Christian Zionism - New Life Tabernacle of Chattanooga

6.4 Demonising Islam
Donald Bridge was for some while Warden of the Garden Tomb, a focal point
for evangelical pilgrims in Jerusalem. His views are illustrative of other
Christian Zionist authors. In his guide book, Travelling Through the Promised
Land, 1323 Bridge repeatedly caricatures and slanders Muslims. In describing
the significance of Jerusalem to the three monotheistic faiths he writes, ‘Jews
worldwide mark their calendars with events that took place here. Muslims
worldwide are eager to engage in holy wars here.’ 1324 When describing the
Temple Mount, Bridge writes, ‘Arab feeling soon runs high here, and is
expressed in anti-Christian and anti-Jewish frenzy. Mullahs shouting over the
minarets’ loudspeakers can turn a congregation into a rampaging mob within
minutes.’ 1325 On a walk through the Old City of Jerusalem he contrasts the
Muslim and Jewish Quarters:
‘The Jewish Quarter basked in golden sunshine ... Take a few steps
out of the Jewish into the Arab Quarter and the contrast is dramatic. It
is more colourful, more noisy, more crowded, more dirty. The sounds
and smells are totally different. The (to us) alien chant, part moan, part
yell, part gargle echoes hauntingly from a dozen minarets ... Arab
head-dresses splash the heaving crowds with black and white or red
check, and about one in every fifteen looks uncomfortably like Yasser
Arafat.’ 1326
Besides erroneously describing the Muslim Quarter as Arab, (since all of the
Old City is designated Arab in international law), the book would have
probably been labelled anti-Semitic had Bridge actually written,
‘uncomfortably like Menachem Begin,’ or ‘Yitzhak Shamir’.
Anti-Arab and Islamaphobic sentiments have become even more
widely tolerated since 11 th September 2001. For example, numerous
dispensational authors have written about America’s war against Islamic
terrorism following the tragedy. 1327
Lindsey’s antipathy is evident when he
1323 Donald Bridge, Travelling Through the Promised Land, (London, Christian Focus, 1998).
1324 Ibid., pp55-56.
1325 Ibid., p70.
1326 Ibid., p60.
1327 See John Hagee, Attack on America, (Nashville, Nelson, 2001); Grant R. Jeffrey, War on
Terror, Unfolding Bible Prophecy, (Toronto, Frontier Research, 2002); Randall Price, Unholy
War, America, Israel and Radical Islam, (Eugene, Oregon, Harvest House, 2002); Ray
Comfort, Nostradamus, Attack on America and More Incredible Prophecies, (South
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