On this day in 70 AD, the pagan Roman Empire is said to have completed the sack of Jerusalem and the destruction of its Temple. And 1,955 years later, a Palestinian terror attack left dozens dead or wounded in Jerusalem as Islamic jihadis continue to try adding the world‘s only Jewish state to the lengthy list of 50 Muslim nations.
While the history of humanity is warfare, it is also true that the land of Israel, though promised in perpetuity to the Jewish people (see Genesis 17:8), has been constantly contested, usually upon religious grounds. From the pagans of ancient times, like the Philistines, Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, to the holy wars of the Middle Ages, to the ceaseless Islamic jihad on Israel since its modern rebirth, we see how determined other peoples are to try and steal the land of the Chosen People.
There have many significant events on Sept. 8, including Revolutionary patriot Nathan Hale volunteering to spy on the British, but two stand out in particular in light of today’s deadly terror attack on a bus in Jerusalem. The first is nearly 2,000 years old. Sept. 8, 70 AD, is estimated as the end of Titus’s devastating siege of Jerusalem and demolition of the Temple, leaving only the Wailing Wall, which still exists today.
As Christ predicted, Titus left not a stone upon another stone (Matthew 24:2). It began the major Jewish Diaspora that endures to modern times, though in the 20th century Israel was finally reestablished as a Jewish nation. And ever since, Muslims both in Israel and outside of it have been trying to destroy it. On the Temple Mount itself, over the ruins of the Temple Titus destroyed, mosques stand, desecrating the holy place with blasphemous services to the demon-god Allah.
Related: Jerusalem Terror Attack: Six Dead, a Dozen Wounded
The other historical event, or rather series of events, that fits all too well with today’s Jerusalem terror attack is the 1970 Black September hijackings, from Sept. 6-9. The terror group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) hijacked four different planes, held the passengers hostage, and demanded the release of terrorists from multiple countries. Germany, Britain, and Switzerland released some terrorists, while Israel and the USA refused.
[Times of Israel] Three of the hijacked planes, carrying slightly more than 300 passengers, were forcibly landed in Zarqa, Jordan, at the Dawson Field… The PFLP … warned that at the end of a 72-hour deadline, the hostages would be murdered.
Most of the hostages — Germans, Swiss, British, Dutch and American, as well as some of the 78 Jewish Americans — were released within the first week, with 107 non-Jewish females and children released after the first day…The terrorists searched for, and singled out, the Jews, holding them in captivity longer than non-Jews with a similar age and gender profile.
Fifty-six captives, including the Jews, individuals with government or military offices, and airplane crew members, were held for three weeks.
More than half a century later, nearly 50 Israelis are again being held hostage by Palestinian terrorists, this time in Gaza. And six innocent Israelis were shot to death in Jerusalem today.
Palestinian terrorists attacked civilians at a bus stop in Jerusalem today, murdering Sarah Mendelson, Yaakov Pinto, Rabbi Levi Yitzhak Pash, Rabbi Israel Matzner, Rabbi Mordechai Steintzag and Rabbi Yosef David.
— Israel ישראל (@Israel) September 8, 2025
We mourn their loss and stand with their families in grief. pic.twitter.com/jYEGnjXPks
Over two millennia, violence has plagued the land of Israel. When will enough be too much?
