Global Update: Impact of Israel’s Elections and How Our Work is Helping Christians Facing Devastation in Nigeria

Israeli politics are multi-faceted and ever changing. Recently, a new coalition has formed, and it is looking like Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu might be out.

For more than a quarter of a century, Benjamin Netanyahu has been involved in his nation’s politics. The longtime minister is launching a last-ditch campaign against his adversaries in hope of undermining the current votes that enable a new government to form. Although, his time may be up now, as Israel is continuously in election mode. It’s very different than our system and sometimes hard to follow.

Under the Biden Administration, Israel has faced renewed assaults from its enemies worldwide. As we told you, just recently rockets were raining down by the terrorist group Hamas with the support of Hezbollah – and ultimately Iran – onto our ally Israel.

ACLJ Senior Advisor for National Security and former Ambassador to Germany Ric Grenell explains how Germany now has a law banning the terrorist group Hezbollah:

Look, this is a very concerning issue. As you know, the European Union does not ban Hezbollah outright. And that’s a real problem. I mean you think about Hezbollah, an admitted, known terrorist organization. Yet, the EU does flip flops trying to figure out how not to offend the terrorists because they don’t want to inflame it. So, when I was Ambassador to Germany this was a real problem and I worked with Secretary Pompeo to make this a priority. . . . We went on a yearlong campaign to convince the Germans that they couldn’t wait for the European Union. They finally took action. They now have a law that bans Hezbollah. And they have the tools to arrest anyone who is organizing and supporting Hezbollah including anyone financing this terror. This is a really big deal. It's too bad the rest of Europe doesn’t follow.

The ACLJ takes every action we can at the U.N. to point out human rights violations. We filed a written submission to the U.N. requesting that the U.N. condemns Hamas and the Palestinian Authority for their many violations of international human rights.

ACLJ Senior Counsel Skip Ash comments on the purpose of this submission:

The purpose was to point out to the Human Rights Council that it is not the Israelis who are the ones violating international law. It’s not the Israelis who are in violation of human rights laws. It is in fact the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip primarily, although not solely I mean the Fatah and the Palestinian Authority also violates human rights . . . , but we are  writing because Israel is constantly under attack. The U.N. Human Rights Council has one permanent country on its agenda and that is Israel. . . . It is Israel that is always the one being attacked.

ACLJ Senior Counsel for Global Affairs and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has tremendous insight when it comes to international affairs, especially when it comes to the persecution of Christians and other religious minorities around the world. During his time as Secretary of State, he designated Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern. When asked how this decision came about, he responded:

The work that the ACLJ did was very informative for our team at the State Department when we began to evaluate whether or not to designate them as a CPC, as a Country of Particular Concern. . . . My team at the State Department worked this issue hard. We don’t do this lightly. When we designate a country as a CPC, it’s because there are egregious violations of religious freedoms. . . We wanted to use the full force of the U.S. law and the full capacity of U.S. diplomatic pressure to convince President Buhari and the leadership in Nigeria that the right thing to do was to protect these religious minorities and these places from threats. The threats from rape, assault, torture, from having their villages burned down, and all of the things we have seen happen in Nigeria was something that concerned us greatly, and the ACLJ contributed to the data set that underlay the decision I made.

This is an issue the ACLJ will continue to engage in.

ACLJ Director of Policy Harry Hutchison summed up why the ACLJ is needed now more than ever:

In addition to policy, vision matters. We also know elections matter. So, while Rome burns, while the border crisis mounts, because of the ineptitude of the Biden Administration, while Christians are being held captive in Nigeria, Asia, and elsewhere, the ACLJ has remained vigilant and our ability to do so depends heavily on our listeners and donors.

Today’s full Sekulow broadcast is complete with even more analysis of the updates on Christians in Nigeria and the situation in Israel.

Watch the full broadcast below.