1,000 supporters attend J’lem rally where US broadcaster announces formation of global pro-Israel movement.
By GIL STERN STERN HOFFMANGlen Beck smiling 311(photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem / The Jerusalem Post)
US broadcaster Glenn Beck announced at a Jerusalem rally on Wednesday that he is forming a new global movement that will seek to defend Israel from the United Nations and human rights organizations around the world.The “Restoring Courage” rally attracted more than 1,000 American Evangelical Christians and right-wing Israelis to the Southern Wall excavation site in the Old City. Additional crowds watched the event at Jerusalem’s Safra Square and at more than 1,400 viewing parties in 60 countries around the world, including China and Cuba.RELATED:Beck moves up Jerusalem event due to RamadanBeck gets it right when it comes to the big picture issuesSpeaking above the din of Peace Now activists protesting the event, Beck enthralled the crowd with his praise for the people of Israel and his condemnations of critics of the Jewish state.“In Israel, there is more courage in one small square mile than in all of Europe,” Beck said. “In Israel, there is more courage in one soldier than in the combined cold hearts of all the bureaucrats in the United Nations.“In Israel you can find people standing against incredible odds against the entire tide of world opinion just because it’s right, just because it’s just and just because it’s good.”Turning to the UN, Beck said the “so-called leaders of the world” talk about human rights while they abuse the meaning of the concept by condemning democratic Israel while ignoring dictatorships that murder their own people like Libya, Syria, and North Korea.“The cause of human rights has been taken over by individuals who share little with those who originally led those movements,” he said.“These organizations have become bullies and grotesque parodies of what they claim to represent. They criticize free nations and they spare the unfree. They are nearly comical in their double standards.Whatever moral force they had is spent, and so today, we dismiss them.”
Beck said his new global movement, which will be based in Texas, aimed to “take back the phrase ‘human rights,’ and put it back where it belongs.”The Jerusalem speech was just the first stop in a global tour launching the movement that will take him to South Africa and South America before a major event in Texas on Sunday. Beck will broadcast his show from Capetown onContinued from Page 1 Thursday to remind people about the horrors of apartheid and categorically reject attempts by Israel’s adversaries to call Israel an apartheid state.Beck’s main message to Israelis was to have confidence they are in the right and critics of the state are wrong.“Sadly, even Israelis are beginning to believe the lies and believe that if they do a little of this or this, maybe it will go away,” Beck said. “Do not lose hope. Do not lose confidence in yourself. You must have courage. You must have knowledge that God led you to this land and that God is not a stranger to the children of Abraham.”The rally began at 5 p.m., and finished before dark in order to accommodate thousands of Muslims who came to the Temple Mount for Ramadan prayers. Beck included the Muslim history of Jerusalem, in addition to its Jewish and Christian past, when telling the story of the holy city.Awards were presented at the event to the mayor of Itamar in honor of the remaining members of the Fogel family, whose parents and siblings were murdered there in March, to the Jewish and Arab owners of a Haifa restaurant blown up by terrorists and to Jerusalem supermarket magnate Rami Levi for encouraging coexistence at his branch in Gush Etzion.A letter was read aloud at the event from Muslim Sheikh Abdel-Khaer Jabari of Hebron, who is a wellknown defender of Israel.“You are congratulated for organizing a rally of Jews and Christians standing for Israel,” Jabari wrote. “I greet you with the courage of a loving friend. May we truly act arm in arm together and bring the one God to the universe united in peace.”
