Iran is Not Rational. It’s Part of the Islamist Death Cult
Resolving the Middle East conflict requires intellectual honesty, historical context and moral clarity. These are not border disputes. They are existential struggles rooted in theology, ideology and survival. The recent Israeli strikes against Iran’s nuclear infrastructure underscore how much higher the stakes have become.
The origins of this enmity stretch back over 1,300 years. The Jews’ original ‘sin’ in Islamic doctrine was not conquest or colonisation, it was rejection. When the Jewish tribes of Arabia refused to accept Muhammad’s claim to prophethood, the response was extermination. The Banu Qurayza were beheaded, their women and children enslaved. This was not a footnote of history but a precedent that jihadist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah still glorify.
Contrast this with Christianity’s beginnings. When the Jews rejected Jesus’s messianic claims, the early Christians responded not with bloodshed but sorrow. They endured persecution, preached forgiveness and offered salvation rather than imposed it. One path sanctified the sword, the other the cross. Islamism remains firmly rooted in the former.
In 1988, Hamas codified its genocidal vision in a Charter citing a Hadith:
The Day of Judgement will not come until Muslims fight the Jews… even the stones and trees will say: “O Muslims… there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.”
This is not hyperbole. It is a theological war cry turned into policy. In 2006, Gazans elected Hamas with full knowledge of its founding document. Despite a 2017 ‘policy update’, the Charter remains intact. The rebranding was pure PR. Western-sanitised jihad.
Israel, meanwhile, withdrew unilaterally from Gaza in 2005, dismantled 21 Jewish settlements and handed the territory to the Palestinian Authority. In response, Hamas seized power in a violent coup and received over $13 billion in aid, more per capita than post-war Europe under the Marshall Plan. Instead of building a state, it built terror tunnels and launched over 30,000 rockets at Israeli civilians.
Israel turned adversity into innovation. From a GDP per capita of $1,500 in 1948, it now exceeds $54,000. It leads in cybersecurity, medical tech and agriculture. Tel Aviv has more startups per capita than Silicon Valley. Gaza, by contrast, chose martyrdom over modernity.
The threat no longer ends at Gaza’s borders. Israel’s recent pre-emptive strikes on Iranian nuclear sites reflect a deep and growing fear that Iran will not merely fund terror, it will enable apocalypse. This fear is entirely rational.
Iran’s Supreme Leader has called Israel a “cancerous tumour” that must be “eradicated”. Former President Ahmadinejad infamously proclaimed, “Israel must be wiped off the map.” Ayatollah Khatami recently declared, “The day will come when the Islamic world will destroy Israel. This is a divine promise.” These are not rhetorical flourishes. They are marching orders.
Iran funds and arms Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad. If it acquires nuclear capability, even a dirty bomb could be handed off to its proxies with plausible deniability. Israel knows this. That’s why it acts. Not for conquest, but for survival.
The West’s Cold War-era doctrine of mutually assured destruction relied on rational actors. Iran is not rational. It is eschatological. Islamism is not a deterrable enemy. It is a theological death cult supported by Iranian state sponsorship.
Israel, too, has its extremists. The inclusion of Jewish supremacists in the current Government is a dangerous provocation and must be condemned. But there is no moral equivalence between fringe ideologues within a democracy and genocidal doctrines enshrined as official policy by terrorist regimes.
History offers precedent. Ideologically rigid and violent movements from the Nazis, Imperial Japan, the Tamil Tigers to ISIS are not negotiated out of existence. They are defeated.
A solution must begin with that clarity. Hamas must be dismantled. A transitional administration led by Arab states should govern Gaza, with reconstruction tied to civic reform and de-radicalisation. The UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar must step up not just with money but with moral leadership. The mosques, madrassas and media that radicalised must now be used to reform. If they truly seek regional stability, they must act before Iran acquires nuclear weapons because after that, peace becomes a fantasy.
Iran must be given a choice. Join a new regional order built on trade and cooperation or continue down the path of pariah status and face the consequences.
