On Jul 27, 2006, at 6:23 AM, Doug Henwood wrote:
> Wall Street Journal - July 27, 2006
>
> Holy War
>
> A Texas Preacher
> Leads Campaign
> To Let Israel Fight
>
> Mr. Hagee Draws Evangelicals
> By Arguing Jewish State
> Fulfills Biblical Prophecy
>
> 'End of World as We Know It'
>
> By ANDREW HIGGINS
>
> WASHINGTON -- After Israel sent warplanes into Iraq in 1981 to bomb a
> nuclear reactor, Texas televangelist John Hagee sent letters to 150
> fellow Christian preachers to rally support for the Jewish state.
>
> He got just one positive response. When Mr. Hagee pressed ahead with
> plans for a pro-Israel gathering in a San Antonio theater, he says he
> got a death threat on the phone and someone shot out all the windows
> of his station wagon parked in his driveway.
>
> Last week, as Israel's armed forces pounded Lebanon and worries of a
> wider conflagration mounted, Mr. Hagee presided over what he called a
> "miracle of God": a gathering of 3,500 evangelical Christians packed
> into a Washington hotel to cheer Israel and its current military
> campaign.
>
> Standing on a stage bedecked with a huge Israeli flag, Mr. Hagee drew
> rapturous applause and shouts of "amen" as he hailed Israel for doing
> God's work in a "war of good versus evil." Calls for Israel to show
> restraint violate "God's foreign-policy statement" toward Jews, he
> said, citing a verse from the Old Testament that promises to "bless
> those who bless you" and curse "the one who curses you."
>
> The gathering was sponsored by Christians United for Israel, a
> national organization the 66-year-old preacher set up this year. The
> group lobbies politicians in Washington, rallies grassroots support
> for Israel and aims to educate Christians on what it calls the
> "biblical imperative" of supporting the Jewish state.
>
> Mr. Hagee is a leading figure in the so-called Christian-Zionist
> movement. This evangelical political philosophy is rooted in biblical
> prophecies and a belief that Israel's struggles signal a prelude to
> Armageddon. Its followers staunchly support the Bush administration's
> unequivocal backing of Israel in its current battle with Hezbollah in
> Lebanon.
>
> President Bush sent a message to the gathering praising Mr. Hagee and
> his supporters for "spreading the hope of God's love and the universal
> gift of freedom." The Israeli prime minister also sent words of
> thanks. Israel's ambassador, its former military chief and a host of
> U.S. political heavyweights, mostly Republican, attended.
>
> At a time when Islamist groups are displacing secular nationalists as
> the main vehicle for political revolt across the Middle East, Mr.
> Hagee and like-minded evangelicals are injecting greater religious
> fervor into American attitudes and policy toward the region. They see,
> and even sometimes seem to embrace, the notion of a global conflict
> between Islam and the Judeo-Christian West, just as do many zealous
> Muslims.
>
> "This is a religious war that Islam cannot -- and must not -- win,"
> Mr. Hagee wrote in a recent book, "Jerusalem Countdown," which focuses
> on what he says is a coming nuclear showdown with Iran. "The end of
> the world as we know it is rapidly approaching.... Rejoice and be
> exceeding glad -- the best is yet to be." The book has sold nearly
> 700,000 copies since it was released in January, according to his
> Florida-based religious publisher, Strang Communications.
>
> Christian Zionism has been around for years but is now gaining greater
> prominence as it gets turbocharged by the marketing flair of Mr. Hagee
> and other religious entrepreneurs. Mr. Hagee has deployed massive
> resources to galvanize support for Israel. He heads a San Antonio
> megachurch, which claims 19,000 members, runs a television company and
> has close ties to Republican Party power brokers. His Washington
> banquet last week cost about $500,000, according to an organizer. A
> big Christian broadcasting network, Daystar, carried the event live.
>
> The following day, he mobilized evangelicals representing all 50
> states in a lobbying blitz through the Capitol. Armed with talking
> points scripted by Mr. Hagee and his staff, they peppered senators and
> congressmen with arguments for Israel and against its enemies,
> particularly Iran.
