Global SITREP B10-17: The Syrian Situation Revisited Part IV



Smoke rises from Al-Quneitra with Mt. Hermon as a backdrop.

UPDATE 28 April 2017: There is enough corroborating foreign media OSINT available to report that an Israeli fire mission also occurred early this week (Monday, 24 April) as another warning to Tehran, Damascus and Moscow. The IDF fired three high-precision ground-to-ground missiles from a position on the Golan destroying a Hezbollah armory within the al-Fawwar camp just outside of Quneitra, Syria.  

The al-Fawwar camp has been manned by Hezbollah-trained, pro-Assad conscripts known as (Syrian) National Defense Forces, or 'the Golan troop.' The three IDF missiles struck the intended target causing multiple high-order secondary explosions which obliterated the Hezbollah armory. It is also important to note that due to Moscow's failure to make any attempt to rein in the IRGC-commanded militias and Hezbollah forces closing in the Golan border the IDF missile strike occurred without Israel using the established hot line to inform Russian military forces in Syria of the fire mission it launched. In other words, IDF ground forces (Northern Command) are not communicating with Russian ground forces in Syria. Such silence equates to overt hostility.

Later in the day yesterday the IDF fired a Patriot air defense missile which intercepted and destroyed a probable Iranian drone that had just penetrated into Israeli airspace from Syria. In addition there a newspaper reports from Beirut, Lebanon stating the Syria has prepared four Scud missiles with half-ton warheads for launching against targets in Israel without warning. The situation on the Northern Front is currently as dangerous and unpredictable than it has been in decades.

27 April 2017: It has now become abundantly clear that the retreat of Syria's best remaining combat aircraft northward to Hmeimim Air Base leaves the whole of southern Syria open to Israel's best fighter aircraft, of which the F-35I 'Adir' is now firmly established at the top of the IAF's power pyramid. 

Early this morning there occurred a series of at least 5 major explosions followed by a huge fireball at the Damascus International Airport. Eschatology Today assesses that the only Israeli aircraft which could have conducted this stealthy strike would be the F-35I. No one saw them arrive, or leave, No Syrian or Russian air defense reaction occurred. 

There is also the near-admission of responsibility for this strike by Israeli Intelligence Minister, Yisrael Katz, who stated during an Israel Army Radio interview today, "We are acting to prevent the transfer of sophisticated weapons from Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon by Iran." Hezbollah's al-Manar radio agreed with Minister Katz in its own report.

We have known in recent month about Israel keeping close tabs on the Iranian/Hezbollah military advances on the slopes of Mt. Hermon and toward Quneitra on the Golan. This advance is intolerable from the Israeli perspective; Israel will never allow and Iranian Hezbollah to establish permanent bases in southern Syria. The presence of Syria's more elite forces (4th Mechanized Div/42nd Bde) mixed in with the advancing Iranian/Hezbollah columns provide no cover whatsoever. That Israel is striking to the rear of the advance of these forces of late (T4 strike and now Damascus Airport) must be seen as a clear warning by Israel of far, far worse to come should these advances continue.

Here's the current tactical picture and Israel's highly likely response to it. With Russia's tacit approval, the attempt to establish an Iranian/Hezbollah front against Israel from the Mediterranean Sea in southern Lebanon pivoting on Mt. Hermon and then through southern Syria southeastwards to the Golan Heights will leave Israel no other option than to execute its recently developed Gideon Doctrine into practice. Readers may recall we discussed this on Eschatology Today when the Gideon Doctrine was suddenly released in its sanitized public-release form in late 2015.

Eschatology Today believes there is a direct correlation between the warfighting foretold through the prophecies of Isaiah 17, Joshua 13 and Psalm 83 and Israel's "Gideon Doctrine." 

Simply put, the Gideon Doctrine is a warfighting doctrine which is based upon a very few key principles mirroring the national goals of the State of Israel and the current realities of the region.

1) Israel has no officially declared borders; 

2) Preserve Israel's values and character as a Jewish state; 

3) Secure the social and economic strength of the State of Israel; 

4) Secure regional and international status of the State of Israel while seeking peace. 

