Earthquakes are not uncommon in Israel as the Syrian-African fault line, art of the Great Rift Valley that runs from eastern Lebanon to Mozambique, that runs underneath the Jordan Valley.

The last earthquake in northern Israel was in July, measuring 4.1 on the Richter Scale, but seismologists estimate that according to statistics and the geologic history, the region should experience a major quake every 80-100 years. The last major quake was in  1927 and registered 6.2 on the Richter Scale killing 500 people. Another major earthquake is therefore now due.

Massive earthquakes in Israel are prophesied to accompany the multinational Gog and Magog conflict that will signal the end of times.

On that day, when Gog sets foot on the soil of Yisrael—declares Hashem—My raging anger shall flare up.For I have decreed in My indignation and in My blazing wrath: On that day, a terrible earthquake shall befall the land of Yisrael. The fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the beasts of the field, all creeping things that move on the ground, and every human being on earth shall quake before Me. Mountains shall be overthrown, cliffs shall topple, and every wall shall crumble to the ground. Ezekiel 38:18-20

Rabbi Haim Shvili, a 20th-century Jewish mystic, described precisely how these earthquakes will play out. In “Cheshbonot HaGeula” (Accountings of the Redemption), Rabbi Shvili’s book of predictions concerning the Messiah published in 1935, he assessed that these earthquakes will come during the holiday of Sukkot, coinciding with the War of Gog and Magog.

Rabbi Shvili noted that the seismic activity will specifically target Muslim and Christian sites, destroying pagan temples and monuments to foreign gods throughout Israel.

These earthquakes will be so severe as to cause geographic changes in the Temple Mount, requiring the construction of an entirely new city. The quakes will cause springs of water to burst forth around Jerusalem, bringing about the prophecy in Zechariah.

And it shall come to pass in that day that living waters shall go out from Yerushalayim: half of them toward the eastern sea and half of them toward the western sea; in summer and in winter shall it be.” Zechariah 14:8

The earthquake will also split the Mount of Olives in two.

On that day, He will set His feet on the Mount of Olives, near Yerushalayim on the east; and the Mount of Olives shall split across from east to west, and one part of the Mount shall shift to the north and the other to the south, a huge gorge. Zechariah 14:4

A 2016 report by the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee’s Home-Front Readiness Subcommittee stated that in the case of a 7.5 magnitude earthquake, an estimated 7,000 people would be killed, another 8,600 injured and 377,000 left homeless. In addition, such a quake could cause up to $55 billion in damages.