An Islamist regime that terrorized the world and brutalized its own people is on its last legs—with those legs now nearly dismembered. Clerics purporting to be men of God, but who were actually cold killers, Jew-haters and enablers of child rape, are now, thankfully, dead.
Since 1979, these fanatical Muslims killed at least 1,000 Americans.
As the world’s leading funder and cheerleader of terrorism, they assisted proxies such as Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and other terror outfits such as ISIS, al-Qaeda, Al-Shabaab, Boko Haram, and the Taliban, to bomb and gun down Americans and Westerners.
Domestically, they tormented their own people with political executions, detentions, torture, and forced confessions that were broadcast on national television. The regime specialized in suppressing the freedom of women and girls. Stoning became a spectator sport. Homosexuals were hung from cranes. Religious minorities were consigned permanent infidel status.
All throughout their reign, Ayatollahs threatened the one democratic nation in its region with being “wiped off the map.” These shamelessly trigger-happy terrorists all the while enriched uranium and never renounced their intention to acquire nuclear weapons so they could make good on their threats and ultimately globalize the Islamic Revolution.
Oh, one more thing: Iran was mischievously and financially allied with America’s enemies—China and Russia.
Democratic Party leadership, America Firsters, and legions of anti-America, anti-Israel, pro-terror Islamists and socialists refuse to celebrate this monumental national security achievement.
After 47 years as implacable nemesis finally coming to an end, many Americans, improbably, can’t take yes for an answer. They are, essentially, rooting for terrorists, taking up their depraved cause! Democratic Party leadership, America Firsters, and legions of anti-America, anti-Israel, pro-terror Islamists and socialists refuse to celebrate this monumental national security achievement.
Is this some kind of sick joke?
Many, instead, are mourning the Ayatollah and his mullah entourage. Some believe America was suckered into a war by Israel. Others maintain that the United States did not face an imminent threat and therefore should not have acted preemptively. Obviously, it’s always preferable to be Pearl Harbored than to initiate hostilities.
But the clincher is also the most revealing reason why no endzone celebration is permitted for Iran’s long overdue regime change: Donald Trump is in the White House. While he sits in the Oval Office, there is a moratorium on American joy. No sigh of relief over a vanquished adversary. No victory lap or righteous self-congratulations. And surely no credit where credit is due.
Only the Iranian people, Iranians in the diaspora, and Israelis can fully comprehend and wholly appreciate what has been taking place.
If Trump were to win a Nobel Prize for making the world a more peaceful place by his removal of Soleimani, al-Baghdadi, Maduro and Khamenei—and possibly ending the Castro regime in Cuba—half the people in the United States will simultaneously throw up. (The Nobel awarded to Barack Obama preceded his presidency! He received it for nothing more than filling out his annual March Madness bracket.)
Ladies and Gentlemen, we have once more crossed over into a new dimension of derangement and entered: “The Twilight Zone” of Donald Trump Haters.
Yes, that mix of absurdism and irrationality, reflexive rejection and disavowal of fundamental truths. Iran posed no “imminent threat?” It has never not presented a guaranteed peril! This war didn’t commence last week. It began in 1979 with an earlier Ayatollah declaring war by ransacking the American Embassy in Tehran and taking 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.
We are hastily calling this a war against Iran, but it is really a continuation of the War on Terror that commenced in 1979, reached its zenith on 9/11, and is still ongoing. What do you think the recent mass shooting in Austin, Texas—with the assailant wearing a “Property of Allah” hoodie—was really about? Molotov cocktails thrown at Jews walking along the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder, Colorado. Two murdered Embassy staffers outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C.
Just ask the world’s most famous fatwa recipient, novelist and American citizen Salman Rushdie, whether Iran was maintaining peaceful relations with the United States. A few years ago, in upstate New York, Rushdie lost an eye and the use of one of his hands when an Islamist savagely reminded him that an Ayatollah’s death sentence is never forgotten.
Where were the outrage and solidarity from American novelists and artists? No campus protests demanding justice for Rushdie? Where’s Mark Ruffalo when he can’t blame Jews for some contrived claim of genocide? If not for faulty vision emanating from a Twilight Zone where Jews and President Trump can do no right, these people might take to the streets and cheer on Operation Epic Fury.
Europeans understand this all too well. And Australians, after the Bondi Beach ambush, finally do, too. The West has too slowly come to realize the ticking timebomb of those whose core beliefs erode Western values and are wholly incompatible with liberal democracies. Sharia courts are in session. No-go zones stop the police in their tracks. Grooming gangs have their way with white women.
