the great empires of ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome fell to infiltration and then invasion by similar hoards of have-nots.

Just a few weeks ago at another congregation, a gentleman mentioned to me about an influx of Moslem doctors into his area. His concern: the Homeland Security office must know the danger this kind of infiltration poses since doctors are trusted to handle and dispense medicines to the public. What will be done about this risk?

Cruise ships have doctors on board. Coincidence? Maybe, but like I said, too many of these “coincidences” are taking place in a relatively short period of time, and no one in authority seems to be willing to publicly make this connection.

The bigger question is: Why is it that our “Homeland Security” office is silent on the matter? Is our government so afraid that the American people won’t be able to handle another crisis that it is keeping mum about a possible bio-terror attack?

Today’s news is replete with incidents of bombings around the world at hotels, at nightclubs and McDonalds restaurants in Indonesia, of a missile attack against airliners in Kenya, of Moslems killing men, women and children in Washington, D.C., as in the sniper attacks, and the list could go on and on. This doesn’t even include the frequent bombings against Israel instigated by Yasser Arafat’s various terror groups.

Islamic web sites continually promote the killing of Americans and other “infidels” until all submit to Allah. The following excerpt was taken from an Arab Internet site during the Islamic “festival” of Ramadan (supposedly, like our Christmas; I don’t think so!) in early December:

These words are directed at you, oh Americans, you who have made your dear ones and your monks into a god other than Allah…. We announce to you the imminent end of your pleasant lives: “They have taken their rabbis and their monks for gods beside Allah, and also the Messiah son of Mary. They had only been commanded to worship the One God. There is no god but He [Allah]. Holy is He above that which they associate with Him.” Allah’s commandment to fight you has already been carried out, and you are worthy of the disasters and tortures planned for you.

The worldwide Islamic community, primarily found among the 22 Arab nations in the Middle East, hates the United States, Israel and all who do not convert to Allah. Al Qaida and Osama bin Laden and Yasser Arafat and the like are guilty beyond any doubt. But we must blame not only the terrorists for these acts of evil, but also the naïve attitudes of those in power in Washington who refuse to confront this evil swiftly and directly. Wes Pruden of The Washington Times waxes eloquent in a recent rebuke of the president himself:

George W., as the president of the United States in a time of grave national peril, has to say a lot of pretty things that ain’t necessarily so. He has on several occasions since September 11 repeated the assertion that Islam is “a faith based upon peace and love and compassion” and a religion committed to “morality and learning and tolerance.” We’re supposed to think that Muslims are just like the Methodists, only different—the difference between Muhammad and John Wesley being one only of degree.

This exasperates to no end Americans who appreciate straight talk, and who don’t see much peace, love, compassion, learning and morality bubbling out of the mosques of Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia and points between, including some here in the United States. Whatever tolerance there may be is often disguised, successfully, as contempt and hate.

Please don’t misunderstand. I am certainly behind our president in his plan to eliminate Saddam Hussein. Saddam is guilty already of using chemical weapons on his own people. Intelligence reports apparently document his possession of biological weapons, too. And don’t be surprised if anthrax is found in his labs. Anthrax (dehver in Hebrew) is in its natural form a type of cattle disease or pestilence; it is the fifth plague mentioned in the Haggadah, the program book for Passover.

Saddam Hussein has a ten-year track record of violating U.N. sanctions. War very soon is probable. But it is wrong to acquiesce to the U.N. again and let Saddam make a fool of the United States through seeming cooperation with U.N. inspectors. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that Arab “coalition” support pressured Bush into this roundabout means to accomplish his goal to finally squash Saddam.

Iraq is putting on quite a show for the world now, too. Complaints about inspections at one of Hussein’s palaces, accusations that the U.N. inspectors are spying for the CIA and the Mossad, blah, blah, blah. Talk show host Rush Limbaugh characterizes Chief U.N. Inspector Hans Blix as an Inspector Clouseau bungler (the inspection team actually got lost and asked Iraqi soldiers the way to their surprise inspection location!).

In early December the inspectors found mustard gas still carefully stored at an Iraqi facility since the last round of inspections in 1998. Does anybody, anywhere, really think Saddam has stopped his pursuit of weapons of mass destruction?

By the time you receive this letter, war could have already commenced. President Bush’s patience is understandably growing very thin. I only wish that he would not ignore our bigger foes, because although he may win in the short term against Iraq, he may make us vulnerable to losing the long-term war against much greater enemies. We should have confronted other, more hostile enemies a year ago, and Saudi Arabia must be on the top of that list.

Sadly, the president has been deceived about his supposed friendship with this backwater despotic regime. The House of Saud is neither friend nor ally. It literally finances terrorism around the world, as recent news reports have shown. The home to extreme Wahabbi Islam, the Saudi Arabian culture indoctrinated Osama bin Laden as well as 15 of the 19 terrorists who murdered over 3,000 Americans on 9-11. Despite the expensive public relations effort to improve their image in the West, the Saudis are now holding rare press conferences to deny complicity in terrorism and to complain about our media, which has exposed payments from Saudi princesses to the 9-11 hijackers, as well as other Saudi terror “charities.” The London daily Guardian reports that Russia has evidence of Saudi financing of the Moscow theatre siege in November. “Several long telephone conversations were intercepted to Saudi Arabia, to the Emirates, and to Qatar,” the paper said. Don’t we have enough evidence against these so-called friends, without whom we could not have had September 11?

