On October 15, following his keynote speech at the 26th annual Night to Honor Israel at Cornerstone Church, radio talk show host and ethicist Dennis Prager interviewed Pastor John Hagee. Click the play button below to listen to the broadcast.

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“During difficult days such as this, when it seems that the whole world is against Israel, many in the Jewish community nervously scan the globe, searching for friends.”

Standing behind the massive gray podium with the blue AIPAC logo, I looked out across the darkened banquet hall. Candlelight flickered from glass containers on the tabletops. Faces were indistinguishable, but I sensed six thousand pairs of eyes scanning the stage. I was well aware that most of the largely Jewish audience disagreed with me on many political issues. But on the issue of the need to support Israel and recognition of the dangerous situation in the Middle East today, we were in total agreement.

“You look toward the United Nations,” I continued, “which Ambassador Dore Gold calls ‘the Tower of Babble.’ You look at Europe, where the ghost of Hitler is again walking across the stage of history. You open your newspapers and read about American universities, where Israel is being vilified by students taught by professors whose Middle Eastern chairs are sponsored by Saudi Arabia. You look to America’s mainline churches and see their initiatives to divest from Israel. You go to the bookstore and see slanderous titles by the former president of the United States–and you feel very much alone.”

I leaned into the podium, feeling as confident–and as earnest–as if I were addressing my Cornerstone congregation. “I want to say this as clearly and plainly as I possibly can: Israel, you are not alone. Ladies and gentlemen, it’s a new day in America. The sleeping giant of Christian Zionism has awakened. Fifty million Christians are standing up and applauding the State of Israel.”

Suddenly six thousand people were standing to their feet and applauding the support I offered on behalf of evangelical Christians, whom I was honored to represent as the first pastor ever invited to address the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the largest and most influential advocacy group for Israel and the Jewish people in the United States.

How I came to be a keynote speaker during the AIPAC 2007 Policy Conference is part of the story of this book. In these pages I want to convey the same message I have been preaching on television and in churches and auditoriums across America for twenty-six years.

As an avid student of history, I am convinced that we are facing the same situation the world faced in 1938.

Iran is the new Germany, and its president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is the new Hitler. Iran poses a threat to the State of Israel that promises nothing less than a nuclear holocaust. The only way to win a nuclear war is to make certain it never starts. We must stop Iran’s nuclear threat and stand boldly with Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East . . .

~ excerpt from Chapter 1 of In Defense of Israel