Continued from the previous chapter.
As the recent (Oct. 2003) Islamic summit in Malaysia openly called on all Muslims to fight against the Jews, Gog must now be very happy as he watches, from his living room, these groups growing in such passion. Perhaps Gog has already decided to use Muslims to win the Middle East. Upon advertising that he is anti-Israeli and/or anti-West, Gog can quickly secure swarms of angry desert pirates for his own purposes.
Moreover, as Russian soldiers, like most Russians, are impoverished, the possibility of someone like Zhirinovsky taking a good portion of the whole lot for an iniquitous swarming of the Middle East is not unimaginable. It might play out better for him if his conquests do not include a large compliment of Russian soldiers sanctioned by the Russian President...unless the UN sanctions them for peacekeeping purposes; Gog can then use them secretly for his own purposes i.e. not in line with the UN agenda. The Daniel prophecy reveals that he will certainly become brazen, and by no means will he continue a peacekeeping role if indeed he ever starts with one. For Daniel reveals this:
With ease, even into the rich places of the [Iraqi] province, he will enter. And he shall do what his fathers have not done, nor his fathers' fathers. He shall plunder and spoil, and scatter goods among them. And he shall devise his plots against the strongholds, even for a time" (Daniel 11:24).
It's hard to believe that someone who sits in a living room could end up like this. I always pictured people in living rooms, at their absolute-naughtiest moments, with custard on their faces, or the oils of potato chips soaking into the carpets. The man in the quote above sounds like a jail-break convict who never knew a living room.
He starts with the "few" fighters -- verse 23 reveals them to include a previously-defeated Iraqi army -- but then builds a great force by sharing what appears to be plunder from invading Iraqi peoples (the Kurds come to mind). One cannot keep such activity hidden from the world. He by that point will have decided to deviate from any sort of peacekeeping or other good-guy role, and become his own boss i.e. a dictator. Previous Russians had been friends and allies with Iraq; Gog will instead rape her. I see this occurring by 2008, but possibly as late as 2009.
[That prediction was due to a 2009-2016 prophetic calendar that I devised and held to with firmness until about 2011, when it was abandoned. But being wrong there doesn't allow me to abandon the rest of what's said in this and related chapters. Not yet, anyway. It should be added that I did not claim the calendar to be a message of God through me; to the contrary, I warned that it could be wrong and some-day retracted. It was advanced in case it was correct, and because there were at least four good reasons for it.]
I could not understand, prior to the Bush-led war, how the Iraqi army, broken by the unidentified army of verse 22, could end up plundering its own people. But, now, as those defeated fighters have been bombing their own peoples, the mystery is no longer. As Gog starts a base in Mosul, and because the Kurds had been the enemies of Saddam, the Saddam loyalists, with Gog on their side, will likely attack the Kurds. Mosul is, after all, in the very face of the Kurdish territories.
But Baghdad will be the better prize. One wonders if some American presence in Baghdad, military and/or diplomatic, will linger until then. As I believe that the False Prophet will be an American president/leader, might not he and Gog work together to rape Iraq? How truly ironic/hypocritical if the False Prophet does so while being a Democrat.
[Update May 2006 -- The Russians have come out publicly this month to announce their readiness and willingness to form a world government, and the United States was emphasized specifically as one of its partners. This announcement occurs as George Bush is at his lowest approval ratings yet, in the lower 30s or high 20s. Might this announcement suggest that the Russians are quite certain that the Democrats will be in power soon, meaning that they wish to form a global government alongside a Democratic-led White House?]
Verse 24 (quoted above) begins to reveal that the size of the Insurgency will become sufficient to plot a Middle-Eastern conquest (i.e. outside Iraq as well), and verse 25 tells how so: there will be Gog-supporters among treacherous Egyptians, those who are willing to betray their Egyptian president on behalf of Gog's agenda. The prophecy tells further that the traitors, and Gog, are successful against Egypt, and that Gog robs that nation's wealth as well.
