
The Likud party is absorbing old faces into its ranks, including Binyamin Begin and Natan Sharansky. Both had once been Likud Knesset members in previous governments, but left the Knesset due to disillusionment of the political scene. Many old-timers who come with strong nationalistic-Zionistic leanings and impeccable backgrounds of integrity, like Begin and Sharansky, are being wooed back to Likud by chairman Binyamin Netanyahu. But the Likud party is adding new faces as well, ones that the Israeli public may not be so comfortable with – messianic Christians.
Recently, some "Christian Zionists" who see their destiny entwined with Israel's, and who have moved to Israel and obtained citizenship here, are pumping money, and building themselves a power base within the Likud by partnering in a number of projects and joining The World Likud Board of Governors.
Author and researcher Ellen Horowitz told Israel National Radio's Weekend Edition that their money and energies are directed towards influencing and becoming a part of the political scene. Although Horowitz expressed enthusiasm for the changes taking place in the Likud with the return of older respected members, she also cautioned about the Likud's newest friends.
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Horowitz stated that certain Likud activists "get very excited when they see the kind of enthusiasm that the evangelicals bring here when they come to Israel, but they don't understand the dangers. And they don't understand the Halacha (Jewish law)."
She also cited certain Christian groups that are also involved in evangelistic efforts here in Israel, calling upon "messianic Christians to move en-mass to Israel, to buy land, and to lay claim to their right to own a home in the Land of Israel because they believe they have been grafted into the commonwealth of Israel, through Jesus. …And Israel is therefore their eternal inheritance which they have equal partnership in, with their brother Judah [religious Jews]." Horowitz said. "So in other words, they [Christians] are basically laying a 'claim'... to the Land of Israel."
New projects, like the World Biblical Zionists, are being activated, Horowitz continued, "where they plan to bring one million Christians to Israel, to live here."
Horowitz is currently working with a team of community leaders and activists who are coordinating their efforts with rabbinic leaders, counter-missionary specialists, educators, and internet developers to create an online presence which will monitor and provide pro-active responses to missionary campaigns and activities which target Jews in the Jewish State.
Horowitz concluded the interview by saying, "The financial, moral and political support, as well as the fight against anti-Semitism… …which currently emanate from certain sectors of an evangelizing Christian world, should not open the door for the Jews in Israel and the Diaspora to break down Torah fences and sanction idolatry, apostasy, and Christian influence in Eretz Yisrael (The Land of Israel). This amounts to spiritual destruction. And it's my overwhelming recommendation, that Jewish and pro-Israel organizations and individuals do not … cooperate with missionaries."