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Let me ask you a question? Do you like digging into ancient history? Is the fulfillment of ancient Bible prophecies of interest to you? Do you enjoy uncovering mysteries and also discovering never-before-seen links? If you responded in the affirmative to any of these three questions, then I believe you will really like this article, because I dug up a few cool treasures which even I had never noticed before either.

Some of my readers may be familiar with the Old Testament prophecy which was made against Tyre. Also known as Tyrus, which means "rock", it was a major Phoenician port city which was located on the Mediterranean coast‭. It actually consisted of two distinct parts: a rocky fortress on the coastal mainland which was called "Old Tyre," and the city of Tyre itself, which was built on a small, rocky island located about half a mile offshore. Today it is a part of the country of Lebanon, and it is a bustling city. What is interesting about Tyre is that it happens to be one of the oldest continuously-inhabited cities in the world.

Tyre was a strong, powerful, rich, maritime merchant city. Furthermore, it is the view of certain historians that the merchants of Tyre may have been the very first people to navigate the Mediterranean Sea and establish colonies all around its perimeter, as far away as Spain and North Africa.

In the Bible, King Hiram -- who was a very close friend of both King David and his son, King Solomon -- was in fact from Tyre. Furthermore, King Hiram provided both laborers -- carpenters and stone masons -- as well as cedars of Lebanon to help build both King David's cedar house, as well as the first Jewish temple, which was constructed by King Solomon.

However, some centuries later, long after the time of David and Solomon, and after many other events had occurred, God had the His prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Amos and Zechariah prophesy against Tyre, because it had become a very proud, wicked, idolatrous city. In fact, as you will discover momentarily, it appears that Tyre became the very seat of power of Satan himself!

However, what particularly upset the Lord was the fact that after King Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed Jerusalem and the temple compound in 587 B.C., as per God's judgment against the Jerusalemites, in their foolish pride, the people of Tyre laughed at Jerusalem. Thus it was that God pronounced judgment against Tyre as well, as we see by the following sample group of Bible verses:

"And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the first day of the month, that the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, because that Tyrus hath said against Jerusalem, Aha, she is broken that was the gates of the people: she is turned unto me: I shall be replenished, now she is laid waste: Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Tyrus, and will cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea causeth his waves to come up. And they shall destroy the walls of Tyrus, and break down her towers: I will also scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock. It shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD: and it shall become a spoil to the nations."


As I mentioned a moment ago, just as we find some verses in Isaiah 14 which seem to describe not only Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar's fall, but Satan's fall as well, in Ezekiel chapter 28, we find something similar happening. But in this case, the judgment against the king of Tyre also seems to be symbolic of the Lord's judgment against Satan as well. For those of you who are interested, I discuss this subject in my series entitled "Satan: King of Tyrus, King of Empires". Consider the following group of verses:

"Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee. Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries by the multitude of thine iniquities, by the iniquity of thy traffick; therefore will I bring forth a fire from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee, and I will bring thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that behold thee. All they that know thee among the people shall be astonished at thee: thou shalt be a terror, and never shalt thou be any more."


Now is that not strange? As I said, while the previous set of Bible verses begin describing the judgment of the king of Tyrus, they suddenly change into describing Satan and his own fall, just as occurred with Nebuchadnezzar in Isaiah 14. It is for that reason that I said earlier that it seems like Satan set up his seat of power right on the island city of Tyre. In a rather weird sort of way, it actually reminds me of Neptune -- the Roman god of water and of the sea, also known as Poseidon to the Greeks -- and also of the fictional comic book character, Aquaman. Then, of course, there is the story of Leviathan, the dragon of the sea, which I discuss in a separate article.

