Mark Armstrong on the Middle East, North Korea and Comey Memos

Mark Armstrong, leader of the Intercontinental Church of God, son of Garner Ted Armstrong, grandson of HWA, has released another weekly update (April 20, 2018).

Let's see what he has to say.

First he talks about the State of Israel celebrating the seventieth anniversary of its independence. The COGs tend to view the State of Israel as a sort of good luck charm which will somehow cause Christ to return. Furthermore because of the inaccurate doctrine of British Israelism the predominantly American followers of Armstrongism believe that Jews are related to themselves. While it is true that all humans are related to each other white Americans are not related to Jews in the way that British Israelism teaches.

Greetings from Tyler, 

Seventy years later, Israel remains on the map. Like an oasis in the midst of a vast desert, the tiny sliver on the globe is a bastion of freedom like few places on earth. Muslim interests have tried endlessly to eradicate the phenomenon through wars, with terrorism and with mindless accusations of every imaginable evil and they're not through yet. Well, some of them are. Egypt recognized the expensive futility of the endless state of war and, under Anwar Sadat, made peace. Jordan also came to grips with under the reign of King Hussein after having been defeated and humiliated twice, realizing peaceful coexistence was the only viable option. 

Actually for most of its history since it proclaimed independence in 1948 the State of Israel has been the superior military power compared with the other Arab nations. In 1956 the Israeli army was able to seize the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt in just eleven days, but they were compelled to give it up after political pressure from President Eisenhower. In 1967 Israel's army seized the Sinai Peninsula again in six days. Israel eventually acquired nuclear weapons. For years now Israel has conducted air strikes against the Assad regime in Syria at various times according to various reports outside of Israel and the Assad regime does not dare retaliate in a similar manner. To this day the Arab nations have not been able to gain military parity with the State of Israel.

Also Egypt made peace partly because the Israeli government agreed to return the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt. Jordan made its peace treaty with Israel in 1994 partly because they were encouraged by Fatah's agreement to participate in the Oslo peace process the previous year.

He conveniently ignores the issue of the Palestinian refugees. About 750,000 Palestinians were expelled from their homes by Israeli forces during the Israeli War of Independence (1947-9) and, with very few exceptions, the Israeli government has refused to let them return. Some of these expelled Palestinians were also Christians and they also yearn to return.

Even the wealthiest Gulf kingdoms gave up the public fight, while still allowing radical Islamic religious outfits to preach and facilitate terrorist activities. Terrorist attacks have been visited upon Europe and the United States primarily because of acceptance and support of the Jewish state. But Israel's list of outright enemies consists of Iran, Syria and a laundry list of terrorist outfits hiding behind the religious rants of radical Islamists. 

The highlighted statement is troubling. Is Mark Armstrong blaming the State of Israel for the problem of Al Qaeda like extremists? We should blame the terrorists for their terrorism and not other people. We need to be careful to be responsible with what we say. One reason Al Qaeda extremism have arisen was because of the preaching of one Abdullah Azzam, who revived the idea of waging war with a twisted interpretation of religion as a motivation in order to lead people to go to Afghanistan and fight the Soviets. This idea was later used by Osama bin Laden but he changed the target and decided to attack America instead of Russia.

When President Trump announce that the American Embassy would be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem the mainstream media erupted with a series of dark predictions as to the angry reactions across the Arab world potentially leading to war.

Actually a lot of people were upset with that decision. Many Palestinians protested this decision in the Holy Land and some of them were even killed. This decision makes it harder to forge a peace agreement between the State of Israel and the Palestinians. The Palestinians want Jerusalem, more specifically East Jerusalem, to be the capital of an independent Palestinian state. Not having East Jerusalem is not much of an option for the Palestinians since it would be a major source of revenue in an independent Palestinian state containing the land Israel conquered in 1967. It seems evident that the Palestinians will not give up East Jerusalem.

For seventy long years hate-filled Imams and sheiks preached of driving the Jews into the Mediterranean Sea as they ran from the fires and explosions of Muslim wrath. Instead, fireworks displays went off in the skies above Jerusalem this week celebrating 70 years and counting. The new American embassy in Jerusalem is expected to open next month.

The COGs teach that the State of Israel will in the near future be conquered during the Great Tribulation shortly before Christ's return. So the COGs seem to agree with these "Imams and sheiks" that some sort of cataclysm will soon be visited upon the State of Israel.

But Iran, or rather Iranian religious and political leaders are still living the dream, such as it is. A spokesman for their Revolutionary Guard blustered this week that their “finger is on the trigger” of missile systems aimed at Israel and its military assets. “Our missiles are ready to be launched at any moment...The only way for you to escape will be to the sea!” There it is, that seventy-year-old dream of driving the Jews into the sea. 