In order to accomplish these objectives the Gideon Doctrine recognizes that when war becomes an inevitability Israel must use the totality of all its military power in an overwhelming, offensive manner to crush all enemy forces. Therefore, the coming war can be seen as a preemptive no-holds-barred war to achieve the four key principles noted above. And when it happens, it will in all likelihood come without further warning.
  

Russian Air Defense Systems currently deployed to Syria

21 April 2017:  OSINT reports on the transfer of the remaining air worthy fixed wing aircraft  of Bashar al-Assad's remaining air force to Russia's Hmeimim Air Base south of Latakia  is confirmed. This redeployment effectively places the Syrian Arab Air Force under direct Russian air defense protection of the S-300 and S-400 AD systems. This is a prudent move as these antique Syrian aircraft of 1980's vintage have zero chance of surviving air-to-air combat with either the state-of-the-art IAF or US combat aircraft.

Note the new image above. The Russian AD systems did not give pause to Israel's air strike against the T4 air base recently. The IAF strike aircraft were well within the Russian air defense capabilities umbrella. The IAF aircraft must have been invisible to the Russian's state-of-the-art electronic warfare and radar systems at Hmeimim Air Base, or the Russian's simply allowed the devastating IAF strike to occur on their Syrian and Iranian/Hezbollah allies. Which of these possibilities is more plausible to you?

Knowing what's coming according to Bible prophecy makes the daily passage of time seem like watching individual grains of sand fall through the hourglass. However, today's exchange of mortar fire from the Syrian side and IDF artillery returning fire on the Syrian mortar positions serves to remind that there are  any number of fuses that could ignite the northern front.

Yesterday, 24 April 2017, the U.S. Trump Administration took the largely irrelevant step of placing economic sanctions on 271 individuals having direct ties to the Syrian chemical weapons program (CERS). Sanctions have never worked as a political tool, and this instance will be no exception in the history of economic sanctions.

Global SITREP B9-17: All War Is Deception

CVN-70 USS Carl Vinson in the Indian Ocean on 15 April 2017

19 April 2017: The most important lesson that should have been learned from this past weekend, and in going forward from here, is that all war is deception.

So with the news released earlier today that the USS Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group One (CSG-1) was nowhere near the Korean peninsula in the Sea of Japan last weekend, the global corporate media's (New York Times leading the pack) near instantaneous negative reaction, as well as that of the lefty blogosphere, was entirely predictable. It was unbridled hostility run amok and barely masked by their favorite sobriquets, like "fake news," "false narrative," and "Trump's lie." In a truly tense environment, the negative media reaction was probably the most appropriate form of comic relief that could have occurred at this juncture.

For the record what occurred this past weekend is known as Operational Deception, or OPDEC. The North Koreans, as well as the Russians and Chinese general staffs all believed, as did the media and blogosphere, that CSG-1 was just down range from a potential North Korean missile barrage to spark World War III. The mere threat of an American Carrier Strike Group close enough to reach out and touch Kim Jong Badhaircut where it hurts was all it took to keep his nuclear test from happening. 

The big unmentioned story here is that neither the Russians or the Chinese were capable of informing the North Koreans that our sea power was at least 3,000 miles away. They, true superpower wannabes, were as blind as a bat, and were probably furiously trying to figure out how an American nuclear-armed naval armada such as this was managing to be such an effective electromagnetic hole in the Western Pacific Ocean. It had to be nightmare of a real-time intelligence failure for the Russian and Chinese navies! I mean they were in the Sea of Japan just a couple of weeks ago for a major exercise with the South Korean and Japanese navies called Operation Foal Eagle 2017. Nobody saw the US carrier strike group leave the area?

I think the fact-of-the-matter is that CSG-1 was stationed near Singapore intentionally, just in case a rapid dash to either the Sea of Japan or the Arabian Sea became necessary in the event another al-Assad chemical warfare episode or a North Korean nuclear event/ICBM launch. Looking at a map of the Eastern Hemisphere this makes sense to this guy.

So, following a quick exercise with our mates Down Under, really good prep for a Korean deployment by the way, it appears that CSG-1 will be re-deploying from the Indian Ocean up to the Sea of Japan after all. Word also came today of a 30-day extension of CSG-1's WESTPAC  mission, and that speaks volumes. So the vast and very powerful armada that the Commander-In-Chief spoke of last week is going to sail off the Korean coast once again. Prudent actions, all of them.

