(Isaiah 21: 1-2) “A prophecy against the Desert by the Sea: Like whirlwinds sweeping through the southland, an invader comes from the desert, from a land of terror. A dire vision has been shown to me: The traitor betrays, the looter takes loot. Elam, attack! Media, lay siege! I will bring to an end all the groaning she caused.”
On January 15 2022 a headline appeared in the online edition of Reuters which said; “UAE-backed forces enter central Yemen fray as UN warns of military escalation.” Part of the article stated; “Yemeni forces backed by the United Arab Emirates have joined coalition troops fighting the Houthi movement around the central city of Marib in a renewed push to secure the prize of an energy-producing region… The nearly seven-year-old conflict, largely seen as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced millions and pushed Yemen to the verge of famine as the economy collapsed.”
Reuters also published the following report on Tuesday; “Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi group attacked the United Arab Emirates in what it said was an operation using missiles and drones, setting off explosions in fuel trucks that killed three people and causing a fire near the airport of Abu Dhabi, capital of the region’s commercial and tourism hub. The strike on a leading Gulf Arab ally of the United States takes the war between the Houthi group and a Saudi-led coalition to a new level, and may hinder efforts to contain regional tensions as Washington and Tehran work to rescue a nuclear deal.”
Yesterday in the Guardian online it was reported that the Saudi-Led Coalition including the forces of the UAE retaliated with airstrikes on the capital, Sana’a, a day after the Houthi drone attack had killed three people in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia’s coalition partner. Neighbours and doctors said about 14 people were killed when the coalition planes struck the home of a high-ranking Houthi military official, including his wife and son.
Now turning to this prophecy in Isaiah Chapter 21:1-2 in its context describes the destruction of the City of Babylon. Historically Babylon was conquered by the Medo-Persian Empire but the city itself was never destroyed but atrophied over time. This oracle relates to the desert region situated by the Sea which would have to be the Red Sea. We also know from God’s Word that the final destruction of the City of Babylon is heard at the Red Sea and that it is a city in the desert and the harlot we see described in the Book of Revelation. .(Jeremiah 49:21) (Revelation 17:3).
The whole of Isaiah Chapter 21 relates to the geographical region of Saudi Arabia. You have also the prophecies against Edom and against Arabia, all within the heart of the Muslim world today located within Saudi Arabia. Mecca, the home of Islam, has the black stone (in reality a meteor) housed in the Kaaba and worshipped and venerated by Muslims around the world overshadowed by the huge clock tower with the crescent moon at its pinnacle. This monolithic structure they call “Mt Babel” named after the Tower of Babel. It was named after the original city of Babylon built by Nimrod, a major type of the Antichrist in the Bible. Today it stands as a sentinel to the whole Muslim world of Islam’s agenda to see a global empire.
The religious roots of Mecca go all the way back to Nimrod’s Babylon, “the Mother of Harlots” that gave birth to all false religion we have seen down through history and which we see in today’s world. We know that Nimrod, the founder of both the Ancient cities of Babylon and Assyria, wanted to build a global empire as an attempt to confront God in an act of defiance. Scripture tells us that Nimrod was an arch rebel in the face of God (Genesis 10:9). It is said that he did this because he was incensed at God for destroying people with the flood.
Babylon in the Bible is also a description of the whole world today. Whether it is the decadence and opulence of Roman Catholicism, or the ideology of Islam with its religious component, or the multitude of different religions and philosophies and sensual pleasures on offer, or the materialistic hedonistic lifestyles and pursuits of a society living without God that spurns the law of God, it is all Babylon today! Babylon is even coming into people’s living rooms through the television, the Internet and through the cyber world of virtual reality today all around the world.
Having said this we are also told that Babylon is a city by the Sea that is destroyed and its destruction is heard at the Red Sea (Jeremiah 49:21). While the original site of the Ancient City of Babylon was located in a desert on the banks of the River Euphrates it was not a city located near the Sea. Saddam Hussein tried to rebuild the city but it was stopped in its tracks by the allies in the war with Iraq which saw the regime of Saddam overthrown. Now let’s look at this prophecy in light of what we see happening in Saudi Arabia today with the escalating war in Yemen between the Saudis, now backed by the United Arab Emirates, fighting the Houthi Rebels backed by Iran.
Let’s turn to the Book of the Prophet Isaiah Chapter 2:1-2.
(Vs.1) “A prophecy against the Desert by the Sea: Like whirlwinds sweeping through the southland, an invader comes from the desert, from a land of terror.
