Dinesh D'Souza - 733 DAYS Dinesh D’Souza Podcast Ep1186

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Oct. 9, 2025 - Dinesh D'Souza

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733 DAYS Dinesh D’Souza Podcast Ep1186

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	The revival of an ancient conflict recorded in the Bible.
	The nation of Israel is a resurrected nation.
	What if there was gonna be a resurrection of another people, an enemy people of Israel?
	The Dragon's Prophecy.
	Watch it now, or by the DVD at the Dragons Prophecyfilm.com.
	Coming up a massive development in the Middle East with the first stage of the Trump peace plan actually going into effect.
	I'll spell out the implications and tell you where I think this is going.
	I'll also update you on how the film, which is now in streaming and DVD, The Dragon's Prophecy, how it ties into all this.
	And I'm also going to address the topic of antisemitism.
	Does it admit of a purely secular or rational explanation?
	Eliana Passenton, she is director of the Regional Council for Judea and Samaria in Israel, She joins me.
	We're gonna talk about biblical archaeology in Shiloh Hey, if you're watching on YouTube, X or Rumble, listening on Apple or Spotify, please subscribe to my channel.
	This is the Dinesh D'Souza Podcast.
	America needs this voice.
	The times are crazy in a time of confusion, division, and lies.
	We need a brave voice of reason, understanding and truth.
	This is the Dinesh D'Souza Podcast.
	Wow, what a spectacular breakthrough in the Middle East.
	It is only the beginnings of a deal, but it is a truly big deal.
	And I'll talk about what it means that these hostages are coming home, that there is this exchange of, well, terrorists for hostages.
	There's a moral ambiguity to it, of course.
	But nevertheless, all things considered, I think a big step forward.
	So I'll talk about that.
	But before I do, I want to um I want to talk a little bit about what's going on with the film, the Dragon's Prophecy.
	The reaction from the theaters from two days, we just had it in about 400 theaters, Monday and Wednesday.
	And wow, we are being like deluged with messages, with people who are just emotionally like overwhelmed.
	Just very powerful comments about this film.
	It appears to have touched a chord as a kind of an understatement.
	Because what you try to do with the film is you try to hit a high point where the whole is much greater than the sum of the parts.
	And there is no kind of automatic or easy way to do that.
	It's almost mystical how that occurs where at some point things harmonize in such a way.
	This probably happens to people who compose music.
	Maybe it happens also in the case of like a great novel where somehow you have so many disparate elements, but they just come together in a beautiful intellectual and in this case also spiritual harmony.
	I want to read a passage.
	post from a pastor that we had on the podcast, but when I had him on, this is Andy Woods from Sugarland Bible Church in Sugarland, Texas.
	He hadn't seen the film, so we sent him the film and he watched it.
	And here's what he says.
	I just returned, he means from the theater, from watching the latest D'Souza movie entitled The Dragon's Prophecy.
	I wanted to say something about it while it's fresh in my mind.
	All caps.
	I loved the movie.
	But this is the part I think that kind of touched Debbie and I the most.
	Virtually everything that I've gone hoarse over trying to teach and communicate is in the movie.
	Wow.
	He's saying that the movie contains sound Bible teaching, but transmitted in a new format, in a new vehicle, not presented as a sermon, but integrated into a narrative or a story.
	I'm continuing.
	It brings together so many vital threads and themes that need to be understood today more than ever before in our present age of propaganda and confusion.
	Wow, here's a pastor who's like on it.
	He knows that there are swirling currents of propaganda and confusion, some from the left, some from the right.
	He's on it.
	And the reason I'm highlighting this is because he's so unusual.
	There's a massive debate going on right now in social media about replacement theology, covenant theology, all kinds of questions about Jesus.
	Did the Jews kill Jesus?
	Are the Jews of today connected to the Jews of the Bible?
	You would think the pastors would be all over it.
	But if you notice, they are for the most part totally silent.
	Even the big name pastors, even some of the conservative pastors have not weighed in on this, even though it is absolutely their territory.
	Now, normally, when we talk to pastors and we make the point, hey, you need to speak up about this.
	This is a moral outrage.
	They say, well, it's not in our wheelhouse.
	Um it's it is bad, we agree, but this is not our specialty.
	It's not what we are trained to do.
	It's not a subject we particularly know about.
	And perhaps in some cases that is true.
	The pastor's reluctance is motivated by, well, just a genuine lack of knowledge about that particular topic, particularly if it's a like a policy topic.
	But who can say that on this topic, which has to do with things like was Jesus a Jew or a Palestinian?
	Um is there in fact an unbroken link from Jews today to the Jews of, let's say, the time of Jesus or the time earlier of Abraham?
	Are God's promises to the Jews like obsolete?
	Are they canceled out by the behavior of the Jews?
	Uh all of this stuff is right in the pastor's backpack or handbook.
	It's stuff that they know about, they actually teach about it, or some of them teach about it, but now when there is an opportunity to like jump into the public square on a topic in which they do have genuine knowledge, there's very little of that.
