Bible TimePsalm 9: Gaza Cease Fire
Israel foreign minister Tzipi Livni was in Washington DC hours before news leaked that Israel was planning a unilateral cease fire.
Psalm 9
Theoretical Time:
- 12999-13-26 02:6:19 AA
- 2009-01-16 19:48:00 TMMT
- 2009-01-16 17:27:06 GMT
- 2009-01-16 12:27:06 EST
26 Psalms 9
1I will praise you, Yahvah, with my whole heart; I will show forth all your marvelous works.
2I will be glad and rejoice in you and I will sing praise to your name, most High.
3When my enemies are beaten back, they will stumble and perish before your presence.
4For you have maintained my right and my cause; you have sat on the throne, righteous judge.
5You have rebuked the Gentiles and you have destroyed the wicked; you have blotted out their name forever and ever.
6My enemies have been annihilated by the sword forever; and you have destroyed the villages and their very memory has perished.
7But Yahvah will endure forever; he has prepared his throne for judgment.
8And he will judge the world in righteousness and the people in uprightness.
9Yahvah will also be a refuge for the poor, a refuge in times of trouble.
10And those who know your name will put their trust in you; for you have not forsaken those who seek you, Yahvah.
11Sing praises to Yahvah, who lives in Zion; declare among the people his skillful actions;
12for he has remembered to avenge their blood; he does not forget the cry of the poor.
13Have mercy on me, Yahvah, and consider my trouble which I suffer of those who hate me, who removes me from the gates of death,
14that I may declare all your praise in the gates of the daughter of Zion; I will rejoice in your salvation.
15The Gentiles are sunk down in the pit that they made; and their foot is caught in the net which they hid.
16Yahvah makes known the judgment which he executes; the wicked is snared in the work of his own hands.
17The wicked will be turned into the grave, and all the peoples that forsake God.
18For the poor will not always be forgotten; and the hope of the poor will not perish forever.
19Arise, Yahvah; do not let man prevail; let the Gentiles be judged in your sight.
20Appoint for them a lawgiver, that the Gentiles may know themselves to be but men.
Gaza Cease Fire
Within hours of the theoretical time, Friday evening in Israel, word began to leak out that Israel was planning a unilateral ceasefire.
This comes hours after the United States and Israel signed a memorandum of understanding while Isreal's foreign minister Tzipi Livni was in Washington DC for the day.
Being unilateral, Hamas has not committed to anything in particular and vowed to keep firing rockets until the last Israeli solder left Gaza.
Debka reported that Israeli military commanders were furious at the apparent change of heart on the part of Israeli civilian leadership.
The plan was expected to be put before a vote of Israel's cabinet on Saturday evening, January 17, 2009, basically after the Sabbath.
The structure of the Psalm leaves it unclear who is being addressed. The Psalmist leaves judgement to God which is probably the issue here. The Israeli military want to continue the assault on the ground while the political forces want to leave it to others to judge what has happened.
The tension is if Israel gained anything from this war, especially without a written agreement from Hamas, but the issue for Israel is that Hamas probably would not keep to any agreement anyway, so why bother seeking paper.
Note on timing: The time for this Psalm bumps into the Sabbath, when most activity ceases in Israel. The news of the agreement leaks out soon after the Sabbath begins, but the vote waited until the Sabbath was over.