What happens when you put words in Jehovah's mouth? He takes away your right to build a Jesus playground. It's a bummer, Pat. We feel your pain. JERUSALEM - Israel won't do business with Pat
Robertson after the evangelical leader suggested Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon's massive stroke was divine punishment, a tourism official said
Wednesday, putting into doubt plans to develop a large Christian
tourism center in northern Israel.
Avi
Hartuv, spokesman for Israel's tourism minister, said officials are
furious with Robertson's suggestion that the stroke was retribution for
Sharon's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip last summer. "We can't accept
this kind of statement," Hartuv said.
Robertson
is leading a group of evangelicals who have pledged to raise $50
million to build the Christian Heritage Center in Israel's northern
Galilee region, where tradition says Jesus lived and taught.
Under a tentative agreement, Robertson's group
was to put up the funding, while Israel would provide land and
infrastructure. Israeli officials believe the project will generate
tens of millions of tourism dollars.
But the project now is in question in light of Robertson's comments, said Hartuv.
"We
will not do business with him, only with other evangelicals who don't
back these comments," Hartuv said. "We will do business with other
evangelical leaders, friends of Israel, but not with him."
A
day after Sharon's stroke on Jan. 4, Robertson suggested the prime
minister was being punished for "dividing God's land," a reference to
the August pullout from the Gaza Strip and four West Bank settlements.
"God
considers this land to be his," Robertson said on his TV program "The
700 Club." "You read the Bible and he says 'This is my land,' and for
any prime minister of Israel who decides he is going to carve it up and
give it away, God says, 'No, this is mine."'
Robertson's comments also drew condemnation from other Christian leaders and even U.S. President George W. Bush.
The ministry's decision was first reported in Wednesday's edition of The Jerusalem Post.
Christian center planned near Galilee Robertson's
Christian Heritage Center was to be tucked away in 35 acres of rolling
Galilee hills, near key Christian sites such as Capernaum, the Mount of
the Beatitudes, where tradition says Jesus delivered the Sermon of the
Mount, and Tabgha -- on the shores of the Sea of Galilee -- where
Christians believe Jesus performed the miracle of the loaves and fish.
The
project underlines how ties have strengthened in recent years between
Israel and evangelical Christian groups that support the Jewish state.
Israel
was considering leasing the land to the Christians for free. Tourism
Minister Avraham Hirschson predicted it would annually draw up to 1
million pilgrims who would spend $1.5 billion in Israel and support
about 40,000 jobs.
Hirschson,
however, is one of Sharon's biggest supporters, and a member of the
centrist Kadima party recently founded by the prime minister.
Hartuv left the door open to continuing the project, but only with people who don't back Robertson's statements.
What a shock it must be to Robertson to be actually held accountable
for his bizarre statements. Maybe eventually the media here will get
around to acting as forthrightly around him as the Israelis have. The
idea of this Christian center in Galilee sounded like a mistake anyway
(speaking as a Catholic); there are enough tensions in that part of the
world without a bunch of right-wing evangelical Americans making it
worse. Pilgrims of all religions should be able to visit Galilee
without having to endure proselytizing and (no doubt), getting hit up
for "donations" from Robertson's cabal.
Hahahaha! Of course, I think everyone but Pat saw that coming. To bad, Pat, no Jesus World for you!