So exactly what happened, and how was the aforementioned prophecy fulfilled? Well, while Tyre was able to withstand years-long sieges from both Assyrian king Shalmaneser, as well as from Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, it was a very different story when it came to Alexander the Great, who conquered the city in 332 BC. The method by which Alexander was able to accomplish this was by building a causeway from the shore to the island. This wide causeway was constructed from all of the rubble of the destroyed "Old Tyre" that was situated on the coast, exactly as the Prophet Ezekiel had written, as we see by the following verse:

"And they shall make a spoil‭‭ of thy riches‭, and make a prey‭‭ of thy merchandise‭: and they shall break down‭‭ thy walls‭, and destroy‭‭ thy pleasant‭ houses‭: and they shall lay‭‭ thy stones‭ and thy timber‭ and thy dust‭ in the midst‭ of the water‭."


Upon completion of the causeway, and after a seven-month siege, the 150-foot tall walls surrounding the island city were breached -- just as Ezekiel had prophesied -- and Tyre was heavily plundered. According to the historical record, eight thousand of the city's inhabitants were killed during the final battle, and another 30,000 were sold into slavery.

Despite the conquest which had been achieved by Alexander the Great, Tyre still remained an economic power even after that. It seems that Ezekiel's prophecy may not have been completely fulfilled until 1291 AD. For it was in that year that Tyre -- which at the time was still under the control of the Crusaders -- was destroyed by the Mameluke Muslims under the leadership of Mamluk Sultan al-Ashraf Khalil.

Also known as Saracens, they in fact reduced Tyre to ashes, exactly as the Prophet Ezekiel had said when he wrote "I will bring‭‭ thee to ashes‭ upon the earth‭ in the sight‭ of all them that behold‭‭ thee." As a result of the destruction, for about the next three hundred years, Tyre remained almost uninhabited. This period of decline lasted until about 1750 AD. In 1894, the population of Tyre was reported to be about two hundred people living in an obscure fishing village. As the Prophet Ezekiel had also written "It shall be ‭a place for‭ the spreading‭ of nets‭ in the midst‭ of the sea‭."

In our more recent times, the country of Lebanon has been rebuilding Tyre, and rebranding it as a tourist attraction. This ancient city now has an estimated population of some 135,000 inhabitants.

At this point in our discussion, perhaps you are wondering exactly how Donald Trump and the Gaza Strip tie into all of this ancient history. Well, now I will tell you. The truth is that in a strange sort of way, we may possibly be witnessing a kind of repeat of ancient history in our modern day. "How so?" you may ask. Well, you see, on February 4, 2025, during his press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, President Trump revealed his plan to the world for the United States to take over the Gaza Strip once the current war there has ended.

While President Trump has softened his rhetoric since that time almost two months ago, to the shock of much of world, and particularly to the shock of the surrounding Arab and Muslim nations, during the press conference, President Trump suggested that all of the remaining two million Palestinians who occupy the Gaza Strip should be removed from Gaza, and then resettled elsewhere, namely in other Arab countries.

Well, let me ask you something. What did Alexander the Great do after he had defeated the island city of Tyre? As we saw earlier, aside from killing 8,000 city inhabitants, he also had 30,000 other Tyrians carried off into slavery. In fact, as I explain more fully in a few other Bill's Bible Basic's articles -- such as in "The Fruits of Disobedience" -- this vile practice of enslaving a defeated population, and then relocating them elsewhere was a rather common practice in ancient times.

For example, when the Assyrians conquered Samaria and the Northern Kingdom of Israel, not only did they carry off many thousands of Israelites into other areas of their empire, but they ALSO brought in people of foreign stock to REPLACE the Israelites who had been forcibly removed out of their own land.

To wit, after Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, imprisoned Israelite king Hoshea for failing to pay tribute, not only did he conquer Samaria, but he carried off the Israelites into Assyrian controlled lands, and then moved people of Assyrian stock into the Northern Kingdom of Israel, as we see by the following group of Bible verses:

"Then the king of Assyria came up throughout all the land, and went up to Samaria, and besieged it three years. In the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes . . . Until the LORD removed Israel out of his sight, as he had said by all his servants the prophets. So was Israel carried away out of their own land to Assyria unto this day. And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel: and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof."