Alternatively, if the Arab world continues to abdicate leadership, Israel will do what nations must when faced with annihilation: survive.
The choice, for Israel, is not between war and peace. It is between Judaic evolution or extinction. In the end, the world must decide. Will it continue moral relativism in the face of theological absolutism, or will it stand on the side of Western Judeo-Christian civilisation?
Clive Pinder is the host of KVEC’s CeaseFire and a columnist for the San Luis Obispo Tribune. He is a devout atheist and apostate of groupthink. Follow him on Substack.
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An admirably clear summary of the Middle East disaster area. Should be compulsory reading for virtue signallers.
I’d argue that Iran (or at least its leaders) is rational – although their rationality depends on a completely different world view of theocracy and authoritarianism. I worry that the leaders would be quite prepared to make martyrs of half their population in a genocidal ‘battle’ against the Jews.
It is said that “You cannot reason someone out of something he or she was not reasoned into.” And that is why Israel is trying to destroy ideologically rigid and violent movements (Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah) because they know that mere negotiations and ‘international law’ cannot change the risks to their survival.
I have no connection to either Judaism or Islam. I have been just an observer and tried to get my information from varied sources.
My personal conclusion of this conflict is in total agreement with the article above.
Islam is a ruthless, violent, totalitarian cult.
I don’t even know if it could ever change into something softer: as some sections of the Quran specifically call for violence against Jews, there are only two options: reject Islam or join a death cult.
“Islamism remains firmly rooted in the former.” The word is Islam. But the media won’t face up to the fact.
https://youtu.be/zs_czXWRDpc?feature=shared anybody interested in an intelligent summary regarding Islam so as to understand some of it motivations could usefully listen to Dr David Wood, as in this interview.
Thanks for reading my piece. The distinction between Islam and Islamism is both deliberate and important. Islam refers to the religion practiced by over a billion people, encompassing a wide range of beliefs and traditions. Islamism, by contrast, refers to a political ideology that seeks to impose Islamic law and governance, often through authoritarian or violent means. Conflating the two not only misrepresents the faith of countless peaceful Muslims but also obscures the very real threat posed by Islamist extremism. The media’s failure isn’t in refusing to call Islam the problem—it’s in often failing to clearly define and confront Islamism as the political pathology it is.
Though I disagree with your article, it’s great that you have rolled up your sleeves and plunged into the fray to defend it, here in comments section.
Well done!
Thank you. Please help me understand what it is about my article you disagree with. My question is this. If you lived next door to a neighbour who has stated repeatedly they intend to eradicate your family, and they are building a weapon to do that, what would you do, especially if moving is not an option?
Answer: Millions of Ethnic Europeans (=”White People”) in the West now have the misfortune to “live next door to a neighbour who has stated repeatedly they intend to eradicate your family”. Ethnic Europeans comprised 25% of all the people on the planet in the 1950s. Today, they are down to 7%, falling to 5% within a decade, and total extinction after that. We are The World’s Smallest Ethnic Group, and are threatened with extinction, because the Globalists have stirred up 93% of humanity to help genocide us out of existence. That is what we should be focussing on, finding “Safe Havens” for our people to live in peace among their own, not getting entangled in foreign wars that have nothing to do with us, and will decimate our European ethnic group even further. As for Islam, it was invented by Yemeni Jews as a Proxy Army to destroy Christianity, while deflecting blame away from its inventors. The supposed conflict between Judaism and Islam is a clever charade. The Koran was written by 40-year-old Yemeni Jewish Khadija, who asked her 20-year-old employee Mohammed to marry her. It was Khadija’s vast wealth, inherited from her Yemeni Jewish father, that funded Mohammed’s armies of… Read more »
Mr Pinder, I completely agree with your view that the enmity of (an uncertain proportion of) Muslims towards Israel is rooted in the rejection 1400 years ago of Mohammed’s prophethood by the Jews of Arabia and that the dispute is at its heart theological rather than territorial or political, and therefore irresolvable.
