{"id":7156,"date":"2026-04-22T20:35:01","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T15:05:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/the-moral-asymmetry-in-the-war-on-iran\/"},"modified":"2026-04-22T20:35:01","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T15:05:01","slug":"the-moral-asymmetry-in-the-war-on-iran","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/the-moral-asymmetry-in-the-war-on-iran\/","title":{"rendered":"The moral asymmetry in the war on Iran"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div itemprop=\"articleBody\">\n<p><iframe title=\"Everlit Audio Player\" src=\"https:\/\/everlit.audio\/embeds\/artl_XPvkGHYrw7Q?ui_title_intro=Listen+now%3A&amp;client=wp&amp;client_version=2.7.1\" width=\"100%\" height=\"136px\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>(RNS) \u2014 Since the war with Iran began, President Donald Trump has directed threats and insults at Iran and its leaders. He warned that he would destroy Iranian civilization and infrastructure and would blockade its ports. He <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nj.com\/politics\/2026\/04\/after-calling-new-iranian-regime-crazy-bastards-trump-says-they-are-smarter.html#:~:text=Trump%20says%20new%20Iranian%20leaders,POLITICS\">called<\/a> Iranian leaders \u201ccrazy bastards,\u201d \u201csick people\u201d and \u201clunatics\u201d on Truth Social. While some of his ultimatums are particularly severe, this rhetoric is familiar.<\/p>\n<p>What is striking to me is the fact that he and other Republican leaders seem to be angered by the fact that Iran \u2014 a sovereign country that, <a href=\"https:\/\/yaledailynews.com\/articles\/law-school-professors-say-strikes-on-iran-violate-international-law\">according to some<\/a> legal scholars, was attacked in violation of the U.S. Constitution and the U.N. charter \u2014 has retaliated.<\/p>\n<p>While the narrative about the reasons for this war has been inconsistent, one of the justifications for the U.S.-Israeli attack is that it was a preemptive strike to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, following repeated <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/world-middle-east-43952196\">allegations<\/a> that Iran was rebuilding its nuclear program.<\/p>\n<p>This current moment is unsettlingly evocative of the 2003 Iraq war, which was preceded by the Bush administration\u2019s unproven claims about weapons of mass destruction allegedly stockpiled by Saddam Hussein. A similar sense of urgency leaves little space for doubt today, while allegations about producing nuclear weapons help build the case for war.<\/p>\n<p>Let us not forget that the United States and Israel do possess nuclear weapons; the United States is the only country to ever have used nuclear weapons in war.<\/p>\n<p>Both American and Israeli claims that they are protecting global peace and security are not self-evident.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_4250385\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 750px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-4250385\" src=\"https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/webRNS-Iran-US-Israel1-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"750\" height=\"500\" srcset=\"https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/webRNS-Iran-US-Israel1-1.jpg 1600w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/webRNS-Iran-US-Israel1-1-427x285.jpg 427w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/webRNS-Iran-US-Israel1-1-807x538.jpg 807w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/webRNS-Iran-US-Israel1-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/webRNS-Iran-US-Israel1-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/webRNS-Iran-US-Israel1-1-600x400.jpg 600w, https:\/\/religionnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/webRNS-Iran-US-Israel1-1-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 750px) 100vw, 750px\"\/> <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text edd-enabled\"><span class=\"caption\">Residents look on and take pictures as flames and smoke rise from an oil storage facility struck as attacks hit the city during the U.S.-Israeli military campaign in Tehran, Iran, March 7, 2026. (Alireza Sotakbar\/ISNA via AP)<\/span><span class=\"credit\"\/><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Alongside threats and insults, the dominant political rhetoric about the war with Iran has adopted <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/ng-interactive\/2026\/apr\/10\/pete-hegseth-christianity-iran-war-crusade\">Christian imagery<\/a>. This is a trick from a very old playbook. Christian moral authority has been used to <a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/the-enduring-legacy-of-medieval-christian-depictions-of-islam-in-todays-political-discourse-272036\">encourage and justify attacks on Muslim lands<\/a> in the past. It\u2019s disappointing to see how many Christians in the United States still interpret Christian Scripture in a way that gives grounds for attacking other countries and faiths.<\/p>\n<p>Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, recently <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/andre_gagne1\/status\/2028623080474497187\">posted<\/a> that, \u201ccrazy regimes, like Iran, hell-bent on prophetic Islamist delusions, cannot have nuclear weapons; it\u2019s common sense\u201d and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/magazine\/2024\/12\/06\/pete-hegseth-defense-religion-christian-00192117\">said<\/a> that \u201cIslam is not a religion of peace.\u201d Discussions of radicalization and violence without a consideration of structural factors like war, military occupation, economic sanctions and histories of colonial intervention obscure more than they reveal.<\/p>\n<p>This war is just one example of the moral asymmetry of how violence is interpreted. While Western violence against Muslims is often presented as \u201cpreemptive wars\u201d \u2014 ones ostensibly conducted in the name of global peace and security, thus morally defensible \u2014 Muslim violence against the West is portrayed as inherently barbaric and irrational \u2014 never defensible. According to this logic, Iran\u2019s response to the U.S. and Israeli attack, described by Iran as justified under Article 51 of the U.N. Charter (which recognizes an inherent right to self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a state), is inevitably interpreted as \u201cescalation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Based on this asymmetry, Iran is not granted the moral right to self-defense.<\/p>\n<p>Given the number of casualties and the degree of destruction wreaked on its infrastructure, Iran\u2019s response to the attack has been relatively restrained. It has avoided full-scale war and sent negotiators to talks even as the conflict continued. The blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and Iran\u2019s drone attacks against Israel and U.S. military assets seem to be calibrated pressure.<\/p>\n<p>Throughout the dispute over the nuclear weapons, Iran\u2019s actions and statements in key moments have been diplomatic and collaborative. In fact, since 2018, it is the U.S. whose actions have been belligerent and framed by communications that often include invectives and sweeping threats.<\/p>\n<p>If we are to worry about who threatens the world, the answer cannot ignore the only country that has ever used nuclear weapons in war and, nonetheless, still claims the authority to decide who else may possess them.<\/p>\n<p><em>(The Rev. Anna Piela is co-founder of Challenging Islamophobia Together Chicagoland and co-associate regional minister of American Baptist Churches Metro Chicago Region. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of Religion News Service.)<\/em><\/p>\n<p><!-- CONTENT END 1 -->\n        <\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/religionnews.com\/2026\/04\/22\/does-iran-have-a-moral-right-to-self-defense\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(RNS) \u2014 Since the war with Iran began, President Donald Trump has directed threats and insults at Iran and its leaders. He warned that he would destroy Iranian civilization and infrastructure and would blockade its ports. He called Iranian leaders \u201ccrazy bastards,\u201d \u201csick people\u201d and \u201clunatics\u201d on Truth Social. While some of his ultimatums are [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7157,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7156\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}