As I have explained before, this ultimately resulted in a polluted gene pool, and it is precisely why centuries later, the Jews of Judah and Jerusalem looked down upon and hated their Israelite brethren in Northern Israel, such as in the region of Galilee. The Jews of Judah viewed their Samaritan brethren as lesser Israelites. This was a very deep-rooted prejudice which even touched Jesus' life, who was raised in Nazareth of Galilee. Perhaps you may recall how Nathanael reacted when a very excited Philip informed him that they had found the Messiah. Consider these two verses:

"Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. And Nathanael said unto him, Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? Philip saith unto him, Come and see."


As I have also mentioned before, we see the very same kind of prejudice being exposed when Jesus sat down at Jacob's well in Samaria, and then a Samaritan woman approached the well in order to draw water. Even the Apostles themselves were apparently taken back when Jesus spoke to her. Consider the following group of verses:

"He left Judaea, and departed again into Galilee. And he must needs go through Samaria. Then cometh he to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. Now Jacob's well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well: and it was about the sixth hour. There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink. (For his disciples were gone away unto the city to buy meat.) Then saith the woman of Samaria unto him, How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria? for the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans . . . And upon this came his disciples, and marvelled that he talked with the woman: yet no man said, What seekest thou? or, Why talkest thou with her?"


As I mentioned earlier, due to their rebellion and apostasy, the Lord purposely allowed Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar to destroy Jerusalem and the temple compound in 587 BC. Just as had occurred via the Assyrians, the Babylonians also carried off lots of Jews to Babylon to serve as their slaves. It was not until seventy years later, during the reign of Persian king Cyrus the Great, that the Jews were finally allowed to return to Israel, and rebuild both Jerusalem, as well as the temple compound.

Moving up in the historical timeline more than six centuries, we discover that the same basic thing happened again. This time, during the seven-year First Jewish-Roman War, Jerusalem and the temple compound were destroyed a second time in 70 AD by the Roman legions under the command of General Titus, who was the son of Emperor Vespasian, and also a future emperor himself.

This event again was a direct fulfillment of Bible prophecy, and words that had been directly spoken by the Lord himself in the Gospels, as I quite amply point out in articles such as "Abomination of Desolation: Explained!". Furthermore, just as had occurred during the Assyrian and Babylonian diasporas -- that is to say, the dispersions -- many thousands of Jews were carried off into slavery in other lands that were under the control of the Romans.

With the aforementioned three historical examples, I believe that I have established for you a firm precedent. Now it is time to return to Mr. Trump's press conference speech. As we have already discussed, his plan was to originally have all of the Palestinians removed/expatriated from the Gaza Strip, and relocated to other nations of the Middle East.

But here is the shocking aspect about this. If we view the examples I have given you in realistic modern terms, what we are actually talking about here amounts to ethnic cleansing, plain and simple. Can we honestly say that what President Trump wants to do in Gaza is any different? It is for this reason that much of the world was shocked by his words.

Let me interject here that at this current time, there are already quite a number of Palestinians who are living in the countries of Lebanon, Jordan and Egypt. This resulted from events that occurred almost eighty years ago when on May 14, 1948, David Ben Gurion declared the restoration of Israel as a Jewish State, and many Palestinians either left Israel of their own accord, or else they were forced out. Sadly, just as still occurs in Israel today with the Palestinians who chose to remain, the Palestinians who live in these other countries are for the most part treated like second class citizens with fewer rights than the native citizens.

Let me also add that while on the surface other Arab nations seem to support the Palestinian cause, the honest truth of the matter is that they only use the Palestinian cause when it is to their political advantage and convenience. As proof of this point, consider the fact that after President Trump announced his intentions regarding Gaza, only very few Arab countries showed any interest in accepting the Palestinians. Furthermore, according to news reports, they are really only interested in taking thousands of them at best. Nobody wants to accept two million Palestinians. Of course, as we know, actions speak much louder than mere words.

