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| Israel Introduces Bill to Outlaw Teaching The Gospel of Jesus Christ, Sentence Violators to Prison | ||
| 2023-03-23 | ||
| [informationliberation] Two influential members of Israel's Knesset have introduced a bill to outlaw teaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ in Israel and sentence violators to prison. Israel already bans Christians from proselytizing minors but this new bill will go even further and "ban any and all efforts to tell people about Jesus." From All Israel News, "EXCLUSIVE: Two Knesset members propose legislation to outlaw sharing the Gospel in Israel and send violators to prison — could it become law?": JERUSALEM, ISRAEL — Is it possible that the Israeli government this year could pass legislation making it illegal for people to share the Gospel message in the very land where Jesus was born, raised, preached, died, buried and rose from the dead? Unfortunately, yes.
The bill would send violators to prison. [...] The proposed legislation would outlaw all efforts by people of one faith who, in any way, want to discuss or try to persuade people of other faiths to consider changing their current religious beliefs. The punishment for doing so would be "one year imprisonment." If the conversation is with minor — someone under the age of 18 — the punishment would be "two years imprisonment." This bill would apply to people having spiritual conversations with Israelis of any religion. However, in their official explanation of the bill, the two Israeli legislators specifically emphasized the warning to stop Christians, in particular. The bill’s primary objective, therefore, appears to be making it illegal for followers of Jesus ("Yeshua" in Hebrew) to explain why they believe that Jesus is both Messiah and God with the hope that Israelis might consider following Him. The bill does not only make a simple personal conversation about Jesus with another individual a crime. It would also make it illegal for "someone who solicits a person — directly, digitally, by mail or online — in order to convert his religion." Thus, producing and publishing online videos explaining the Gospel to Jewish or Muslim people in Israel — and to those of any other religious faiths — would suddenly become illegal. Publishing books, other printed literature, online articles, podcasts, or other forms of media that explains the life and ministry of Jesus and His message found in the New Testament would also become illegal. So would discussing the Gospel message via email, text messages, written letters and/or on social media, including answering questions initiated by people who don’t follow Jesus. All Israel News has the full text of the bill. This is how Christians are treated when they preach the Gospel in Israel: A new Pew Research poll in America found that Evangelicals have a +39 favorability rating towards Jews but Jews have a -40 favorability rating of Evangelicals. Jews having a favorable of -40 for Evangelical Christians while Evangelical Christians are +39 towards Jews will never stop being funny. Where these people live and given their SES, they probably have little direct experience and only know Jews as comic book heroes on Fox News. pic.twitter.com/34KYh0idDQ — Richard Hanania (@RichardHanania) March 16, 2023 Anti-Christian attitudes are even worse in Israel. In 2019, the pro-Israel Christian TV broadcasting network Daystar had their headquarters burned to the ground by suspected Jewish extremists who were never caught. The Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem warned last year that "our presence in Jerusalem is under threat." "Our churches are threatened by Israeli radical fringe groups," Patriarch Theofilos III said. "At the hands of these Zionist extremists the Christian community in Jerusalem is suffering greatly. Our brothers and sisters are the victims of hate crimes. Our churches are regularly desecrated and vandalized. Our clergy are subject to frequent intimidation." Just last month, a Jewish extremist from America desecrated a statue of Jesus inside a Jerusalem church. "We cannot have idols in Jerusalem," the Jewish-American vandal said. "This is a very serious matter, we cannot worship stones of false gods in Jerusalem." 🇮🇱 Israeli police today #arrested an #American tourist after he #smashed a statue of #Jesus in a church in the Old City of #Jerusalem. The tourist claims that he was set up. #Poland #Canada #India #Australia #London #kyiv #Pakistan #Dubai #Israel #NewyorkCity #Toronto #iran pic.twitter.com/n4qEK0Iv4i — Top Viral Videos (@ManojKu40226010) February 2, 2023 ⚠️Video of the American tourist that vandalized a statue of Jesus in a church in the Old City of #Jerusalem. This footage supports the notion that the man has some kind of a form of Jerusalem Syndrome.#Israel pic.twitter.com/9Vh4vt3sJo — parallel_universe🇺🇦🇮🇱 (@ignis_fatum) February 2, 2023 A poll from Gallup released last week found that Israel is losing support among American Democrats, though support among Republicans - especially Evangelicals -- remains strong. For the first time ever, Democrats said "their sympathies in the Middle East now lie more with the Palestinians than the Israelis, 49% versus 38%," Gallup reported: Today's attitudes reflect an 11-percentage-point increase over the past year in Democrats' sympathy with the Palestinians. At the same time, the percentages sympathizing more with the Israelis (38%) and those not favoring a side (13%) have dipped to new lows. Sympathy toward the Palestinians is also at a new high among political independents, up six points to 32%. However, more independents still lean toward the Israelis (49%). Republicans' views are unchanged, with nearly eight in 10 (78%) continuing to sympathize more with the Israelis while 11% side with the Palestinians. All Israel News said the bill to outlaw teaching the Gospel in Israel has a solid chance of passing now that Orthodox and ultra-Orthodox Jewish members control the legislature. "These members are far more aggressive in this legislative session than ever before in pushing for legislations to be passed that advance their theological worldview," All Israel News reported. Despite PM’s assurances, Christian Zionists bedeviled by anti-missionary bill
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| Posted by:746 |
| #6 My understanding of the Jewish view of Jesus is that He was a Jewish rebel who tried to take on Rome and got killed. A heretic, certainly, though I never understood him as aiming at Rome. But he wasn’t the only claimant to being messiah among the Jews. A century (132 CE) later Bar Kochba triggered the second or third Jewish-Roman war — depending whether one counts the Kitos Revolt, which took place outside of the Holy Land, as #2 — and actually ruled Israel as a prince for three years before Rome reconquered it. The first Jewish-Roman war started in 66 CE, a generation after Jesus died, and had nothing to do with him as far as I am aware. Wikipedia has a page of claimants to being the Jewish messiah here, most of which I’m not familiar with, though Shabbatai Zvi in the 17th century got a great many people across Europe to sell all their belongings and follow him through the Ottoman empire to the Holy Land... except that the Ottomans caught him and persuaded him to convert to Islam. I believe those who followed him mostly ended up slaves, but who knows. The most recent claimant is the Chabad rabbi Menachem Schneerson, who died in 1994. None has delivered the promised Messianic Age ruled by a descendant of the House of David from Jerusalem, which is definitive as far as we’re concerned. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2023-03-23 23:06 |
| #5 Many countries and empires, beginning with the Roman Empire, have tried this. It has never worked. |
| Posted by: Tom 2023-03-23 14:32 |
| #4 Barabas, or Yeshua Bar Abba as he was known back, was also a rebel who was accused of killing Romans. He is the one who the Jews wanted freed in stead of Jesus (whose name was also Yeshua) because Bar Abba was actively fighting against the Romans where Jesus was not. |
| Posted by: Deacon Blues 2023-03-23 11:54 |
| #3 Sounds like a good way to generate anti-semitism in a generally sympathetic population group. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2023-03-23 10:36 |
| #2 1. My understanding of the Jewish view of Jesus is that He was a Jewish rebel who tried to take on Rome and got killed. 2. I have read Jews, Muslims, and commies fear Evangelicals a lot. |
| Posted by: Bill Greans6336 2023-03-23 09:49 |
| #1 Posturing for the rubes always carries the risk that it will be taken seriously. Not that we have had any such problem on this side of the Atlantic. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2023-03-23 09:22 |