Global SITREP B8-17: Now Is The Time To Teach About The 'End of Days

13 April 2017: Taking a very brief time-out from the ongoing SITREP series about the literal fulfillment of Isaiah, Jeremiah as Asaph's prophesies in order to get this message out there. 

There's probably a good number of Christian folks, asking their pastors, ministers parish priests, aldermen, bishops and lay leaders about what's going on in the world today. They're asking questions like, "Are we heading into a world war because of the Syrian civil war or the North Korean nuclear threat?" Because these people are asking these questions of their religious leaders, that tends to indicate that they are not seeking the answers from the only definitive and 100% accurate source there is - the Word of God, the Holy Bible. I believe this is probably a given, and I pray that those who are being asked these questions are giving Spirit-led answers.

Then there are the rest of humanity all over the world. On the Google Trend website (trends.google.com) Eschatology Today conducted a trends search last evening  for the phrase 'World War III.'  To say that global interest in this is at a high level is an epic understatement. Normal index on this topic over the past five years (2012-2017) on a scale of 1 to 100 is usually around 5, with peaks having occurred in April and August 2013 when Obama threatened Syria over its chemical weapons and then did nothing, and March-April 2014 when Russia invaded Crimea and southeastern Ukraine, and again in November 2015 when Turkey, a NATO ally, shot down a Russian fighter jet. But none of these can top the current index of 100 due to the threat of a world war igniting over Syria and North Korea.

If there was ever a time for the bride of Christ to lead the unsaved to our Lord through the Biblical teachings on the 'last days' events, then right now is that time. As can be seen from the embedded URL above, people are searching for answers all over the world. "World War III' is just one example of a search term; there are any number of other directly related terms which could be searched for trends. For example, one search term would be just plain "World War.' With this term the average increases by nearly a factor of 5 (23 vs 5) for the entire past 5 years, with the greatest peak (100) having occurred during the Syrian chemical weapons crisis of 2013. 

The point is, people the world over are keenly interested and they're searching for answers. So, what are we waiting for?

Global SITREP B7-17: The Syrian Situation Revisited Part III

Clearly identified RBK-500 ZAB-2.5SM incendiary bombs slung under 

the wing of a Russian Su-34 'Fullback' at Hmeimim Air Base in 2016

Su-34 Fullback carrying a full load-out of RBK-500 ZAB-2.5SM incendiary bombs prior to takeoff at Hmeimim Air Base, Syria.

Update 11 April 2017: The Ezekiel Summit takes place today in Lucca, Italy when the Group of 7 (G7) industrialized nations (the US, UK, Germany, Japan, France, Italy and Canada) will hold a summit meeting led by US SECSTATE Rex Tillerson to discus the extremely dangerous and potential major war crisis point in Syria. 

The Group of Seven (G7) industrialized nations will be joined by five Sunni Arab nations: Turkey, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Jordan and Qatar. For this reason Eschatology Today is going to coin the phrase "The Ezekiel Summit" for this and all future G7 Summits with their Sunni Arab allies. 

The Ezekiel Summit constitutes the first iteration of the alliance found in Ezekiel 38:13 literally translated from the Hebrew Scripture Shĕba' Dĕdan cachar Tarshiysh kĕphiyr as "Sheba, Dedan, the merchants of Tarshish and all their young lions..."  It is not too far or a stretch to at least consider that these 12 nations may a few years become the 10 nations among whom the "little horn" emerges according to the angel Gabriel in Daniel in Daniel 7, as well as the "Ten Toes" of the two feet of the two legs discussed in Daniel 2.

We will be very keen to learn what comes from The Ezekiel Summit as these 12 nations line up against Russia and Iran in a fight over Syria. In this we have most of the nation state actors found in the entire host of pre-70th Week prophecies, and with Israel likely to bear a heavy burden in the eruption of hostilities per Isaiah 17:4-6. 

More updates to come...

10 April 2017: The big and as yet unreported news, unreported because no one outside of the United States Government has yet made this public information, is the Obama Administration kept stone cold quiet (this is "flexibility" as defined by Obama) on Russian military forces widespread use of banned incendiary weapons in Syria. Incendiary weapons are not banned in use in combat against enemy forces, but they are banned by international law from use where civilian populations are present. 