Wes Pruden hits the issue squarely again:

The president…does his credibility no good with his courtship of “bad” Muslims, his welcoming to the White House and to the ranch the representatives of oleaginous regimes whose state-owned television stations and newspapers call relentlessly for Muslims to kill Jews and Christians.

Until our president—or some courageous world leader—stands up to these terror-fostering regimes with serious, military-backed ultimatums, we will see terrorism rise around the world, and even in our own land.

Of course, it may not take a courageous leader, but rather a Satanic one. The Antichrist, when he rises to power, will secure a supposed peace for Israel and the entire world, which will catapult him to supreme leadership of the earth during the Tribulation. Are we close to that time?

In the meanwhile, the interrogation of Islamic prisoners we’ve captured reveals that plans are in the works to wreak havoc on America through shootings, bombings and weapons of mass destruction. September 11 was not the climax of their strategy, but merely chapter one in their plan to defeat “the Great Satan” and the “infidels.” It’s time to act decisively, without compromise, and confront our real enemies.

During my last visit to Israel, I took our television crew into Ramallah and had a chance to sit down with one of Israel’s staunchest enemies, Palestinian spokesperson Hanan Ashrawi. During our interview, it was amazing to me how pleasantly this American-educated woman could so skillfully weave such a fictional account about the situation between Israel and the Palestinians.

Homicide bombings accompanied by whining propaganda to the Western media is the strategy of these Arabs who want nothing less than the annihilation of the Chosen People. Though the majority of Israelis still favor a tough response to Arafat’s campaign of terror, leaders in the West, the U.N., the European Union (which just announced that it’s considering removing Hamas from its list of terror organizations), and our own George W. Bush have been successfully trapped by the Arab regimes who possess much of the world’s oil and harbor most of the world’s terrorists. Let up on Arafat, they say, or we’ll play hardball in other areas.

And speaking of Yasser Arafat, did you know that he canceled the annual Christmas celebration in Bethlehem? Israeli troops had entered the area in a police operation to arrest a terrorist who had hit Jerusalem recently, and Arafat seized the opportunity to get back into the news. He’s a Moslem. He’s at enmity with God. He rejects Jesus as his Savior. What gives him any link to the celebration of Jesus’ birth? And yet, the media make a big news story about what this hater of the Chosen People says and does. But we all know that Arafat is the Grinch who stole Christmas.

Enough of this kowtowing to our sworn enemies! It’s time to take the warnings of eminent danger seriously and confront our aggressors forcefully.

The time of our Messiah’s return must be near, my friends. How much closer can this world come to global catastrophe than we are now? America is losing its authority and influence—and its moral high ground. The Europeans and the third-worlders represented at the United Nations are gaining a more powerful voice. And with their voices come anti-American, anti-Semitic attitudes and policies that are bound to lead much of the world headlong into disaster.

We as believers in Jesus Christ must garner all our spiritual strength and influence to win as many to Christ as we can until that day when we’re raptured up to our Father’s house. Read and study the prophetic Scriptures and books that expound upon them. Contact our office to obtain a copy of the new book, Prophecy at Ground Zero, which addresses this subject from all sides. I’ve got a chapter in there along with many of today’s leading prophecy scholars.

Encourage your pastors and Sunday school teachers to address End Times teaching in their regular schedule of instruction. And if they won’t, start your own Bible study or attend a church that’s not afraid to talk about all of the Scriptures.

Get involved in evangelism through your church or through other Christian ministries. And when you do, don’t forget to witness to the Chosen People. Your seed-planting efforts may eventually lead to the conversion of one of the future 144,000 Jewish evangelists who will be used by God in a great harvest of souls during the Tribulation.

And pray—pray fervently for this nation. We have the freedom to criticize President Bush and his ineffective policies, but we also have the responsibility to uphold him and his advisors in prayer, that God will intervene and lead them with wisdom and grace.

Pray, too, for the Chosen People and for the peace of the eternal city of Jerusalem, your home and mine in the Millennial Kingdom and beyond.

Your Messenger,

P.S. Since many of you are receiving this letter just before the end of 2002, let me encourage you to consider a significant year-end contribution to keep this ministry going. This is the time of year when your donations determine just how extensively we can continue to report on Israel. Folks, we have to go there to get the job done. Your generosity sends evangelists to the Chosen People, assists the Israeli community of Anatot, provides ongoing support for the Garden Tomb, and helps so many other vital ministries here and in the Promised Land. Romans 10:15 says, “And how shall they preach, except they be sent?” Here we are, friends, send us. Thank you for your participation with us in the Lord’s work. — Zola