EPICENTER 2.0: INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW EDITION

The attack came hard, fast, and without warning.

At 8:07 a.m. on July 12, 2006, in broad daylight, forces of the Iranian- and Syrian-backed terrorist organization known as Hezbollah (“the party of God”) launched a brazen, unprovoked raid against an Israeli patrol on the Israeli side of the border with Lebanon. Within minutes, Islamic guerrillas had killed three Jewish soldiers and captured two more: First Sergeant Eldad Regev, twenty-seven, and Master Sergeant Ehud “Udi” Goldwasser, thirty-one, who had just gotten married ten months earlier.

The attack caught 7 million Israelis just starting the new day completely off guard. What’s more, it came on the heels of an unprovoked Hamas terror raid on the Israeli side of Israel’s southern border with the Gaza Strip just weeks before.

At precisely 5:40 a.m. local time on June 25, “eight armed Palestinians infiltrated Israel through a tunnel leading from the Strip into Israel’s territory, and split into three teams once they came out,” reported Yediot Aharonot, a leading Israeli daily newspaper. “One team approached an armored personnel carrier stationed at the place and fired at it. The APC was empty and no injuries were reported in that attack. Another group simultaneously fired a missile and hurled grenades at a tank standing nearby. The missile hit the tank’s rear, hurting the four soldiers that were inside. Two were immediately killed, a third soldier sustained injuries and the fourth was initially reported missing. As the incident developed, security officials came to believe that the soldier has been kidnapped. During the attack, a third terrorist team moved in the direction of a desert patrol army post and engaged in a shooting battle with the soldiers.”1

The abducted Israeli soldier, Corporal Gilad Schalit, was only nineteen.

Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert was suddenly faced with a two-front war. He quickly and defiantly rejected negotiations with the radical jihadist groups to get back Schalit, Goldwasser, and Regev. Instead, he ordered the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to launch massive military operations on both fronts aimed at recovering Israel’s men and crippling the Hezbollah and Hamas organizations. Israeli fighter jets bombed runways at Beirut International Airport. Israeli tanks and troops stormed into Gaza and southern Lebanon. But just as the initial attacks by the terror groups had caught Israel and the world by surprise, so, too, did their response.

Rather than finding quick and easy success, the most powerful military in the history of the Middle East found itself strangely outfoxed and outmaneuvered. Over the course of thirty-three days, Hezbollah launched more than four thousand missiles at civilian Israeli targets as far south as Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee, terrifying the Jewish population and causing tens of millions of dollars worth of property damage. More than one million Israelis living along the northern border with Lebanon were forced to flee their homes or live underground in bomb shelters. Meanwhile, the half-million Israelis living near the southern border with Gaza found themselves subjected to thousands more missiles, rockets, and mortars. Many of the weapons fired by the jihadists were launched from inside private homes, local schools and hospitals, and even mosques, making it extremely difficult for the Israeli air force to retaliate without risking enormous civilian casualties and collateral damage.

I had completed the manuscript for the original hardcover edition of Epicenter just a month earlier, making the case that Israel was destined to become the center of global events and interest in the last days of human history. Now a new and devastating geopolitical earthquake was traumatizing the people of the Middle East. Once again, the eyes of the world were riveted on Israel and her neighbors, the epicenter of the momentous events shaking our world and shaping our future. What would the future hold?

The war dominated headlines for weeks. Newspapers, magazines, Web sites, and cable news networks provided almost nonstop coverage of the conflict, even asking whether the war had prophetic implications. In a USA Today article entitled “In the Headlines, Glimpses of the Apocalypse,” columnist Chuck Raasch raised a question on the minds of many around the world: “Are these the end of times? . . . You can’t look at the headlines these days and not conjure up apocalyptic visions. . . . With the war in Iraq persisting, with fresh fighting in Afghanistan, with missiles raining down on even Nazareth, the hometown of Jesus Christ, the world’s most powerful governments and the United Nations appear unable or unwilling to stop a chain of events that may be spinning out of earthly control.”

Raasch was not alone in his analysis. CNN, FOX, and MSNBC devoted numerous segments of their Middle East coverage to asking whether current events suggest we are living in the last days before the return of Christ, as did other networks. A headline in the Waco Tribune-Herald at the time asked, “Are We Living in the Final Days?” A Columbus Dispatch headline asked, “Is the Mideast Rupture a Sign of the Rapture?” Salon.com declared, “The Apocalypse Is Drawing Closer!” Newt Gingrich, the former Speaker of the House, merely added fuel to the fire when he said he believes we are living in “the early stages of World War III.”2

When the shooting stopped and the smoke cleared, attention shifted quickly from prophecy to realpolitik. In just a month, it had become painfully clear to most observers that unlike previous Arab-Israeli wars, this one had not ended with a decisive Israeli victory. To the contrary, Prime Minister Olmert’s military and political strategy had failed badly. Israel’s three soldiers had not been recovered (and still have not been as of this writing). The military machines of Hezbollah and Hamas had not been crushed. Indeed, they were celebrating their “success” against the “Zionist enemy.” Their allies in Tehran and Damascus were suddenly emboldened. Israel no longer looked invincible. Allah, the clerics argued, was preparing to annihilate the Jewish state once and for all.