>
> While Mr. Bush is clearly close to evangelicals, he has never fully
> embraced their agenda or rhetoric. But their views are generally in
> sync with the aims of his national-security strategists, who reach
> similar conclusions through a different logic. They have long blasted
> what they've termed the "false stability" of a region mostly ruled by
> autocrats and that has tolerated terrorist organizations committed to
> Israel's destruction. The influential "neo-conservative" school of
> foreign-policy advisers has also buttressed this line, arguing that
> the U.S. must push more aggressively for democracy in the Middle East.
>
> Bedrock for Bush
>
> Christian evangelicals, who first found political traction under
> President Reagan in the 1980s, now number about 50 million and form a
> bedrock constituency for President Bush. Best known for their lobbying
> against abortion, same-sex marriage and on other domestic issues, they
> have also taken a keen interest in foreign policy, especially since
> the attacks of 9/11.
>
> "Leave Israel alone. Let them do the job," Mr. Hagee told his
> supporters last week at the banquet. Israel's enemies, said New York
> Congressman Eliot Engel, one of the few Democratic speakers, "do the
> work of Satan."
>
> This melding of realpolitik and religion, say former and current U.S.
> officials, has produced a potent force. Israel's evangelical
> supporters "were out there before, but didn't really appear on the
> radar screen," says Dennis Ross, a Middle East envoy in the
> administrations of both George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. "Now they
> are an important part of the landscape." More than any prior White
> House, the Bush administration has established formal, regular
> contacts with American evangelical leaders.
>
> The White House says it isn't overly influenced by any one group. "The
> president makes decisions about policies for our country based on what
> is right for our citizens," says Dana Perino, deputy press secretary.
> "The United States has been an ally of Israel since its founding, and
> President Bush has worked to strengthen that alliance."
>
> The main vehicle for Mr. Hagee's pro-Israel activities over the years
> has been San Antonio's Cornerstone Church, which he first joined as
> pastor back in 1975 when it was called Church of Castle Hill, a
> moribund parish with only a few dozen worshippers and heavy debts. He
> had quit his previous church the same year during a messy divorce that
> was quickly followed by his remarriage to a young churchgoer.
> Attracted by Mr. Hagee's mix of thundering oratory and folksy humor,
> the congregation mushroomed.
>
> The son of a puritanical preacher, Mr. Hagee first visited Israel in
> 1978. He says he went there "as a tourist and came back home a
> Zionist." While in Israel, Mr. Hagee visited Jerusalem's Western Wall
> and says he felt a "nearness to God like no other place on Earth." At
> that moment, he recalls, "The Lord required of me to do everything I
> could to bring Christians and Jews together."
>
> After returning to Texas, Mr. Hagee says he plunged into a "three-year
> study binge to discover the Jewish roots of Christianity." This
> coincided with a surge of contacts between American evangelicals and
> the then Israeli government of Menachem Begin, a devout biblical
> scholar and hardline defender of Israel's right to territories won in
> 1967. Mr. Begin worked hard to cultivate American evangelicals, with
> whom he shared a belief that Israel's birth in 1948 and subsequent
> struggles were a fulfillment of biblical prophecy.
>
> Mr. Hagee says he met with Mr. Begin three times.
>
> When Mr. Begin ordered Israel's air force to bomb Saddam Hussein's
> Osirak nuclear reactor in 1981, Mr. Hagee was horrified by widespread
> criticism that followed. After reading a San Antonio newspaper that
> described the attack as an act of "gunboat diplomacy," he decided to
> organize a pro-Israel gathering.
>
> Local Christians initially showed little enthusiasm for the idea. San
> Antonio's Jewish community was even more wary. "There was a lot of
> skepticism," recalls Aryeh Scheinberg, an Orthodox rabbi who took part
> in meetings among Jewish leaders to decide how to respond to Mr.
> Hagee's proposal. "Everyone wanted to know: 'What does he really
> want?' I said, 'Let's give the man a chance and take the risk.' "
>
> The pro-Israel gathering went ahead with both Jews and Christians
> present. As Mr. Scheinberg mounted the podium to deliver a final
> prayer, security told Mr. Hagee of a bomb threat. Mr. Hagee, a stocky
> man who got to college on a football scholarship, says he asked God to
> make the rabbi pray "not like Moses but like a Presbyterian late for
> lunch." The threat was a hoax.