Now returning to President Trump, sadly, that was not the end of Mr. Trump's "shock and awe" February 4, 2025 speech. After explaining his intentions to remove the Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, he continued to tell the public why he wanted them to be removed, and exactly what would happen to the Gaza Strip once the war had ended, with the following words:

——- Begin Quote ——-

"It's right now a DEMOLITION SITE. This is just a DEMOLITION SITE. Virtually every building is down. They're living under fallen concrete that's very dangerous and very precarious . . . The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it too. We'll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, LEVEL THE SITE and get rid of the destroyed buildings, LEVEL IT OUT. Create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area. Do a real job, do something different."

----- End Quote -----

In addition to the above, President Trump claimed that many Middle Eastern leaders thought that what he was proposing for Gaza was a great idea. Furthermore, he also made clear that the Gaza Strip development project would not be for "a specific group of people" -- by which I assume the president means Palestinians -- but rather for people "all over the Middle East."

My friends, let's just call a spade a spade. Make no mistake about it. In my opinion, what President Trump said in that shocking speech is simply a diplomatic way of saying ethnic cleansing. To reiterate my previous point, when you remove a native population, and replace them with non-local people, that is ethnic cleansing, just as the ancient conquerors did, meaning the Assyrians, the Babylonians and the Romans. There is really no difference, is there?

We should never forget that Donald Trump is all about money and profit. He believes that everything can be bought if he throws enough money at a person. Trump is always looking for the next good deal. It is the way that he is mentally wired. If you doubt that this is so, just consider how he is now trying to purchase Greenland, even though the Greenlanders are not interested in being bought. As I mention in "Trump Fiefdom and the Trilateral World", President Trump's main interest in Greenland -- similar to us here on the island of Guam -- is its strategic military importance, along with its vast mineral wealth.

In fact, as I am in the process of completing this article, US Vice President JD Vance has just visited Greenland. To his surprise, his delegation received a very cold response from both the government of Greenland, and from the people of Greenland as well. As a result, not only did his wife not attend the world-famous dog sled race, but instead, the trip was made more low-key, and Vance's delegation spent time at the US military base there. Could the people of Greenland have made their disdain for Mr. Trump's takeover plan more apparent?

So as I said, while Mr. Trump may currently be the president, he is, and in fact has always been, a businessman first. As such, he will always look for the money angle. Whether we are talking about developing the Gaza Strip, or taking over the island of Greenland, or acquiring Ukraine's mineral wealth, or trying to convince North Korea to give up its nukes, Trump is always looking to make money deals. He promises to make people or nations rich if they will just follow his program. That is his modus operandi.

In fact, if you stop and think about it, President Trump is using the same strategy with the American public right now. As I mention in the article "President Trump and the Golden Age", for a few months now, he and his acolytes -- such as his MAGA supporters -- have been promising us an American Golden Age, and saying that all of the tariffs are going to make us all rich beyond our wildest dreams. My dear friends, I would not hold my breath if I were you.

Thus, I am convinced that this is exactly what Mr. Trump is doing with regard to the Gaza Strip. He sees dollar signs, and he views Gaza as a good investment and a potential cash cow, if he can just convince the right investors to accept his "Mediterranean Riviera" dream.

In fact, as I've shared with a few friends, ever since the February 4th press conference, I have been entertaining this sneaking suspicion that President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu may have possibly made some kind of backroom deal. In other words, Donald Trump would turn a blind eye while Mr. Netanyahu would continue to use the IDF to finish the job by completely wiping out Hamas, and by destroying what is still standing in the Gaza Strip.

If you think that I am just plain crazy or that my suspicion doesn't have any merit, then let me remind you of the set of words I purposely placed in uppercase letters from President Trump's February 4th speech:

DEMOLITION SITE (used 2 times)
LEVEL THE SITE
LEVEL IT OUT

Now let me ask you something. Do those words by any chance remind you of something we have already discussed? If not, please recall the prophecies against the city of Tyre, and what eventually happened to it. Let me share those verses with you again:

"And they shall destroy the walls of Tyrus, and break down her towers: I will also scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock. It shall be a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the sea: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD: and it shall become a spoil to the nations . . . And they shall make a spoil of thy riches, and make a prey of thy merchandise: and they shall break down thy walls, and destroy thy pleasant houses: and they shall lay thy stones and thy timber and thy dust in the midst of the water."


