Thoughts about the war on Easter Sunday
Pontificating about peace is not helpful
Today is Easter Sunday, when the Christian world’s religious and political leaders deliver uplifting messages.
Pope Leo XIV called on “those who have the power to unleash wars” to choose peace.“ “Let us abandon every desire for conflict, domination and power, and implore the Lord to grant his peace to a world ravaged by wars,” he said. Uppermost in his mind was the current war being waged by Israel and the US against Iran.
All very lofty sentiments, but the pontiff’s words show moral equivocation. There is no equivalence between western democracies fighting a just war on the one hand, and a fanatical regime ideologically committed to exporting global terrorism and violence on the other. The Islamic Republic is a regime hellbent on acquiring nuclear weapons which it will not be afraid to use, even at the cost of the lives of its own citizens.
The casus belli here is not so much ‘imminent threat’ as ‘unacceptable risk.’ Whatever one may think of Donald Trump - and there is plenty about him to criticise - he should be credited for taking decisive action to stop Iran’s race to becoming the next North Korea. The best case scenario is ‘regime change’ but failing that, the war would leave Iran’s missiles and infrastructure so extensively degraded that they would take years to rebuild.
The craven Europeans still believe that ‘this is not our war,’ although the Iranians have demonstrated that their ballistic missiles could reach Rome and London. Europe has not learned the lessons of the 1930s - that appeasement never works.
In Churchill’s famous words, "An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last." Not only does it fail to recognise the seriousness of the Iranian threat, but the West suffers from a dangerous tendency to underestimate the power of ideology.
The Islamic Republic has turned down several chances to do a deal. Platitudes about ending wars and ‘choosing peace’ are not helpful.
I agree completely. This American pope is all ready no better or worse than the Argentine one. I always learn from your writing about the history of the Jews of Mid East and N. Africa and have advocated for Ashkenazi Jews to be more aware of this legacy. Doing my own research since I"m a teen. And I always feel I am free to take from the array of Jewish experience....we all share the same DNA....for those for whom race is the ultimate test of legitimacy.
Europe does not understand ideology because it has no ideology. No priorities. No morals. No ethics. The only thing the elites in Europe want to do is to hold on to power as long a possible, and damn the consequences to future generations.
Look at how France blocked the vote at the UN Security Council to agree to go to war to open up the Strait of Hormuz, (not that the UN is actually worthwhile, but still) and then lo and behold the Iranians let a French oil tanker through the next day. Of course the next day the UAE canceled a billion dollar project with France so I hope macron is happy. But it shows you the obsequiousness of those who purport to govern Europe. Ottoman Turkey used to be called the "sick man of Europe." But now the entire continent seems to have actually gotten the plague.
And don't get me started on Pope Leo. funny how he condemns what happened on Palm Sunday in Jerusalem but could not offer 1 word of outrage or condolence to the christians slaughtered by Islamists on that same day. There is an unhealthy and unholy obsession going on in Vatican City and we have also seen this play out before, too.