>
> The event has been held every year since, though some Jewish leaders
> refuse to attend and reject any alliance with Mr. Hagee. "Many of his
> views are hateful," says Barry Block, a prominent reform rabbi in San
> Antonio, who accuses Mr. Hagee of demonizing Muslims and propounding a
> divisive right-wing agenda that erodes the barrier between church and
> state.
>
> When addressing Jewish audiences, Mr. Hagee generally avoids talking
> about Armageddon. But his books, whose titles include "Beginning of
> the End" and "From Daniel to Doomsday," are filled with death and
> mayhem. "The battlefield will cover the nation of Israel!" he writes
> in "Jerusalem Countdown," his recent work, describing a "sea of human
> blood drained from the veins of those who have followed Satan."
>
> Some fellow evangelicals accuse Mr. Hagee of ignoring Arab Christians.
> Donald Wagner of North Park University, an evangelical Christian
> college in Chicago, first traveled to Israel at around the same time
> as Mr. Hagee but reached the opposite conclusion. "I was very
> pro-Israel until I went there," says Mr. Wagner, who heads a research
> group that challenges the theology of Christian Zionists.
>
> A Turn to Television
>
> Little known outside of Texas when he first embraced Zionism, Mr.
> Hagee turned to television to promote Jesus, Israel and his own name.
> His main platform for this was Global Evangelism Television Inc., a
> nonprofit organization. First set up in 1978, GETV initially relayed
> the programming of others to local cable operators. In the 1980s it
> began pumping out its own shows featuring Mr. Hagee for broadcast on
> national Christian networks. His sermons and chat shows now appear on
> 120 stations and, he says, reach more than 90 million homes.
>
> By the mid-1980s his flock had outgrown his church in central San
> Antonio. In 1987, Cornerstone moved to a 35-acre suburban campus with
> a 5,000-person assembly hall and a new television and radio studio.
>
> As his exposure grew, so did controversy. He ran into flak for
> inviting former White House aide Oliver North, a pardoned felon, and
> disgraced televangelist Jimmy Swaggart to speak at Cornerstone. He
> also feuded with the U.S. Postal Service over nonprofit rates for
> church mailings that contained ads for his books and videos. (He sued
> and, he says, got a refund of around $40,000.)
>
> Mr. Hagee also upset black leaders. To help students seeking odd jobs,
> his church newsletter, The Cluster, advertised a "slave" sale.
> "Slavery in America is returning to Cornerstone," it said. "Make plans
> to come and go home with a slave." Mr. Hagee apologized but, in a
> radio interview, protested about pressure to be "politically correct"
> and joked that perhaps his pet dog should be called a "canine
> American."
>
> The quarrels didn't stop the steady growth of his congregation, which
> is multiracial. His "nights to honor Israel" got bigger, too, as did
> his clout as a fund-raiser for Israeli causes. He says he has raised
> over $12 million so far.
>
> Increasingly prominent, the preacher attracted the eye and, initially,
> the ire of Jerry Falwell, the dean of the Christian right and another
> enthusiastic supporter of Israel.
>
> In 1994, The National Liberty Journal, a conservative monthly run by
> Mr. Falwell, labeled Mr. Hagee a "heretic" for championing so-called
> dual-covenant theory -- a belief that Jews and Christians have
> separate deals with God that allow each to get into heaven. The
> traditional Christian view is that Jews and other non-Christians must
> convert -- or end up on the wrong side of the battle of Armageddon.
>
> Soon after the article appeared, Mr. Falwell arranged to meet the
> Texan at a Christian pow-wow in Memphis. Mr. Hagee, says Mr. Falwell,
> convinced him that he didn't believe in the "dual covenant." Mr.
> Falwell now sits on the board of Christians United for Israel.
>
> Mr. Hagee, citing a New Testament verse, says a "remnant of Jewish
> people...have favor with God right now" but he is vague on which Jews
> will get to heaven without conversion, saying that only God knows
> this. He dismisses the dual-covenant issue as "something to start
> coffee-table debate."
