Hoping for the Apocalypse

I came across Melanie Phillips column in the Daily Mail explaining why the West must take serious Iran's obtaining a nuclear weapon even if it means catastrophic war.  The alternative as Ms. Phillips explains is a nuclear exchange between Israel and Iran in the near future that could escalate into a world war with millions incinerated and many more millions suffering the effects of radiation poisoning.  Her logic makes sense to a point but the thought of hundreds of thousands of casualties (if not millions) in another Asian land war that could easily spin out of control is also unnerving.  Ms. Philips says that Iran will not come to its senses because it desires the fulfillment of messianic prophesy of the return of the messiah.   She quotes an inside source of the Iranian regime:

‘Khamenei has been heard to say that the coming of the last Islamic Messiah, the Shiites’ 12th Imam Mahdi, is near and that specific actions need to be taken to protect the Islamic regime for upcoming events. Mahdi, according to Shiite belief, will reappear at the time of Armageddon... Many in the Guards and Basij have been told that the 12th Imam is on earth, facilitated the victory of Hezbollah over Israel in the 2006 war and soon will announce publicly his presence after the needed environment is created.

'... Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, an influential cleric and a radical Twelver, previously had stated that Khamenei ascends to the sky every year to take direction from Imam Mahdi, and sources close to the cleric have disclosed that Khamenei has been ordered by Imam Mahdi to continue with the nuclear program despite worldwide objection as it will facilitate his coming.’

I take it as true that this statement expresses the sentiment of the Islamic regime.  However, not everything you read is true and this could be just a crafty piece of misinformation.  On the other side of the equation you have the American Christian Zionists who 100% support for equally eschatological  reasons. From Wikipedia is the explanation of Christian Zionism:

Christian Zionism is a belief among some Christians that the return of the Jews to the Holy Land, and the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, is in accordance with Biblical prophecy. It overlaps with, but is distinct from, the nineteenth century movement for the Restoration of the Jews to the Holy Land, which had both religiously and politically motivated supporters. The term Christian Zionism was popularized in the mid-twentieth century. Prior to that time the common term was Restorationism.^[1]

Some Christian Zionists believe that the "ingathering" of Jews in Israel is a prerequisite for the Second Coming of Jesus. This belief is primarily, though not exclusively, associated with Christian Dispensationalism. The idea that Christians should actively support a Jewish return to the Land of Israel, along with the parallel idea that the Jews ought to be encouraged to become Christian, as a means fulfilling a Biblical prophecy has been common in Protestant circles since the Reformation.^[2][3][4]

Many Christian Zionists believe that the people of Israel remain part of the chosen people of God, along with the “ingrafted” Gentile Christians^{[Romans 11:17-24]} (dual-covenant theology). This has the added effect of turning Christian Zionists into supporters of Jewish Zionism.

We have three different but parallel religious views of the end of the world fueling the politics in Iran and the USA.

The Jews in the USA understandingly want to avoid the destruction of Israel at all costs even if it means a preventive war between the United States and Iran.  The threat of nuclear blackmail from Iran is simply untenable and from a Jewish point of view, Iran is another Nazi state in a different guise.  If any lessons can be gleamed from WWII from the Jewish perspective is that preventive war in the 1930's would have stymied Hitler's objectives and have prevented the Holocaust.  However, this is a hypothesis and far from a consensus view.

The evangelical community which supports Israel 100% and is an integral part of GOP politics as seen in the Republican presidential nominees tripping over one another in their desire for war with Iran.  I find it ironic that the GOP is so pro-Israel when 90%+ of American Jews vote democratic.  A major factor in making the GOP so pro-Israeli is the takeover of the party by the neoconservatives and their dedicated support to the Israeli cause.  Additionally over the past two generations there is a cross party political consensus (due to strong Israeli lobbying) that a candidate for major office in either party cannot be considered as a major party member for office if his views on Israeli support deviate from being 100% supportive of the state of Israel.  To be not pro-Israeli is to be considered an anti-Semite.  Ironically, there is more disparate views about Israeli politics within Israel than there is in the USA.  Without the strong evangelical support of Israel in the GOP, there would be a significant weakening of Israeli support since some groups like blacks, Latinos and recent immigrants from Asia have no affinity to the Jewish state.

It is ironic and tragic the increasingly secular country (for many wrong reasons) of the United States is being pushed into a non-winnable war with potentially casualties in the millions due to the theological beliefs of three disparate religious groups.  The Christian evangelicals as I have written have a more Old Testament mentality with regard to peace and war; the Iranian Muslims are devout believers in Jihad against the infidel; and the Israeli's are fighting to avoid an Armageddon battle with Iran in the near future once it obtains the means of delivering a lethal strike against Israel.

I have to say from my own analysis that history is repeating itself.  In 1914 the world entered a war that made absolutely no sense to anyone except imperialists.  It looks like a repeat.........