Are we on the brink of the greatest prophetic fulfillment in 2,000 years?

 The Israeli and Palestinian Peace Agreement

By Irvin Baxter

 

The prophecy foretells that a peace agreement will be signed between Israelis and Palestinians and that this agreement will mark the beginning of the Final Seven Years to the Battle of Armageddon and the Second Coming of Jesus to the earth.

We thought the Oslo Accords signed on September 13, 1993 by Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin might have been the prophesied agreement. Three thousand leaders from around the world assembled on the White House lawn to witness the famous handshake between Arafat and Rabin. But the agreement soon turned to ashes as bus bombing after bus bombing rocked the center of Jerusalem. (pic of the Arafat, Rabin, Clinton handshake)

 

Then came the historic peace negotiations in July of 2000 when Yasser Arafat, Ehud Barak and President Clinton locked themselves in at Camp David for two solid weeks. All reports emanating from those talks indicated that the parties were on the brink of achieving the elusive peace agreement – only to see it fall apart over who would control the 35 acres in Jerusalem known as the Temple Mount.

 

President George W. Bush put together the Annapolis Peace Conference on November 27, 2007 during his last year in office. Negotiations then continued through 2008. Hopes were high that the parties were on the brink of finally ending the 4,000-year-old conflict between Arabs and Jews. The talks finally broke down when Abbas insisted on the right of 4 million Palestinian refugees to return to Israel. This resulted in negotiations once again ending in failure.

 

Here We Go Again

Barack Obama promised in 2008, during his campaign to become president of the United States, that he would not wait until the last year of his presidency to seek a peace agreement in the Middle East, as Presidents Clinton and Bush had done before him. Obama promised that the first year of his administration he would launch a campaign to achieve peace in the Middle East.

 

President Obama held true to his promise. On the first full day of his presidency, January 22, 2009 he named former senator George Mitchell as his special envoy to the Middle East. Mitchell had negotiated the peace agreement between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland. It was felt since he had achieved this, he was the best person on earth to finally reach peace between Arabs and Israelis.

 

Mitchell immediately plunged into his mission. After two years of frustration and failure, on April 6, 2011 Mitchell resigned in disgust. For the remainder of President Obama’s first term, the Middle East conflict appeared to be put on the back burner.

 

Beginning his second term, President Obama set two goals for the remainder of his presidency: 1) Solve the crisis in Iran over its pursuit of nuclear weapons capability. 2) Finally bring peace to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

 

Obama’s first overseas trip of his second term took him to the land of Israel in March 2013. He made a speech at Jerusalem’s International Conference Center. Young people, especially were invited to attend the speech. Obama cast his vision as to how peace could finally come to the Middle East.

 

Newly appointed Secretary of State John Kerry immediately swung into action. He urged Palestinian Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to give peace another chance.

 

Netanyahu was quick to agree that peace negotiations should resume without preconditions. On the other hand, Abbas was very reluctant to return to the peace table. He argued that peace negotiations would only give Israel time to continue expanding the settlements in the West Bank, creating facts on the ground that would ultimately prove irreversible. Abbas felt his best chance at achieving the goals of the Palestinian people was to appeal to the United Nations where he knew Palestinians enjoyed support from a large majority of the world’s nations.

 

Finally, after the exertion of tremendous pressure by the US, Abbas agreed to give negotiations nine months. If an agreement was not reached during that timeframe, Abbas said he would break off negotiations and go the World Community to achieve “justice” for his people.

 

On July 30, 2013 peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians were launched. It was agreed that a comprehensive agreement should be achieved by April 29, 2014. It was also agreed that the status of the talks would be kept secret so that pressure groups could not attempt to sabotage the talks at every turn.

 

Kerry threw himself into the negotiations with unprecedented energy and determination. From August 2013 until today, Kerry has visited the Middle East at least once a month and has been in conversation with the two negotiating teams on almost a daily basis.

 

As I write this article, we now know talks have temporarily broken down and an agreement has not been reached. Secretary of State Kerry says that both parties have told him that they want to find a way to continue the peace negotiations. Kerry says all parties involved are taking a pause to determine what future achievements might be possible.

 

A Peace Agreement is Certain

Even though John Kerry’s deadline has come and gone without an agreement being finalized, let’s be clear on one thing. There is going to be a peace agreement between Israelis and Palestinians. The only question is “When?” An agreement is prophesied, and the prophecies never fail!

 

How will We Recognize the Prophesied Agreement?