Such heated rhetoric is of course a concern but the State of Israel has an army. Israel gets about 25% of its military expenditure paid for as aid by the US government. They even have nuclear weapons as an option. Israel is far from helpless. This is one reason why a peace treaty between the State of Israel and the Palestinians would be good since that would deny a pretext for Iran.

Mark Armstrong then seems to boast about the recent air strikes against the Assad regime in Syria.

We don't know how successful Iran has been at placing military assets in Syria, but presume Israel does. The missile air-strikes against Syria's chemical production and storage facilities apparently went off without a hitch. Apparently, no one was even hurt, while structures and storage depots were eliminated. Russia stayed completely out of the way, leaving many a brilliant analyst with crow on his face, even though there are outstanding questions about the validity of chemical attack still circulating.

Without question things are in a dire state in the Middle East at present. But the COGs insist that things will get far worse. They insist that some sort of nuclear war will soon occur. They insist that things will only get better after Christ returns. In other words there is no hope and no one can do anything to help until Christ returns. That is a terrible way to view matters. How is anyone supposed to do anything constructive thinking like this? It is better to have hope and to know that peace is possible no matter remote it may seem at present. Peace will return to the Middle East. May that day soon dawn.

He then talks about North Korea.

Other than the obvious tensions between Russia, China and the United States, Iran, with its nuclear ambitions, remains the world's number one concern. Until a few weeks ago, that dubious honor belonged to North Korea. You haven't forgotten his threats, or the responses from the Trump administration leading scores of elite media experts to warn that World War III would be ignited by a presidential tweet storm. In case the news organizations forgot to apologize for their criticisms of the unhinged, clinically insane egomaniac who was about to blow up the world inadvertently, that never happened. And when it didn't, they pretended not to notice. 

And so we see Mark Armstrong using tensions regarding North Korea to once condemn the media.

Now we know that Mike Pompeo, Director of the CIA and nominee for Secretary of State has been in high-level negotiations with North Korea, maybe Kim Jong-un himself. It seems too fantastic to believe, particularly after all the scare-mongering on cable news. Maybe North Korea is leading diplomats down a primrose path and it's another trick like those played on numerous previous administrations. If so, we'll know soon enough, and the dire predictions will resume. In the meantime, the Japanese are sleeping a lot better without missile tests overhead. Several reports indicate that real progress has been made and that President Trump may indeed meet with Kim Jong-un on neutral territory sometime in the near future. 

Of course he happens to be quite pleased when things seem to go well for his preferred president.

He then mentions the recent release of Comey's memos regarding his conversations with Mark Armstrong's preferred president.

Lastly, the Russia-collusion story has fallen completely apart, though CNN has yet to notice. The Comey bombshells weren't even firecrackers. His classified Memos, released overnight, dispute the posture taken in his book and promotional interviews. His memos exonerate Trump, both on the Russia-collusion accusation and the obstruction of justice claims. Still, the false “dossier” has given Comey and all the sober media analysts the opportunity to use Trump's name in close proximity to descriptions of ladies of the evening and various unmentionable exploits. They can't get enough of it. They repeat the same grotesque phrases again and again, (as does Comey in self-righteous whispers) in the apparent hope that the President's name will become synonymous with the lowest of behavior.

Actually the memos do not discuss the evidence of alleged collusion with Russia and the memos' similarity with Comey's later testimony further enhances his credibility on this particular topic. It seems quite clear that these memos will not stop the ongoing investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

Mark Armstrong insists that there is some sort of conspiracy against his preferred president being conducted by "top officials in the FBI, the DoJ, the NSA and the CIA," an allegation that serves to make his followers inclined to ignore whatever such individuals may say about any investigation involving his preferred president. He is teaching his followers to ignore their statements.

Despite the underhanded efforts of top officials in the FBI, the DoJ, the NSA and the CIA, the truth of their conspiracy in violation of laws they were sworn to uphold and defend, is leaking out more rapidly all the time. Suddenly the “professional career public servants” are playing defense. They were so sure that their activities would be covered by a Hillary Clinton presidency that they got sloppy and put all kinds of evidence against themselves in writing, casually. Even joyfully. That's how arrogant these people were. Though we'd never heard of some of them at the time, they're rapidly becoming household names bound for infamy. 

He ends his polemic insisting that he will never let himself submit to the Pope even though he never mentioned the Pope anywhere else in this weekly update. No one can force to become Catholic so why is he worried about the Pope?

The very survival of the United States as a Constitutional Republic still hangs in the balance, despite some of the largely ignored good news. It seems the large corporations, mainstream media, social media and educational institutions are determined that we all bow down to the dictates of political correctness. That's not going to happen, not even if the pope himself demands it. Especially if the pope demands it!  

Mark

And so yet another weekly missive from Mark Armstrong comes to an end. Somehow the people in his organization still take him seriously and send tithes to his organization.