An interesting prophecy in the Bible’s book of Zechariah may have been fulfilled when an earthquake struck southern Syria and Lebanon on the very day an attack by Iran and Hezbollah against Israel was anticipated.
Israel has been bracing for an attack by Iran and its proxy Hezbollah ever since the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in Tehran on July 31, according to the Times of Israel.
“Although the strike on Haniyeh was widely assumed to have been carried out by Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government made no claim of responsibility and said it would make no comment on the killing,” Reuters reported.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told Israel to expect “harsh punishment.”
Some have felt the delay in a response may have been because the Islamic State wanted to wait for the Tisha B’Av, or the 9th of Av on the Jewish lunar calendar, which began on Monday evening, Aug. 12, and continued until nightfall the next day. The 9th of Av has traditionally been a date of calamities throughout Jewish history.
However, the Associated Press reported that a 5.5 magnitude earthquake struck the city of Hama at 11:56 p.m. Monday. The official Syria state news outlet said it was a 4.8 magnitude quake, Reuters reprorted. Aftershocks continued into Tuesday morning.
“In Damascus and Beirut — the capital of neighboring Lebanon, where the earthquake was also felt — residents descended to the streets fearing a stronger quake that would collapse buildings,” according to the AP.
Duvi Honig, CEO of the Jewish Chamber of Commerce, authored an opinion piece for the Jerusalem Post. titled, “Heaven sent: Is Lebanon’s earthquake a testament to divine protection?”
“In our collective memory, Tisha B’Av has always been a solemn day, marked by the destruction of the First and Second Temples. This year, however, the day bore witness to what many of us view as a modern-day miracle — a testament to divine intervention that could not have come at a more crucial time,” he wrote.
Dallas Theological Seminary professor Mark Hitchcock explained on his weekly podcast “Marking the End Times” last week that the 9th of Av, which usually falls in early August on the Gregorian solar calendar, is the date Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 B.C. and the second temple was demolished by the Romans in 70 A.D.
What came after the first conquest was a period in Jewish history known as the Babylonian captivity, when much of the population was taken from the kingdom of Judah (modern-day Israel) to Babylon (Iraq).
The captivity ended in 538 B.C. after Persia conquered the Babylonian empire and the Jews were allowed to return and resettle their land.
The Jewish prophet Zechariah, who was living in Judah following the return, prophesied around 520 B.C., “Thus says the Lord of hosts: The fast of the fourth month and the fast of the fifth and the fast of the seventh and the fast of the tenth shall be to the house of Judah seasons of joy and gladness and cheerful feasts. Therefore love truth and peace.”
The Jews had designated annual fasts to remember the travesty of their conquest by the Babylonians.
The fast of the fourth month on the Jewish calendar was to commemorate the fall of Jerusalem. The fast of the fifth month was to remember the destruction of the temple. The fast of the seventh month recalled the assassination of Gedaliah, a righteous governor of Judah during this time period.
Finally, the fast of the tenth month was to remember when the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem began.
The fast of the fifth month, Tisha B’Av, has coincided with multiple catastrophic events in Jewish history. It was not just the destruction of the first and second temples, but Jews being expelled from England in 1290 A.D. and from Spain in 1492 A.D., and the mass deportation of Jews from Warsaw to the Treblinka extermination camp during the Holocaust in World War II.
But this year, things were different.
As Honig wrote in the Post, the earthquake that struck Lebanon and Syria, where Hezbollah is based, flipped the script on what Tisha B’Av has commemorated.
“It may have served as an unanticipated yet divine act that thwarted a grave threat against the Jewish nation,” he argued.
“Hezbollah, an established proxy of Iran, had been preparing to launch an attack on Israel — a direct affront planned deliberately for Tisha B’Av. Many of the group’s underground tunnels, teeming with armaments, may have been reduced to rubble by an act of God to protect His children, which could effectively halt Hezbollah’s nefarious plan before it could materialize,” Honig wrote.
“It is hard to perceive it as mere coincidence that the earth shook on the very day Hezbollah had intended to send Israel into mourning once more. With tunnels collapsing and their arsenals buried, what could have been a devastating assault turned into a day of bewildering relief and gratitude,” he said.
Honig concluded, “Tisha B’Av, usually a day of sorrow and reflection, was transformed into a moment where we could see the hand of God in action, turning our potential despair into potential reassurance.”
Hitchcock agreed, saying the timing of the earthquake likely encouraged Israelis and gave Hezbollah pause.
“One thing is sure in all of this: God is in control of the timetable and the scope of any attack by Iran and Hezbollah against Israel,” he added.
Zechariah accurately predicted the 9th of Av would eventually be a day of celebration instead of mourning.
And this year, that was the case.