But I cannot agree with your distinction between Islam and Islamism. It seems to me a superficial distinction between “nice Islam” and “nasty Islam” which arose only in the West as a tune to whistle in the dark. Erdogan gave the game away when he told us there is only Islam.
Going back to the source, as you did, would you call Mohammed an Islamist or merely Islamic? If the word “Islamist” has any meaning then who could be more of an Islamist?
Iran is older than 1,300 years. Iran is different from Islamism. And previously, different from Islam. It could be argued that the country would be better off with its own religion which it once had. But that is beyond recovery. Iran has been interfered with many times by other powers in just over a century. Its democratic government was overthrown by the USA and Britain in 1953. The reforms of Reza Shah Pahlavi in the 1930s show that the country itself is perfectly able to function as any other state. Russia should have been better off by getting Lenin off the backs of the people. There’s no certainty that Iran would be more stable by removing the theocrats. The relationship between the people and the state in Iran is an ancient one where political legitimacy rests, not in law and consent, as in Britain or the USA, but in the ability to wield raw power. And overthrowing the regime is hardly likely with citizens fleeing the capital. The Iranian state can be broken by these bombardments but there’s no one going to step in and occupy the country to ensure the internal societal development that the author wants. For it… Read more »
Im glad you’ve tried to introduce sone nuance and a different perspective.
Im no fan of theocratic regimes of any kind. But this labelling of Iran as a “death cult” and the idea that Iran is all wrong and Israel all right is just propaganda. And it’s going to be absorbed well by people who are fed up of Muslim immigration.
If I understand you correctly you are saying that Israel and Jews should ignore Article 7 and all the genocidal statements coming from Hamas and Iran? Would you be prepared to do that if your neighbor had been saying for years that he would annihilate you and your family? Israel doesn’t have the option of moving! Help me understand your thinking but base it in fact not wishful thinking.
Which genocidal statements and by whom exactly?
Lots of people say all sorts of things. Lindsey Graham, for example, called for Putin’s assassination.
Does that entitle Putin to kill Lindsey Graham? Or maybe a few of his staffers, you know, to send a stern message?
Honestly it’s tiresome arguing with people who think their clever little argument is clincher and allows them to cling on their strongly held emotion ridden beliefs under the self delusion that they’re being extremely logical and rational.
The Israeli government are killing ordinary people in Iran and in Gaza and Lebanon. Hamas are killing ordinary people in Israel. Iran is killing ordinary people in Israel and probably contributing to getting ordinary people killed in Lebanon and Gaza. It’s all disgusting and to try to excuse any one of them with some tidy little historical argument is also disgusting. In my view.
The quotes are in the article as is the text from Hamas’ Charter Article 7. We are all entitled to our opinions. Mine are based on facts. I also note you have not answered my direct question.
“Iran is older than 1,300 years”
Indeed. Ask the Greeks – they might point out that little has changed with respect to its thirst for regional dominance since Xerxes.
It wasn’t like that under the Shah.
There is good news for Iranians today:
Iran’s exiled Crown Prince calls on citizens to rise up and ‘reclaim’ the country from ‘hiding rat’ Supreme Leader Khamenei and vows to restore democracy as Israel pounds Tehran | Daily Mail Online
And here is a historical photo of the day 100,000 Iranian women protested against the headscarf:
Women protesting forced hijab days after the Iranian Revolution, 1979 – Rare Historical Photos
As one public commenter said,
“MIPA: Make Iran Persian Again!”
Look at the faces and decent modern clothing of the women in that photo, and realize that these are Persian women, descended from the ancient Persian Empire of Cyrus the Great in 550 BC, one of the largest and most influential empires in history, until it was defeated by Alexander the Great in 330 BC.
Nothing to do with Islam.