>
> Closer to Power
>
> Mr. Bush's 2000 election victory and the Republican Party's control of
> both houses of Congress brought evangelical Christians closer to power
> than ever before. Mr. Hagee had met Mr. Bush several times while he
> was Texas governor and solidly supported his push for the White House.
> Mr. Hagee was closer, though, to another powerful Texan, Congressman
> Tom DeLay. Soon after becoming majority leader in the House of
> Representatives, Mr. DeLay gave the keynote speech at Mr. Hagee's 2002
> pro-Israel gathering in San Antonio. Mr. DeLay, since embroiled in a
> corruption scandal, also spoke last week in Washington.
>
> In 2003, The San Antonio Express-News dug into Mr. Hagee's filings
> with the Internal Revenue Service. The article alleged no wrongdoing,
> but reported that Mr. Hagee received more than $1.25 million in 2001
> for his church and TV work and had a trust that includes a nearly
> 8,000-acre $2.1 million Texas ranch.
>
> Mr. Hagee says that the bulk of his earnings comes from royalty
> payments from his 21 books, not from churchgoers' donations. He says
> he'll earn much the same this year if book sales hold up.
>
> His finances under the spotlight, Mr. Hagee reorganized his holdings
> in a way that allowed him to avoid having to make public filings. In
> September 2004, Global Evangelism Television re-registered as a church
> under the name Grace Church of San Antonio. Churches, unlike religious
> TV companies and other nonprofit outfits, are exempt from filing
> detailed returns with the IRS. A further reorganization in recent
> weeks moved all assets into Cornerstone Church. None of the Church's
> financial records are publicly available. Mr. Hagee said his lawyers
> had recommended the changes for "greater clarity."
>
> President Bush abandoned President Clinton's efforts to secure a
> big-bang peace settlement to the Israel-Palestine conflict but, under
> prodding from Britain and others, did back a slow-paced plan known as
> the Roadmap for Peace.
>
> In May 2003, Mr. Hagee and other evangelical leaders sent a letter to
> President Bush applauding the invasion of Iraq but complaining about
> the Israel-Palestine peace plan. They said it would be "morally
> reprehensible" for the U.S. to be "evenhanded" between Israel and "the
> terrorist-infested Palestinian infrastructure."
>
> Last fall, he took his annual "night to honor Israel," to Israel,
> holding the event in the hangar of an Israeli air-force base. He spoke
> at the Israeli Parliament and organized a visit for his U.S. followers
> to Megiddo, an Israeli hilltop that he believes will be the site of
> the battle of Armageddon.
>
> Mr. Hagee also started laying plans for Christians United for Israel,
> hoping to meld a plethora of mostly small pro-Israel Christian groups
> into a national network. He contacted Mr. Falwell, who says he
> immediately offered support. He hired David Brog, a lawyer who had
> worked in both Israel and on Capitol Hill and who is a distant cousin
> of former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, as the new organization's
> executive director.
>
> As Mr. Hagee's plans took shape last fall, American Israel Public
> Affairs Committee, the pro-Israel lobby, set up an "outreach" unit to
> work with Christians and others. Appointed to head the unit was a San
> Antonio native who had previously worshipped at the synagogue of Mr.
> Scheinberg, the Orthodox rabbi who has been one of Mr. Hagee's keenest
> supporters.
>
> Christians United for Israel held its first meeting in San Antonio in
> February and immediately began organizing last week's Washington
> event. To galvanize support and allay suspicions in some quarters of
> his motives, Mr. Hagee traveled around the country, meeting with
> Christian and Jewish leaders. Some Jews worry that Christian-Zionists
> want to convert Jews to Christianity, something Mr. Hagee has always
> denied.
>
> The current eruption of violence, says Mr. Hagee, shows that Israel
> should not surrender land in search of peace and that Christians and
> Jews are on the same side.
>
> "If God opposes giving away the land, if it has never worked, let's
> come up with another plan," he thundered last week. "Do not give the
> land away. It belongs to you. It is God's heritage to you."
>
> --Karby Leggett in Jerusalem contributed to this article.
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