One can easily predict the treacherous situation befalling Egypt befalling other Muslin nations. While Kuwait comes to mind as a sitting hen waiting to be re-plucked, Isaiah 10 reveals Gog's seizure of Syrian localities -- no small task to be undertaken by mere terrorist groups as we know them; it would require some tanks rather than mere pipe bombs. The conquests of Egypt and Syrian regions (if not Syria as a whole) suggest that the American military has by that time either left the Middle East, or that it is still there but in the hands of a president who for some insanely-desperate reason makes a pact with Gog.
[Update May 2011 -- Russia is playing on the fence in the latest Syria developments. The UN has now entered the Syria civil war, as peace broker to minimize the fighting. Russia needs to play somewhat West-friendly as it seeks to keep Assad in power. As part of it's token gestures to the West, Russia is advocating mere reforms in the Assad government, though that's as far as Russia goes in its public statements. I don't easily foresee a Russian Gog partnering with the West in regards to the prophetic take-over of Syria, but Obama could surprise us all.
The situation as it now stands is not seemingly conducive to a Gog-Sunni partnership (though that could change as fast as a bribe) because it's a news-stated fact that Sunni / Baathists of Mosul and other areas of northern Iraq are, along with the West, seeking to take Assad down. That effort predicts that Iraqi and Syrian Sunni are planning together, and therefore coalescing into a single fighting force, something that is conducive to my view that Baathists (they are Sunni) constitute the end-time Seleucid empire. I don't imagine that the Sunni / Baathists are sworn blood brothers with Obama, so to speak, and besides, if Romney removes Obama from power late this year, we could imagine the Russians taking the Sunni militia to their own whims. End update]
The Daniel prophecy does not seem to touch on end-time Iran, and therefore I don't at this time know the particular timing in which Iran and the other nations listed in Ezekiel 38 will join Gog, whether during his Middle-East conquest in the first half of the Week (= seven-year period of Daniel 9), or only against his Israeli invasion in the second half. But I can assure you that the West will be wetting its pants when this Gog arises, and the Lord of Heaven and Earth may even cause Americans to know instinctively that it's all happening to bring Democracy down, the Democracy that allows Satan's sons equal, if not greater, licence than the people of Jesus Christ.
This is what Democracy is all about: equality for all, equality for Satan. Am I starting to sound like a radical Muslim? They are correct, you know, when Muslims call America the "Great Satan." [America is most-definitely the new Satan that was previously the convulsion of Russia. After Russia awoke from its stroke in paralysis, the devil flew to America to command his schemes there, to ramp up his liberal agenda to the point of furious.] And Europe? God gave Europe to Satan long ago, long before Jesus appeared the first time.
But don't rejoice at this, you radical Muslims, for the greatest Wrath is reserved for you, on the mountains of Israel. Just when you come to believe (along with Gog) that victory in Israel is yours, He will come with a flashing sky to remove your hopes; then you will know that He is the God of Jacob. You bend your backs in vain bowing down to Allah; there is no God but the God of Jacob. Allah was an invention of sword-slicing Arabs.
Although Daniel does not give the reason, one modern nation is said to "escape" the anti-Christ: "Edom and Moab, and the chief of the sons of Ammon" (11:41). These three peoples are today identified collectively as Jordan. How telling, since Jordanian territory funnels from Iraq directly toward the Arab-inhabited West Bank territory of Israel (i.e. west bank of the Jordan river), which in turn leads right up to Arab East Jerusalem where the Temple site sits awaiting the arrival of the Abomination.
Here is how the Daniel-11 prophecy puts Gog's initial invasion of Egypt:
"And he will stir up his power and his heart against the king of the south with a great army. And the king of the south will be stirred to battle with a great and very mighty army. But he shall not stand, for they shall devise plots against him. Yea, those who eat his food shall break him, and his army shall overflow. And many will fall down slain" (Dan.11:25-26).
In that the king of the south is identified as Egyptian in the early segments of the prophecy, so also here in the end-time segment he must be a ruler of Egypt. Though one cannot make it out in the above quote, it becomes clearly revealed, as one reads on, that the loser of this great war will be Egypt. But do note the passion by which the king of Egypt will fight Gog and his Muslim fighters, suggesting that Egypt will remain a firm ally of Israel up until that point.
