Christian missionaries, whose explicit goal is to convert
Jews in Israel to Christianity, are entering Israel when most Jews cannot, through a
loophole in Israeli government-mandated regulations for the country’s latest
coronavirus lockdown. The lack of government sensitivity and response to this
issue, when queried, suggests that the loophole was purposefully created. It
seems someone wants these mi
The following photo shows Dean Bye’s Return
Ministries group arriving in Israel. Return Ministries shared the photo on Facebook as an announcement of the loophole for missionaries, the year-long volunteer visa, during the coronavirus lockdown:
Longer version with Hebrew subtitles:
It is the belief of Glenn and Pauline Plummer that they are "grafted" onto the Jewish people through Jesus. The two are in Israel specifically to target the Ethiopian community. Bishop Plummer believes God’s promise to bring the people out of Egypt/Africa includes those of African descent. He also believes Martin Luther King was not being at all metaphoric in his mountaintop speech when he referenced being allowed to reach the Promised Land. It wasn’t suburbia to which MLK was describing, from Plummer’s perspective, but a scenario in which African Americans belong to the actual physical land of Israel and must return.
Judy Maltz of Haaretz
has previously looked at Tommy
Waller and Hayovel, wondering who gave them visas during a lockdown when Jews
are barred. Now she has addressed the issue of Bishop and Dr. Plummer claiming
to make aliyah.
Maltz, being that she writes for Haaretz, made sure to underscore the point
that it is the settlers who benefit from the work of the Christian “volunteers.”
In August, the Interior Ministry announced that 12,000 yeshiva students and another 5,000 foreign exchange students and participants in Masa educational and social programs, aimed at young Jewish adults, would also be allowed into the country.As reported in Haaretz several weeks ago, an exception was also made for a group of 70 volunteers from a U.S.-based evangelical organization, known as Hayovel. The volunteers obtained special government permission to enter the country so they could help with the grape harvest on West Bank settlements.
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| Event poster announces Bishop Glenn and Dr. Pauline Plummer in Jerusalem |
At the same time, Maltz made one small, incidental mention of proselytization only at the end of her piece, as if to minimize the importance of the issue.
Asked to address concerns that COGIC had set up a presence in Israel in order to persuade Jews to convert to Christianity, Plummer said: “That’s not our mission. I, as a Christian believer and Christian leader, am fully convinced that Yeshua, Jesus, is the messiah. I believe that with every fiber in me. But I’m not going to try to convince you to believe that. If you ask me why I believe that, though, of course I’m going to tell you.”
This, of course, is a lie. Let’s look at what Bishop and Dr. Plummer themselves said in the video (earlier in this piece), regarding their purpose in coming to Israel, and in fact, their purpose in life:
What is the church called to do? In my humble opinion, it rests on two things. One is to win souls and the second is to make disciples. Disciple-making is really a big call.
That's exactly the call and the mission and the goal of the church. "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father, and of the son, and of the holy ghost.”
We lead people to the lord. The church is commissioned. The church is called to go forth and teach, to instruct all nations, to do as Jesus did and make disciples. We are called to tell people everywhere about Jesus.
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| Facebook about page |
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| Tweet after participating in a congressional caucus on black and Jewish relations |
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| Mission as declared on the website of Bishop and Dr. Plummer |
A colleague who lives in Samaria, where so many evangelicals are residing while working the vineyards for free, when he heard my concerns about Bishop Plummer commented, “Just you should know, there are highly-placed individuals who have known him for decades who will make sure he understands the situation he is in and if you want, I can try to ask him specifically not to reach out to you.”
It is not, of course, my concern that these people will
reach out to me personally. My concern is that they are here to “win souls” and
“make disciples.” I find this sort of proselytization highly offensive. The Jewish people did
not survive the Inquisition, the Crusades, the Muslim Conquest, pogroms, terror, and the
Holocaust in order to have missionaries infiltrate the Jewish State of Israel
to rob our children of their souls, in order that the settlers of Samaria benefit from free labor to harvest their grapes.
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| Plummer: first "bishop of Israel in the 112 year history of the church" |
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| The focus of the work of Bishop and Dr. Plummer in Israel: outreach to Ethiopian Jews |
It sure does look as though the one sure way to get into Israel
right now is to be Christian and committed to converting the Jews. It's a definite exception to the otherwise unusually severe lockdown measures mandated by the Israeli government. And it worked great for Bishop Glenn and Dr. Pauline Plummer. But it also worked for Return Ministries, manned by Dean Bye and Chaim
Malespin. The entire group of their evangelical volunteers received
one-and-a-half-year visas.
It's important to note that evangelicals do not
qualify to live in Israel under the Law of Return,
despite the claim of Dr. Plummer that she and her husband are not in Israel to
be tourists, but have actually made aliyah.
When asked about this by Judy Maltz at Haaretz, a spokeswoman
from Israel’s Interior Ministry, responsible for issuing visas to the Plummers
and the other evangelicals, said only that she, “wasn’t at liberty to discuss
individual cases because of privacy issues.”
All we really know is that Israel is in the middle of a
pandemic lockdown in which thousands of Jews cannot get into the country, but
the government has announced this loophole that mainly serves evangelical
Christians.
It’s not a good look.
Breaking
Israel News is calling this loophole for international volunteers
the fulfillment of the prophecy that “strangers,” or “Christians,” have been
allowed into Israel to harvest:
Strangers shall stand and pasture your flocks, Aliens shall be your plowmen and vine-trimmers; Isaiah 61:5.
This prophecy, the missionaries see as both literally and
metaphorically true. For while so many Jews cannot visit Israel during the holidays
or see family, the strangers are here for the harvest. They're here for the
grapes and the souls.
(h/t Shannon Nuszen of Beyneynu)