	And um, and so um let me continue with this uh with this post.
	Such themes, this is um themes of the film, include the archaeological veracity of the Bible, the legitimacy of Israel's claim to our ancient and historic homeland, the spiritual explanation for anti-Semitism through history and why it's growing today among the right and left alike, how the stage is being set for the end time scenario, and why Israel's conflict today is actually America's conflict as well.
	Wow.
	I mean, what a beautiful uh summary of the themes covered in this film.
	All of this is the actual landscape uh of this movie.
	I cannot say enough good things about this production.
	Wow, this is where we take a small bow because this is our think our ninth documentary film, and so we've tried to get better and better and better.
	And this is a film, by the way, that makes creative use of some cutting-edge AI, but it also has on-site, highly cinematic um cinematography and a story for another day, but it has hauntingly uh beautiful music.
	Music that we think in some ways has itself a kind of providential source.
	The Christian world needs to pack the theaters.
	Your children and grandchildren need to see it even more than you do.
	Live streaming is available.
	Please, please, please go see it.
	So this is the this is a this is the voice of a pastor, an important pastor who has who's actually seen it and knows that in the end, even though this film is enmeshed in politics, it doesn't shy away from politics.
	It discusses the left, it discusses the right, uh, Ilhan Omar's in the film, Tucker Carlson's in the film, Netanyahu's in the film.
	But its ultimate message is spiritual, and its ultimate purpose is clarification.
	I would say unification and also edification.
	Now let me talk about unification for a minute, because I think with this kind of peace plan, which I'm about to say a few words about, there's also an opportunity for some for a peace plan inside of MAGA, by which I mean there's a there's time for us sort of right of center and in the MAGA movement to say, all right, we don't agree on Israel, but we do agree on a lot of other things.
	In fact, we agree on most things.
	We might even agree on all things except this.
	And we also agree that our country's uh domestic needs and also domestic threats are paramount.
	Uh, we need to focus on those, and we don't need to, we want to make sure that we are strong enough together uh to defeat who.
	Well, in in the end, it's the it's the platoons of the dragon, isn't it?
	And who are those platoons or what are those platoons?
	I would say that they are two.
	There is the platoon of the cultural left, this is the platoon of cultural degradation, of promiscuity, of opening the border, of um of making right into wrong and wrong into right.
	It's as Debbie sometimes says the Mulan Rouge society, that's Platoon one.
	And then there is the other platoon, uh, the Islamic jihadis.
	Uh and here I'm focused on not simply their plans for the Middle East, but their plans to infiltrate the West and come to America and uh see a proliferation of mosques, not only in our cities but also suburbs, and take over our school boards and local councils and create a hundred Ilahan Omars.
	So this is something that no peace plan is going to um settle.
	It's going to be an ongoing challenge, I think, in the years to come, and we do need a unified strong MAGA movement to resist it and to defeat it.
	So here is my public call for a peace plan of our own, uh, and one that doesn't really require us to relinquish our views uh of uh what's going on in the Middle East, but it does require us to recognize our threats within this within this country.
	Now, this is not to say the debate kind of goes away or the debate ends.
	Uh, I will say that uh I don't think that there's going to be permanent resolution in the Middle East, and that's because the Bible tells us that.
	Ultimate solutions are not likely until the end of time.
	But that doesn't mean you can't have penultimate solutions or intermediate solutions or temporary solutions.
	And this peace plan, I think, on the balance, well, step one is the hostages come home.
	And that alone is worth a lot.
	Uh admittedly, Israel is paying a steep price.
	It's going to give up a lot of terrorists who are going to go back.
	Now, they're not going to be in charge in Gaza, but they are going to be around.
	Some of them may stay, some of them may get safe passage outside to other places.
	But you can be fairly sure that their objectives will continue.
	In fact, let's think about it.
	The name Hamas, uh, Jonathan Khan points this out in the film.
	In Hebrew means violence, means destruction.
	And this is not just a matter of this is the Hebrew name.
	Look at their charter, look at their stated objectives.
	Um, look at their actions.
	Uh Debbie prompts me from the sidelines.
	Thank you very much.
	Uh So, yes, um, Hamas is a leopard that is not changing its spots.
	I think we can be sure about that.
	Now, um, and then we go on to phase two, which is going to be the even harder part of the plan because it essentially the demilitarization of Gaza.
	It is the removal of the Hamas governing structure completely and its replacement by a kind of international structure which has some European and an American involvement, but I think the primary um governing force is going to be from the Muslim countries.
	So from places like Saudi Arabia and Egypt and uh Bahrain and United Arab Emirates and Jordan.
	I think this is actually a very good way to go, because this is a way to assure the Muslim world that look, these are Muslim people, and they're gonna have essentially people who've subscribe to the same religion, the same faith, governing them, although not in the Hamas way.
	I don't think Israel is going to kind of move out, but Israel cannot be expected not to keep its eye on Gaza, right?
	If if your neighbor does a home invasion on you and causes havoc, uh you might figure out a settlement at some point, but guess what?
