For anyone aware of the Bible’s battle of Gog and Magog prophecy, the events unfolding in Israel since Saturday probably have your attention.
Hamas, an Iranian-backed Palestinian terrorist organization, launched its surprise attack in southern Israel from the Gaza Strip on Saturday, killing at least 1,200 people, including 14 Americans.
Meanwhile, to the north, Israel says it has killed several Hezbollah fighters, also backed by Iran, crossing into the Jewish state from Lebanon.
Hezbollah has also launched rocket and drone strikes into Israel and reportedly is mobilizing ground forces.
Ali Barakeh, a senior Hamas official, said Monday that Iran and Hezbollah “will join the battle if Gaza is subjected to a war of annihilation,” The Associated Press reported.
The book of Ezekiel, chapters 38 and 39, details a battle that will take place in the end times involving a coalition of nations striking Israel from the north, including Iran and likely Russia and Turkey, among others.
Ezekiel was a prophet from the ancient kingdom of Judah who had been taken into captivity by the Babylonians, along with most of the rest of the nation, around 600 B.C.
He foresaw a time — under divine inspiration, according to the Bible — when the Jews would not just be taken to Babylon, but be spread throughout the nations of the earth, which certainly happened starting in the first century.
Their exile would last until the latter days, when they would return to Israel and be a nation again.
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In fact, in Ezekiel chapter 37, the prophet recounted that God showed him a valley of dry bones.
“Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel,” God told him. “They indeed say, ‘Our bones are dry, our hope is lost, and we ourselves are cut off!’ Therefore prophesy and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: “Behold, O My people, I will open your graves and cause you to come up from your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel.”
The Jews in fact began coming back into the land of Israel beginning in the late 1800s, after nearly two millennia of exile, and became an independent country again in May 1948 in the aftermath of the Holocaust during World War II.
Todd Hampson, host of the Prophecy Pros Podcast, told CBN News earlier this year, “Every Old Testament prophet, except for Jonah, predicted that Israel would become a nation again in the last days, and that its people would be gathered from all over the world back to their original homeland.
“So anybody who says Israel becoming a nation again in 1948 is not a fulfillment of prophecy is either twisting scripture or ignoring scripture,” he added.
Hampson called Israel’s rebirth the “super sign” that the Bible’s end-time prophecies are true and will come to pass, and the next event Ezekiel addresses in chapter 38 is the battle of Gog and Magog.
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The prophet saw a coalition of nations coming against Israel in the “latter days,” including Persia, modern-day Iran, as well as Gog of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal.
Magog was the grandson of Noah, and his tribe settled to the far north of Israel. Due north of Jerusalem is Moscow. Gog is listed as their leader in the upcoming battle, according to Ezekiel.
Rosh may provide further evidence that the northern land is modern-day Russia, author David Parsons wrote for The Jerusalem Post.
Other tribes listed in the passage can be traced to their probable current nations.
Meshech and Tubal are referred to in genealogies in Genesis 10, and scholars believe it refers to peoples who settled in modern-day Turkey.
Cush and Put are two other tribes listed, likely corresponding to Ethiopia and Libya.
Hampson noted how in recent years Russia has entered into military agreements with Iran and created closer ties to Turkey, which could draw Moscow into a war against Israel it does not necessarily want.
“I will turn you around, put hooks into your jaws, and lead you out, with all your army, horses, and horsemen, all splendidly clothed, a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords,” Ezekiel wrote.
“You will come up against My people Israel like a cloud, to cover the land. It will be in the latter days that I will bring you against My land, so that the nations may know Me, when I am hallowed in you, O Gog, before their eyes,” he added.
God then says he will show his fury by causing a massive earthquake in Israel, impacting the invading forces, and bring down judgment by way of pestilence, flooding, hailstones, fire and brimstone and to decimate them.
“Thus I will magnify Myself and sanctify Myself, and I will be known in the eyes of many nations. Then they shall know that I am the Lord,” God told Ezekiel.
CBN’s Bill Hallowell noted that these countries — Russia, Iran, Turkey — appear to be aligning just as Ezekiel foresaw.
“All of these nations have been part of this conversation. It is really strange,” he said.
“If I were an atheist, I’d been looking at this and saying, ‘OK, it’s a little weird that all these things in Ezekiel, all these places that he’s talking about, thousands of years later, are the places that are — not just like they’re random events — this is the centerpiece of what we are talking about right now globally,” Hallowell contended.
Author Jeff Kinley, who has written extensively about the end times, agreed.
“Like you said, 2,500 years ago,” Ezekiel wrote his prophecies, Kinley said. “Did Ezekiel just get lucky? No, I think he was under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.”
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The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that Iranian security officials helped plan Saturday’s surprise attack by Hamas, according to senior members of Hamas and Hezbollah.
Further, Iran gave the green light last week for the attack to go forward. Iran has denied involvement.
Meanwhile, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan called the Israeli military response to the Hamas terrorist attack a “massacre,” Reuters reported.
“Preventing people meeting their most fundamental needs and bombing housing where civilians live – in short, conducting a conflict using every sort of shameful method – is not a war, it’s a massacre,” he said, referring to Israel cutting off electricity and water and bombing sites in Gaza.
Russia has also been building ties with Hamas. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov met Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh in Moscow in September 2022.
The Times of Israel reported that Lavrov has met with him several times in recent years.
Ismail Haniyeh, chief terrorist of Hamas, meets with Sergei Lavrov, Putin’s foreign minister. Russia, Iran and Hamas planned the assault on Israel’s population. pic.twitter.com/jnaIGYCc8B
— Rɪᴄʜᴀʀᴅ Kᴇᴍᴘ ⋁ (@COLRICHARDKEMP) October 9, 2023
Hampson pointed out that both Iran and Russia have military assets in Syria now.
“We’re seeing the stage being so clearly set,” for the battle of Gog and Magog, he argued.
One can readily see how events in Israel could quickly escalate, drawing Israel into a direct war with Iran.
Regional powers and others would no doubt quickly take sides in the conflict, as we saw during the Six-Day War in 1967 and Yom Kippur War in 1973.
How would the United States play into such a scenario? It’s not mentioned specifically in the Bible, but Ezekiel wrote of “The merchants of Tarshish, and all their young lions” apparently protesting the invasion.
Tarshish is a land west of Israel, potentially modern-day Great Britain, and its young lions could include the United States, as an offspring, if you will, of the mother country.
Both Britain and the United States played a pivotal role in the birth of modern Israel after World War II.
“Have you come to take plunder? Have you gathered your army to take booty, to carry away silver and gold, to take away livestock and goods, to take great plunder?” Tarshish and other nations ask to invading forces.
One could see the Joe Biden administration offering such a feeble response to an invasion of Israel.
Is the battle of Gog and Magog about to unfold? Maybe. The nations are aligning just as Ezekiel predicted.