Egypt's peace treaty with Israel came on the heels, and was an extension, of the Camp David Accord (1978), during which process Egypt and Israel swore peaceful co-existence. And that must surely explain why the Daniel-11 prophecy has the anti-Christ attacking Egypt just prior to, or in conjunction with, his attacking Israel. Note that it is not the current ruler of Egypt who made the camp David agreement with Israel (the one who made it, Anwar Sadat, was assassinated (1981) by Islamic-State Muslims precisely for making that deal), yet the current ruler (Hosni Mubarak) may very well be the one in the Biblical quote above, for he has opposed and even jailed radical Muslims to this day, and stood against Saddam in both wars with America.
[Update May 2012 -- After Mubarak was ousted from power due to insufficient support from his military, he fell ill on a long-term basis and is not likely to return to power. One could argue that Mubarak is the king of the south in the Daniel verses above because he was broken by those who ate with him. That is, parts of his own military allowed to let him go from power. However, the uprising against him was hardly a war as we see wars, nor was it from an invasion for which Mubarak had to raise a "great and very mighty army." One could argue, on the other hand, that Mubarak had to get his entire military to oppose the uprising, but even then, we would be lost to identify the king of the north in that uprising.
The military leaders who chose to let Mubarak go still have a wish to rule Egypt. It's very possible that Western and Israeli powers have been engaging the election process in past months to get a pro-Israeli president. In such a scenario, with the Muslim Brotherhood leading the legislative branches of government, we can't neglect Zawahiri, the Egyptian co-founder of al-Qaeda who is a Muslim-Brotherhood man. We can easily see the Brotherhood pulling strings in the next president's courts in efforts to topple him too. End update]
At about the same time as the Camp David agreement, Muslims at the other end of the political spectrum removed the pro-West Shah of Iran and had him replaced with Khomeini (1979), he going on to create an Islamic State (typically an anti-Israeli state). Arabs have been divided ever since between those who continued to call for the wholesale destruction of Israel, and those who would tolerate in peaceful co-existence. Egypt (under Sadat) had led a war against Israel not long earlier, just in 1973, attacking her on a high-holy Sabbath (Day of Atonement). Greatly outnumbered, Israel won the war to the amazement of the world. Egypt, at that time desired by those who wanted it for Islamic statehood, went pro-peace with Israel, and West-friendly, instead.
Frustrated for decades by repeated/back-to-back war losses to the Israelis (1948, 1956, 1967, 1973, 1982), and most recently to the pro-Zionist Americans, not to mention that Israel successfully bombed Iran's nuclear-bomb-making capabilities not long ago, all anti-Jewish Arabs -- orthodox Muslim or otherwise -- will experience mania when their hopes go ablaze at Gog's overpowering of the Egyptian military. A smoother invasion into Israel itself will then be much more assured. Yet, they must all enter the Holy Land with the watchdog of the West standing guard; it will, apparently, oppose Gog to some degree at that point, probably while biting its nails to the bone.
All is under God's control here, so don't you bite your nails like those who have no Hope. The chilling defeat of Egypt reflects/fulfills Isaiah 30:3, where it says: "The stronghold of Pharaoh shall be a shame to you [Israel], and trusting on the shadow of Egypt a disgrace."
You may read the writings of believers who share that the current peace between Egypt and Israel is favored by God, or is somehow a part of God's re-establishment of Israel in the last days. You will read more often those who see the establishment of Israel (in 1948) by the Rothschilds as favored by God. But Isaiah 30 may suggest differently. In verse 1, just before reprimanding Israel for seeking the shade of Egypt, God complains that Israel carries out plans/schemes that are not His, and makes alliances that are not by His Spirit.
