UNESCO grants full membership to Palestinian Authority

UNESCO and the Palestinians-

The Palestinians had lodged a request to the UN Security Council to become a full member state in the United Nations. At the same time, they put in a request to be a full member state in the cultural and scientific organisation of the UN called UNESCO. The vote for the statehood-membership to the organization UNESCO was held this morning in Paris and they granted membership to the Palestinian Authority.

BBC News: UN cultural and scientific organisation, Unesco, votes to allow Palestinian Authority full membership
"The Palestinian move is aimed at gaining momentum ahead of a UN Security Council vote in November on whether Palestine should become a full United Nations member state. Membership of Unesco - perhaps best known for its World Heritage Sites - may seem a strange step towards statehood, says the BBC's Jon Donnison, in Ramallah, but Palestinian leaders see it as part of a broader push to get international recognition and put pressure on Israel. The move comes a month after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas asked for Palestine to become a full UN member state.The UN Security Council is expected to vote on that bid in November. The United States has said it will use its veto.

107 votes for Palestinian UNESCO membership. 14 against. 49 abstain. US, Canada, Germany voted against Palestinian UNESCO bid; Russia, China, France voted in favor; UK abstained. Palestine gets UNESCO membership. Laughter in auditorium when Israel voted no. Huge applause when it passed.

CNN Reports: "22% of its funding in its regular budget comes from the United States, said Sue Williams of UNESCO's press office. A spokeswoman for the U.S. Mission to UNESCO said U.S. funding stands at about $80 million annually. "Any recognition of Palestine as a Member State would not only jeopardize the hope for a resumption of direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, but (it) would endanger the United States' contribution to UNESCO," said an October 13 letter signed by members of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations, which appropriates UNESCO's U.S. funding."

The funding could be cut off based on this US provision of U.S. code which states: "No funds authorized to be appropriated by this Act or any other Act shall be available for the United Nations or any specialized agency thereof which accords the Palestine Liberation Organization the same standing as member states."

I had read last week that the PA also plans to use UNESCO status to lay claim to Israel's Holy and Historical sites. The American Thinker reported thoroughly on this. In that article, they wrote:

"Although UNESCO has no power to confer statehood, Palestinian admittance to this U.N. body will be a launching pad to attack all Jewish and Christian historical claims to the land of Israel. UNESCO has already been complicit in Palestinian historical revisionism when it voted that two of Judaism's holiest sites, the Cave of the Patriarchs and Rachel's Tomb, are not Israel's heritage sites, but mosques. Palestinians will most likely leverage their UNESCO membership to claim the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and the Western Wall of the Temple as wholly Palestinian heritage sites. The Palestinian Authority has already issued a paper denying Jewish connection to the Western Wall. Palestinian claims to sacred Jewish sites can't possibly be based on religious connections. Consider that the Temple Mount is currently being used for picnics and soccer games by Palestinians, and when Palestinians gained control over Joseph's Tomb, they tried to burn it down -- twice. The purpose of laying claim to Jewish holy sites is to erase over 3,000 years of Jewish presence in the land. Denying Jewish history is a stepping stone to denying a Jewish future."

Very true.

It is interesting that the PA attempted several times before to gain membership to UNESCO and failed. It seems that it passed quite easily today.

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Now to prophetic meaning--

The time of the West is declining and the time of the Muslim nations is rising. This is prophesied. The Time of Jacob's Trouble as it is known (the Tribulation last 7 years) is about Israel. Israel is the hand on God's prophetic clock. These things must come to pass as it is prophesied that Israel on that last day will stand alone with all her enemies around her.

"A prophecy: The word of the LORD concerning Israel. The LORD, who stretches out the heavens, who lays the foundation of the earth, and who forms the human spirit within a person, declares: “I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that sends all the surrounding peoples reeling. Judah will be besieged as well as Jerusalem. On that day, when all the nations of the earth are gathered against her, I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. All who try to move it will injure themselves." (Zech 12:1-3).

Why? So that they turn to their Messiah, the One whom they rejected but now call upon!

"For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery, lest you be wise in your own estimation, that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and thus all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, 'The Deliverer will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob'" (Rom. 11:25-26).

That verse tells us that Jews in Israel will be accepting Jesus as Messiah during the Tribulation.

"And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit[a] of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son.' (Zechariah 12:10).

What a glorious God we worship. Though rejected for 2000 years, on that Day He will pour out grace. Not mete it out, not dribble it out, but POUR it out upon those who refused to know Him but now clamor for His grace.

The rapidity with which it is all lining up is stunning and more than awe-inspiring. It seems to me to be like a Mack Truck bearing down on a stranded turtle in the middle of the highway. I'm not looking for it. I'm not hoping for it. But if indeed this report is true that there are nukes in Libya; (and with all that yellowcake it was obvious that there likely would be) unstable, Sharia instituting, al-Qaeda flag planting, Libya- prophesied to be so much a part of the war and horror of the last days, then these wars seem more likely than ever to be near to us in time.

Why do we read & study prophecy and stay attuned to the news of the world in relation to it? Because we are commanded to be ready.

"So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him." (Matthew 24:44).

"When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near." (Luke 21:28).

We study these things so we are not surprised.

"But you, brothers, are not in darkness so that this day should surprise you like a thief. You are all sons of the light and sons of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be alert and self-controlled." (1 Thessalonians 54-6).

We study these things so we can tell others.

"We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts." (2 Peter 1:19)

The Word is more sure than personal experience. The Word is more sure than even the news. The Word is the surest thing there is, the Word IS Jesus:

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it."

Friends, the Word is sure. These things will come to pass. And there will only be two kinds of people, friends of Jesus in the Light (believers) and enemies of Jesus in the dark (unbelievers). The rift is growing and the time is coming to make sure of your salvation. In these uncertain times, two things are certain: they will happen exactly as foretold, and Jesus is our Holy God coming to retrieve the saved (1 Thessalonians 4, 1 Corinthians 15) and punish the wicked. (Isaiah 13:11). Make sure you are in the first group! Email me if you are not sure how. Or visit this link, "The Plan of Salvation."
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