By Peyton Majors
Christian Action League
November 3, 2023
A coalition of North Carolina churches rallied together at an event last week to raise more than $300,000 for Israel’s version of the Red Cross, an organization that is in need of funds following the devastating attack by the terrorist organization Hamas.
“A Night for Israel” at Trinity Baptist Church in Asheville, N.C., raised $308,010 for Israel’s Magen David Adom (MDA) organization, which handles disaster relief, ambulance and blood services for Israel. It is Israel’s official representative to the International Red Cross and does not receive government support for its general operations. MDA relies on support from donors.
Ralph Sexton Jr., head of Ralph Sexton Ministries, partnered with Trinity for the event. Sexton is pastor emeritus at the church and was in Israel four days before the attack.
“We must stand with Israel,” Sexton told attendees at the event. “Israel, you are the home of our Lord. Israel, you gave us the prophets and the holy Scriptures. And Israel, we stand with you.”
Throughout the world, Sexton said, there are 67 Roman Catholic countries, 49 Islamic, 49 Protestant, 14 Eastern Orthodox, three Hindu but only one Jewish nation. (The data is derived by religious majority.)
“The evil of this world has chased the Jews for thousands of years,” Sexton said.
Sexton’s father began standing for Israel in the 1950s after meeting Holocaust survivors.
Referencing the Holocaust and other past waves of persecution, Sexton added, “Jerusalem is the capital of Israel. Israel is the home of the Jewish people. And Hamas needs to hear us in solidarity with Israel to say tonight: Never again.”
Winston Parrish, pastor of Trinity Baptist Church, said the “brutality of the attack” by Hamas “is unspeakable.”
“The atrocities carried out by Hamas seem unimaginable. Not since the ash covered the ground of Auschwitz have the Jewish people been so brutally, methodically and sadistically executed simply for being home,” Parrish said.
Yonatan Yagodovsky, director of international fundraising for MDA, spoke at the event and described the tall task the organization faces. MDA uses bullet-proof ambulances, he said. Family members of MDA workers were injured and killed, he added.
“This was a vicious attack, and Israelis were moved from their homes,” Yagodovsky told WYFF. “Ten team members of ours were murdered on the way to assist other people. We’ve lost quite a lot of ambulances.”
MDA must “be ready for the next escalation, and the next escalation could happen in the next few hours,” Yagodovsky added.
“According to the Magen David Adom law, we are non-governmental. We are not financially supported by the Israeli government, even though we carry national duties, so we have to fundraise within Israel in addition to our own income,” he said.
