What is really happening in the Middle East? Joel Rosenberg | Part 2

To celebrate our 2^nd anniversary this month, Stephanie will welcome two special guests who each embody a key aspect of our mission here at Gospel Spice. Today Stephanie is joined by Joel Rosenberg, New York Times bestselling author of novels and nonfiction books with nearly 5 million copies in print. Their conversation was so fascinating that we publish it in two episodes this week. This is part 2.

Joel has been profiled by the New York Times, the Washington Times, and the Jerusalem Post and has appeared on hundreds of radio and TV programs in the U.S., Canada, and around the world. As a sought-after speaker, he has addressed audiences at the White House, the Pentagon, the U.S. Capitol, the Israeli president’s residence, the Israeli Knesset, the European Union parliament in Brussels, and business and faith conferences in North America and around the world.

Joel became famous in 2002 when writing novels that had the uncanny tendency to become reality. He says, “Before my first political thriller was released, I had never in my life been on national television. Nor had I been on but a few small radio shows. But when The Last Jihad was published in November of 2002, I suddenly found myself interviewed on more than 160 radio and TV programs. Sean Hannity. Rush Limbaugh. Michael Reagan. Fox News. MSNBC. I had the opportunity to talk to more than twenty million people in less than sixty days.

The media was intrigued that anyone could have written a novel that opened with a plane hijacked by radical Islamic terrorists flying a kamikaze attack into an American city and then led to a war between the United States and Iraq over terrorism and weapons of mass destruction. They were even more intrigued that I’d begun writing nine months before 9/11 and had finished the book before any of it had ever happened for real. How was this possible? Did I work for the CIA? Did I have some sort of inside information? To each host I would explain how after more than a decade in Washington as a senior advisor to a number of U.S. and Israeli leaders including Steve Forbes, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Natan Sharansky, I had decided to write a political thriller about a War on Terror I was convinced was coming and how such a war might be triggered. I explained the research I had done, and the process I’d gone through of writing a first novel.

Such questions only intensified after my second thriller, The Last Days, was published in October 2003. It opened with the death of Yasser Arafat and an American president pushing hard for peace and democracy in the Middle East. Thirteen months after it was published, Arafat died, and two months later President Bush decided to make democracy in the Middle East the centerpiece of his second term agenda.

What was particularly odd was that the first few pages of Days put readers inside a U.S. diplomatic convoy heading into Gaza as part of the peace process that would involve an Israeli pullout from Gaza and the West Bank when that convoy was attacked by a massive explosion. Just two weeks before Days hit bookstores, something terrible happened. A U.S. diplomatic convoy heading into Gaza as part of the peace process was suddenly attacked by a massive explosion.

That’s when U.S. News & World Report did a story dubbing me a “modern Nostradamus.”

Among the readers of his books are Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former President George W. Bush, former CIA Director Porter Goss, former Delta Force Commander General Jerry Boykin, former senior White House advisor Jason Greenblatt, Jordan’s King Abdullah II, former Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, former Israeli Interior Minister Natan Sharansky, former Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon, and many other US, Israeli, Arab and other foreign leaders.

Joel’s latest non-fiction book, “Enemies and Allies,” releases this week and is already poised to become a global bestseller (you can order it here: https://joelrosenberg.com/non-fiction/). Do recent changes in the Middle East signal peace? One Arab country after another is signing historic, game-changing peace, trade, investment, and tourism deals with Israel. At the same time, Russia, Iran, and Turkey are forming a highly dangerous alliance that could threaten the Western powers. Meanwhile, the U.S. is drawing down its military forces in the Mideast and focusing on matters closer to home. Where’s it all heading? Enemies and Allies will take readers behind closed doors in the Middle East and introduce them to the very kings and crown princes, presidents and prime ministers who are leading the change.

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