Did Tim LaHaye Just Call Israelis "Not-To-Be-Trusted Yids?"

The Christian right sure gets its panties in a bunch when Jews act without their permission. Recently, a speech by the ADL's Abe Foxman denouncing the Christian right's theocratic agenda provoked a Gangland-style threat from James Dobson minion Tom Minnery -- "If you keep bullying your friends, pretty soon you won't have any." Then, in response to Ariel Sharon's Gaza pullout and subsequent formation of a new, centrist party, Tim LaHaye's Left Behind Prophecy Group leapt into the fracas with some good, old-fashioned anti-Semitic slurs.

In an article entitled "Will the Goyim Win?" published on the official site of best-selling author Tim LaHaye (who also operates an annual Holy Land tour for evangelicals), "Christian journalist" Stan Goodenough takes Israel and the Sharon government to task for trading land for peace. In breathless prose, Goodenough bemoans the Israelis' supposed surrender of "the cradle of their nationhood, the burial places of their national patriarchs and heroes."

Then, he proceeds to pile it on:

But do you know what, Jews of Israel – and those Jews still in exile who so fervently support this way? You may think that in so acquiescing, you are setting a glowing example to the nations of the world.

But as far as these nations are concerned, the last thing they will want to do is emulate you. All you are doing is proving them right in their long-held belief that you are illegitimate, land grabbing, not-to-be-trusted Yids. And, as far as the Muslim world is concerned, your actions only confirm their view of you as a dhimmi nation, fit only to be ruled over by, and subdued under, Islam.

Ariel Sharon may have bulldozed countless Palestinian homes, but to the apparent dismay of many Christian Zionists, he won't clear enough space in the Holy Land to build the Messiah's landing pad. And so the movement that had hoped to exploit the Jewish state all the way to Judgement Day has reverted to its old, bigoted self. Though Goodenough tries to afford himself a degree of plausible deniability by using the international community as his surrogate for calling Israelis "not-to-be-trusted Yids," his point is clear: If Israel is not useful to rapture-ready evangelicals, it might as well not exist.

(This piece is cross-posted at Talk2Action, a brand-new blog devoted entirely to exploring the agenda of the Christian right. Check it out.)