Russian forces were caught (pardon the pun) red-handed with incendiary munitions, such as RBK-500 ZAB-2.5SM incendiary bombs, deployed to Syria. The above image was taken from a video made by the English-language propaganda station RT on 18 June 2016 as Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu was visiting Hmeimim Air Base near Latakia, Syria. The video was broadcast internationally, with the above screen-captured image freaking out Russian military censors. This part of the video footage was promptly removed from subsequent airings. But that did not matter, the cat had escaped the bag. Perhaps not so amazing was that Russia denied after this video aired the first time that these incendiary weapons were deployed to Syria. 

RBK-500 ZAB-2.5SM incendiary bombs are loaded with a metallic powder fuel known as thermite. Thermite burns even hotter than white phosphorus; it cannot be extinguished by any normal means and must burn itself out. This is a clear violation of the Convention of Certain Chemical Weapons (CCCW); a convention to which Russia is a signatory nation. These weapons first appeared in Syria after Russian forces first deployed to Hmeimim Air Base, they use as air-dropped incendiary munitions began shortly thereafter and it continues up to the present. They were used on a civilian populated village south of Aleppo, Umm al-Karamil, on 16 March 2017, and they appear to have been used this past weekend, probably as an act of defiance against the U.S. strike on Ash Sha'irat Air Base.

Now you know the likely scenario through which a greater level of hostilities, possibly including a clash between Russian and American forces in the Syrian war zone may well take place in the days ahead.

Russia's most advanced frigate, the guided missile frigate RFS 494 Admiral Grigorovich, as it passes Istanbul on its way south to the Eastern Mediterranean Sea on Friday 7 April 2017. USNI News image provided by ship spotter in Istanbul.

9 April 2017: The Russian Federation Navy has deployed into the Eastern Mediterranean Sea its most advanced class of guided missile frigate following the U.S. Navy's Tomahawk land attack missile strike on Ash Sha'irat Air Base last Thursday in Syria. Russian Federation Ship 494 Admiral Grigorovich is expected to take up station shadowing U.S. Navy guided missile destroyers (Arleigh Burke class) DDG-78 Porter and DDG-71 Ross either before or after a brief port call to the Russian replenishment facility in port Tartus, Syria. The USS Porter and USS Ross are not the only forward deployed U.S. Navy ships in the combat zone; there are two other U.S. Navy destroyers nearby, and there is without doubt a US nuclear fast attack submarine prowling nearby as well.

Syrian jets were seen departing from Ash Sah'irat Air Base the day following the U.S. strike. The US national military authority has made it clear, as has U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley, that additional strikes are possible depending on the actions of the Syrian government, which is a client state of the Russian Federation. 

There will also be a direct diplomatic clash between the United States and the Russian Federation as U.S. SECSTATE Rex Tillerson will be travelling to Moscow this week (Wednesday, 12 April) to confront the Russian government with what the U.S. believes is proof the collected intelligence of Russian foreknowledge and complicity in the sarin gas attack on Khan Sheikhoun on Tuesday, 4 March.

The collected intelligence presented will also prove a Russian attempt to cover up the sarin gas attack. The evidence of Russian complicity is being presented privately to Vladimir Putin's government as leverage to force Russia to abandon its military support of the war criminal Bashar al-Assad regime. How Russia responds to this evidence will determine much going forward; the Russian response if negative to U.S. goals may well lead the to a public release of this evidence in an open hearing at the United Nations. What will occur is all but predictable based upon the texts of Isaiah 17 and Jeremiah 49:23-27. 

Global SITREP B6-17: The Syrian Situation Revisited Part II

Location of Shayrat Air Base in west-central Syria

FINAL UPDATE 8 April 2017: This will be the final update for SITREP B6:17 so that it doesn't become too large. Subsequent related events in Syria, the Eastern Mediterranean or elsewhere in the Middle East will be covered in The Syrian Situation Part III SITREP.

