Andy Walton’s

Weekly World Watch

October 12 - 18, 2008

“If the watchman sees the sword coming and

does not blow the trumpet to warn the people
and the sword comes and takes the life of one
of them, that man will be taken away because
of his sin, but I will hold the watchman
accountable for his blood.”
(Ezekiel 33:6, New International Version)

To skip the introductory slides and go straight to this weeks developments click here.
 What is a Weekly World Watch?
The idea is simple. It is to look at current events and compare them to
events spoken of in the Bible. .
I hope to build up a picture of God’s hand working in the affairs of this
world. God is bringing about a day when all nations will be gathered to
Jerusalem to battle. At that time God will send His Son, the Lord Jesus
Christ, back to this earth. Jesus will then establish God’s kingdom on earth.
This kingdom will last for ever. This is our hope and the reason we watch.

The following six themes will appear repeatedly in WWW:

• Israel: The continuing conflict in the Middle East and focus on Jerusalem.
• Europe: Its developing union, both political and religious.
• Russia: Its return to anti-Western ways as Bible prophecy’s “king of the north.”
• The UK and the US: Bible prophecy’s “king of the south.”
• Moral standards in decline and violence on the increase.
• Increasing natural disasters: including earthquake, famine etc
WWW presentations in PowerPoint can be ordered as audio/visual CDs by clicking here.
Move your mouse to place the cursor on the blue link and click.
 What is in a Weekly World Watch?
Each WWW looks at a few key developments that have happened during the
past week. It is in no way meant to be exhaustive – just a look at those events
I saw as significant from a Biblical point of view.
Every WWW event slide has the following format. To reveal each block of text
just left click your mouse or press the space bar. You control when it appears.

This is straight from a news report that caught my

HEADLINE
eye because it looked significant from a Biblical News
perspective, usually that of prophecy.
The source of the headline and the date are included.
Photo
EVENT This is the reporter’s description of the event. It is always a direct
quotation from the news report and reflects the understanding of the
reporter and editors.

COMMENT This is my comment on why the event is interesting to a Bible student.

The intention of the WWW is to offer brief Biblical perspectives without
going into detail. If more detail is desired, please e-mail me:
(andy@weeklyworldwatch.co.uk).

BIBLE This is normally one verse which backs up why the event that has occurred
is interesting from a Biblical perspective. Please read in its context.
QUOTE
Unless stated otherwise, all quotes are from the King James Version.
(Book, chapter, and verse)
 This Week’s Developments
October 12 - 18, 2008

• Britain leads fight to stop EU-Russia talks

• Iranian Air force exercise simulates attack on Israel
• Cold shoulder for Iceland, Russia offers help
• Russia calls for Europe to join anti-US pact
• Financial crisis dents America's strategic standing
• Israeli youth seek Judaism
To print any of the event slides that follow, click the picture on the upper right
 Britain leads fight to stop EU-Russia talks
David Miliband, the British Foreign
Daily Telegraph, October 16, 2008 Secretary, warned his Italian, German and
French colleagues, over Russian trade talks

EVENT Britain, in alliance with Poland, Sweden and the Baltic States,
has narrowly prevented the European Union from reopening trade and aid talks
with Moscow, frozen because of Russia's occupation of Georgia.
EU "partnership and co-operation" negotiations were halted last month following the
Russian invasion of Georgia in August and Moscow's occupation of the breakaway
regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
After Russia pulled back some troops last week, Italy and Germany have pressed for
the resumption of "business as usual" on building trade, energy and political ties with
Moscow.
Britain, already at odds with Russia over the 2006 murder of the ex-KGB defector
Alexander Litvinenko, is taking a hawkish line towards Moscow along with former
Soviet countries.

COMMENT Britain is not as dependent on Russian oil and gas as other European nations are.
Therefore the UK can afford to take a far tougher line with Russia than say Germany.
Heavily dependent on Russian oil and gas, Germany has been traditionally reluctant to
risk offending the Kremlin even though Miss Merkel has been slightly more willing to
tackle Moscow than her Social Democrat predecessor Gerhard Schroeder.
On Wednesday the Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, even went as far as calling
for Russia to be given EU membership!
With Bible in hand we can see how these events fit Bible prophecy very accurately.
Ezekiel 38 speaks of Russia (Gog) and Europe (Gomer) on the one side (fighting
against Israel) with Britain (Tarshish) and America (young lion) on the other.

