Headline: Israelite History and the Boston Marathon Bombing

You might not think that there is a connection between the Boston marathon bombing and Israelite history but, unfortunately, there is. Sixteen years ago I made a film called “Quest for the Lost Tribes” (http://www.apltd.ca/store/5). Basically, the thesis of the film is that the so called “lost tribes” of Israel i.e., ten Israelite tribes that were taken into exile some 2,700 years ago and disappeared from Western history, were actually very much not lost. The Bible tells us that they were taken to a place called Havor on the River Gozan and today the Havor Pass, known by its anglicized name as the Khyber Pass, is close to the Pakistani city of Peshawar, which also means the city of Havor. It is on the River Gazni. In other words, the place that the Bible describes exists on the Pakistani-Afghan border and, what do you know, there are 16 million people living there that call themselves “Bani Israel” i.e., “the children of Israel”.

They still live in tribal structures corresponding to the Biblical tribes. The tribe of Ephraim is now called Afridi, Gad is called Gadun, Reuven is called Rabani and so on. There is even a tribe called the Yusufsai i.e., the children of Joseph (http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/2.209/could-the-taliban-be-genetically-linked-to-the-jews-1.261447). We traveled to the Khyber Pass sixteen years ago and moved among the people that we call Afghans or Pathans. They call themselves Pashtun or Puchtu and they say that they are Israelites. Our film documented the many, many connections between the modern Afghani tribes and the ancient Israelites. Since the return of the tribes is prophesied in the Bible, I assumed that the discovery of the tribes would have a great impact on a Western audience. At the very least among Israelis, Jews in general and Christians. After all, the fate of the lost tribes of Israel is tied up with the fate of all Israel.

The film did pretty well in the ratings and has a bit of a cult following, but it didn’t change history. Several times I met up with academics who scoffed. They couldn’t believe that this is real. One told me that the Afghanis had “made up an Israelite history so that they could feel important”. When I asked him why 16 million Muslims would want to invent a Jewish past, he had no answer. In fact, not only did they not make up an Israelite history for themselves, some of them denied it. When we were in the tribal territories on the Afghani-Pakistani border, we found that the Jihadists rejected their Israelite background. During the second World War, a theory took hold that the Pathans were of “Aryan” stock. I guess faced with the power of Nazi Germany some Afghans preferred to be Aryans rather than Jews. This theory was resuscitated by Jihadists who didn’t want to be connected in any way, shape or form with Israel – ancient or modern. But these people were in the minority. Even members of the Taliban told me that they are the descendants of Israelites. They pointed out that the very name “Afghanistan” means “the land of Afghan”. Afghan, they said, was a son of Saul, the first king of Israel. He fled to this area, they said, to get away from King David who took over the throne. In other words, from the perspective of the Afghans, the very name of the country is Israelite in origin. They also pointed out that the name of their capital, “Kabul”, appears twice in the Bible (Joshua 19:27 and Kings 9:13). There were two Kabuls in ancient Israel. One mentioned as a city conquered by Joshua, and the other in the north of Israel. The tribes of Israel, they said, transplanted Israelite city names to their place of exile. Even the mountain range next to their capital is called “Suliman,” after King Solomon. All these Israelite connections are common knowledge in Afghanistan.

A few times I approached some US defense ministry types with this history. They weren’t particularly interested. “What’s the point?” they asked. “The point,” I said, “is that you should connect with these people by connecting with their history. They are not necessarily anti-Western. They are not anti-Israel. The Taliban is a political movement that is the creation of Pakistani Intelligence. It’s a foreign implant. If you want to undermine Jihadism, connect with the Bani Israel’s natural Israelitism.” To illustrate my argument, I pointed out that in the Bible there were “cities of refuge” in ancient Israel. The only place where that tradition continues is among Afghanis. Unlike Western intelligence services, Bin Laden understood the Israelite ideology of the Pashtun and took residence for a long time in a city of refuge. He knew the Pathans would never give up someone who has taken refuge in such a protected environment. Unlike the West, he used the Afghanis’ Israelite beliefs to his advantage. Again, no one paid attention.

Now a distressing trend is taking shape. Some of the Jihadists have changed their minds. They are no longer saying that they are Aryans. They are no longer denying their Israelite past, they are embracing it – but with a twist. Instead of returning to their Israelite roots they are using their history to rationalize Islamic terrorism. One of the videos posted on the deceased suspect’s YouTube page is a Jihadist propaganda film (http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/19/do-social-media-profile-youtube-videos-belong-to-the-boston-bombers/). Basically, it uses hypnotic music and images of “glorious” fighters along with quotes from various Islamic texts to make an End of Days prophecy. The video is called “The Emergence of Prophecy: The Black Flags From Khorasan”. It quotes a hadith, a prophecy ascribed to Mohammad, which states that in the End of Days the “Mahdi” i.e., the Muslim messiah, will emerge from the area of Afghanistan. It states that this messiah figure will lead an army for Islam and that he will not be an Arab. Rather, he will be an Israelite. Basically, this Jihadist ideology attempts to hijack the Israelite history of the Afghans and put it to the service of Islamic fundamentalism and an ideology of terror. The Jihadists use all kinds of clips to enhance their video including one from a Hollywood film and the other from my “Quest for the Lost Tribes”.

So I want to come back to my original point – when I went to the Afghan tribal territories sixteen years ago, hardly anyone cared about Afghanistan. Then, after 9/11, people cared about conquering the area but not about learning its history. You can’t fight ideology with brute force. The only way to fight them is to understand them. You can’t entice them with liberalism. It’s simply not attractive to them. But you can mobilize them by connecting with them. The Pakistanis understood that and they created the Taliban so that they could control Afghanistan by Islamic proxy. The West should take a page out of the Jihadist propaganda book. We should be using the Afghans’ Israelite history to connect with them on a primordial level that they can identify with and understand.

Put simply, we must approach the people of Afghanistan as Israelites and they will respond as Israelites. At least some of them. The West may scoff at their Israelite claims, but they take their own history seriously. Approach them as Israelites and they may connect with modern Israel and its allies, primarily the United States. I know. I moved among these people and they embraced me as a brother. It’s time that we reached out to them and let them know that their natural allies are not Islamic fundamentalists. Rather, because modern Israel is part of the Western sphere, the natural allies of the Afghan people are Westerners.

The Afghans call their holy law “Puchtuwalli” i.e., the law of the Pathans, the law of the Bani Israel. They respect this law before they respect even the Koran. Puchtuwalli is basically the written Torah. Biblical laws without the context of the oral law. In their books, an “eye for an eye” is a literal statement. But this law, even in its basic form, is a common basis for a relationship. They’ve been separated from their fellow Israelites for too long, but there is a bridge. The bridge is not Western liberalism, it’s their Israelite consciousness. It’s time that the poison of the “Black Flags From Khorasan” ideology is neutralized. The only way to do this is by working within the matrix of their own psyche. The only way to fight bad ideology is with good ideology.