As most are now aware the USS Porter and USS Ross launched 30 Tomahawks each. One of those cruise missiles malfunctioned and fell harmlessly into the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. As military operations go, this was a very limited, extremely precise, meticulously planned and professionally executed strike mission. This strike mission could have been a much larger operation, but in the deliberations over what the US should do the concept of proportionality was the key determining element on the scale of operation the US would execute. It was the correct option that was chosen.

The message this strike mission sent to the most hostile governments in Syria, Iran and North Korea was as precise as the strike itself. Those government's understanding of the message is another matter entirely and out of any human control. Ditto for the Russian government. Xi Jinping wears three hats: he is the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party; the President of the People's Republic of China, and the Chairman of the Central Military Commission. That this strike was prepped and ultimately occurred while Xi Jinping was dining with President Trump in the middle of their very first and extremely important summit meeting is positively astounding. The effect must have been nothing short of seismic. 

In fact, the entire world was sent the unmistakable message that the United States of America is back, and back in increasing power on the global stage; gone like the wind was the pontificating but do-nothing America of Barack Obama. And the whole world was put on notice and has taken notice - friends and foes alike. Clean-up in aisle planet earth, which is overdue as a result of the eight Obama Administration years, is happening in real-time.

I have always believed that the fulfillment of Bible prophecy is largely the Lord's omniscient forewarning about the results of the free will decisions that human governments and their leaders will make in the future. That is what I believe is occurring now and will occur in the immediate future because Bible prophecy, as with the entire Word of God, is inerrant and fulfilled as explicitly as it has been written. So it will be with Jeremiah 49:23-27 and Isaiah 17. 

7 April 2017: Less than 24 hours later and the now highlighted analysis provided below has become real-world fact: the United States of America, a nation far too many Bible scholars and teachers of last days eschatology have opined to play no-role in last days prophetic fulfillment, has just done exactly that. A few hours ago U.S. executed a key event in the ongoing fulfillment of Bible prophecy found in the books of Jeremiah and Isaiah. Action such as the United States has just undertaken in Syria are commonly known in today's parlance as a "game changer." FACT: as witnessed by innumerable individuals around the world, the United States has been a central player in the literal fulfillment of Bible prophecy since Israel's re-birth in 1948.

On the order of U.S. Commander-In-Chief Donald J. Trump the United States Navy's guided missile destroyers Porter and Ross (DDG 78 and DDG 71, respectively) launched a total of about 30 Tomahawk cruise missiles each at Bashar al-Assad's Shayrat (Ash Sha'irat) Air Base where the chemical attack of three days ago on Khan Sheikhoun was determined through all-source intelligence analysis to have originated. (Additional and graphic details HERE.) The U.S. Tomahawks began impacting the base at 3:45 AM this morning Syrian time, or approximately 6 hours prior to this posting.

October 2016 DigitalGlobe satellite image of Ash Sha-irat Air Base southeast of Homs, Syria 

A damage assessment image of Shayrat air base in Syria, following U.S. Tomahawk Land Attack Missile strikes on April 7, 2017 from the USS Ross and USS Porter, Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers. DigitalGlobe/U.S. Department of Defense/AP

The forty aircraft shelters known to be at Ash Sha-irat probably each received at least one Tomahawk. So did the anti-air positions and fuel depot. Ash Sha-irat Air base is now also known to be a Syrian chemical weapons storage site. All anyone can do is hope the remaining 20 Tomahawks destroyed the chemical weapons bunkers at Ash Sha-irat Air Base, but it also should go without saying that Bashar al-Assad did not have all of his chemical weapons eggs in this one basket. Syria has now been found guilty of crimes against humanity, and its allies (Russia, Iran/Hezbollah and North Korea) are complicit in these crimes which now span from December 2012 to April 2017. The Obama Administration is now also complicit with the Russian Federation in fomenting a bald-faced lie regarding Syrian Weapons of mass Destruction. To borrow a phrase, Obama lied and Syrian children and babies died.

At approximately 01:30 hours this morning (EDT in Washington, D.C.) the Bashar al-Assad government released a statement calling the U.S. strikes on Ash Sha-irat Air Base "aggression" which had caused "losses."  Responsibility for this attack is also borne by the Russian Federation which had caused a boondoggle in the UN Security Council deliberations of yesterday due to its persistent objections in defending the al-Assad regime and threatened veto over the text of a condemning resolution. That failed diplomatic tactic convinced U.S. National Military Authority to strike immediately. 