	You're gonna sleep with one eye open, as Debbie says, with one foot on the ground uh in case this were to happen again.
	Now, I want to say a word about anti-Semitism, because this is a word that is often used on social media, it's typically met with derisive attacks of people who say, Well, yeah, you're saying that because any criticism of Netanyahu or any criticism of Israel, no, that's actually not anti-Semitism.
	Anti-Semitism, I think, is this holding the Jews and Israel to a different standard than you apply to anyone else.
	If you do that and you do that consistently, then your motives, I think, are rightly suspect.
	And um, and it is an open question why you are doing that, why your normal moral compass seems to fail you in this one particular case again and again and again.
	I was asked on a recent uh radio show, and I've been doing you know almost non-stop media.
	Uh today, my um my my uh swordsmanship with Chenk Uyghur, which was from the Piers Morgan show, comes out today.
	Uh, I did the Glenn Beck show yesterday, and that was great.
	And um Eric Stackelbeck's show, which comes out on TBN today.
	And one of these shows I was asked about anti-Semitism, and what is the explanation for it?
	Like why?
	And I said this.
	I said, look, we can try to give it a natural explanation.
	And I have tried, in fact, in my own previous work to do that.
	In my book, The End of Racism, which goes back to 1995, I distinguished between racism and anti-Semitism.
	I basically said that racism is looking down on somebody and in some ways proclaiming them degraded or less than or inferior.
	But I said, but anti-Semitism isn't like that.
	It's often directed at, well, it's directed against perhaps the most successful group or tribe in world history.
	And so it doesn't work to say you're inferior.
	How can you tell people who have studied more than you have, who have who are wealthier than you, who have more successful businesses?
	Uh, how do you tell them they're inferior?
	So you don't.
	Or to put it differently, you what you say to them is they're morally inferior.
	And in fact, it's precisely their sleazy uh morally questionable tactics that have enabled their success over your group.
	Kind of what you're saying is that if we were willing to be unscrupulous like the Jews, then we would be just as successful as they are, but we are too virtuous to do that.
	So there is this kind of anti-Semitism is a loser mentality, and it is motivated to some degree by envy.
	And yet, even as I say that, I recognize, and I think this film has helped me to recognize even more, that the natural explanation, which I just gave you, is insufficient.
	It's not wrong, but it's inadequate.
	It doesn't give a full grasp of the situation.
	And this is where I think the supernatural explanation is needed, uh, not to displace, but to complement the natural explanation.
	And uh so I will leave it at that because this supernatural explanation, why the dragon, why the devil himself might want to target the Jews, uh, is I think unfurled with particular uh ingenuity, uh plausibility in this film.
	The uh film is now in streaming, it's now in DVDs, and um it's streaming, by the way, on Salem now.
	It's also streaming on the platform Rumble, kind of a pay-per-view.
	You just you just buy uh the stream uh and then click and watch.
	So uh the website is the dragonsprophecyfilm.com that will take you to the Salem now uh website and also DVDs.
	DVDs are being ordered galore and our shipping out uh as we speak.
	So this is a great way to share the message.
	Uh and uh and it is an uplifting message at the end of the day.
	It is the the film takes you really into the basement, it takes you into the dark corners, if you will, of our world, starting with October 7th, but continuing with the well, exposing the machinations of the devil himself is a bit of a dark project, isn't it?
	But the film doesn't uh end there or leave you there.
	Uh it ends precisely on the note of uh restoration, renewal, uh, and it's ultimately not even a film about what's going on over there.
	It's a film about what's at stake for you, the ongoing battle between good and evil, between God and the dragon and the devil, and the imperative of taking sides and taking the right side.
	It's not a choice whether to take a side, it's only a choice which side you should take.
	So choose wisely because a lot depends on it.
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	Guys, I want to introduce you to a new guest on this podcast.
	She is not new to you if you have watched already The Dragon's Prophecy, because she has a small but really, I think unforgettable role in this film.
	Just a wonderful uh conversation, and Debbie and I were delighted to meet her in Israel.
	And uh I'm talking about Eliana Passenton.
	She's the international desk director of the regional council.
	It's called the Binyamin Regional Council.
	It's the area of Judea and Samaria.
	Now, interestingly, Eliana grew up in San Francisco and emigrated to Israel.
	It's called the Aliyah, kind of a uh a moving to Israel permanently.
	And she is very involved in Judea and Samaria.
	She gives lectures, she gives tours.
	Uh, She showed us a bunch of things, and we were so blown away that we were like, we have to get you in the movie.
	And we're delighted that we that we did.
	Eliana, welcome.
	Thanks for thanks for joining us.
	I want to, I want to, I want you to tell your story, but before we do, I have to ask you about what's in the news.
	The um apparently phase one of this peace plan has been agreed to, the exchange of terrorists for hostages.
	I'm sure that doesn't make you entirely uh happy about it.
	Uh can you talk about your mood as well as the mood in Israel about a swap that is ambiguous, but of course has the great virtue of bringing home the hostages to their to their families.
