Kurz and Guttenberg Host Clandestine Gathering
Former Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and former German Defense Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg hosted a four-day meeting earlier this month titled “Moving MountAIns,” a name referencing one of the event’s central themes: artificial intelligence. The meeting in Seefeld in Tyrol was attended by 80 participants, including Arab royals, government ministers from several countries, and billionaire investors. Yet none of the attendees were willing to speak with Austria’s profil.at or other media outlets that sought insight into the gathering.
Profil.at observed:
A Greek military aircraft landed in Innsbruck with the Greek defense minister on board. Turkish Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek also traveled there, as did a German minister and royals from the Middle East, as well as Orbán politicians and entrepreneurs. …
Private jets from the [United States] also landed: Eric Schmidt, former ceo of Google, came. According to Bloomberg Billionaires, he is the 45th richest person in the world. Also from the U.S. was Dovi Frances, an Israeli-American venture capitalist and television personality.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s son Avner was also present, along with other “financially powerful investors from Israel” who “spent four days talking to those who would otherwise tend to be on the other side of the Middle East conflict,” the article states.
While Kurz does business in the Arab world, the headquarters of his most successful company, Dream, is located in Israel. Kurz thus brings the two sides together. “Arabs sat down with Israelis to discuss the Middle East conflict—on the eve of the ceasefire, incidentally,” profil.at reported.
Since resigning from office, Kurz has spent much time in the Middle East. His aim goes far beyond creating private wealth and driving innovation.
In February, he told Jerusalem Post that while he admires Tel Aviv’s “vibrant tech community” and the United Arab Emirates’ “abundant capital and innovation.” He is most drawn by the vision of peace symbolized by the Abraham Accords, which established diplomatic relations between Israel and several Arab states—an initiative that Guttenberg is also fond of.
We can assume that the overarching goal of the meeting went beyond creating business connections and discussing the future of technological innovations.
Since Nov. 14, 2022, Kurz has been on the Honorary Advisory Council of the Abraham Accords Peace Institute, founded by Jared Kushner, son-in-law of U.S. President Donald Trump. Kushner is working with special envoy Steve Witkoff on the ceasefire deal.
Kurz is a great proponent of the U.S. peace initiative, but unlike some of his fellow peacemakers, Kurz has an additional desire for Jerusalem: preserving the city’s Catholic heritage. He believes this heritage is the solution to the region’s conflicts.
Referring to the Austrian Hospice of the Holy Family in Jerusalem, Kurz said in March 2018: “For more than 150 years, the Jerusalem hospice has been an important representation for our country in the Middle East.” The hospice serves as “host and bridge builder at the same time,” as well as the “flagship of Christian Austria in the Holy Land,” he said. “We would like to further strengthen its important role and therefore support the work of the Austrian Catholic Church in Jerusalem.”
Kurz wants the Catholic Church to be a bridge builder in the Middle East, where religious conflicts have raged for centuries.
Guttenberg has a similar view of events in the Middle East. He cofounded the Friends of Israel Initiative due to “the onslaught of radical Islamism as well as the specter of a nuclear Iran, both of which threaten the entire world.”
These two men are much closer to the Middle East conflict than Donald Trump and his advisers. While Trump may see another conflict to solve, Guttenberg and Kurz are deeply invested. Whatever these two men discussed at this clandestine meeting may play a role in shaping the future of the Middle East.
This becomes much more evident if you consider what Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry discussed in the July 2024 Trumpet issue about a forming alliance between Europe and the Arab world. He wrote:
On April 13-14, Iran directly attacked Israel with hundreds of drones. Just after, Germany’s Welt newspaper wrote that as pressure on Israel increases, “it will also become clear whether any of Germany’s political capital remains in the Arab world that can help forge an alliance against Iran and stabilize the region” (April 14; emphasis mine throughout).
For longtime Trumpet readers, that is an extraordinary statement. Germany is working to forge an alliance of Arab nations against Iran. This is a development we have forecast for years based on Psalm 83. But as we will see, confronting Iran is only part of the alliance’s goal.
Psalm 83 is a prophecy of Assyria, the modern-day German people, which also includes Austria, allying with Turkey and various Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Many of these nations are currently involved in Trump’s peace plan for Gaza. But while Germany today is seen as a staunch ally of Israel, Turkey and others are viewed with great suspicion. As Zvi Hauser, former chairman of the Knesset Defense Committee, wrote in Israel Hayom:
As far as the existence and prosperity of a Jewish state in the Middle East is concerned, there is no fundamental difference between the perception of the ayatollahs in Iran and the perception of the Muslim Brotherhood in Turkey and Qatar. Both categorically deny the existence of an independent Jewish state in the region. But while the Iranians have been labeled for years by Western countries as a violent and aggressive factor that strives for instability in the Middle East, including obtaining nuclear capabilities to realize its goals—the Turkish-Qatari axis is an ally of the West: Turkey is a member of nato, and Qatar has a new security-strategic agreement with the Americans, which does not prevent it from continuing to systematically work to establish an anti-Israel narrative throughout both the Muslim and Western worlds.
In many ways, these Arab nations’ alliance with the West makes them more dangerous than Iran. While Iran has been sanctioned for years, these Arab nations have been allowed to flourish.
This makes Kurz’s and Guttenberg’s alliance with these nations so astonishing—and they may well have great prophetic relevance.
For more than 15 years, Mr. Flurry has suggested that Guttenberg could be the leader of a prophesied emerging Europe superpower. He has also pointed to Sebastian Kurz as a key player in the fulfillment of these prophecies, as you can read in “The Holy Roman Empire Goes Public—Big Time!”
Now we see both of these leaders getting more involved in the power politics of the Middle East, which is exactly what we expect based on Bible prophecy.
Luke 21 and other prophecies show that European peacekeepers will surround Jerusalem in a time now imminent. Daniel 11:40 adds critical context, prophesying of a king of the north (Catholic Europe) conquering a king of the south (radical Islam led by Iran). In “The Hidden Danger in Germany’s ‘Alliance Against Iran,’” Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry explains what happens next:
Daniel 11:41 says of this European power: “He shall enter also into the glorious land”—speaking of Israel. The Hebrew for “enter” indicates a peaceful entry, not forced. The Germans will undoubtedly be invited in as a peacekeeping force—to militarily secure Jerusalem from the engulfing violence. (This is further explained in my booklet Jerusalem in Prophecy.)
But all along, behind the scenes, the most sinister plot is developing—and it is revealed in Psalm 83!
Read Mr. Flurry’s full article for the critical context of these prophecies.
As Mr. Flurry highlighted, this Psalm 83 alliance will confront radical Islam. The individual nations of the alliance may even play a direct role in bringing a temporary peace to the region. However, the Bible is clear that these nations’ hatred for Israel will not vanish; in fact, they will work behind Israel’s back, plotting its destruction.
Psalm 83:3-4 read: “They have taken crafty counsel against thy people, and consulted against thy hidden ones. They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.”
Turkey’s current president is quite open about his hatred for Israel. And what is revealed only in Bible prophecy is that Turkey will get together with other Arab nations and Germany to plot Israel’s demise.
Part of this strategy may include luring Israel into a false sense of security. Perhaps it may even include meetings like the one Guttenberg and Kurz just hosted.