Editor, The Smithfield Times:

The Jewish people’s fight against radical Islam is our fight. All Christians must come together to support our Old Testament brothers and sisters. 

Isle of Wight County itself has little Hebraic heritage. But the story of our ancestors fleeing religious persecution is quintessentially American. Our Puritan and Quaker forebears could flee to the newly established colonies when religious persecution became intolerable.

But the Jews have no refuge but Israel. We must stand by them to ensure they keep their homeland. As Golda Meir apparently said to then-Sen. Joe Biden, “Our greatest weapon is that we have no other place to go.”

Ironically, it was two Jewish Confederate officers who came to rescue Smithfield in 1864 when Union forces became trapped in town after their failed riverine landing. It was Capts. Edwin Moise and Isaac Pipkin of the 31st North Carolina Regiment who led the two “pincer” advances through Smithfield that surrounded and ultimately defeated the small invading “Yankee” army. Since we cannot change history, we must give credit where credit is due.

I entreat our local Protestant and Catholic churches to rally their congregations behind their Hebrew progenitors. After all, there would be no New Testament Christian theology without the preceding Old Testament Jewish foundation.

Radical Islamists have proved themselves the enemy of civilization itself. We must do all we can to not let their barbarism prevail.

 

Albert P. Burckard Jr.

Carrollton