	Well, first of all, thank you.
	Thank you, Dinesh.
	Thank you for having me here today.
	And uh and thank you.
	It was it was an honor to take part in your in your film.
	I'll share with you my personal, um, my personal feelings and my views and thoughts.
	So I I was up almost all night, just I kept checking my phone.
	I said, I can't believe this is really happening.
	So, on one hand, um, just as a Jew living in Israel, uh, two of our residents, I'm from the Binyamin region.
	I work with the governor of the Benyamin Regional Council.
	It's the largest regional council in Israel.
	It's named for the tribal inheritance of Benjamin.
	And we have two of our residents that have been held hostage for two years.
	Now, when I say two of our residents, it's they're our brothers, we know their families.
	We're very close.
	We live in very small, close-knit communities.
	We're talking about Ram Breslevski, and we're talking about Avinatan or.
	You might know the name of Vinatan or because Noah Gamani, his girlfriend has become very well known.
	She travels the world and speaks, and there's a famous video of her being thrown on a motorcycle holding her hands out, and he's being torn away from her.
	So they became like a famous couple.
	But I want to share um a different perspective of Avinatan's mother who lives right across the hilltop from where I live in the town of Shiloh.
	There's modern Shiloh, you and I were in biblical Shiloh.
	And this woman named Dita, every morning, she says her morning prayers, and she doesn't, we as Jews pray towards Jerusalem, but she moved her body and stood towards Gaza every single morning for the last two years, trying to speak to her son, to pray for her son.
	So my heart is with this mother.
	I can't even imagine the hell they've been going through.
	And we're joyous and we're happy and we are grateful to President Trump.
	We are grateful to Prime Minister Netanyahu.
	But as a resident living in my region, just behind my on one on one side of my house, um, we have Shiloh, Shiloh, uh the biblical, uh, the birthplace of prayer, the place of the tabernacle.
	But just behind that are a number of Arab villages, and they that there are terrorists in those villages, and I understand what it means when terror hits.
	I've lost so many friends.
	And the fact that terrorists are being released, and history proves itself time and time again that they go back to committing these horrible, horrible acts of terror.
	They murder children, they've murdered children, they've murdered elderly.
	It's something that's absolutely unacceptable.
	So we do unfortunately have mixed feelings.
	On one hand, there is joy, and we're grateful to God, and we're grateful again to President Trump and to our prime minister.
	But on the other hand, we have the mixed feelings of terrorists being released, and that is something that is extremely problematic.
	And I and I think Eliana, what you're saying is that this is not a problem confined to Gaza.
	There are two regions which have had relatively autonomous uh control.
	Um the Judea-Samaria region has been under the Palestinian authority.
	Gaza has been since at least 2005 when Hamas was elected.
	Uh Hamas has been the governing authority, but there is A certain kind of similarity of temperament is there not in both the regions, and there are not only concerns about terrorism, but there have been acts of terrorism that have come not simply out of Gaza as in October 7th, but also out of Judea and Samaria.
	So, in a sense, you are living in somewhat dangerous territory, right?
	No, no, definitely.
	Um, for some reason, the international community is trying to separate and differentiate between Gaza and what the world mistakenly calls the West Bank, and we call use the historic names of Jude and Samaria.
	85% of the Palestinians in this area are pro-Hamas.
	I've seen from just from my home.
	I see the Hamas flags, I hear them chanting, I hear the Moazim, which is supposed to summon uh for peaceful prayer.
	They talk about killing the Jews and killing the Zionists.
	I send it to be translated, and I know a little bit of Arabic, and we're definitely living in an area where they don't want us here.
	They don't want us here.
	I'm not saying every single Palestinian living in the region, but we definitely definitely have to understand there's a connection between what's happening in Gaza with Hamas and what's happening right here in our backyard.
	Ramallah, which is here in our region and not far from where I live, they found rockets that were the terrorists were going to shoot to Modien.
	Uh today we had this unbelievable view for my backyard of the Mediterranean of Tel Aviv.
	Um, from the river to the sea is in my backyard.
	In the morning, I see Jordan, and just beneath Jordan is the Jordan Valley and the Jordan River, that's the river.
	And on the other side of my backyard is the Mediterranean Sea.
	And today I saw the most beautiful view of the sea, the Mediterranean, and Tel Aviv and all the buildings, and just without binoculars, standing in my backyard, I realized that this is a vantage point, and it's extremely important that the Israelis are here on top of these mountains.
	Where I'm almost 3,000 feet above sea level, and I can just see everything.
	Now, from the river to the sea is not about Jude and Samaria, it's not about the settlers.
	What it's referring to is the state, the entire state of Israel as one big settlement.
	So when people say that from the river to the sea, what they're talking about is essentially removing the Jews from their ancestral homeland where they have been for thousands of years, right?
	Not just 2,000 years, but uh 3,000 years going back to David and Solomon, almost 4,000 years going back, going back to Abraham.
	Um it was very uh interesting to come to Shiloh to Shiloh.
	You showed us the site of the original tabernacle.