Arabofzion – ORG on X: “🔥 A brave Iranian woman chased down a man who tried to force her to wear the hijab ، she went after him and beat him without fear. Down with the Islamic regime. Down with Khamenei’s rule. Free Iran ✊ https://t.co/vygQfmqNPv” / X
Christians were victims for as long as they were powerless. Afterwards came about one millenium of reign of terror by the church (by that time, there was only one) which prescribed people their lives down to the last detail and put them to gruesome deaths for transgressions like dissenting interpretation of the scripture.
“A solution must begin with that clarity. Hamas must be dismantled. A transitional administration led by Arab states should govern Gaza, with reconstruction tied to civic reform and de-radicalisation.”
Never try to teach a pig to sing, it wastes your time and annoys the pig.
So kill the pig?
No! Let Israel and Iran sort out their problems themselves, and RECALL all their citizens in the world diaspora to return to their ancestral homelands to help fight that war.
Like the Ukraine-Russian Meatgrinder War, it has NOTHING TO DO WITH THE WEST, and not one drop of western blood must be shed in either of those foreign regional conflicts.
This is just another Globalist attempt to continue THE NEVERENDING WARS, part of the Depopulation Agenda.
Remember how just as soon as the Afghanistan War ended, the Ukraine-Russian Meatgrinder War suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Now that everyone is sick to death of both Putin the Tatar & Zelensky the Weasel, suddenly this new Israel-Iran war starts up. Gosh, what a coincidence!
Have you read the Hamas Charter or other epistles from clerics from Iran, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and ISIS? If you think this stops with the Jews, you haven’t been paying attention. These groups frame their war as one against all unbelievers — Jews first, then Christians, then the rest. As Sayyid Qutb, the intellectual godfather of modern jihadism, wrote:
“The whole world is divided into two camps: Islam and jahiliyya [ignorance].”
This is not a liberation movement. It’s a blueprint for theocratic apartheid. Eradicating Israel is simply Phase One.
The Muslim statements you quote are only reflecting and imitating the statements of the Talmud, upon which the Koran is based, having been written by Khadija, the Yemeni Jewish first wife of Mohammed.
As is similarly stated in the Talmud:
The whole world is divided into two camps: Jews and Goyim.
What a fantastic quote to remember! 🙂
“Never try to teach a pig to sing, it wastes your time and annoys the pig.”
Just who is killing whom and who is threatening whom in the Middle East? I do not care what nonsense anyone believes but there are supposedly well over 2 billion Christians and just under 2 billion Muslims in the world, but the only place where there is any violence relating to those religions is Israel. Why is that? And I thought it was the orthodox Jews who were eschatological, waiting for golden calves to appear, signifying the end of time or something equally cheerful. The author may claim to be an atheist but the article is extremely critical of Islam while being highly supportive of the Israeli regime, although the latter is currently committing genocide against its indigenous population, happily bombing every surrounding country (except Egypt which is enslaved to US financial support and therefore out of bounds) and, at the same time, goading USA into attacking Iran, thereby risking a nuclear war which could evolve into a global conflict. So nothing to worry about then because, of course, Israel is only acting in self-defence and we must all support these violent Israeli extremists, who have done nothing but sow discontent since the State of Israel was created (and before).… Read more »
CGW wrote, “There are supposedly well over 2 billion Christians and just under 2 billion Muslims in the world, but the only place where there is any violence relating to those religions is Israel.”
WHAT???!!!
Islam: The Politically Incorrect Truth
Jihad Report for May 2025:
Attacks 177
Killed 964
Injured 382
Suicide Blasts 3
Countries 16
List of Islamic Terror Attacks
**********************************************
Islam and Slavery
“Muslims are encouraged to live in the way of Muhammad, who was a slave owner and trader. He captured slaves in battle; he had sex with his slaves; and he instructed his men to do the same. The Quran actually devotes more verses to making sure that Muslim men know they can keep women as sex slaves (4) than it does to telling them to pray five times a day (zero).”
I was referring to countries and not individuals. Now list the numbers killed in May by Israel alone.
If you bother to look at the links I provided, you will see a long list of specific Muslim Terror Attacks in a multitude of different countries in the world, mostly against Christians rather than Jews. Just pick any month of any year, and the website lists them.