So, when an agreement is signed, how will we know it is the one prophesied in scripture? Some have wondered if an agreement could be signed that would not meet the requirements for fulfilling the “seven-year” prophecy. Such a thing could certainly happen.

 

A Simple Test

The prophesied agreement must do three things: 1) It must establish a Palestinian state in Judea, normally referred to by the media as the West Bank. 2) It will allow the Jewish settlers presently living in Judea to remain in their homes, living as a Jewish minority in the new Palestinian state. 3) It will place the Temple Mount under a sharing arrangement allowing both Jews and Muslims to worship there. The sharing arrangement will be supervised by the United Nations or by some other international oversight authority.

 

If a peace agreement is signed doing these three things, it appears that such an agreement will be the prophesied agreement that marks the beginning of the Final Seven Years to Armageddon and the Second Coming.

 

What do We Know About Progress of the Talks?

We know that both Palestinians and Israelis agree that a Palestinian state will be established in Judea. Prime Minister Netanyahu made a speech at Bar Ilan University, on June 14, 2009 publicly acknowledging the necessity of a Palestinian state on territory presently held by Israel.

 

We also know that former Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad stated that Jews living in the territory of the new Palestinian state could remain in their homes as a Jewish minority. He argued that there are presently 1.6 million Arabs living inside of Israel, so why couldn’t there be 100,000 or 200,000 Jews living in Palestine?

 

Finally, on November 1, 2013 a bill was introduced into the Israeli Knesset that would place the Temple Mount under a sharing arrangement so that both Jews and Muslims could worship there. So far in 2014, the Knesset has openly discussed the need to arrange for Jews to be able to visit and pray on their number one holy site, the Temple Mount. Furthermore, Mahmoud Abbas recently stated that Israel is striving to divide the Temple Mount so that it would be shared between Muslims and Jews. (see “Abbas: Israel is Aiming to Divide the Temple Mount,” Israel National News, March 25, 2014)

 

As we can see, all three of the requirements for the peace agreement that will begin the Final Seven Years appear to be within reach.

 

What must We Do?

Endtime Ministries is planning to mail a magazine to every home in Israel the month the prophesied peace agreement is signed – whenever that occurs. Our purpose is to announce to the people of Israel that the Final Seven Years to Armageddon have just begun. We want to explain the prophecy to them and explain what they need to do in response. We believe this will result in an awakening to the prophecies and will begin the revival that is foretold in scripture. Romans 11:25-26 declares that all Israel will be saved during the prophesied seven-year period or at the culmination of the final seven-year period.

 

We know the agreement is not going to be a comprehensive agreement settling all issues. It will be an interim agreement establishing the borders between Israel and the new Palestinian state, and it will place the Temple Mount under a sharing arrangement. The agreement will apparently not settle the status of the city of Jerusalem. That will be left for later.

 

Preparing for the Greatest Prophetic Fulfillment in 2,000 Years

Endtime is doing two things in preparation for the greatest prophetic fulfillment since the resurrection of Jesus from the dead: 1) As stated above, we are preparing to send a magazine to every single home in Israel explaining the prophecy and what people must do in response. 2) We are revamping our studio at our Endtime headquarters, preparing for daily worldwide televising via the Internet. We are in the process of purchasing the building where Endtime has been headquartered for the last six and one-half years in order to secure a permanent location for the establishment of the Endtime Evangelism Center.

 

Our budget for printing and mailing a magazine to every home in Israel is $1.8 million. We presently have received $1.4 million toward this project, which is tremendous! This means we only have $400,000 to go. Please pray with us about this need and contribute toward it if you can. We will never have another chance to impact Israel like we can at this prophetic juncture. We must not miss it! My faith is that we will not miss it. I don’t believe there is a greater or more urgent cause on earth today than the need to teach the people of Israel about the prophecies that are presently engulfing them!

 

The cost for the purchase of Endtime’s headquarters building is $3.9 million. We presently have the down payment for this purchase and are in the process of negotiating a loan for the balance of around $3 million. We really believe God could provide the entire purchase price so that Endtime Ministries would be unencumbered by debt during the coming Final Seven Years, (whenever that may be), as we devote ourselves to reaching every person on earth with the message; Armageddon and the Second Coming of Jesus are just ahead. Please pray with us about this need.

 

Partners and friends of Endtime, you have been absolutely wonderful. Your support has enabled us to position Endtime Ministries for the final dash to the endtime finish line. I know you will continue to stand with us with your prayers and financial support.

 

If you would like to make a special gift toward the Israel Project or to the Endtime Evangelism Center, simply call.