For his part Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin released a statement through his spokesman Dmitry Peskov saying Russia regarded the American strike as "aggression against a sovereign nation" based upon a "made-up pretext." The U.S. and Russia are now locked into opposing sides of what amounts to a military confrontation on a Middle Eastern battlefield. 

Final assessment for this update: The Syrian capability to continue to use its banned chemical weapons against its enemies has only been very moderately reduced as a result of the Tomahawk strike on Ash Sha-irat Air Base, which is now a smoking pile of rubble. While the American Tomahawk strikes are currently billed as "one-off" there is little doubt that additional attacks by Al-Assad using WMD on his own people will result in fresh attacks on his military forces - who are defended by Russian military forces. 

Not to jump too far ahead of the present situation, but according to Bible prophecy, the Syrian government will be proven to have learned nothing from the lesson this strike was intended to have taught them. Bye bye Damascus; Bye bye Syria.

More updates to follow...

Map of Syria: Areas of Control, Khan Sheikhoun Sarin Attack 

6 April 2017: Instead of posting an update to Global SITREP A9-17, I've decided to post this as Part II of that SITREP, along with the understanding that this is also an near-real time update to what was being discussed in the preceding Global SITREP B5-17. In fact, it seems at this point a lot of prophetic Scripture is running together as it they were a stampede.

Firstly, the map (clickable) above illustrates the current lines and areas of control of the factions involved in the Syrian civil war as well as the location of the Sarin gas WMD attack by the government of Bashar al-Assad upon the civilians of the rebel-held city of Khan Sheikhoun. 

There are two critical things to note immediately. Some of you who've been reading Eschatology Today in the past several months are probably already aware of what will once again be stated. Based upon Jeremiah 49:23 the high probability has been repeatedly stressed of some major catastrophe occurring in northwest Syria. A weapons of mass destruction (WMD) attack involving the use of the G-series Sarin nerve agent on civilians in Khan Sheikhoun in northwest Syria definitively qualifies in the literal fulfillment of Jeremiah 49:23.

However, this is just the beginning and worse is coming down the pike. This is the second note of note of critical importance. The likelihood of U.S. military action, airstrikes or cruise missile strikes, upon one or more Syrian government airfields is a very high probability. These U.S. attacks could occur this morning or in the next day or so. Sooner rather than later in order to convey the seriousness of how the Trump Administration views the situation.

What is unknown is how Russia will respond to U.S. attacks and their level of severity upon their patron Bashar al-Assad's military infrastructure. The cratering of airfield runways and destruction of rotary-wing aircraft (helicopters) is a minimum of what U.S. air and naval forces in the region are likely to hit. Naval forces may be a key as the second half of Jeremiah 49:23 indicates:

"Hamath and Arpad are shamed,
For they have heard bad news.
They are fainthearted;
There is trouble on the sea;
It cannot be quiet."

Notice the direct tie-in of this verse to what Isaiah prophesied in Isaiah 17:12-13. For sure this is another indicator of far, far worse that is yet to come. Another unknown is that when the U.S. strikes Syria will Assad, at Iranian urging then strike out at Israel? Understand this: If Bashar al-Assad (or the IRGC/Hezbollah) were to order a weapons of mass destruction chemical attack upon Israel, then have no illusions that Israel will strike back with nuclear weaponry. And here we could be witness to the literal fulfillment of both Isaiah's and Jeremiah's prophecies in real-time. 

What strikes most solidly about all this is that instead of referencing an entire chapter of the Lord's prophetic word through His prophets, it is now necessary to cite individual and pairs of verses as coming to fulfillment before our eyes.

Marana'tha

Global SITREP B5-17: The Coming Jerusalem Temple

UPDATE 3 April 2017: During a ceremony at Hatzor Air Base in Israel yesterday, PM Bibi Netanyahu led an array of Israeli civilian defense, military officers and other dignitaries in announcing the operational deployment of the joint U.S.-Israel developed David's Sling Defense System. Among the many Bibi quotes being reported in the media I find the Prime Minister's initial statement to be key with respect to this SITREP covering the Isaiah 17 and Psalm 83 prophecies: "Whoever seeks to hit us will be hit. Whoever threatens our existence places himself in existential danger.” 