BIBLE Gomer, and all his bands…. (Gomer possibly refers to much of Europe including France, Italy
QUOTE etc)
the merchants of Tarshish, with all (Ezekiel
the young lions…
38:6 & 13)
 Iranian Air force exercise simulates attack on Israel
Debkafile, October 15, 2008

EVENT DEBKAfile’s military sources report that the drill beginning Thursday, Oct. 16 in
northern Iran, is Tehran’s rejoinder to Israel’s big aerial manoeuvre last June.
Then, more than 100 Israeli fighter-bombers went through their paces over the
Mediterranean and Aegean Seas, roughly the same distance from Israel as Iran.
Tehran’s media claim the exercise will test its air force’s ability to fly to Israel and
back without refuelling.
The exercise will also test the US-made FBX-T band anti-missile radar system
delivered in September and installed at the IAF Nevatim air base in the Negev. The
Iranians say they will be practicing their “state-of-the-art military equipment and flight
tactics,” meaning an attempt to jam US and Israeli electronics and radar.
According to Iranian media, the entire range of Iran's fighter fleet will take part,
including US-made F-4, F-5, F-7 and F-14 fighters and domestic Saegheh fighters.
Mid-air refuelling will be provided by Boeing 707 aerial tankers.

COMMENT We are watching the nations practising for the final war. Israel last year had a dry run
in simulating a massive attack on Iran. This week Iran has begun a dry run in
simulating a massive attack on Israel.
These so called “war games” are not games at all. They are needed to prepare for war.
It helps military planners increase their understanding and knowledge and test their
equipment. It also enables them to see how their enemy reacts. Finally it increases the
tensions and the nations take another step forward towards conflict.
This is precisely what God says will happen. The verse below speaks of Gentile
nations preparing for war. The preparation will soon lead to action.
BIBLE Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of
QUOTE war draw near; let them come up: Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into
spears: let the weak say, I am strong.
(Joel 3:9)
 Cold shoulder for Iceland allows rival to court new ally
The Times, October 10, 2008

EVENT Declining to offer Iceland a quick €4 billion loan is one of the worst decisions the US
and European countries have made in the financial turmoil. It is a false economy that
will prove diplomatically expensive.
Not that Iceland is the world’s most attractive credit risk, it hardly needs saying. The
chance that it will lack resources to repay a foreign currency loan would be a
conventional reason for saying no (although its Government says firmly that it will be
able to meet the terms). But the collective refusal, including, it seems, a rebuff by
other Nordic countries, has allowed Russia to offer the deal.
It doesn’t take much to work out what Russia is thinking. A former superpower, in
search of territory and allies, which planted its own flag last year on the seabed of the
North Pole – what better prize could it want than a Nato member that has just been
rebuffed by fellow allies?

COMMENT Russia is taking advantage of the financial turmoil.

Iceland is in huge financial trouble as a nation. It needs cash and quickly.
America and Europe refused to give a a quick loan and so Russia stepped into the
breach. Not because it is generous and likes Iceland but because it can extend its
sphere of influence into a Nato nation.
Note the sentence above that says that Russia is “in search of territory and allies”.
Iceland’s mid-Atlantic location makes it a hugely desirable ally. Russia has its eye on
oil and gas below the North Pole (the point of the flag-planting stunt). Those will be
easier to reach if global warming melts the ice cap.
The Bible says that Russia will be prosperous at the time of the end. It also implies that
Russia with use this wealth to further its great ambitions. These ambitions result in
BIBLE war.
And his power shall be mighty, but not by his own power: and he shall destroy wonderfully, and
QUOTE shall prosper, and practise, and shall destroy the mighty and the holy people.
(Daniel 8:24)
 Russia calls for Europe to join anti-US pact
Daily Telegraph, October 10, 2008

EVENT The Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, has called on European

leaders to create a new world order that minimises the role of the US.
Confident that a spat with Europe prompted by Russia's invasion of Georgia in
August was over, Mr Medvedev arrived in the French spa town of Evian determined to
woo his fellow leaders into creating an anti-US front.
Gone was the kind of war time rhetoric that saw Mr Medvedev lash out at the West
and characterise his Georgian counterpart Mikheil Saakashvili as a "lunatic". Instead
Mr Medvedev spoke of a Russia that was "absolutely not interested in confrontation".
Yet there was little doubt that Mr Medvedev was playing the divide-and-rule tactics of
his predecessor Vladimir Putin by seeking to pit the United States against its
European allies.

