SHOULD AHMADINEJAD HAVE FREE SPEECH?
By Rev. Ted Pike
10 Nov 08
President-elect Obama says he is willing to talk to any international
leader (including Ahmadinejad) if it will make Americans safer. Such
openness horrifies tens of millions of evangelicals who unquestioningly
accept Israel's "Don't talk. Attack!" mentality toward
Iran.
Before Ahmadinejad's recent visit to the United Nations, the International
Christian Embassy (a prominent Jerusalem-based evangelical organization) petitioned
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. It demanded not only that the Iranian leader
be denied freedom to speak to the UN but also that he be indicted for incitement
to genocide against Israel. More than 55,000 people from 128 countries signed
the petition. (See, "Evangelicals
to UN: Indict Ahmadinejad")
Are some people so evil they should be denied freedom to speak in the international
arena? Almost every evangelical lover of Israel says "Yes!" and believes
Ahmadinejad is one of them.
But does God endorse their opinion? Christians, what if we could ask God what
He thinks of banning free speech, even for those considered exceptionally evil?
God reveals His point of view in the Biblical book of Job. There we find Satan
in the presence of a holy God, free to express any evil or malicious idea (short
of reviling God to His face). In this ancient inspired Scripture, God taunts
Satan that He enjoys the complete loyalty of a perfect man, Job. Satan audaciously
boasts that he can make Job curse his Creator. The wager is laid between God's
power to redeem and Satan's to destroy. Job is steadfast. God wins, despite
staggering demonic persecution of Job. Through one man's life, God created
an eternal testimony to those who trust in Him: although it may seem that He
has forsaken us, He is very near and will everlastingly reward.
Could God's faithfulness have been so established if He had not first allowed
free speech to Satan? It couldn't. Having created us free will beings, God warns
that the wages of sin is death. Yet He defers judgment for periods short or long,
respecting our freedom. He may be very angry at what we say, still, He always
allows free will and resultant free speech.
Yet that's exactly what most evangelicals and Jews don't want Ahmadinejad
to have: freedom to speak to the world!
False Prophets Forbade Free Speech
Throughout the Bible, evil Jewish leaders and false prophets routinely
forbade free speech. Their actions anticipated modern "speech
crime" laws, also inspired by evil Jews (the Anti-Defamation
League). There was no grace period then, just as there is none under
modern "hate crime" bureaucracies. Both demanded immediate
silence under threat of harsh penalties. Like hate laws enforcers
now, those evil rulers would not be reasoned with. Truth was not
allowed to be admitted as evidence then or in hate crime tribunals
at present. In times of Elijah, Jeremiah, and John the Baptist, authorities
feared the prophets would humiliate them by publicly laying their
sins bare. Nothing has changed today, as Jewish supremacists attempt
to suppress all criticism of matters Jewish.
With God it is different. From the dawn of creation He allowed Satan free reign
to articulately deceive Eve, and Eve, in turn to persuade Adam to rebel. Except
for incitement to extremely dangerous or egregious sins such as idolatry, blasphemy,
and reviling of parents, the theocracy of the Old Testament never sanctioned
laws and use of force to end free speech. In such exceptions, God allowed free
expression until the moment He cut it off. King David, reviled and stoned
by Shimei as he fled the insurrection of David's son, Absalom, did not allow
Shimei to be silenced. (2 Samuel 16:11) Such indulgence of free speech only
increased in the New Testament age of grace.
The Bible's position could not be clearer: Let there be free speech!
What Ahmadinejad Really Says
Let's take a closer look at what Ahmadinejad actually says.
He alleges that Jewish supremacy represents a primary nexus of evil
in the world, particularly through domination of media, finance,
and government in Western society. He also says Zionist Israel
cruelly oppresses the Palestinians. He views the state of Israel
as a tyranny which came into existence through terrorizing 800,000
Palestinians into fleeing their ancestral homeland in 1948. Israel, he says, continues such oppressions by incarcerating Palestinians
in hellholes of Zionist concentration camps and IDF-occupied territories.
(See, Israel's
Founding: Miracle or Land Grab?) All this is true.
Ahmadinejad advocates an end to the political state of Israel yet the larger
context of his speeches and writings, however, proves he doesn't invite genocide
(extermination) of the Jewish inhabitants of Israel. Yet,
falsely, this is the primary accusation made by Christian Embassy and many
Christians and Jews today.
