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'Gaza withdrawal could repel US evangelical Christians'

Herb Keinon
Apr. 24, 2004

An Israeli withdrawal from the territories could lead to an anti-Semitic backlash among evangelical Christians who are today among Israel's strongest US supporters, said Herbert Zweibon, an American Jewish activist with close ties to the evangelical community.

Zweibon, chairman of Americans for a Safe Israel, a US Jewish organization fighting a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, explained that evangelical Christian support is based on a deep belief that God has a covenant with Israel that includes the Jews' return to the biblical Land of Israel.

"If the Jews give up on their part of the covenant," said Zweibon, "I think the Christians will walk away from their support for Israel. Why should they stand by it, if the Jews don't?"

Zweibon said that if the "road map goes through as stated, and Israel withdraws from Judea, Samaria and Gaza, I think you will see anti-Semitism in America like you have never seen.

These people will see it as a betrayal of their own trust."

Asked what good the support of this community is if the relationship could so quickly turn from love to hate, Zweibon said, "Every divorce turns from love to hate, often because of a feeling of betrayal."

Zweibon was behind an effort last year to place evangelical Christian pressure on US President George W. Bush to ditch the road map initiative. His organization sponsored the placement of some 130 billboards, at a price of $75,000, in the US Bible Belt calling on people to phone the White House to tell Bush to "honor God's covenant with Israel."

The billboards read: "And the Lord said to Jacob... Unto thy offspring will I give this land (Genesis 35:11-12). Pray that President Bush honors God's covenant with Israel." The billboard then listed the White House phone number and urged people to call.

Although no similar campaign is currently planned to battle Bush's support for the disengagement plan, Zweibon, in Israel for a brief visit, is currently putting together for settlement leaders a tour of churches in a number of states expected to be key in the upcoming US elections. The leaders will urge the evangelical community to press Bush to back away from any diplomatic process leading to a two-state solution.

The states to be targeted are Florida, Ohio, Tennessee and Missouri, which all went to Bush in the 2000 elections by slim margins. Zweibon hopes evangelical Christians from these states will make their concerns known to Karl Rove, Bush's political strategist.

In 2001 Rove, according to Zweibon, said that prior to the 2000 election the Bush campaign's premise was that 19 million Bible-believing Christians would come out to vote for Bush. In the end, he quoted Rove as saying, four million of these voters never turned up to vote – a real concern now for Bush's reelection campaign.

The Israel issue may be a catalyst to get them to the polls, Zweibon said.

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