The fully operational David's Sling is aptly named. In 1 Samuel 17 is told the epic encounter between the 9 foot 6 inch tall Philistine giant, Golyath of Gath, and his equally epic weaponry against the youthful son of Jesse named David. And David stunned Golyath with a single stone flung from his sling. David then stood upon the unconscious giant and removed Golyath's head with Golyath's own sword. The David's Sling state-of-the-art weapon is a hunt-to-kill missile known as the Stunner. The Stunner missile is designed to race toward the target and destroy it though the sheer power of impact, just like the stone from young David's sling.

David went forward into battle against an armed enemy which both sides saw for him as having zero chance of victory. But young David went forth knowing in faith that the living God of Israel would deliver the enemy into his hand, and it was so. 

For the purposes of the enemy nations named in Isaiah 17 and Psalm 83, and as discussed here in previous blog posts, the prophetic past as prologue template which follows the fulfillment of Isaiah 17 and Psalm 83 fully applies to the building of the coming third Temple. That template is found in 1 Kings 5:3-5.

"You know how my father David could not build a house for the name of the Lord his God because of the wars which were fought against him on every side, until the Lord put his foes under the soles of his feet. But now the Lord my God has given me rest on every side; there is neither adversary nor evil occurrence. And behold, I propose to build a house for the name of the Lord my God, as the Lord spoke to my father David, saying, “Your son, whom I will set on your throne in your place, he shall build the house for My name.”"

The aftermath of the final fulfillment of Isaiah 17 and Psalm 83 there will be no enemy on any of Israel's borders, not one on any side. The past as prologue.


1 April 2017: In the previous SITREP B4-17 the case was made that the final fulfillment of Psalm 83 does appear to be quite imminent as evidenced by the statements made by King Abdullah II of Jordan. While Psalm 83 has been a prophecy long in a process of fulfillment, another pair of prophecies, found in Isaiah 17 and Jeremiah 49:23-27, have in the last 6 years also begun their own parallel process towards total fulfillment along with Psalm 83. 

As stated many times during the course of the now 9-year blog, I happen to hold to the eschatological view that these pre-70th Week fulfillment's happen in rapid sequence, like a prophetic flood, and like a series of prophetic dominoes to fall in their proper sequence. I believe Isaiah and Jeremiah's prophecies are the domino which will topple the Psalm 83 domino over. This SITREP will look at the sum total of what Eschatology Today consistently refers to as the "big picture" painted by the fulfillment of these prophecies. 

That is to say, specifically per Isaiah 17:1-3, that the destruction of Damascus and the nation-state we know as Syria, plus the damage which is done to Israel as seen in Isaiah 17:4-6, will lead the named enemies in Psalm 83:6-8 to believe their golden opportunity to “Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation, that the name of Israel may be remembered no more” has finally arrived. They will execute this action as Muslims waging jihad in full submission to their god and in his name.

This will be a unique phase to the Psalm 83 war in that there will almost certainly be no external intervention by other nations on behalf of the Islamic nations or on the behalf of Israel. Why and how can I arrive at this conclusion? Because i believe the Lord has declared it will be so through His prophets. 

Make a key note of what I am going to say here, it is that important to understand. In the ongoing war in Syria, a truly internationalized civil war if there ever was one, there are the intervening gentile military forces of Russia, Iran and its Lebanese Shi'a proxy Hezbollah, plus Iranian Shi'a mercenary forces from Iraq and Afghanistan on the side of the government and army in Damascus. On the other side there are the gentile forces of 61 nations, plus the EU and Arab League, which are led by the United States of America. This coalition of nations is known as Operation Inherent Resolve (clickable image below).

The Nations within the Operation Inherent Resolve Coalition

The palm wreath is a symbol of honor; the scimitars indicate the dual nature of the coalition-the defeat of ISIL and the restoration of stability to the area.  The three stars indicate the command and are colored gold for excellence.  Buff and flag blue denote the land, sea and air components of the military.

Both of the groups of forces operating in Syria are opposed to and engaged in destroying the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Sunni Muslim). They are also on opposite sides with respect to the Alawite (Branch of Shi'a Islam) government in Damascus. 

