Last week’s scoop by Newsweek’s Eli Lake, that the Obama administration had sold bunker-busting bombs to Israel for use against Iran’s nuclear sites, placed the Antichrist Obama in agreement with John Hagee.
That’s not to say that Obama believes all the apocalyptic stuff, only that politically speaking, he, like Hagee, apparently thinks Israel should have the ammunition to go after Iran’s nuclear program.
Foreign policy reporter Laura Rozen explains that while some Democrats have latched onto the new revelations to prove that Obama, indeed, is pro-Israel, despite griping from the right, Lake insists the reasons for the transfer weren’t political. Instead, Rozen suggests, the disclosure of the transfer now is intended “to send a potent warning to Iran.” National security writers Jim Lobe and Paul Pillar question the wisdom of the transfer, given that it looks like, in Pillar’s words, that the Obama administration was giving Israel a “green light” to go to war with Iran.
Whatever the political calculation, Obama has done what George W. Bush’s Christian Zionist supporters probably wanted him to do but didn’t. (Rozen et al. note that the Bush administration did transfer bunker-busting weaponry to Israel, but it wasn’t of sufficient power to be used against Iran’s underground nuclear sites.)
In his 2006 book, Jerusalem Countdown (filled with the apocalyptic fervor that Matt Sutton discussed in his Times op-ed today), Hagee advocated for the use of such weaponry against Iran, arguing that it would unleash the chain of events leading to the Second Coming: “If Israel bombs Iran’s eight nuclear sites with laser-guided, bunker-buster bombs, it could easily launch Ezekiel’s war, as described in Ezekiel 38-39.”
As I wrote when Jerusalem Countdown appeared:
He argues that a strike against Iran will cause Arab nations to unite under Russia’s leadership, as outlined in chapters 38 and 39 of the Book of Ezekiel, leading to an “inferno [that] will explode across the Middle East, plunging the world toward Armageddon” . . . .
In Hagee’s telling, Israel has no choice but to strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities, with or without America’s help. The strike will provoke Russia—which wants Persian Gulf oil—to lead an army of Arab nations against Israel. Then God will wipe out all but one-sixth of the Russian-led army, as the world watches “with shock and awe . . . .”
But Hagee doesn’t stop there. He adds that Ezekiel predicts fire upon those who “live in security in the coastlands.” From this sentence he concludes that there will be judgment upon all who stood by while the Russian-led force invaded Israel, and issues a stark warning to the United States to intervene: “Could it be that America, who refuses to defend Israel from the Russian invasion, will experience nuclear warfare on our east and west coasts?” He says yes, citing Genesis 12:3, in which God said to Israel: “I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you.”
To fill the power vacuum left by God’s decimation of the Russian army, the Antichrist—identified by Hagee as the head of the European Union—will rule “a one-world government, a one-world currency and a one-world religion” for three and a half years. (He adds that “one need only be a casual observer of current events to see that all three of these things are coming into reality.”) The “demonic world leader” will then be confronted by a false prophet, identified by Hagee as China, at Armageddon, the Mount of Megiddo in Israel. As they prepare for the final battle, Jesus will return on a white horse and cast both villains—and presumably any nonbelievers—into a “lake of fire burning with brimstone,” thus marking the beginning of his millennial reign.
Of course Obama wasn’t motivated by Ezekiel’s war, but by political and national security calculations, whatever his lack of wisdom in carrying them out. And still, conservatives and Israel hawks hammer away at whether he is sufficiently “pro-Israel.” Will Hagee applaud the bunker-buster transfer, admitting that the Obama administration’s actions will lead to the war he’s been hankering for?
Is there anything in the Bible about the Antichrist starting that war?