Founding Fathers Weigh In
What about the authority of America's Founding Fathers regarding
the freedom of evil people to speak? If we could raise Patrick Henry,
Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson from the dead, would they
join today's chorus of evangelicals and Jews attempting to
take free speech from Ahmadinejad? Or would they
sanction overthrow of governments if they become tyrannical and oppressive?
The Bill of Rights maintains it is the right and duty of
the people to overthrow despotism! "But when a long train of
abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces
a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right,
it is their duty, to throw off such Government..." The
Founding Fathers' endorsement of revolution, if necessary, also implies
that whatever inflammatory speech is required to encourage such overthrow
should be allowed.
Would Founders Agree with Ahmadinejad?
Ahmadinejad and the Palestinians are accused of wanting to "drive
Israel into the sea." But did not America's Founding
Fathers attempt, through violence-inciting rhetoric and actual military
offensives, to do just that to the British? They tried to drive the
British into the sea for much smaller offenses than the Palestinians
have suffered under Israel for the last 60 years!
Is Ahmadinejad a new Hitler, or a Patrick Henry, to the oppressed Palestinians?
Concerning his right to free speech, it doesn't matter. Both Biblical
and Constitutional precedence affirm his right to speak – even to the
point of advocating violence against what he perceives as tyranny.
Of course, society must have laws that forbid speech and expression that encourages
harm to the innocent. Yet Ahmadinejad's speech is not directed against the
Jewish people in general, but against a conspiratorial international Jewish
elite and oppressive government and military in Israel. Surely, Israel's
cruel mistreatment of the Palestinians constitutes "a long train of abuses
and usurpations pursuing invariably the same Object [which] evinces a design
to reduce them [the Palestinians] under absolute Despotism…" I
believe that if the framers of our Constitution were to come on the scene today
and be presented with an unbiased description of the plight of the Palestinians
under Israel's harsh dominion, they, like Ahmadinejad, would cry out
for an end to the political state of Israel.
Actually, the Bible prophesies that not Ahmadinejad but, with poetic justice,
Israel's own long-awaited false messiah, antichrist, will turn upon the "great
harlot" Israel, destroying her. Out of ensuing "great tribulation," a
remnant of repentant Jews will believe on Christ at His second coming and,
in obedience, at last have scriptural right to occupy the land. (See, Bible
Prophecy Made Simple)
Conquest through Ideas, not Sword
Today Israel's status as fourth greatest military superpower,
buttressed by at least 200 nuclear missiles, renders futile any attempt
to militarily vanquish her. The Arab world has the right to defend
itself from Zionist/American colonization of the Middle East. But
it should abandon all terrorism, including suicide bombings. Violence
against civilians and incendiary language is the best PR Israel could
imagine, uniting world opinion against the Palestinians and Iran.
It makes their legitimate cries against Jewish supremacy and Zionist
oppression vastly more difficult for the world to accept.
Ultimately, the only feasible way to restrain Jewish supremacy in Israel or
anywhere else is not by the violent revolution America's founders might
recommend but by heeding the cautions of Christ: "all they that take
the sword shall perish with the sword." (Matthew 26:52) The Bible indicates
warfare against the "synagogue of Satan" in all its manifestations
is spiritual – an ideological contest between good and evil ideas. This
battle is waged by the righteous through free speech.
Most American Christians are already very used to limiting their own free speech,
having imposed on themselves and rigorously enforced a century-old ban on criticism
of Israel and matters Jewish. Now, they further help destroy Biblically and
Constitutionally authorized freedom by joining with Jews to deprive Ahmadinejad
of free speech in the international forum. Although increasingly aware that
Jewish-created hate laws threaten their free speech, they hypocritically
unite with those very Jewish supremacists to deny free expression to one whom
Jews declare "beneath representation."
The cycles of history have repeatedly demonstrated that one era's politically
correct become the outcasts of another era. If Christians tear down the social
and legal structures that have protected unpopular speech for centuries, someday
Christians will find themselves without legal protection. Already, the Jewish
supremacists with whom evangelicals have joined—including the Anti-Defamation
League—describe Christian evangelicals as similar to Ahmadinejad, perpetuating "anti-Semitism," "genocide," "spiritual
holocaust," "killing of Jewish souls." How? Do
Christians threaten Israel? No. Their crime is sharing the good news of salvation
with Jews! (See, ADL's
Foxman: New Testament is Anti-Semitic)
With this kind of actual hate speech proceeding against Christians from Jews
in the highest echelons of media control and power, it takes little imagination
to see what's coming. The same Jewish media that deprives Ahmadinejad of free
speech today will as eagerly take it from Christians tomorrow.