So you see, while President Trump is presenting his idea to the world as something wonderful, big and beautiful -- Mr. Trump just loves using the word "beautiful" for everything he does -- which according to him will benefit the entire Middle East in the end, in my view, he is simply cloaking a wicked money-making scheme under a thin veil of diplomacy. As for Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, during that press conference, he simply stood at his own podium with a smile on his face as President Trump shocked the world with his very unorthodox pronouncements regarding the intended fate of the Palestinian people.

Why would Bibi do that? Well, because he realizes that Trump is giving him the green light to finish the job. Then, once the job is done, they will scrape the Gaza Strip clean by literally pushing all that remains of Gaza's cities into the Mediterranean Sea -- just as Tyre was pushed into the sea -- so that they can initiate building their new "Mediterranean Riviera", as President Trump has referred to it on a number of occasions.

In fact, since I first began writing this article a week ago, the ceasefire has pretty much failed, and Israel is back to bombing and infiltrating the Gaza Strip again. Meanwhile, the leaders of Hamas -- those few who still remain alive -- have begun to realize that they've now lost most of their leverage, because there are now very few -- if any -- hostages still remaining alive which they can use as bargaining chips.

While President Trump claims that the entire Middle East is going to benefit from his Gaza Strip redevelopment project, again, do not be deceived. If the truth be told, the only people who will actually benefit from it, will be Mr. Trump, Prime Minister Netanyahu, and any other major investors in their redevelopment project. All of those oppressed Gazans will not see any of that money, to be sure, and it's rather doubtful that they will benefit from the Trump plan in any serious way.

Sadly, this has always been the case with large development projects such as this, so watch out! The big money boys move in and convince the local population how great their project will be for everyone. But in the end, the locals profit very little from it. The developer may create some low level jobs for the local population, but most of the profits will just remain in the hands of the developers themselves. Not only that, but such large development projects can also introduce serious new problems into the area, such as an increase in the pollution level, a strain on the local utilities such as power and water, a potentially negative impact on the local culture, etc.

So, my friends, the above are my personal thoughts regarding all of these various issues. As always, you may or may not agree with me. At the very least, I hope that I have given you some new things to think about. Perhaps you have even learned a few new things along the way, or opened your mind to a brand new perspective.

With these thoughts, I will bring this article to a close. It is my hope that you've found it informative and enlightening, and I pray that it has been a blessing in your life as well. If you have an account with Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr or with any other social network, I would really appreciate if you'd take the time to click or tap on the corresponding link that is found on this page. Thanks so much, and may God bless you abundantly!

For additional information and further study, you may want to refer to the list of reading resources below which were either mentioned in this article, or which contain topics which are related to this article. All of these articles are likewise located on the Bill's Bible Basics web server. To read these articles, simply click or tap on any link you see below.

2024 US Presidential Election: Into the Darkness
America vs. Iran: "This Was an Act of War"
America, Trump, MAGA and Peace, Safety and Prosperity
America: Land of the Free . . . and Hypocrisy!
Don't Ever Underestimate Our Spiritual Enemy
False Accusation: Trump is a Warmonger!
Gaza Strip Horrors and the Trump Plan
If You Poke a Bear Long Enough
Is Elon Musk the Antichrist?
It Is Time to Wake Up!
Leviathan: An Ancient Dragon of the Sea?
Obama, McCain and the Bush Legacy
President Trump and the Cashless Society
President Trump and the Golden Age
Satan: His Origin, Purpose and Future
Satan: King of Tyrus, King of Empires
To Vote, or Not to Vote
Trump Fiefdom and the Trilateral World
What is Wrong with Modern America?
Who is the Real Terrorist?

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