In May 2025 alone, there were Muslim Terror Attacks in Pakistan, Nigeria, Syria, Sudan, Thailand, Uganda, the USA, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Indonesia, and the Congo.
964 people were killed
382 people were injured
=1,346 casualties caused by Muslim Terror Attacks around the world
From just one week:
Israeli forces carried out massacres across the Gaza Strip this week, killing 497 Palestinians and wounding nearly 2,100 between 5 June and 11 June, targeting Palestinian men, women and children in residential buildings, school shelters, tent shelters, and at so-called aid distribution points.
Israel killed at least 123 Palestinians between Tuesday and Wednesday alone, according to the Palestinian health ministry in Gaza.
Nearly half of those deaths recorded in those 24 hours were people killed while trying to retrieve meager parcels of aid at the US-Israeli distribution points.
I would suggest there would be many Islamic attacks less if, firstly, extremist groups were not financed and encouraged by Western so-called intelligence services intent on regime change somewhere of their choosing and, secondly, if a solution were to be found for the Palestinian problem. And probably other reasons …
But just demonizing one religion while praising another, equally violent religion (e.g. Northern Ireland) is hardly any sort of solution.
Yes, those pesky Northern Irish are attacking people all over the world every day, every week, every year— aren’t they?
From darkest Africa to the wilds of Indonesia, and all over Europe & America, those pesky Northern Irish accents warn that a terror attack is imminent.
Shocking, innit?
“According to the Palestinian health ministry in Gaza” is the only part of your comment that’s relevant.
Who’s the health ministry in Gaza? It’s Hamas. They’ve been issuing massively overinflated casualty figures since the start of the current conflict, or do you believe everything a bunch of barbaric baby butcherers says?
Islam is the only religion that encourages it’s followers to kill people in the name of religion. Israel is doing what it is because it believes, almost certainly correctly, that it’s survival as a nation is under threat, and definitely not in the name of Judaism.
References to NI are irrelevant, the conflict in the Middle East doesn’t involve Christians. Neither was the conflict in NI about religion, it was about one community believing, rightly or wrongly, that they were being discriminated against. No IRA terrorist killed anyone in the name of Catholicism just as no one in the UDF UVF etc. ever killed anyone in the name of Protestantism.
Matt Dalby wrote: “Islam is the only religion that encourages it’s followers to kill people in the name of religion.”
That’s not actually true, because many religions encourage their followers to kill people in the name of religion:
Islam, Judaism (see the Talmud), Hinduism & Sikhism (ritual human sacrifices, including the Thuggees), Maori Cannibalism and other pagan religions around the world (including Ethnic Africans, Native Americans, and the Hawaiians who cannibalized Captain Cook), medieval Catholicism (ritual human fire sacrifices), and Satanism.
Adam The Apostate on X: “A woman enters into a church in London to argue with its adherents. When she doesn’t agree with their beliefs she runs up to the front to scream ‘Allahu Akbar’ Can you imagine the outrage if a Christian did this in a mosque? https://t.co/mvZuQyfIGK” / X
And what is your solution to all these problems? Murder 2 billion people à la Israel, or what do you suggest?
I suggest letting Israel & Iran get on with it, and sort it out themselves, because we in the West are NOT THE WORLD’S POLICEMAN.
We have massive problems of our own to deal with, most of which are caused by our Treasonous Communist governments inviting the entire Third World to come and live here, and forcing us to pay for them all.
I agree wholeheartedly, whereby USA should also stay out of it and stop supplying Israel with all the destruction it requires.
You’re right. And that goes for Britain’s Own Little Stalin forcing British Taxpayers to supply Israel with all the destruction it requires. Ditto forcing us to supply Zelensky the Weasel with all the destruction HE requires.
Ditto licking the high heels of Ursula the Shrew who wants to be Empress of Europe, and Commander of the EU Army, even though she made such a pig’s ear of the last time she tried that in Germany as Defence Minister, forcing the troops to put sticks on their tanks because she failed to supply them with guns.