	Now, explain what that tabernacle is.
	What does it stand for?
	Um, it's related ultimately to the idea of the temple, but it's different than the temple.
	So, what is a tabernacle and what does it have to do with uh with Shiloh?
	So Shila was Israel's first capital city for 369 years.
	For almost 400 years, this is the first capital city before Jerusalem.
	It's one of the first stops of the children of Israel in Israel.
	And the 12 tribes, the land is divided, the 12 tribes are sent all over from north to south, but they congregate three times a year in Shiloh.
	The tabernacle that we know from the wilderness was more like a tent.
	But in Shiloh, the Talmud explains that the tabernacle was stone, a stone structure on the bottom and fabric on the top.
	In Hebrew, we say Avanimilmatan, Vigriot Milmalan.
	So we understand there's a semi-um, it's it's almost a full beautiful structure, but we leave fabric on top.
	And why is that?
	Because Shiloh means a resting and tranquility, it's a stop.
	And Jerusalem is the inheritance.
	That's our final destination.
	So the children of Israel don't have a clue of how long they're going to be there.
	They know God sent us here, we're going to be here for th for a while.
	They end up staying almost 400 years.
	Now, this tabernacle is like a temple before the temple.
	The Jews would congregate here three times a year, come and offer their sacrifices, their offerings.
	If you had a baby, you'd come and say uh uh uh given uh an offering of gratitude, Etc.
	etc.
	So this was the main um it was the nucleus, it was the center of the 12 tribes for almost 400 years.
	And it is also known as the birthplace of prayer because this is where Hannah prayed her famous prayer, a woman who had did not have a child.
	She prayed for a child.
	She was blessed with Samuel, who grows up to be Samuel the prophet who will later anoint King David and build Jerusalem.
	This is something that I think people don't realize because when you when you pray, um you assume that this kind of thing has been around forever.
	Uh you assume that ancient peoples, ancient religions, you know, prayer is just part of what religious people do.
	And it comes with some uh surprise, maybe even shock to realize that prayer, in the sense that we know it, in a way itself had a beginning, uh, or at least it had a kind of um, it had a kind of origin and it's had a sort of history.
	And and right at the beginning stands this woman, Hannah.
	Uh, talk a little bit about so what was that first prayer?
	What did it even sound like?
	Because of course Hannah didn't have prayer she could recite, she didn't have a book that she could open and read.
	She was kind of, you could say winging it as they as we say today.
	Um, how did Hannah wing it and what did she ask of God?
	So what's fascinating is um when you think about it, we're so used to prayer.
	Any church you go to, even a mosque or a temple or a synagogue, it prayer as we know it today begins in Shiloh I use the Hebrew pronunciation versus Shiloh, and what Hannah does is revolutionary.
	Up until the day that she stands and praise, there were offerings, animal offerings, uh sacrifices that were offered to God.
	There were priests, Kohanim, that knew exactly what they're supposed to do, what they're supposed to say, how they're supposed to act.
	And all of a sudden, there's a woman standing, speaking directly to God.
	She moved her lips and no sound comes out.
	Samuel one, and uh Eli the high priest has no idea what she's doing.
	He thinks she's drunk.
	He's never seen anyone pray because it was something that she began doing.
	She just spoke from her heart to God.
	But where does this prayer come from and what is she asking for?
	She is childless, and every woman who yearns for a child, that's something that's perfectly understandable.
	But at the end of the book of Judges, just before the book of Samuel 1, it says there's no king in Israel, and every man did what was right in his own eyes.
	And what she's asking from God is not for a personal child for herself.
	She makes a deal with God.
	She says, if you give me a child, I will bring him back to you to the tabernacle to the Mishka.
	And when he's three years old, he will grow up here, he will serve you.
	She's she's going to sacrifice what she's asking for because she understands that there's no king in Israel.
	Every man did what was right in his own eyes.
	And she has this prophecy, and she knows that this child will be Samuel the prophet, that he will grow up and he will bring the children of Israel to the next step, which is Jerusalem, which is King David, which is the temple.
	And that is what is so huge about this prayer.
	It's her making a difference in the world that we still feel today.
	And it's giving up something, it's it's a selfless prayer, and it teaches us humility to be humble.
	We are nothing in the presence of God.
	And what I'm asking of you, God, is for something that I'm going to give.
	It's a savior for my people.
	It's not something personal for myself.
	And I just will share, Dinesh, that um on a daily basis, I get WhatsApp and private messages on my Instagram and phone calls from people who came either with me uh or asked me to pray for them in Shiloh, and they're pregnant or they're having a baby, or they just had a baby, or they're getting married, or this one.
	It's amazing the amount of wonderful news.
	I was in Manhattan walking on a Sunday morning in May, and I hear somebody yelling my name, Iliana, Iliana, I turn around, and there's this young couple with a baby in a stroller, and they say, Do you remember us?
	And they look really familiar.
	All of a sudden I remembered who they were, and they turn the stroller around, they say, This is the baby.
	And that happens all the time.
	It's really, it's it's it's incredible.
