4 ms·

> I am just befuddled by how much of this violence is directly motivated by religious concerns, both on the side of Iran and on the side of Israel and USA. Can

> I am just befuddled by how much of this violence is directly motivated by religious concerns, both on the side of Iran and on the side of Israel and USA. Can you provide an example of this in 2026? It seems a little tenable with the ayatollah and Iran. But even here you don’t hear much talk of this being a war in the name of religion anymore. Nowhere near a few years ago and certainly nothing like 9/11 and the Taliban. And I hear nobody in Israel or America talking that way. Just a war defending people against attackers at the gates.

samrus 7mo ago
The evangelicals support isreal due to religious obligation. Project 2025, a christian nationalist policy advisement widely followed by the current regime, prescribes supporting isreal
- swingboy 7mo ago
  Evangelicals point to Genesis 12:3 as justification but never seem to have ever read any of Galatians 3.
kubb 7mo ago
The land promised to the Israelites generally extends from the Nile River in Egypt to the Euphrates River in Iraq/Syria, encompassing modern-day Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, and parts of Syria and Saudi Arabia. If you're a religious Jew, then you believe you have a mandate from God (so an irrefutable right, or even obligation, needing no justification) to settle and rule not only the West Bank but the entire region. So there will always be that motivation, as long as religious Judaism exists in Israel.
- azernik 7mo ago
  That is not the ruling Likud ideology in Israel nor the allied national religious ideology; both refer to Israel+Palestine+Golan as "the Whole Land of Israel". And in any case, the "most religious" (ie those whose politics are most totally driven by Judaism) bloc in Israel are at best ambivalent about the Israeli state and the settlement enterprise, and actively hostile to military service. Israeli hostility to Iran is driven by a "defensive" paranoia, not a religious mission.
  - kubb 7mo ago
    Of course it needs to be approached pragmatically. If Israel stated that its number one goal is to rule the entire region, they wouldn't have been as successful as they are. Also God didn't say when. But he did promise, according to the Book.
    - azernik 7mo ago
      This is insane conspiracy theory nonsense, and is also not how actual Jews read the Tanakh. (Which is also not referred to as "the Book", since it's a collection of books. This may seem like a nitpick, but I think is indicative of you getting your information from non-Jewish conspiracy theorist circles rather than anything related to Jewish theology or culture.)
      - kubb 7mo ago
        Try to resist the temptation to lump me in with the conspiracy theorists. If you can, provide facts. Thanks for your nuance about the Books. I was using the terminology I learned for the Bible (which also consists of multiple Books, but is referred to as the Book), but I'm happy to switch to "scripture". The Dati Leumi, the Religious Zionists, who constitute the ideological backbone of the settler movement, and have a lot of political influence in Israel, absolutely believe in their duty to govern the biblical land. For many, holding the West Bank is a religious obligation, and they consider the Golan settled and annexed. Religiously, the same principle that justifies them holding Golan applies to these territories. Here are some recent statements from political leaders: Bezalel Smotrich (Finance Minister, Religious Zionist party) "it is written that the future of Jerusalem is to expand to Damascus." Daniella Weiss (prominent settler leader) said in 2024: "We know from the Bible that the real borders of Greater Israel are the Euphrates and the Nile." Benjamin Netanyahu said he's on a "historic and spiritual mission" and that he is "very" attached to the vision of Greater Israel, which includes Palestinian areas and possibly also places that are part of Jordan, Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon. Yair Lapid, the secular centrist opposition leader (!). "I don't think I have a dispute on the biblical level about what the original borders of Israel are... I support anything that will allow the Jews a big, vast, strong land." Mike Huckabee (US Ambassador to Israel) "It would be fine if they took it all."
- nyc_data_geek1 7mo ago
  Tell that to the millions of Hasidic Jews in the United States who do not believe that a Jewish nation should exist at all.
  - kubb 7mo ago
    Thanks for this information, I'd like to offer something in return. Only certain Hasidic groups oppose Israel, including Satmar Hasidim (over 100k followers), and Neturei Karta (fringe, only about 1k supporters). That's less than millions, and a minority within the Hasidic world. Theologically, they oppose it based on an interpretation a Talmudic passage saying that establishment of Israel has to happen after the coming of the Messiah. Additionally, there are a lot different denominations of Jews within Israel, some of whom have more pragmatic views. But a significant, politically influential minority believes in their duty to govern all biblical land.
- weatherlite 7mo ago
  > If you're a religious Jew, then you believe you have a mandate from God (so an irrefutable right, or even obligation, needing no justification) to settle and rule not only the West Bank but the entire region. Well not really , most Orthodox definitely don't believe this in fact some of them are anti Zionist and the ones who accept Israel's existence definitely do not think Israel needs to expand its borders like that. So no to that.
  - kubb 7mo ago
    Israeli have a diverse spectrum of religious denominations. This includes religious, non Orthodox Jews. Dati Leumi (the religious Zionists) are by far the most hawkish. They absolutely believe that the biblical land belongs to the Jewish people. They account for about 15% and are incredibly politically influential. The Haredim (the ultra-Orthodox) are more complicated, and in general don't want all the promised land (they believe that the state established militarily/politically isn't the "spiritual" state that was promised). But, when it comes to the currently occupied land, they have been shifting right in recent years. They vote in coalition with the nationalist right, and their communities increasingly overlap geographically with settlements.
    - YZF 7mo ago
