Bill Maher’s Unexpected Defense of Israel

Sometimes the most powerful defense of a biblical truth comes from the last person you would ever expect to deliver it. Comedian and longtime liberal commentator Bill Maher, an outspoken atheist who has built a career criticizing religion of every kind, stunned his audience when he laid out a defense of Israel that sounded straight out of a Bible class. “I would submit that Israel did not steal anybody’s land. The Jews have been in that area of the world since about 1200 B.C., way before the first Muslim or Arab walked the earth, a thousand years before. I mean, Jerusalem was their capital. Okay, so if it’s just about who got there first, it’s not even close.” Maher made the remarks on his HBO show Real Time, pushing back against the growing progressive narrative that brands Israel as an occupier or colonizer. He went further, pointing out that the Jewish people were the ones who were occupied for centuries by the Romans, Persians, Byzantines, and Ottomans, and that there was never a sovereign Arab country called Palestine. For Christians, the historical claim Maher is defending is also a spiritual one. The land God promised Abraham, where David ruled, where the prophets walked, and where Jesus was crucified and rose again, was never just real estate. It is the stage on which the entire story of redemption unfolded. “I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you. The whole land of Canaan, where you now reside as a foreigner, I will give as an everlasting possession.” — Genesis 17:7-8 God’s hand on Israel did not disappear with the New Testament. The story continues, and so does His covenant with the people He chose to bring the Messiah into the world. Why do you think a secular voice like Bill Maher is willing to defend Israel’s history when so many Christians are not? #truth #celebrity #accountability