GNITN - Special Edition

Israel At War – Day 81

Longer Than We Think

Months Or Years

It depends on who you talk with on how much longer the war in Israel will last. We read first from a report from The Times Of Israel:

Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said Tuesday that the military is expanding its operations in southern and central Gaza as it is close to dismantling all of Hamas’s battalions in the northern part of the Strip, but warned that the war will last “many more months.”

“We eliminated many terrorists and commanders, some of them surrendered to our forces and we took hundreds of prisoners. We destroyed many underground infrastructures and weapons,” Halevi said in a press conference in southern Israel.

More time may be needed because they need to be thorough:

However, he warned that in “this dense urban area, where terrorists are dressed as civilians, it cannot be said that we killed all of them.”

The complexity of the war requires more time, Halevi added:

“This war has necessary and not easy goals to achieve, it takes place in complex territory. That’s why the war will continue for many more months, and we will work with different methods, so that the achievement will be maintained for a long time,” he said, adding that the IDF is constantly learning and adapting its fighting methods to each area of the Gaza Strip it operates in.

“There are no magic solutions, no shortcuts in the thorough dismantling of a terror organization, but stubborn and determined fighting. And we are very, very determined,” Halevi said.

“It was correct to set high goals” for the war against Hamas, “and we will reach high [achievements],” he elaborated. “We assessed from the start that it would take many months, and we believe that our assessments are accurate. Therefore, the timescale will be lengthy. At the end, will we be able to say ‘There are no more enemies around Israel?’ I think that’s too ambitious. But we will bring about a different security situation, and as much stability as we can.”

He said that the IDF is determined:

He added that the IDF “will not allow a return to the security reality before October 7, and we will not allow such an event to be repeated.”

Another Estimate Of Time

In a speech to the Knesset, the Defense Minister suggested that the war could last years:

“This is a long, tough war. It has costs, heavy costs, but its justification is the highest that can be,” Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told Knesset lawmakers Tuesday, hours after the army raised the death toll from the ground offensive to 158 soldiers. He vowed Israel would punish Hamas over its brutal October 7 attack, “whether it takes months or years.”

He said that Israel is being attacked on 7 fronts, but only acted against 6 of them:

Gallant warned the Knesset’s powerful Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee against allowing threats to fester along Israel’s borders, saying that the military was dealing with threats on six of seven fronts, in what was seen as an implied message to Iran.

“We are in a multi-front war. We are being attacked from seven fronts — Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), Iraq, Yemen and Iran,” he said. “We have already responded and acted on six of those fronts.”

“Everyone who acts against us is a potential target,” he added. “Nobody has immunity.”

It’s talk like this that makes my feelings that the Psalm 83 war is up next. Gallant added that living in peace and safety is necessary:

Without meeting the goals of the war, we will find ourselves in a situation where the problem will not be those who live near Gaza or live in the north; the problem will be that people will not want to live in a place where we do not know how to protect them,” he also said.

He responded to those who heckled the Prime Minister that keeping the pressure on Hamas is the best way for hostages to be released:

The full-throated defense of Israel’s war goals came a day after families of hostages heckled the prime minister during a speech in the Knesset, as he argued that military pressure was the surest way to secure their release but required “time.”

Good News About The Good News

A former Muslim, Afshin Javid, was bent on converting Christians was on his way to America, but God had other plans for him as we read in an article from CBN.com:

"I was on my way to the United States to convert Christians to Islam, and I had 30 illegal passports at that time. I was arrested and put in jail in Malaysia. I was a dedicated Muslim who not only prayed the prayers, but I read the Koran once every ten days cover to cover. So I was very dedicated in my time in jail," Javid said.

"One day, as I'm praying, a man appears in front of me – normal size, but his being shines like light. This light is not a normal light. This light carried identity in it. And you knew that he is holy and instantaneously, I knew I am not. Even though I had prayed so many prayers, even though I had fasted so much and I had read the Koran and I had volunteered to work on landmines or I had participated in hanging people trying to please Allah, I knew, even though I have kept all the rules and regulation of Islam, I knew I am not just and I'm not holy and I knew the only just thing for him to do is to kill me," he recalled.

"But I didn't want to die. So I ran to the corner of the room, literally held my head in my arms, and just cried out, shouting, 'Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me,'"Javid said.

What he heard next surprised him:

And I didn't think he will forgive me because he is just. Still, I felt a touch on my left arm, and he said, 'I forgive you.' And I felt the weight just lifted off me. And I knew I'm forgiven, but I don't know how. And I was confused. Still, I say, okay, I don't understand. Only God can forgive, but you just forgave me. You are God, but you are a different God than the one I have studied about. This is not Allah. So who are you that forgives me? And he said, 'I am the way, the truth, and the life,' he continued.

He always thought truth was a path, not a person, yet he was shaken with the next thing he heard:

"And I thought, That's very powerful. It means a lot because as a Muslim, you pray 'Show me there's a straight path.' And so the way is a direction. Truth is something you measure. Life is a source, but he claims to be all those three. I never thought the way is a person. The truth is a person, and life is a person, and all of them is the same person," Javid explained.

"So I said, 'I don't understand what is your name?' And he said, 'Jesus Christ.' And it was as if someone grabbed all my bones out of my body. I just fell like a piece of meat to the ground. And I just began to weep," he told CBN News.

Javid became a Christian and his life was changed forever.

A Strong Hatred

When talking about what he thought about Jews before he was saved, he said this:

"It's like, you know, being colorblind, and then suddenly you see colors, and you realize the world is so much more beautiful than you ever thought. And if you ask me what made the world so colorless, it's the hatred, the anger that is in the heart of every Muslim. People say, 'Why did you hate the Jews?'" Javid said.

"I had never met a Jew. I thought Hitler was a good man for doing what he did. He just didn't finish the job. I don't know why I hated them. No Jew had ever done anything bad to me. God didn't design us to hate; he didn't design us to want to see someone dead. He did not design us for these things. These are designs of Satan. How do you think killing the people to whom God gave this land is going to please Allah? Jesus is not a God that celebrates when Jews are killed," he explained.

And it is that hatred that is at the heart of these terrorist attacks and will continue to drive them even when the whole area is demilitarized. Like a broken record I keep saying that destroying Hamas will not end the warring, it will only stabilize the area. And only the peace that Javid received that fateful day in a Malaysian jail cell can change the hearts of the Palestinians and Arabs who cheered on October 7th and who want to see their babies grow up to be suicide bombers. When praying for the war, pray that the citizens who come back to Gaza also encounter Jesus. Then they will also know the peace of Jerusalem.