	That is that is amazing.
	Eliana, when we were together, um, you pointed uh From the hill in Shiloh that we were standing on to a highway, which is a biblical highway, although it is also today a normal highway.
	You can see the trucks, you can see the cars.
	But this is a highway that really goes back to ancient times.
	And you beautifully explained the significance of that highway and some of the rather well-known people from the Bible who who walked that highway.
	Can you say a bit about that highway and what it signifies then as now?
	So the highway that we take today, Highway 60, is the main artery of life.
	It starts where I live, uh starts up in Afula, goes down to Beersheba, and it's mentioned in the book of Judges, chapter 21, verse 19, that behold, this is the festival of the Lord from year to year in Shiloh and it explains where this festival of the Lord is taking place and where Shilo is, it's north of Bethel, east of the highway that goes from Bethel to Shem, and on the south of Libona.
	Now we know where Libona is, we know where Bethel is, and this highway, the this highway that we've paved today, it's it's it's a it's a main road, is the it's in the exact same location that it was during the time of our patriarchs, Abraham.
	If you open the book of Genesis and you follow Abraham walking up and down from Elon Morem, going down to Hebron, and then you follow Jacob and you follow Joseph just after he receives the coat of many colors.
	He's sent to look for his brothers, and just before they throw him in the pit.
	It's he's actually walking right past my house, which is amazing because we drive on the exact same road that our forefathers walked or rode their camel or their donkey.
	How many people can say that?
	That I get my gas where Abraham pitched his tent, literally.
	Wow.
	I mean, you made this astounding decision to move from San Francisco, and I'm kind of getting the answer.
	I was gonna ask you, like, why'd you do it?
	Uh, and I kind of know why.
	I have a surprising answer.
	I was 11 years old, and I my my parents literally took me kicking and screaming to the airport.
	I was fifth generation California, I loved my life.
	I did not want to move to a country that I don't know the language or don't understand what's happening.
	I knew I was Jewish, but I didn't feel any kind of special connection.
	My parents were Zionists, it was their dream to move to Israel.
	It took me three years to get a just start to like the country a little bit.
	Then I met this guy who and I ended up marrying.
	And so that's that was a help.
	But when I was 16 years old, I was hiking with my class.
	We have we had we were on a field trip down in the Negev in the desert, and we're hiking and walking up this mountain.
	It took us forever.
	And all the girls in my class were complaining, it's too hard a hike, and this is too much.
	And I felt like I loved the challenge.
	And we got to the top, all of a sudden we see this breathtaking view of the desert.
	And I felt something that I can't explain.
	But I always say that I hiked up that mountain, an American, and I hiked down an Israeli.
	Because I made that a decision when I saw that view that this is my country, this is my land, and this is where I belong.
	And now, as the director of the international desk for the region, for the Benjamin region, working for Governor Gantz, who's also the head of the Yesha Council, which is Judea and Samaria, I represent I do all the foreign affairs for this region.
	I travel to Washington, D.C., I host people and delegations from all over the world trying to share our story to share our perspective.
	That's why I think what you did in the in the movie is such an you did such an exceptional job of bringing our story to the world.
	That means so much, Eliana.
	Thank you for that.
	Let's talk for a moment about something that touches on biblical archaeology, which is sort of how Shiloh came to an end, or at least came to an end in ancient times.
	There was a great battle.
	This is going back to, I guess, right around a thousand BC, uh, and it was a battle against the Philistines.
	Um talk about that.
	So we we see at the end of the um the end of the story of Shiloh.
	It's interesting because there's um you have the biblical story, and then you have the uh archaeological evidence.
	And what's fascinating in Shilo, it's it's it's it's you have one half you read and the other half you see, which is incredible.
	You don't have this in every single archaeological site.
	Um, so we have is the story of the children of Israel taking the the golden ark, the Ark of the Covenant with them to the battlefield.
	Now, Eli the high priest is is home in Chilo and waiting, and he's nervous.
	He's nervous.
	Um, it's a long journey.
	He doesn't you know no iPhones, he doesn't know what's happening.
	And then the messenger comes running from the battlefield.
	And before he reaches Eli, he comes in through the southern entrance, and everybody sees him wearing his torn garments and ash on his head, which is a symbol of mourning.
	Eli the high priest hears the screams, and then when the messenger comes, he tells them that we lost the battle.
	His sons were killed.
	And the absolute worst news is that we lost the golden ark, the ark of the covenant.
	And here Eli the high priest falls, breaks his neck, and dies.
	And this is the end of Shiloh as we hear it and read it in the Bible.
	We understand that the enemy, the Pleastim, came from the battlefield all the way up to the mountain and burnt Shilo down.
	It doesn't say this in the book of Judges.
	It doesn't say this in the book of Samuel.
	But later on we see in Jeremiah that God says to Jeremiah, I will do to you to Jerusalem what I did to Shiloh.
	And we understand that Sheila was burned.
	Sheila was destroyed.
	Now we see a layer of ash of a fire, a long burning fire that dates exactly.
