Last week I published a short update from Israel from Vivienne Myburgh national director of the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ), South Africa, who was leading a tour group of South Africans at a joyful Feast of Tabernacles celebration.
Little did either of us suspect that the next week we would be talking about the murderous Hamas attack on Israeli families at dawn on Saturday while Vivienne and her group of 23 people were visiting the Dead Sea, a day after the weeklong feast celebration ended.
While the group was enjoying breakfast at about 8 that morning, the little child of Jewish hotel guests came into the dining room and said:”Bang, bang, war. There’s war. Bang, bang.”
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“That was the first that the people in my group actually even realised something was happening. Then all the reports started coming through immediately. And we were just shell shocked; you can’t believe that this is happening,” said Vivienne.
Noting that Saturday’s surprise attack on Israel on the special Sabbath day of Simchat Torah echoed the surprise attack 50 years ago on the holy day of Yom Kipur, she said the day of rejoicing in Israel quickly changed into a day of horror with more people barbarically murdered in one day than at any time since the Holocaust.
She said their hotel at the Dead Sea was probably one of the safest places in Israel at the time but the pain and heartbreak of the terrorist onslaught was brought close to them when people the military had rescued from the epicentre of the carnage – in the southern Gaza border region – were given refuge in the hotel.
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Vivienne said that throughout their Israel tour their group sensed God’s hand orchestrating things. “The fact that we left Jerusalem the day before all the rockets were hitting there and everybody was in bomb shelters. And we were supposed to be at the Black Arrow site overlooking Gaza on Sunday and this attack happened on Saturday.
“And even when we left for the airport, I delayed our bus leaving the hotel because I interviewed the leader of the Be’erei community [a kibbutz 4km from the Gaza fence, where many people were murdered by Hamas terrorists and others were kidnapped] who was at our hotel and I sat with him for 20 minutes, you know. And if I hadn’t, we would have been driving our bus on the road where the rockets actually hit an area in Abu Ghosh. It hit an area in Abu Ghosh, literally the time we would have been driving if we weren’t delayed.
“And the fact that I booked with El Al to fly, you know. I don’t do that every year. And this year I did, and they were the only airline, just about, flying still, and you could get out without any problems.”
Vivienne said the rescued people who were brought to the hotel with nothing but the clothes on their backs appeared numbed by shock.
“They were in a zone where they didn’t know how to think. Their family and friends were missing. They didn’t know if they were dead or alive. And they said to me: ‘This is a holocaust.’ And it was.”
She said she met a man, Tom, from the Be’erei community, whose 8 year-old daughter, Emily, was staying over with a friend at the kibbutz when the attacks occurred. Emily was taken hostage with her friend and her friend’s mom.
During Vivienne’s pre-flight interview with the kibbutz leader, Gal, he told her that hundreds of people from their community of 1 200 people were missing. He said the terrorists knocked on doors and shot or kidnapped those who came out. They set alight homes where people did not open doors and then shot those who came out. Many of those who survived the attack were people who remained locked in their bomb shelters, enduring the smoke that poured in. He said they were a close community and would do their best to rebuild it again, though it would not be the same as many children were orphaned and families had lost loved ones.
Vivienne said the community’s plight was “beyond heartbreaking” and when they left the hotel on Monday afternoon to catch their flight home they “felt like we are deserting these people”. Their connection with the Be’erei attack survivors was intensified by the fact that an ICEJ group visited the community on Thursday and planted trees there. Vivienne’s group would have gone there later.
She said it was evident that the brutal Hamas attack and the Israeli government’s declaration of war had united the country which had been going through a time of great division over proposed judicial reform.
She also expressed shock that at a time when many nations were condemning Hamas for its mass murder of Israeli civilians, the SA government and Anglican church leadership in SA had released statements calling for solidarity with Palestinians in their conflict with Israel and devoid of any criticism of Hamas’s actions.
It is very serious, when the Church, which has the Word of God, goes against God’s people and effectively becomes an instrument of God’s enemy, she said. But she said that Israelis are generally aware that a section of the Church is anti-Israel.
“They also have realised that their truest friends today are the real Christians who take the Word at face value and are loving and supportive and blessing of the nation of Israel despite their flaws and the change of government and government positions that they might not agree with,” she said.
She said the ICEJ, which has been serving in Israel since 1980 according to the Isaiah 40:1 mandate to be a comfort to the Jewish people, has paid for 200 bomb shelters in Israel and brought 180 000 Jews home to Israel from various parts of the world.
She said she has no doubt that bomb shelters installed in the Gaza border area by the ICEJ saved lives at the weekend.
Asked how people can help in the current crisis in Israel, she said: “First of all, pray. We have our Global Prayer Gathering now happening daily at three o’clock South African time.” (You can join the prayer at http://on.icej.org/ICEJGlobalPrayer )
Secondly she said that the ICEJ has always worked very closely with the communities in the area hit by Hamas. They also have a collection point in Jerusalem for dispensing relief to communities in need. So the ICEJ is an easy, effective channel for Christians who want to help communities that have lost everything. You can help the ICEJ by donating at https://icej.org.za/bless/?fbclid=IwAR3OaKgXqFbDzpSBjaXor7mIeQl1ghkelgIUhuqsdbzl5qR3yaukzdtI6k0
And finally, she said Christians can make a contribution by advocating for Israel. “Go to our Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/ICEJSA) and like it and share information because the media battle is going to intensify and people need to know and stand up for the truth more than ever before. You can also join Vivienne’s Israel info group at https://chat.whatsapp.com/DoTkjbZ0S2NBOOBtgfpOnq to get regular Israel updates.
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