Notice that the invader, like a whirlwind which destroys everything in its path, comes out of the desert and from a land of terror. Today Iran is a land of terror and terrorists that are fighting a proxy war against the west, against Israel and against the moderate Arab states located on the Saudi Arabian Peninsula that the Iranian regime see as apostates because of the Arab states association with the western democracies primarily through trading with them. Already we see the whirlwind of terror coming out of the desert in Yemen against the Saudis and undoubtedly the City of Mecca is in the sights of the Houthi missiles and drones supplied by Iran.
One of the reasons that the Saudis were originally inclined to join the Abraham Accord brokered by Donald Trump was to have an ally against Iran. Now with Biden in the White House and with his abandonment of Afghanistan the moderate Arab world are now concerned with Iranian hostility especially as Iran is very close to nuclear capability with their uranium enrichment programme moving ahead in leaps and bounds and with the EU and the US fostering this by seeking to re-start the Iranian nuclear deal brokered by Obama in 2015. No wonder the UAE forces have entered into the fray and backed the Saudi forces fighting against the Houthi rebels backed by Iran. Now the war has intensified with missiles and drones from the Houthis landing in the UAE.
We know from God’s Word that the City of Babylon the Great will be burned by the firepower of the Islamic beast empire and its ten nation Islamic confederacy. God’s judgement will ultimately fall on the City of Babylon (Mecca) because He will have put it in the hearts of the Islamic beast empire and its ten nation Islamic confederacy to destroy the Harlot City located in the desert by the Red Sea (Revelation 17:3, 16-18) We are told in other passages of scripture about the fiery judgement that will come upon Saudi Arabia which will see the oil reserves under the desert burn out of control and the fallout making the whole geographical region uninhabitable by humans (Isaiah 34:8-10) (Revelation 18:9-19). It’s judgement is because of the way it has treated God’s people the Jews and by extension and inclusion the faithful Body of the Messiah being faithful New Covenant Believers in the Messiah our Lord Jesus (Obadiah 1:10-14) (Revelation 17:6). And then we read;
(Vs.2) “A dire vision has been shown to me: The traitor betrays, the looter takes loot. Elam, attack! Media, lay siege! I will bring to an end all the groaning she caused.”
This was a dreadful, appalling, and a frightful vision that Isaiah saw. The traitor who betrays is the regime of Iran that betrays its Muslim brethren and wants to loot its treasures. Iran hates the Saudis because they are in competition with Iran over exporting oil. Iran wants to be the sole exporter of oil so they have to destroy the Saudi Oil enterprise. When the Iranians burn Mecca they will see it as having looted the Saudis. We know it will be the firepower of Iran that will hit Mecca and possibly other Arab kingdoms on the Saudi Arabian Peninsula, especially the UAE. Today faithful New Covenant believers are persecuted and beheaded in Saudi Arabia. The groaning of these faithful believers will have reached the throne of God and He will respond accordingly.
Persia today is Iran and the Medes today are the modern day Kurds. Somehow the Iranians and the Kurds will join forces to destroy the City of Babylon and burn it with fire. Possibly a Missile with a nuclear warhead might be the means of the fall of Babylon causing fallout in the whole region. Either that or it would be a barrage of missiles or armed drones coming out of Iran or out of the desert of Yemen that will not only hit Mecca but ignite the oil reserves under the Saudi Arabian desert to burn out of control. Either way the City of Babylon will burn! Indeed it is written in God’s Word; “Fallen, fallen is Babylon!”
We must always keep in mind that Babylon was an ancient empire, its culture and decadence and opulence and its multi-faith religious culture and its immoral, sensual and hedonistic lifestyles have been seen in every civilization, culture and nation down through history and it is seen today in a world that has turned away from God and embraced ‘Babylon’ and all that comes with it. When the City of Babylon burns in the desert by the Sea it will be the precursor of the fiery judgement upon the whole world when the Lord Jesus comes back in the Day of the Lord to destroy the ‘Babylon’ of this present evil age and that with blazing fire (2 Peter 3:10-12) (2 Thessalonians 2:6-9).
As New Covenant believers we are admonished to “Flee from Babylon! Escape with your lives! Do not be destroyed in her punishment. For this is the time of the LORD’s vengeance; He will pay her what she deserves” (Jeremiah 51:6). Then we also read in the Book of Revelation where the Apostle John picks up on what Jeremiah wrote. “Then I heard another voice from heaven say: “Come out of her, My people, so that you will not share in her sins or contract any of her plagues. For her sins are piled up to heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities” (Revelation 18:4-5). The escalating war on Saudi Arabian Peninsula it would seem is the prelude to a conflagration in the Middle-East that will shake the nations of the world!