	Now, how do I know exactly?
	because we found charred raisins.
	The roof collapsed in one of the buildings.
	The raisins were burnt to a crisp.
	We sent them to be carbon-14 dated.
	And we know basically the day, maybe I don't know, the time of day that the Plishtim came up from the valley from the area which is today Roshain and burnt down and destroyed Shilo.
	So you have the biblical story, you have the archaeological evidence, and it all fits together.
	And you know, when I listen to things like this, and I've heard similar archaeological accounts in Jerusalem.
	I'm I'm I'm my reaction is why isn't this information being screamed from the rooftops of every synagogue and church, like in the world, you know?
	Uh is it because people don't but but that's why uh it's so important what you're doing, and that's why it is uh that's why we made this film is to try to share the word uh for people who haven't seen it for themselves.
	You can at least experience it cinematically.
	Uh I must say your role in the film, very powerful, very unforgettable.
	We're delighted to have you.
	Uh and guys, I've been talking to Eliana Passenton, the International Desk Director of the Benjamin Regional Council.
	Eliana, what a great conversation, and thank you so much for joining me.
	Thank you, Dinesh, and thank you for all of your hard work.
	And we invite everyone to come to Shiloh to visit, to pray, to share the voice of peace.
	This is an oasis of peace in an area of dispute.
	There is a dispute, and we will we will find the solution to that dispute, but it's not as it seems sharing our story.
	And thank you for coming.
	And we hope to see you again soon.
	You certainly will.
	Three weeks ago, my friend Charlie Kirk was supposed to be the one reading this to you.
	Just two days before he was assassinated.
	He decided to support an explosive new documentary, his death and the violent attacks on churches and schools remind us that we are in a real spiritual battle.
	But there is hope.
	Church attendance is rising, especially among young people.
	And for that hope to last, we need generational change.
	That's why Charlie wanted you to see off school property in theaters on October 23rd.
	This film tells the story of LifeWise, a nonprofit bringing Bible classes to public school students during the school day.
	Charlie was excited about this mission.
	This nonprofit called Life Wise in Ohio said, okay, we'll raise the money, find the space, and the school has to allow one hour of religious instruction.
	So I just learned about this a couple days ago.
	This could be a revolution in government schools across the country.
	Now it's up to us to carry it forward.
	Take your family and friends to see off school property in theaters nationwide, October 23rd.
	Find a theater near you at lifewise.org slash dinesh.
	That's L-I-F-E-W-I-S-E, lifewise.org slash Dinesh.
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	It's D-I-N-E-S-H Dinesh.
	I'm continuing my discussion of life after death.
	And I want to focus today on a single important point, which is what can we know right off the bat about this topic.
	Can we know that there's life after death?
	Now, if you talk to a believer, a Christian believer, in fact, a religious believer, they're likely to say, Well, yes, we can.
	Of course, there's life after death.
	And in fact, the believer may go on to tell you a lot about what that's like.
	There's heaven, there's hell, there's a good place, there's a bad place.
	And then you ask the believer, well, how do you know all this?
	And the believer will say, Well, the old testament, the gospels, the book of Revelation.
	And um, and if you say, Well, how do you know that those things are accurate?
	They'll say, Well, as I once saw in a bumper sticker, the Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it.
	Now, let's take this kind of evidence to a skeptic or an atheist, and uh you will get a very, well, skeptical reaction.
	Let me read a line from the book, The End of Faith by Sam Harris.
	Tell a devout Christian that his wife is cheating on him or that frozen yogurt can make a man invisible, and he's likely to require as much evidence as anyone else, and to be persuaded only to the extent you give it.
	Tell him that the book he keeps by his bed was written by an invisible deity who will punish him with fire for eternity if he fails to accept its every incredible claim about the universe, and he seems to require no evidence whatsoever.
	So what Sam Harris saying here, he's basically saying, I don't believe the Bible.
	He's saying you need to prove the Bible because otherwise uh that is not real evidence at all.
	And certainly faith, he's saying, does not constitute any kind of evidence.
	Now, you have to concede if you think about it that there's a little bit of common sense behind what this guy, Sam Harris is saying.
	What he's really saying is that the typical types of reasoning used by the believer appear to be kind of circular.
	Circular reason is reasoning that kind of goes in a circle and in a sense reinforces its own uh premises.
	How do we know that there's an afterlife?
	Answer, the Bible says so.
	How do we know the Bible is true?
	Well, because God wrote it.
	Well, how do you know God wrote it?
	Well, because it says so in the Bible.
	So this is uh almost a very definition of what you would call circular reasoning.
	And um, And the atheist applies this kind of skepticism in general to any religious claim, including, of course, life after death.
	Now, here's Michael Schirmer pressing the point very much in his writings, but this was also in a debate with me.
	We Sherman and I have done a lot of debates, perhaps not as many as I've done with Hitchens, but pretty close.
	And one of his big points is hey, listen, the believer has no basis, no experiential basis for life after death.
	Have you ever met a dead guy whoever disappeared and was put in the grave and then somehow came back?