This is where we turn our attention to the Lord's prophetic word in Isaiah 17:12-13 (NKJV with my emphasis added) which describes a result of what is going to shortly take place in the course of the Isaiah 17 prophetic fulfillment:

Woe to the multitude of many people
Who make a noise like the roar of the seas,
And to the rushing of nations
That make a rushing like the rushing of mighty waters!

The nations will rush like the rushing of many waters;
But God will rebuke them and they will flee far away,
And be chased like the chaff of the mountains before the wind,Like a rolling thing before the whirlwind.

All of these gentile nations on both sides of the conflict in Syria are going to make a tumult which the prophet describes as the roaring and rushing of the seas. The seas of this planet being in such a state are normally an immovable and overwhelming force of nature. Yet in this God will rebuke them all and they will flee far away. Now you have to think about this, consider it carefully. What kind of a rebuke does the LORD God bring down on these gentile nations that they would all turn tail and immediately flee far away? I guarantee you that I would not want to be the object of such a rebuke where the better part of 100 gentile nations are forced from the battlefield that is Syria! 

Nevertheless, what the LORD God (YHWH) declares through Isaiah is exactly what will happen: both the Russian-led coalition and the U.S.-led coalition will be shattered by the coming rebuke from God. This means that His sovereign will will be manifest, not the will of these two groups of gentile nations fighting over control of this land, but God's will shall rule that day and is what will take place. Now some will say this sounds like 'Divine intervention,' and they would be right, it will be Divine intervention in the course of events in Syria, and in Israel, in the fulfillment of Isaiah 17. Scripture leaves no doubt about it.

That brings us to Psalm 83. All of the other gentile nations, except for Lebanon, Jordan, the Palestinians in Judea and Samaria, Gaza and Sinai will have fled the battlefield of the MidEast, and these nations, which Asaph clearly identified, are left to execute their attempt at making Psalm 83:4 come true. But as we know their hate-filled conspiracy against God and His people Israel has no chance of success. In fact exactly the opposite will occur and Israel will emerge victorious, and perhaps three, or four or five times its current territorial size. The greater Israel will include Lebanon (Joshua 13), control over much of Syria, all of western Jordan, Judea and Samaria, Gaza and probably all of the Sinai.

Yet this is not the greatest part of what occurs as a result of the sequential fulfillment of Isaiah 17 and Psalm 83. The greatest part of result of this has been foretold by Asaph in Psalm 83:16-18 (NKJV with my emphasis added):

Fill their faces with shame,That they may seek Your name, O Lord.Let them be confounded and dismayed forever;Yes, let them be put to shame and perish,That they may know that You, whose name alone is the Lord,Are the Most High over all the earth.

This prophetic passage described the end of Islam, the conversion of a great number of Muslims from submission to their god allah to the God of Israel. The end result of these prophetic wars is that Muslims will seek the name of YHWH. They will be confounded and dismayed that allah was powerless, a false god, and their devotion to that false god will abruptly come to an end; Islam, which is specifically submission to allah, will perish. Muslims will come to know that YHWH God is truly "the existing One;" that He is the El-yōn' meaning Most High over all of the earth.

And this bring us finally to the pair of clickable images at the top. Those images are taken from a modern reproduction of a 1924 publication by the Muslim Orphanage Printing Press, Jerusalem, which was run by the Muslim Supreme Council (the Waqf) in Jerusalem.  An identical 1925 reproduction is available through a TempleInstitute.org online .pdf file (link) if anyone is interested.

Whether or not the current edifices (Dome of the Rock and Al Aqsa Mosque) are destroyed during the fulfillment of Psalm 83 is beside the point made above about Muslims finally recognizing YHWH God, the God of Israel. Given that the generation of Muslims which wrote that the identity of the site of the Dome of the Rock with the site of Solomon's Temple is beyond dispute, how likely would it be that any YHWH worshiping former Muslim would object to a new Temple standing on this same site for the purposes of worshiping "the existing One; the El-yōn'?  None I would say, or at least not enough to make a difference in objection. In fact, I would tend to think those former Muslims which are now YHWH devotees would even assist their Jewish cousins in any manner possible to construct it as quickly as possible.