      The Dati Leumi camp isn't as uniform as you portray it. There are many examples (e.g. Avrum Burg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avraham_Burg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avraham_Burg ) do not think Israel should be over the entire historical/biblical region ("Eretz Israel Ha-Shlema"). More examples are: - Rabbi Yehuda Amital and the Meimad Party - Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein You are confusing politics and religion.
      - kubb 7mo ago
        > You are confusing politics and religion. Religious Zionism is a religious denomination. National Religious Party–Religious Zionism is a political party. It feels unfair and unjustified that you are accusing me of confusing them without substantiating your accusation. I am still open to learn anything that you might want to share with me that you think is important.
- YZF 7mo ago
  > If you're a religious Jew, then you believe you have a mandate from God (so an irrefutable right, or even obligation, needing no justification) to settle and rule not only the West Bank but the entire region. So there will always be that motivation, as long as religious Judaism exists in Israel. I would say this is generally false. There are many religious Jews who believe there should be no state of Israel until the Messiah comes. Judaism is very open to interpretations and certainly within the question of modern state politics doesn't have as much to say as you seem to think it does. There are many different Rabbis in Israel with different political opinions and generally their followers will tend to hold similar beliefs. There are right wing Rabbis and left wing Rabbis, it's not uniform at all. During the Oslo peace process there were many religious people supporting and many opposing, pretty much the same as secular. What is true is that some Israelis view their right to the land in the context of the biblical promise God made our people. That is not the same thing. Funny enough I'd say more Christians believe the literal promise and it's implication on current day politics than Jews. It's also true that religious people these days tend to be more right leaning politically. But the religion isn't mandating those world views it just that they can align.
  - kubb 7mo ago
    I will grant you this: there are many Israelis that don't believe this, and some of them are religious. Will you grant me this: religious motivations for violence exist within Israel, including the ruling political class?
- _DeadFred_ 7mo ago
  Imagine making such a blanket claim of religious Muslims. It is wild how people can assign with authority jews motivations/behaviors. If you make the same claims of conquest but with regards to Muslims, it wouldn't be acceptable. Should we allow such claims to understand Muslims behaviors, or have you stepped over a line in your defining religious Jews?
- dlubarov 7mo ago
  A belief that Jews were given lands millennia ago does not imply a justification, let alone an obligation, to violently reconquer those lands today. Consider that we haven't had a Sanhedrin (supreme Jewish council) for a while, which makes a bunch of Jewish law unenforceable. While there's some fringe interest in reinstituting the classical system, there's no scripture that would clearly obligate Jews to do so. Most just accept that times have changed. Similarly while there's some fringe interest in recapturing all historic Jewish lands, there's no scripture that would clearly obligate Jews to do so. Most just accept that times have changed. You can find a few weird individuals anywhere if you look hard enough, but portraying "religious Jews" broadly as aspiring to conquer the whole Middle East is way off base.
sosomoxie 7mo ago
[flagged]
- azernik 7mo ago
  That tweet does not support your claim, and it is in fact not Purim yet.
  - sosomoxie 7mo ago
    How does that tweet not support my claim? It's CNN reporting, here's the actual article: https://edition.cnn.com/world/live-news/israel-iran-attack-02-28-26-hnk-intl?post-id=cmm60wotj001m3b6pawhvknhc https://edition.cnn.com/world/live-news/israel-iran-attack-0...
    - azernik 7mo ago
      The tweet and article say the timing comes with symbolism, not that the symbolism was the reason for the timing. Correlation is not causation, and the article does not even claim causation.
      - sosomoxie 7mo ago
        Why would a mainstream media article be correlating war crimes with niche religious symbolism? It's Jewish supremacy propaganda at the very least.
- keeda 7mo ago
  I feel like this sort of symbolic planning means you don't even need to leak to the wrong Signal chat group to telegraph your attack? Especially when enemy warships have already been hovering for a few days...
thisislife2 7mo ago
> And I hear nobody in Israel or America talking that way. The American ambassador to Israel recently publicly said that Israel has a "biblical right" to the whole of the middle-east! (Watch these two interviews to understand how cleverly, and strongly, Israeli politics is tied up with American evangelical Christianity to keep American polity tied to Israel's existence - https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-fares-abraham-021826 https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-fares-abraham-021826 and https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-mike-huckabee-022026 https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-mike-huckabee-022026 . Both these interviews give you a very insightful picture of how religious fundamentalist Israelis in power are total nutcases, supported by the American Christian fundamentalist fruitcakes).
- dlubarov 7mo ago
  Can you offer a source that wouldn't require us to listen to hours of Tucker Carlson?
  - thisislife2 7mo ago
    The source is not Tucker Carlson - it is the person(s) he is interviewing. And if you don't want to listen to the interview, you can pay him to get a transcription of the interview and search through it. (Meanwhile, you may find this equally insightful - The Terrorist Forefathers of Israel: The Irgun and Lehi: https://dissidentvoice.org/2023/03/the-terrorist-forefathers-of-israel-the-irgun-and-lehi/ https://dissidentvoice.org/2023/03/the-terrorist-forefathers... - supporting my arguments on how Jewish religious fundamentalists have captured power in Israel. Without getting rid of them, peace is not possible in that region as they are the other side of coin that was Hamas in Palestine).