Restrain your opinion, therefore, those of you who insist that Israel was re-established by God in 1948, for as yet we don't really know if that's true. What we do know for certain is that God will re-establish Israel at/after Armageddon. I do not believe that modern Zionism -- as initiated officially by Britain, supported by the Rothschilds and later by the United States, flavored all along by Orthodox/Pharisaic Jewry, and steered by her secular leaders -- is a movement that God supports. This explains why Isaiah 31:3 says that all who help Israel in the end times will perish/fall with her.
Verse 13 (of Isaiah 30) goes on to say that Gog will attack Israel "suddenly," and by the Lord's will, yet the Lord will grant the surviving Israelites the Millennium (touched on from verse 19 up until verse 26). After that, as of verse 27, Armageddon is the topic, while the end of Gog is illustrated skillfully beginning in verse 30, where in verse 31 he is identified as "Assyria." That identification supports his having headquarters in Mosul, which was ancient Nineveh, the capital of Assyria.
According to Ezekiel 38-39, Gog is destined to cover Israel's mountains like a cloud. However, details of Gog's advance into Jerusalem are not given there, although many details are given in the first several chapters of Ezekiel. Daniel 11 provides the timing; in verse 28 we are shown what appears to be Gog's initial strike on Israel -- a small/short "act" -- immediately after the defeat of the Egyptian armies:
"And both of these kings [king of the north and king of the south], their hearts will seek to do evil, and they will speak lies at one table. But it shall not prosper, for the end will come at the appointed time. And he [king of the north] will return to his land with great wealth. And his heart shall be against the holy covenant. And he will act, and he will return to his land" (27, 28).
Aside from his pillaging in Iraq and who knows what other Mid-East peoples, he now becomes fabulously wealthy from the spoils of Egyptian war. I can't say whether the Egyptian conference is before or after the war, but I can predict confidently that soon you will see a happy war-hog on his celebrated way from Egypt "to his own land." I suppose he returns to his own land to count his net-worth, and to discern how far that money can catapult him further, into Israel. For, before returning, this Satan-incarnate "will act" against "the holy covenant."
The Holy Covenant, I believe, indicates God's promise to forever grant so-called "Palestine" to Abraham and his Israeli-line grandson (Jacob), not to Abraham and his son, Ishmael, as the Muslims insist. We might view the current world crisis leading to Armageddon as a family squabble on inheritance rights. But that's not the concern of Gog. Daniel prophecy tells that his primary concern will be precious gems and, bluntly, filthy lucre. Even Ezekiel 38 exposes him as a desperado who convinces himself into Israel merely to acquire her plunder. Still, by the time that he finds himself acting against Israel, the Muslims will have given him a large ego, and he will then act on their behalf, setting his own soul against the Holy Covenant, so that now he becomes a Crusader of sorts, with a holy Mission, and this new agenda, it would appear, takes hold of his spirit passionately.
[In my delving into ancient-historical topics, it was found that Kirkuk, near Mosul, was anciently called, Arrapachitis, apparently named after Arphaxad, an ancestor of Abraham. But Arrapachitis was corrupted to, "Arabkha," according to Wikipedia, which gives the impression that Arabs were named after that place. Then, "Mosul" smacks of "Muslim." We might ponder whether Gog sets himself up in Mosul just because the God of Israel has an end-time message that He wants to send the Arab bedrock.]
Gog's act(ion) against the Holy Covenant is not his successful entry into Jerusalem. That mesmerizing event does not occur until verse 31. What we can resolve is the important detail that the "act" is a military jolt occurring prior to the mid-way point of the Week...thereby alerting us to the anti-Christ's arrival years in advance of the skincode! [If the powers bringing on the skincode wish to hide its approach until it's sprung on us suddenly, it looks like God has given us the means to know just when it's about to be sprung.]
Sadly, much of the Church does not to date view Gog as the anti-Christ, and will not view Gog as such because he will not make a peace deal with Israel. Much of the Church may feel that Gog's initial action against Israel is paving the way toward the final Week, when in reality that Week will already be underway. This explains why my chapters are running so long on this topic, and why I repeat myself in regards to preparing a tribulation retreat, because I have a task in convincing the people of Jesus that Gog is the anti-Christ. As it is, much of the American Church is being led to believe that the anti-Christ comes after Gog is killed in Israel, and that the Church won't need to live through the latter half of the Week anyway, wherefore the Church is not being led to prepare a means to live apart from using the Mark-of-the-Beast skincode.