Ursula von der Leyen’s army so under-equipped it used broomsticks instead of guns | World | News | Express.co.uk
Have you read the Hamas Charter or other epistles from clerics from Iran, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and ISIS? The article quotes genocidal statements made on the record of their plans do exterminate Jews. What would you do if these threats were made against your family? If you think this stops with the Jews, you haven’t been paying attention. These groups frame their war as one against all unbelievers — Jews first, then Christians, then the rest. As Sayyid Qutb, the intellectual godfather of modern jihadism, wrote:
“The whole world is divided into two camps: Islam and jahiliyya [ignorance].”
This is not a liberation movement. It’s a blueprint for theocratic apartheid. Eradicating Israel is simply Phase One.
Religious fanatics have been writing doomsday scenarios since mankind learned to write. Actions speak louder than words and the current Israeli fanatics have determined their religion is prime. They are the ones doing what? Bombing the hell out of their neighbours and depriving their own people of the basic necessities required for life. No, not Hamas, not Iran, not Muslims but Israeli Jews are murdering en masse while on the verge of ordering the US President, another one of the world’s more questionable figures, to wipe a sovereign country (Iran) off the map.
So do not accuse me of lack of knowledge: you are the one pushing the Israeli propaganda, the sole intent of which is to justify yet another criminal attack against mankind – all in the name of self-defence, of course.
I’m really not sure that Israel would accept “a transitional administration led by Arab states” to govern Gaza.
And why should they? It would mean Israel being encircled by their enemies. Yes, to differing degrees, all those States mentioned want Israel eliminated.
It seems to me that the author has also misunderstood Iran. Iran is not a mad theocracy. Iran might not be “rational” – but many Iranians are perfectly rational.
Iran currently has a theocratic government. In the past it had the Shah. Historically it had an empire. This is a historic and ancient State that from time to time dominated the region. Whatever government it has will seek to do that. Unfortunately the West has enfeebled the two nations (Iraq and Syria) that traditionally balanced Iran’s power.
Western meddling in the byzantine politics of the Middle East does not have a happy history.
Thanks for your comment Adam. You are right that Iran has a rich and historic history. It could do so again but only if its people rise up and condemn the current genocidal regime to that history. The same is true of people in Gaza. History shows that people can rebel against and evict oppressive and violent regimes. With the support of their Arabic neighbors, the same can happen in Iran. Until that time however, when your enemy repeatedly makes it clear they intend to eradicate you, it is wise to take that threat very seriously.
” Western meddling in the byzantine politics of the Middlel East does not have a happy history” Yes 6 or 7 Crusades starting in 1100 about. Each one of them successful at first and then doomed and the occupants driven out.
It’s important to remember why the Crusades were launched in the first place.
Muslims already had TWO HOLY CITIES of Mecca & Medina, but they decided to grab a THIRD, to which they had no historical claim whatsoever: Jerusalem.
It was only after Muslims forcibly denied Christian pilgrims entry to Jerusalem that the Crusades were launched, in order to regain the right of Christians to enter THEIR ONLY HOLY CITY.
And all the while parts of our great nation are being Islamified with the full knowledge and encouragement of this and previous governments.
How long before the Islamist holy war consumes Britain?
It’s good to read an article that explains the reality of the situation. The Theocratic Nutters in Iran want to “fulfil the prophecies” and start Armageddon.
They will not be deterred by rational means.
Actually, it is the Jews and the Muslims worldwide who want to “fulfil the prophecies” and start Armageddon. Christians also don’t mind, because they are fed up with the evil of the world, and want to go home to Heaven.
The real reason Muslims have invaded the West, raping & murdering & burning & trashing the once-proud civilization based upon Christianity, is because their own prophecies say that their “Mahdi AntiChrist” will only be able to take human form upon the Earth if Muslims deliberately create enough Negative Energy Chaos everywhere to welcome him.