samrus 7mo ago

The evangelicals support isreal due to religious obligation. Project 2025, a christian nationalist policy advisement widely followed by the current regime, prescribes supporting isreal

swingboy 7mo ago
Evangelicals point to Genesis 12:3 as justification but never seem to have ever read any of Galatians 3.

kubb 7mo ago

The land promised to the Israelites generally extends from the Nile River in Egypt to the Euphrates River in Iraq/Syria, encompassing modern-day Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, and parts of Syria and Saudi Arabia. If you're a religious Jew, then you believe you have a mandate from God (so an irrefutable right, or even obligation, needing no justification) to settle and rule not only the West Bank but the entire region. So there will always be that motivation, as long as religious Judaism exists in Israel.

azernik 7mo ago
That is not the ruling Likud ideology in Israel nor the allied national religious ideology; both refer to Israel+Palestine+Golan as "the Whole Land of Israel". And in any case, the "most religious" (ie those whose politics are most totally driven by Judaism) bloc in Israel are at best ambivalent about the Israeli state and the settlement enterprise, and actively hostile to military service. Israeli hostility to Iran is driven by a "defensive" paranoia, not a religious mission.
- kubb 7mo ago
  Of course it needs to be approached pragmatically. If Israel stated that its number one goal is to rule the entire region, they wouldn't have been as successful as they are. Also God didn't say when. But he did promise, according to the Book.
  - azernik 7mo ago
    This is insane conspiracy theory nonsense, and is also not how actual Jews read the Tanakh. (Which is also not referred to as "the Book", since it's a collection of books. This may seem like a nitpick, but I think is indicative of you getting your information from non-Jewish conspiracy theorist circles rather than anything related to Jewish theology or culture.)
    - kubb 7mo ago
      Try to resist the temptation to lump me in with the conspiracy theorists. If you can, provide facts. Thanks for your nuance about the Books. I was using the terminology I learned for the Bible (which also consists of multiple Books, but is referred to as the Book), but I'm happy to switch to "scripture". The Dati Leumi, the Religious Zionists, who constitute the ideological backbone of the settler movement, and have a lot of political influence in Israel, absolutely believe in their duty to govern the biblical land. For many, holding the West Bank is a religious obligation, and they consider the Golan settled and annexed. Religiously, the same principle that justifies them holding Golan applies to these territories. Here are some recent statements from political leaders: Bezalel Smotrich (Finance Minister, Religious Zionist party) "it is written that the future of Jerusalem is to expand to Damascus." Daniella Weiss (prominent settler leader) said in 2024: "We know from the Bible that the real borders of Greater Israel are the Euphrates and the Nile." Benjamin Netanyahu said he's on a "historic and spiritual mission" and that he is "very" attached to the vision of Greater Israel, which includes Palestinian areas and possibly also places that are part of Jordan, Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon. Yair Lapid, the secular centrist opposition leader (!). "I don't think I have a dispute on the biblical level about what the original borders of Israel are... I support anything that will allow the Jews a big, vast, strong land." Mike Huckabee (US Ambassador to Israel) "It would be fine if they took it all."
nyc_data_geek1 7mo ago
Tell that to the millions of Hasidic Jews in the United States who do not believe that a Jewish nation should exist at all.
- kubb 7mo ago
  Thanks for this information, I'd like to offer something in return. Only certain Hasidic groups oppose Israel, including Satmar Hasidim (over 100k followers), and Neturei Karta (fringe, only about 1k supporters). That's less than millions, and a minority within the Hasidic world. Theologically, they oppose it based on an interpretation a Talmudic passage saying that establishment of Israel has to happen after the coming of the Messiah. Additionally, there are a lot different denominations of Jews within Israel, some of whom have more pragmatic views. But a significant, politically influential minority believes in their duty to govern all biblical land.
weatherlite 7mo ago
