Standing With Israel: Regent Marks October 7 Anniversary

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Regent University honors the Jewish state, remembers the October 7 terror attacks, and marks a turning point for peace.

VIRGINIA BEACH, VA (October 8, 2025) — Two years after Hamas terrorists launched their deadly assault on Israel, Regent University’s Robertson School of Government (RSG) gathered students, faculty, civic leaders, and guests inside the University Library Auditorium for a solemn commemoration—and a message of enduring hope.

The event took place just days before a landmark peace accord — brokered under President Donald Trump’s Middle East initiative — brought an end to Hamas-Israel hostilities and secured the release of twenty surviving hostages on October 13, 2025. Together, Regent leaders reaffirmed the biblical and moral foundations of Israel’s right to exist and the Christian duty to stand with God’s chosen people.

Remembering October 7 and Standing with Israel

Opening the ceremony, Ryley Garrido, assistant director of Regent’s Israel Institute, welcomed guests to “a solemn commemoration of the second anniversary of the terrorist attack of October 7, 2023.”

“We hope you’ll come away with a better sense of what happened, why it matters, what impact it has on America, and what you can do in response,” Garrido said, noting Regent’s distinction as “the only institute for the study of modern Israel at a biblically faithful Christian university.”

Garrido thanked Regent University Chancellor Gordon Robertson and CBN Israel for their ongoing partnership, and acknowledged student organizations whose support “made this event possible,” adding, “We’re looking forward to strengthening Regent’s ties with Israel and educating the Regent community and the general public about the history and politics of Israel.”

The audience heard firsthand testimony from Shye Klein, a 27-year-old Canadian-Israeli photographer who survived the Hamas massacre at the Supernova Music Festival. “It’s so important for me to be able to convey what happened to us to such supportive people,” Klein said. “We didn’t know if we would survive, and we ran for our lives.”

He recounted driving “through fields for almost an hour,” seeing “numerous bodies in all sorts of states.” Since that day, he said, he has visited “over 235 cities across the continental United States… telling the same story each time.”

Klein urged the audience to support the peace deal and the release of remaining hostages: “Lasting peace will only come when both sides choose dialogue over destruction and dignity over division.”

Lessons of Faith, History, and Courage

Former Virginia governor and current Regent distinguished professor Bob McDonnell followed with an impassioned call to remember both Scripture and history. “We are bound with Israel, not only because of our geopolitical friendships, but because of our core beliefs,” he said. “Our rights come from a Creator.”

Calling Israel “the only democracy in the Mideast,” McDonnell reminded attendees that the Jewish people’s claim to the land is “a special land uniquely and specifically and clearly given by the voice of God himself to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
Quoting from Genesis and Deuteronomy, he affirmed: “The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still… There is something so powerfully unique about this land that God from the beginning of time has given His hedge of protection and His favor.”

McDonnell linked Virginia’s heritage to that friendship, highlighting the state’s “permanent enshrinement of the friendship between Israel and Virginia” through the Virginia Israel Advisory Board and through business ties such as Sabra Hummus, launched during his governorship. “This friendship is holy,” he concluded. “It’s one that is sacred, and one that all of us need to treasure.”

A City’s Proclamation of Solidarity

Virginia Beach Mayor Bobby Dyer, a Regent alumnus and RSG faculty member, presented an official city proclamation honoring Israel and condemning anti-Semitism. He read the text aloud, saying:

“The massacre committed by Hamas on October 7th was the bloodiest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust. Now, therefore, I, Robert ‘Bobby’ Dyer, Mayor of the City of Virginia Beach, do hereby proclaim solemn remembrance for the two-year anniversary of the terrorist attack… and call upon all citizens to stand alongside Israel, the Jewish people, and especially the Jewish citizens of Virginia Beach.”

He concluded firmly: “We will not forget, we will not waver, and we will stand with you. God bless America. God bless Israel.”

Dean Michele Bachmann: Truth Amid Propaganda

Delivering the keynote address, Dean Michele Bachmann — a former U.S. Representative (R-Minn.) and founder of Regent’s Israel Institute — recounted her first visit to Israel at age 18 and her decades-long devotion to the nation’s security and biblical heritage.

“Israel has an absolute — not only biblical right to the land of Israel — moral right and geopolitical, international-law right,” she said, citing the 1920 San Remo Agreement and subsequent United Nations incorporation that “recognized Israel’s right to the land.”

Bachmann warned students about the “global delusion” of anti-Israel propaganda financed by terrorist-sponsoring regimes. “Qatar has spent over $100 billion on America,” she said, “targeting the young people of America to turn away from Israel with lie after lie.”

She described the October 7 attacks as “the genocide” of the Jewish people and condemned Hamas as “a terror organization… that creates famine so that they can profit off it.” Reflecting on her personal connection to Kibbutz Be’eri — where she once lived as a teenager and which was devastated in 2023 — Bachmann shared the heartbreak of returning to see “the suburban type homes with the bullet holes and the floors drenched in blood.”

“Israel was the victim,” she said. “They just do what they have to do and they survive. And they will survive and they will go on.” As for Regent’s commitment to Israel, she affirmed, “We are committed to the truth… to standing with the Jewish people, to standing with the state of Israel. We are not a fair-weather friend. We are here for the long haul.”

“Never Alone”: A Christian Commitment

For closing remarks, Dr. A.J. Nolte, director of the Israel Institute and associate professor of politics at Regent, thanked the speakers and partners. “You might say it’s a ‘flex’ — bringing a mayor, a governor, and a former presidential candidate to an event,” he quipped. “I would say no — that’s a faculty meeting here at Regent University.”

Turning solemn, Nolte declared that October 7 proved “never again happened again.” Having visited Kibbutz Be’eri himself, he described “the ruins that Hamas left behind” and denounced the “lies, half-truths, and misdirections” that continue to fuel anti-Semitism.

“For Christians around the world,” he said, “the Islamic supremacist ideology of Hamas has been used against Christians to persecute, to kill and destroy… first the Saturday people, then the Sunday people.”

He called believers to a new pledge: “If we can’t say ‘never again,’ let us say ‘never alone.’ To our Jewish friends, our Jewish brothers and sisters — you will never be alone. When you fight back, we will fight with you. When they come after you, they’ll have to come through us.”

Faith, Freedom, and the Promise of Peace

Nolte closed with a prayerful hope that “on the third-year anniversary, we will be here to celebrate the safe return of the hostages, the disarming and beginning de-radicalization of Hamas… anti-Semitism on the wane, and Israel once again able to celebrate its many accomplishments.”

Two years after the darkest day in modern Israeli history — and just days before a long-prayed-for peace — the Regent community stood united in purpose: to remember, to stand firm, and to proclaim God’s faithfulness over His people and His land.