The Rabbinical Council of Judea and Samaria issued a statement Thursday in which it said that the results of Israel's interception of a flotilla trying to break the naval blockade of Gaza "place us at the beginning of the Gog and Magog process where the world is against us, but whose end orders the third and final redemption," according to the Kol Rinah news service. The reference is to the book of Ezekiel 38:18-39:16, read on the intermediate Sabbath of Sukkot (Tabernacles), which describes a war that will precede the final redemption.

The statement continued, "Secular Zionism always aspired that we not be 'a people alone among the peoples', but the legitimacy of our people is not derived from the nations of the world and their hateful traditions, rather from the Torah of Israel which teaches us, "The people will live alone and will not take other peoples into consideration." (Numbers 23:9) The council blessed the soldiers and called for the unity of an emergency government that will bring about promises of salvation for the people.

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