When the nation of Israel evacuated from Europe after WWII and repatriated themselves en masse to Palestine, ships began to dock on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean and the new, updated flag of the nascent State of Israel greeted them: for hundreds of thousands of Jews, this was good comfort, for they brought with them horrific recounts of a harsh, inhumane life in Europe during National Socialist rule, and they wanted to extract themselves from all of that.

At the United Nations, the mood was split on the issue of restoring Israel in Palestine, the Canaanite motherland. Left-wing governments in the United States (Democrat) and Soviet Union (Communist) opted yea in favor of recreating a State of Israel on top of the province of Palestine. The Palestinian racial group – who after centuries of imperial Islam were, by now, Muslim as well as Christian – repeated their objections, but to no avail. They had complained for twenty-five years before 1947, and the British had tried to haphazardly coordinate a defense of Palestinian sovereignty between 1922 and 1945. But none of it worked.

In 1947, China’s central administration was still known worldwide as the Republic of China, and her leaders voted to abstain from the UN decision-making process. China did not want to embroil herself in the Palestine-Israel tussle. Meanwhile, the State of Israel came into existence, and the province of Palestine became a distant memory.

The Desensitization of the Masses in a Postmodern World

The Holocaust is the cornerstone reason for the State of Israel, and forms the basis for the reverence many Christians have for the Jewish State. Gas chambers, death camps, and ghettoization of Jewish persons in unsanitary and under-supplied conditions were crimes against humanity; there is no ethical argument at all for the maltreatment of civilians in any war. By all counts, war itself is a dastardly game with no moral winner, and no politician should conceive of it as a first resort. It is incumbent on all national governments to correspond, discuss, negotiate, and cooperate: for blessed are peacemakers, not warmongers.

Six million Chinese were massacred directly by the Japanese Armed Forces. You read that right: the Chinese six million is a real stat, but it was quickly sidestepped by global media with the advent of the Cold War (1950). Another 14 million Chinese died in the Japanese advance, in no-less-direct sacrifices with the onset of shortages, starvation, stripped agriculture, and bombed-out cities. The Japanese confiscated food and water supplies, and the native Chinese perished like unworthy numbers on an insignificant spreadsheet.

What is the value in a life? Nothing, if you use atheistic measurements. It’s five dollars’ worth of carbon and nothing much besides. Upwards of six million Chinese got shot in rows, shoved into mass graves, aborted by bayonet to the womb, tested on with germs and chemicals, raped, gang-raped and sexually enslaved, and cut down, carted, stacked on beaches and burned: all because we were perceived as racially weak and evolutionarily inferior to the Japs.

What is the value in a life? Nothing, if one relies on a mechanistic and atheistic worldview. There is nothing inherently praiseworthy in a Jewish or Gentile life. The earth doesn’t miss a species of butterfly, and certainly not six million Jews or twenty million Chinese. The geology does not care, the stars of the cosmos do not care, and the waves of the sea pay us no heed. This blasé attitude has become somewhat internalized by generations of people today, in a post-1970s world.

Kill a life in the womb – who cares? Drive tanks into the Ukraine and terminate civilians – who cares? Disarm good people, so that bad folks can use firearms without fear in schools and malls – who cares?

75 Years of Pain, Sweat and Tears

A Palestinian life? Who cares. Palestine has become a country forgotten, a province forsaken, a motherland erased. Most of the region’s first Christians were Palestinians – not Jews, for the Jewish ethnic councils prohibited Jews from coming to Christ. Only a tiny, miniscule minority of Jews joined up to Christ: these were the disciples of Jesus and the later apostle, Paul. But the rest of the Jewish nation maintain a separation from Christ, from then to the present day.

Most Americans and Europeans are exactly like the Palestinian people: Gentiles. In Paul’s time, as we also see today, the churches of the Gentiles flourish. The largest supporters of Christianity throughout the world are without a doubt Gentiles. This is a faith led by a Jewish Son of God, and upheld globally by the Gentile races.

Therefore, it is important for Christians to be level-headed and ethical when making a decision on the Palestine-Israel issue. Israel is God’s chosen race: this is described in the Old Testament and echoed in the New. But what of the Christian duty to America, Palestine, China, India, Germany, Spain, and numerous other Gentile nations?

When put into such perspective – indeed the only viable biblical perspective, everything becomes crystal clear. The Gentile nations are numerous, and the Jewish nation: numerically one. The Old Testament was centered on Jewish wellbeing. The only separation oft-touted in the Old Testament was a separation between Jews and Gentiles. Jews were taught to cling to Jehovah, and to stay away from Gentiles.

The New Testament marks a departure from Judaism, because the gospel went out into the Gentile nations for the first time ever. This is the foundation of Christianity. The Christian faith has become an inheritance of the Gentile world, simply because the Gentiles wanted Christ so much.

Therefore the next time you see some Jewish Democrats or certain Christian Republicans, and hear their stilted inability to process the reality of Palestine, remind yourself of what really matters: God. Palestine used to be a matter Republicans took seriously, but the trend fizzled out by 2001. Democrats have hijacked Palestine, but two decades of showboating by Democrats have served up no viable rescue for the people of Palestine.

To God, the value of a Gentile life comes from His creation endeavor in Genesis. Every human woman or man possesses the image of God. That is the focal point of Christian duty and Christian mission – or at least, ideally. The next time you are tempted to see only Israel, and ignore Palestine, remember God and remember the gospel. It is the “gospel for all nations,” not a “gospel for the Hebrews only.”

(Travel tips: Today you can still visit the University of Bethlehem in what remains of Palestine, where Muslims and Christians study in a top-quality Catholic university environment with modern infrastructure, and qualify in humanities, business, and other degrees – the university’s credentialing is internationally recognized and accepted for jobs around the world. This university in Bethlehem, Palestine is one of the more premier institutions of higher learning in east Palestine, also known as the West Bank, and hosts a significant American and European expatriate presence. East Palestine is governed by the Palestinian National Authority – Fatah.)