NOTHING HOLY ABOUT THIS WAR

After President Trump's military executed "0peration Midnight Hammer" June 22 of last year, he proclaimed that "Iran's nuclear facilities have been obliterated, and suggestions otherwise are fake news." So, when the administration initiated "Operation Epic Fury" on February 28 this year in conjunction with Israel as an extension of the "Ramadan War," ostensibly to prevent the country from developing nuclear capabilities, the resulting devastating activity appeared counter intuitive. The "operation" resulted in an estimated economic damage of between $50 and $300 billion, or roughly 40% of Iran's pre-war GDP, while killing 13 U.S. troops, and 2,000 Iranians. Iranian fatalities included almost 175 young girls between the ages of 7-12 at the Shajarah Tayyebeh girls school in Minab killed by a U.S. Tomahawk missile strike. It is hard to imagine that these kids posed a threat to our security. Since critics managed to debunk the rationale behind the initial justification for this war the administration gradually began rebranding its military activity as a "holy war," heavily invoking Christian nationalist rhetoric to justify its action. Some of Trump's allies now portray the U.S. - Israel war against Iran as a "modern crusade," with some military commanders actually telling troops that the conflict is ordained by God to trigger a divine return. The idea of invoking a holy war is not new. It refers to an armed conflict justified by religious causes aimed at defending, spreading or reclaiming sacred beliefs or lands. an early instance of this concept was initiated by Pope Urban II, who in 1095 called for a reclamation of the holy land, framing military action as a "just war," a crusade with the rallying cry "Deus Vult" - God wills it, which, by the way is tattooed on Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's bicep. Secretary Hegseth has framed the Iran war as a Christian "holy war" or "modern crusade" which emphasizes overwhelming violence and divine sanction. On April 15, at a Pentagon worship service he prayed in the name of Jesus that U.S. soldiers might use " overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy." He followed it up with "Let every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation." Dressing up the devastating military action as a bible based divine mission in which God is on the side of the U.S. arose almost naturally within an environment where Trump is regularly deified. During the White House Easter prayer event Paula White Cain, Senior Advisor to the White House Faith Office, Trump's long-time spiritual advisor, a Pentecostal televangelist, compared the president to Jesus himself, suggesting that he had been persecuted, unfairly accused, and had risen again. She expressed that, in her opinion, "God is using you to defeat evil." In an earlier video she had opined that "Saying no to Trump is the same as saying no to God." Whichever justification the administration uses to convince the voting public of its right to pursue this illegal, brutal, unprincipled war, its human consequences are dramatically illustrated in a short story, written by Mark Twain around 1904-1905, the "War Prayer," in which he issues a scathing indictment of war targeting the Spanish American War (1898) and the Philippine American War of 1899-1902. He expressed his disgust with the patriotic fervor and the "Christian" justification for the violent destruction of foreign peoples. Twain insisted that prayers for victory in battle ignore the suffering inflicted upon the enemy. His "prayer" is still very relevant today: "O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their fields with the pale forms of their patriotic dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their un-offending widows with unraveling grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst - for our sake who adore thee lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives." Secretary Hegseth ought to take note. Twain told his publisher not to print it "for it would be regarded as sacrilege." His prayer was ultimately printed after his death in Harper's Magazine of November of 1916. With midterm elections on the horizon, one wonders whether the Trump administration is grasping at straws to protect its slight electoral majority. All and all, not a very Christian effort. Theo Wierdsma