London memorial for victims of Iran regime, Oct. 7 targeted in suspected arson attack

Obadiah's oracle addresses the nation of Edom, which stood by — and ultimately participated in — the violence done to Jerusalem. The plain grammatical-historical sense condemns not only active aggression but the celebration and erasure of Jewish suffering.

The principle is timeless and directly applicable: those who attack memorials honoring Jewish victims are doing precisely what Obadiah indicts — gloating over misfortune and seeking to erase the record of Judah's suffering. The arsonists are not passive bystanders; they are active participants in the very spirit Obadiah condemns.

The destruction of a London memorial to October 7 victims and victims of Iran's regime is a modern instantiation of Obadiah's indictment. The perpetrators sought not merely to harm but to erase memory — to 'rejoice over the people of Judah in the day of their ruin.'

Obadiah pronounces that 'as you have done, it shall be done to you' (v. 15).

This oracle stands as a solemn warning to those who carry out and those who tolerate such acts on British soil.

The LORD of hosts declares through Zechariah that the nations which plunder and harm Israel are touching the very apple of His eye — the most sensitive and protected part of a person. The covenant promise is not merely that Israel will survive, but that those who lay hands against her provoke the immediate jealousy of the Almighty.

This promise was made in the context of Babylon's treatment of the exiles, but its covenantal logic extends to all nations in all times: God's protective covenant over His people is not geographically limited to the land of Israel.

The attack in London — on soil far from Jerusalem — demonstrates that hatred of the Jewish people follows them wherever they memorialize their dead. But Zechariah's covenant promise follows them equally: the LORD of hosts declares that every hand raised against them, in London or anywhere else, is raised against the apple of His eye.

This is both a warning to those who sent or carried out the arson, and a comfort to the communities in London who mourn.

The fifth seal reveals that God keeps an eternal, inviolable record of those slain unjustly — their witness cannot be erased, even when earthly memorials are destroyed. The cry of the martyrs 'how long?' is the cry of those whose memory the world seeks to obliterate.

Though this passage speaks of those slain for the word of God, its underlying theological principle is that God is the ultimate keeper of the memory of the unjustly slain, and that no act of physical erasure can reach His record.

The arsonists who burned a London memorial sought to erase the testimony of October 7 victims and those killed by Iran's regime. But Revelation 6 declares that the testimony of the slain is kept not in stone or candle but before the throne of the Sovereign Lord.

No fire reaches that altar. The memorial that truly endures is the one held in the hands of the Judge of all the earth.