	Well, you can say, well, yeah, I have.
	In a dream, well, you dream about a lot of things that aren't real, that are fictional, that are in a way constructed by your mind.
	How do you know that that dream represents an actual visitation?
	So you see where we're going with this.
	This is the language of unbelief, it's the language of skepticism.
	But notice that this language can be turned against the skeptic.
	And this was actually one of my kind of common debating tactics in these situations, is instead of uh stomping my feet and insisting that no, faith is reasonable, and no, even though it is uh based on faith alone, nevertheless, faith alone is just as reliable a basis for action.
	I recognize here that we have a bit of a gulf.
	The gulf is the gulf between reason and revelation, and in a way the two don't directly meet.
	The more you insist on claims based on revelation, the more the guy who's operating within the realm of reason is in an alternative universe that operates by you could almost say different language, different laws.
	And so he just looks at you like I don't even know what you're talking about, and you make absolutely no kind of headway at all.
	So my um tactic in apologetics is to actually move into his world, uh move into his universe, adopt his language, accept his criteria.
	All right, we're gonna talk about the language of experience.
	All right, let me let me turn it on you.
	And the question I want to get at here is what do you know?
	What do you, the skeptic, know that I, the believer, don't know?
	And my answer to that question is nothing.
	So you, the skeptic, you the atheist, have you interviewed any dead people?
	No.
	Um, have you ever crossed the the river and in the boat of death to see what's on the other side?
	No.
	So if, as Hamlet says, death is the undiscovered country, it's undiscovered by you no less than by me.
	And um, and the difference between you and me is not that you know and I don't, or I know and you don't.
	Here's the real difference.
	I at least acknowledge that my belief is based on faith.
	You somehow have uh deluded yourself into thinking that your belief is based on evidence.
	But what is your evidence?
	You don't have any.
	So you're the position I'm trying to make here is that yeah, the believer is saying life after death, for sure, I believe it on faith.
	The atheist is saying, I don't believe it on the basis of reason, but there are no reasons that he or she can give.
	There's no reason to give at all.
	So that position is also based upon faith, but it's based upon a faith that doesn't like recognize itself.
	It's a it is a claim based on faith that is hiding under the banner or marching under the banner of reason.
	So, in other words, it looks like at the first glance that there's a moral equivalence here.
	The believer doesn't know, the atheist doesn't know, at least doesn't know on the basis of reason and experience.
	Um and uh the difference I'm trying to say is that there is a difference, and the difference has to do more with knowing what you know and knowing what you don't know.
	I mean, think about it.
	When you're trying to figure something out, it is a great problem if you don't know anything, but you don't know that you don't know.
	You think you know, and so you're gonna continually make idiotic statements and unsupported statements in the confidence that you are speaking The language of reason, even though you aren't.
	The point I'm trying to make is the believer is in a much better position.
	And this is kind of my starting position in this book, and that is all right.
	Let's start with an acknowledgement of what it is that we don't know.
	And then we can begin an inquiry.
	Um the philosopher Emmanuel Kant, uh, in the opening pages of his book, The Critique of Pure Reason, he says, look, uh, we want to have a discussion about morality and uh free will and about God, and all the big questions of metaphysics, uh, of philosophy, of morality, of theology.
	But he goes, but before we get out the gate, before we start this, uh, an inquiry we're going to be conducting in the vocabulary of reason.
	He goes, we have to start by asking a very simple question.
	What can reason tell us and what can reason not tell us?
	Because reason is not unbounded.
	It's not even unbounded externally.
	Uh, there are regions of the universe that are so far away, they're more than 14 and a half million light years away.
	And so no information can have reached us from those regions.
	We can never learn about them.
	Not because we aren't curious or willing to learn, but because the information that is carried by light.
	We can see stars five light years away, ten light years away.
	Of course, we see them five years later, ten years later, because that's how long it takes for the light to get here.
	That's how we know that there was a star there five years ago.
	We actually don't know if there's a star there now.
	It could have burned out in the intervening five years.
	But there are regions of the universe that are so distant that they are inaccessible to us permanently to all human beings.
	And then, says Emmanuel Kant, there may be other things that we can't possibly know.
	And life after death is a very good candidate for one of those things because how would you know?
	How would you go about figuring it out if you want to conduct like a laboratory experiment?
	What experiment would even work?
	So you can actually see here, first of all, not just that the atheist is making unsupported claims, which is part of my point, but you can see here the difficulty of the voyage we are undertaking together in this book, because how do we go about making progress?
	And you're gonna see how we're gonna use every available trick and tactic and technique to try to go beyond what appears to be this like tall wall, this uh giant stone, this obstacle uh in which we want to see beyond it, but we don't appear to have any kind of eyes to be able to be able to do that.
	That is the challenge facing us in this um investigation called Life After Death The Evidence.
	Uh, when I pick it up next time, I'm going to start to begin my way to try to part move the stone, uh, part the clouds, if you will, so that we can begin to make some real progress on what is admittedly uh an extremely difficult topic to investigate.

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