> If you're a religious Jew, then you believe you have a mandate from God (so an irrefutable right, or even obligation, needing no justification) to settle and rule not only the West Bank but the entire region. Well not really , most Orthodox definitely don't believe this in fact some of them are anti Zionist and the ones who accept Israel's existence definitely do not think Israel needs to expand its borders like that. So no to that.
- kubb 7mo ago
  Israeli have a diverse spectrum of religious denominations. This includes religious, non Orthodox Jews. Dati Leumi (the religious Zionists) are by far the most hawkish. They absolutely believe that the biblical land belongs to the Jewish people. They account for about 15% and are incredibly politically influential. The Haredim (the ultra-Orthodox) are more complicated, and in general don't want all the promised land (they believe that the state established militarily/politically isn't the "spiritual" state that was promised). But, when it comes to the currently occupied land, they have been shifting right in recent years. They vote in coalition with the nationalist right, and their communities increasingly overlap geographically with settlements.
  - YZF 7mo ago
    The Dati Leumi camp isn't as uniform as you portray it. There are many examples (e.g. Avrum Burg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avraham_Burg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avraham_Burg ) do not think Israel should be over the entire historical/biblical region ("Eretz Israel Ha-Shlema"). More examples are: - Rabbi Yehuda Amital and the Meimad Party - Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein You are confusing politics and religion.
    - kubb 7mo ago
      > You are confusing politics and religion. Religious Zionism is a religious denomination. National Religious Party–Religious Zionism is a political party. It feels unfair and unjustified that you are accusing me of confusing them without substantiating your accusation. I am still open to learn anything that you might want to share with me that you think is important.
YZF 7mo ago
> If you're a religious Jew, then you believe you have a mandate from God (so an irrefutable right, or even obligation, needing no justification) to settle and rule not only the West Bank but the entire region. So there will always be that motivation, as long as religious Judaism exists in Israel. I would say this is generally false. There are many religious Jews who believe there should be no state of Israel until the Messiah comes. Judaism is very open to interpretations and certainly within the question of modern state politics doesn't have as much to say as you seem to think it does. There are many different Rabbis in Israel with different political opinions and generally their followers will tend to hold similar beliefs. There are right wing Rabbis and left wing Rabbis, it's not uniform at all. During the Oslo peace process there were many religious people supporting and many opposing, pretty much the same as secular. What is true is that some Israelis view their right to the land in the context of the biblical promise God made our people. That is not the same thing. Funny enough I'd say more Christians believe the literal promise and it's implication on current day politics than Jews. It's also true that religious people these days tend to be more right leaning politically. But the religion isn't mandating those world views it just that they can align.
- kubb 7mo ago
  I will grant you this: there are many Israelis that don't believe this, and some of them are religious. Will you grant me this: religious motivations for violence exist within Israel, including the ruling political class?
_DeadFred_ 7mo ago
Imagine making such a blanket claim of religious Muslims. It is wild how people can assign with authority jews motivations/behaviors. If you make the same claims of conquest but with regards to Muslims, it wouldn't be acceptable. Should we allow such claims to understand Muslims behaviors, or have you stepped over a line in your defining religious Jews?
dlubarov 7mo ago
A belief that Jews were given lands millennia ago does not imply a justification, let alone an obligation, to violently reconquer those lands today. Consider that we haven't had a Sanhedrin (supreme Jewish council) for a while, which makes a bunch of Jewish law unenforceable. While there's some fringe interest in reinstituting the classical system, there's no scripture that would clearly obligate Jews to do so. Most just accept that times have changed. Similarly while there's some fringe interest in recapturing all historic Jewish lands, there's no scripture that would clearly obligate Jews to do so. Most just accept that times have changed. You can find a few weird individuals anywhere if you look hard enough, but portraying "religious Jews" broadly as aspiring to conquer the whole Middle East is way off base.