To me this situation in Prophecy Land is amazing with perplexity, that while prophecy experts know both -- 1) that the Abomination causing Desolation begins as Jerusalem is surrounded by foreign armies, and, 2) that Gog will cover Israel like a cloud -- yet the experts fail to equate Gog with the Abomination of Desolation. Those who hold tenaciously to this error (of viewing Gog and the anti-Christ as distinct persons and attacking Israel on separate occasions) fully expect Gog to fail in his Jerusalem invasion, because the success of that task is reserved for the anti-Christ alone. It may therefore be that those I wish to alert now will not be converted to the reality until Gog enters Jerusalem successfully. But if the bulk of the Church may at that time, and at that time only, understand that Gog is the anti-Christ, isn't that a disaster?
While only a few writers equate the King of the North with Gog, the good news is that many writers have long been teaching that the King of the North is the anti-Christ, wherefore when Christians see the king-of-the-north prophecy fulfilled as outlined as in these chapters, they, along with realizing that the Week has arrived, will understand that the king of the north is also Gog, for it is inconceivable that the anti-Christ should arrive before Gog. But if the king of the north is not a Russian, how will anyone know that the king of the north is Gog? Or, if they don't read these chapters or other writings like them, how will they know that the king of the north has fulfilled anything? Hardly anyone is writing on Daniel 11:21-31 as an end-time event.
Woe be unto the bulk of pre-tribulationists at that time. Tell the truth all of you strange prophecy lovers who for the sake of winning an argument/debate on the rapture timing are sending the people of God to their terrible peril. I say that you are strange because you push your pre-trib rapture as though the Bible had perfect evidence for the idea when in fact there is nothing remotely acting as evidence for it no matter where one reads. The pre-trib arguments that you hold on to, created long ago by clever cultists, are easily explained in a post-trib framework if only you would place half the energy in doing so as you exercise in holding tenaciously to your thin ice.
As Daniel 8 tells us that Gog's military activities against Israel last for 2300 days, the start of those days is quite likely at the act above (of Daniel 11:28). This causes me to believe that Gog's successful strike on Egypt will occur either in a 220-day period just prior to the 2300 days (the Week is considered by some to be 2520 days long), or prior to the 70th Week altogether. In spite of the erroneous teachings now circulating, I believe that in those early days of the Week, God will show many believers the realities that I am here expressing, and I pray and expect God to raise many preachers and writers, before Gog's invasion on Egypt, to echo what I'm saying.
It's not likely that the "ruler of the covenant" is broken within the 70th Week if Gog's first "act" on Israel starts the 2300-day period. For, the ruler is broken in verse 22, well before the "act" of verse 28. Daniel does not tell us the time interval between the breaking of the "ruler of a covenant" and the breaking of Iraq, nor does he tell us which of the two forces is broken first. But, once again, judging by the time that it would take for the events in verses 23-27 to take place, the breaking of Iraq and of the ruler of a covenant is likely well before the Week...especially if the "act" of verse 28 is indeed the start of the 2300 days (as the end of these days is also the end of the Week, the 2300 days -- nearly seven years -- are virtually synonymous with the Week).
Here is yet another theory (i.e. not a sure fact) for your consideration: there will pass at least one year between Gog's invasions in Iraq (v 23) and his initial invasion on Egypt. This theory comes from the term, "a time" in verse 24. That is, since "times, times, and half a time" is known to be a 3.5-year period (e.g. Daniel 12:7), "a time" in 11:24 could indicate "one year." If all true, then
1) the armies of both Iraq and the Ruler of a Covenant are broken well prior to the Week;
2) Gog joins the defeated armies still prior to the Week;
3) Iraq is seized militarily by Gog for a period of one year (i.e. "a time")
ending at/near the start of the Week;
4) At the very start of the Week, and perhaps during that one year, the seven-year
Daniel 9:27 war pact is confirmed between Gog and "the many" anti-Israelis
5) Gog attacks Egypt and succeeds prior to the 220th day of the Week;
6) Gog acts against Israel for the first time on approximately the 220th day (with 2300 days to go), and,
7) Gog returns to his own land probably because he doesn't yet have what it takes to defeat Israel.