“The occupying regime of Palestine has actually pushed the button of its own destruction by launching a new round of invasion and barbaric onslaught on Lebanon,” declared Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, triumphantly, echoing the mood of the moment.3

Olmert’s approval ratings plunged into the single digits as Israelis blamed the prime minister for effectively losing the war and severely damaging Israel’s deterrence against other possible aggressors in the region. A government commission would later describe this “Second Lebanon War” (the first being Israel’s war against the Palestine Liberation Organization in the early 1980s) as a “serious missed opportunity” and conclude that the IDF “did not provide an effective response” to the Hezbollah missiles. The commission blasted Olmert and his advisors for “serious failings and shortcomings in the decision-making processes and staff-work in the political and the military echelons and their interface” and found “serious failings and flaws in the lack of strategic thinking and planning, in both the political and the military echelons.”⁴

It was clear that the cease-fire between Israel, Hezbollah, and Hamas was temporary at best. No one knew when the next major round of hostilities would break out. Nor did anyone know whether the next war would be prophetic in nature or merely another devastating regional conflict. But there was no question that all sides were rearming, recruiting, refueling, and readjusting to the new realities on the ground. Nor was there any question that the leaders of Iran, in particular, were more determined than ever to wipe the Jewish state off the map and more convinced than ever that such a feat was truly possible. They had been probing for Israeli weaknesses and found many. They were preparing to strike again, and much harder the next time. They had a set of deeply held religious beliefs compelling them. They had a military plan guiding them. They had a sense of destiny driving them. And the clock was ticking.

Into that environment, we launched the Epicenter book tour on Tuesday, September 18, 2006. Not surprisingly, perhaps, there was a great deal of interest in a new nonfiction book that examined current events in the Middle East, ancient Bible prophecies, and the possible convergence of the two. C-SPAN covered our first event—an address to some 2,500 people at a Bible prophecy conference near Los Angeles—just hours after covering Iranian president Ahmadinejad’s address to the United Nations General Assembly in New York. Interest just seemed to grow from there, from interview and speaking requests, to thousands of e-mailed questions from all over the world, to invitations to meet privately with Jewish leaders, Islamic leaders, foreign ambassadors, military and intelligence officials, high-ranking current and former administration officials, and members of Congress. To be sure, not all of them agreed with my conclusions, but their interest in the subject—and at times even intense curiosity—was, I thought, noteworthy.

But let’s be clear: much of the interest at high levels of the U.S. government and within numerous foreign governments has been generated not by the quality of my prose, but by key events that have played out around the world over the past several years. The significance of such events will become clearer as you read further.

That said, there are several points I should like to make up front.

First, nothing in the following original chapters or appendices has been added to, deleted, or changed in any way. If there are any errors of fact or judgment from the first edition of Epicenter, they remain so that you will have a baseline of my original thoughts and conclusions to compare to your own thoughts and conclusions with the benefit of more time and consideration. This new edition merely adds this new introduction; a new afterword, examining some of the events and trends since the hardcover publication; a new appendix revealing the results of an exclusive new national survey we commissioned on the attitude of American Christians toward Israel, Iran, and the Middle East; and a new appendix with transcripts of interviews I conducted for the Epicenter documentary film released in June of 2007 for the fortieth anniversary of the Six Days’ War.

Second, as with the original edition, my intent with Epicenter is not to persuade anyone of what is coming or what these events mean. Rather it is to explain how I came to write novels that seem to have come at least partially true; to explain various Bible prophecies that have not been given enough attention in the past; to answer many questions that have flowed from the novels and the prophecies upon which they were based; to update readers on new events that are relevant to the prophecies described herein; and to update readers on the work of the Joshua Fund (www.joshuafund.net), our humanitarian relief work in the Middle East. Clearly I have strong beliefs or I would not have written this book. But I do not seek to impose my beliefs. To the contrary, I deeply respect the reader’s right to draw his or her own informed conclusions.

Third, even an updated and expanded edition such as this cannot possibly do justice to the fast-moving developments in Russia and the Middle East. I would encourage readers who would like to know more to visit my weblog (www.joelrosenberg.com). There I track and analyze such events on a daily and weekly basis. Those readers so inclined may also sign up for “Flash Traffic,” weekly and biweekly e-mail updates (free of charge) in which I discuss the most important events and trends from the epicenter.

Thank you so much for your interest in this new edition of Epicenter. It is my sincerest hope that you find it helpful and thought-provoking, come what may.

Joel C. Rosenberg

WASHINGTON, DC

APRIL 2008