sosomoxie 7mo ago

[flagged]

azernik 7mo ago
That tweet does not support your claim, and it is in fact not Purim yet.
- sosomoxie 7mo ago
  How does that tweet not support my claim? It's CNN reporting, here's the actual article: https://edition.cnn.com/world/live-news/israel-iran-attack-02-28-26-hnk-intl?post-id=cmm60wotj001m3b6pawhvknhc https://edition.cnn.com/world/live-news/israel-iran-attack-0...
  - azernik 7mo ago
    The tweet and article say the timing comes with symbolism, not that the symbolism was the reason for the timing. Correlation is not causation, and the article does not even claim causation.
    - sosomoxie 7mo ago
      Why would a mainstream media article be correlating war crimes with niche religious symbolism? It's Jewish supremacy propaganda at the very least.
keeda 7mo ago
I feel like this sort of symbolic planning means you don't even need to leak to the wrong Signal chat group to telegraph your attack? Especially when enemy warships have already been hovering for a few days...

thisislife2 7mo ago

> And I hear nobody in Israel or America talking that way. The American ambassador to Israel recently publicly said that Israel has a "biblical right" to the whole of the middle-east! (Watch these two interviews to understand how cleverly, and strongly, Israeli politics is tied up with American evangelical Christianity to keep American polity tied to Israel's existence - https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-fares-abraham-021826 https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-fares-abraham-021826 and https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-mike-huckabee-022026 https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-mike-huckabee-022026 . Both these interviews give you a very insightful picture of how religious fundamentalist Israelis in power are total nutcases, supported by the American Christian fundamentalist fruitcakes).

dlubarov 7mo ago
Can you offer a source that wouldn't require us to listen to hours of Tucker Carlson?
- thisislife2 7mo ago
  The source is not Tucker Carlson - it is the person(s) he is interviewing. And if you don't want to listen to the interview, you can pay him to get a transcription of the interview and search through it. (Meanwhile, you may find this equally insightful - The Terrorist Forefathers of Israel: The Irgun and Lehi: https://dissidentvoice.org/2023/03/the-terrorist-forefathers-of-israel-the-irgun-and-lehi/ https://dissidentvoice.org/2023/03/the-terrorist-forefathers... - supporting my arguments on how Jewish religious fundamentalists have captured power in Israel. Without getting rid of them, peace is not possible in that region as they are the other side of coin that was Hamas in Palestine).