COMMENT We can surely see God’s hand behind this financial crisis. The angels are very busy
bringing about the situation required for the final judgement of mankind.
The fallout from this crisis is yet to be fully felt. The ripples of the collapse of capitalist
principles are spreading out and beginning to enter the political arena.
Russia is now trying to use this turmoil to create “a new world order”!!
It sees America’s position as being drastically weakened. Suddenly, almost overnight
America’s standing in the world has declined and Russia wants to “capitalise” on this.
There is growing concern that Russia could actually destabilise the whole financial
system. It is one of only 3 countries (Saudi Arabia and China), that sit on a massive
amount of cash that could actually influence the system. So far the cash has been
seen in order to stabilize and secure Russia domestically. In fact Russia is holding
talks with China later this month to discuss reducing their dollar holdings! The crisis will
get time
The worse
is come, the day draweth near: let not the buyer rejoice, nor the seller mourn: for wrath
BIBLE is upon all the multitude thereof.
QUOTE (Ezekiel 7:12)
 Financial crisis dents America's strategic standing
Debkanetweekly, October 17, 2008

EVENT Moscow, which has not for a moment halted its military provocations of Washington,
is coming round to the conviction that state regulation of market forces, abandoned
when the Soviet empire collapsed in the early 1990s, is the right way, compared with
the American free market culture which has brought the world to catastrophe.
Beijing, just three months after flaunting its admission to the worldwide global village
during its successful Olympic event, is now congratulating itself on applying the
brakes to market freedoms and refraining from expanding the Western financial
enclaves of Hong Kong and Shanghai.
The most violent reactions have come from the Muslim world. In the Arab Middle
East, there is frank talk of the need to break away from the American economy and
establishing an international Islamic financial system. Iran's leaders gloat over the
Western economic meltdown as indicating the end of capitalism, the failure of liberal
democracy, marking the superiority of the Islamic republic's political model.

COMMENT Continents and nations are going their own way, addressing their troubles and seeking
cures without reference to the United States.
This weakening of the world’s only superpower is necessary. When Israel is finally
surrounded by armies one might have expected America to come to their aid.
However we know that America (and Britain) will NOT be able to stop Israel from being
overrun. Why does God want this to happen?
Ultimately God wants Israel to turn to HIM not to some other “super power”.
When Christ returns Israel will be its knees – two thirds in the land will have been
killed.
Their
And only come
it shall hope to
willpass
be to accept
in that day,him.
that They will do
I will seek to so… and
destroy all he
thewill accept
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BIBLE Jerusalem. And I will pour upon the house of David,.. the spirit of grace and of supplications: and
QUOTE they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him
(Zechariah 12:10)
 Israeli youth seek Judaism
Israel National News, October 12, 2008
http://www.aish.com/discoveryisrael/index.html

EVENT A powerful trend has been noted at the Beit El Yeshiva website: Dozens of teenagers
tenaciously overcoming family and other obstacles to become religiously observant.
The decade-old Beit El Yeshiva website provides thousands of Torah classes in
various formats by leading rabbis, and features a popular "Ask the Rabbi" section.
Among the 100,000 monthly visitors are those who are not religiously observant, but
who want to learn more about Judaism.
In recent months, the website administrators say, "the wave of requests for spiritual
direction - particularly from young readers who have not been formally exposed to
Judaism - has been increasingly strong. We sense an undercurrent of a tremendous
process of awakening and desire to return to authentic Judaism among young
people"
COMMENT There is an incredible number of Jews that do not believe in God at all. Israel has
become a mainly secular nation. HOWEVER, this is beginning to change.
One example is given above. Another example is an organisation called Aish HaTorah
("Fire of the Torah"). Aish HaTorah is an Orthodox organization and yeshiva (Torah
study). The organization's stated mission is "providing opportunities for Jews of all
backgrounds to discover their heritage." Its headquarters are in Jerusalem. A key Aish
HaTorah program is the Discovery Seminar. It explores the authenticity of Judaism and
its relevance to modern times. It attempts to answer questions such as, "Why Be
Jewish?" "Does God Exist?" and "Is Torah True?“ More than 100,000 people (mainly
Jews) worldwide have attended the seminars! They are very similar in approach to the
seminars we run as Christadelphians. The Bible speaks of a time BEFORE Christ
returns when SOME Jews do look back and believe again. It is the work of Elijah.

BIBLE And he [Elijah] shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to
QUOTE their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.
(Malachi 4:6)
 The end of this week’s
Weekly World Watch

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