There is yet time, prior to the mid-way point of the Week, for Gog to plan and carry out the preliminary stages of a second strike against Egypt. Logically, he plans the attack while in "his own land."
"At the appointed time he will return and come against the king of the south, but it will not be as the former or as the latter. For the ships of Chittim will come against him. And he shall be grieved, and turn [back], and be furious against the holy covenant. And he shall act, and will turn, and will regard those forsaking the holy covenant" (29-30).
Between Egyptian battles, Gog becomes obsessed with Jerusalem while not realizing that he is a mere puppet in God's hand to punish Israel. He imagines himself to be a great one, for everything done to date had turned to gold, and in his mind he finds extraordinary powers. My guess is that he will leave Islamic-State Arabs in charge of Egypt upon his initial victory over that nation, but that soon after pro-West factions will be in charge again, so that Gog feels it necessary to launch a second invasion.
When he is finally poised to re-attack, hoping to bask in yet another rewarding victory so as to springboard into the ultimate invasion of Jerusalem, his desires will include his heroically becoming the one to finally rid Palestine of the Jews. He apparently decides to take the Mediterranean coastal route to Egypt so as to be able to harass Israel in the same thrust. But his fantasy is crushed as a nervous West is ready for him this time with Mediterranean fleets called, "ships of Chittim."
[Update May 2012 -- If it seems a difficulty to imagine Gog's armies driving across the coastal zone of Israel, right past the Israeli capital of Tel Aviv, we might instead imagine that Gog goes to Egypt by ship...which can explain opposition from ships of Chittim. Russia does have a naval base even now in Syria.
After his first success in Egypt, the armies of Hamas in Gaza, and of Hezbollah in Lebanon, should explode in size and power. We could even predict that Lebanon's peoples will be forced into accepting Hezbollah as the supreme governmental faction. An excited and robust Hamas and Hezbollah team may become capable of securing a land route down the Israeli coastal zones, though admittedly, the Daniel prophecy mentions nothing of the kind. It's therefore fuzzy in my mind what the situation will look like at that early time. It may be that the king of the north does his second Egyptian invasion only by sea, but with Hamas on Egypt's border agreeing to do the fighting along with radicals inside Egypt. End update]
I can't decide whether the anti-Christ dons a white shirt and tie in Europe while entrusting his Mid-East military campaigns to commanders, or whether he is knee-deep in the mud of his Mid-East campaigns while entrusting his European rule to another -- e.g. the False Prophet. On the one hand we do have a scripture showing the False Prophet acting on his behalf (Revelation 13:12): "And [the False Prophet] exercises all the authority of the [anti-Christ] before it." Thus, the False Prophet could be the one in white shirt and tie while the anti-Christ is in his army gear.
On the other hand, we have the anti-Christ asking this question: "Are not all my commanders like kings" (Isaiah 10:8), suggesting that those whom he buys with the spoils of war in the first half of the Week could be ruling conquered Middle-East nations in the second half while he gives orders from a European desk.
The invasion of Egypt by Gog is the one expounded upon in Isaiah 19, where it says that the Lord "will shut up Egypt into the hand of cruel lords; and a fierce king shall rule them" (v 4). As the fierce king translates into Gog, the "cruel lords" would translate into his commanders. Note in Revelation 11, where Jerusalem is said to be trampled for 42 months, that it doesn't show the Beast doing so personally, but only the "Gentiles." Likewise, in Daniel 11:31, it is specifically his armed soldiers who enter Jerusalem (to set up the Abomination), not the king of the north himself.
Kittim Behind Me, Satan
This chapter touches on the identity of the Kittim,
and suggests that they could side
with end-time Gog.
Table of Contents