Since 1979, there have been nearly 70,000 Islamic terrorist attacks worldwide, killing nearly 250,000 people. The fall of the Twin Towers and the bombing at the Boston Marathon in America; gunmen, suicide bombers and car rammings laying siege to subways, a concert hall, a major stadium, bars, restaurants, and Christmas markets in Europe; and the massacre at the Nova Music Festival in Israel, are merely the best known.
Yes, terrorism is terrifying and rightly generates phobia about Islam.
Was Hitler an “imminent threat” to the United States in late 1939? Should it have taken the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor two years later to finally draw America into the fight? Many credit the United States for winning World War II. But might the Third Reich have come to a sooner end—making Japan’s entry superfluous—had the United States not taken an isolationist, America First stance?
Remember, the Nazis always spoke in euphemistic language: “The Final Solution to the Jewish Question,” and not Jewish genocide; “resettlement” and not death camps; “living space” and not global expansion. Perhaps there was cause for America to hesitate. Did we know for sure where this would all lead?
Iran, however, has never disguised its intentions with euphemisms. Just listen to what Islamists openly say in state rooms and mosques around the world: the clear intention to bend the will of Western nations toward Islamic teachings; manipulating the freedoms of democratic societies for duplicitous ends; and the killing of all Jews and infidels.
Hitler’s speeches were rife with Jewish scapegoating. But he never once spoke of “wiping countries off maps” or announced what he had in mind for Auschwitz.
Iran has never been coy. Trash-talking threats are always imminent. There is but one God, one prophet and one truth, and none of it has room for Judeo-Christian traditions.
For half a century, Iran has been begging to be defeated. That day has finally arrived. And it has come all wrapped up with the added bonus of expanding the list of Abraham Accord nations—Arabs and Jews coming together to fight a common enemy.
With moral clarity not clouded by anti-Trump, anti-Israel hysteria, everyone should be able to get behind this just war against Iran—not unlike Israel’s just war in Gaza. For half a century, Iran has been begging to be defeated. That day has finally arrived. And it has come all wrapped up with the added bonus of expanding the list of Abraham Accord nations—Arabs and Jews coming together to fight a common enemy.
If ever there was a time to dance the hora, this is it.
Trump in ‘The Twilight Zone’
Thane Rosenbaum
An Islamist regime that terrorized the world and brutalized its own people is on its last legs—with those legs now nearly dismembered. Clerics purporting to be men of God, but who were actually cold killers, Jew-haters and enablers of child rape, are now, thankfully, dead.
Since 1979, these fanatical Muslims killed at least 1,000 Americans.
As the world’s leading funder and cheerleader of terrorism, they assisted proxies such as Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, and other terror outfits such as ISIS, al-Qaeda, Al-Shabaab, Boko Haram, and the Taliban, to bomb and gun down Americans and Westerners.
Domestically, they tormented their own people with political executions, detentions, torture, and forced confessions that were broadcast on national television. The regime specialized in suppressing the freedom of women and girls. Stoning became a spectator sport. Homosexuals were hung from cranes. Religious minorities were consigned permanent infidel status.
All throughout their reign, Ayatollahs threatened the one democratic nation in its region with being “wiped off the map.” These shamelessly trigger-happy terrorists all the while enriched uranium and never renounced their intention to acquire nuclear weapons so they could make good on their threats and ultimately globalize the Islamic Revolution.
Oh, one more thing: Iran was mischievously and financially allied with America’s enemies—China and Russia.
After 47 years as implacable nemesis finally coming to an end, many Americans, improbably, can’t take yes for an answer. They are, essentially, rooting for terrorists, taking up their depraved cause! Democratic Party leadership, America Firsters, and legions of anti-America, anti-Israel, pro-terror Islamists and socialists refuse to celebrate this monumental national security achievement.
Is this some kind of sick joke?
Many, instead, are mourning the Ayatollah and his mullah entourage. Some believe America was suckered into a war by Israel. Others maintain that the United States did not face an imminent threat and therefore should not have acted preemptively. Obviously, it’s always preferable to be Pearl Harbored than to initiate hostilities.
But the clincher is also the most revealing reason why no endzone celebration is permitted for Iran’s long overdue regime change: Donald Trump is in the White House. While he sits in the Oval Office, there is a moratorium on American joy. No sigh of relief over a vanquished adversary. No victory lap or righteous self-congratulations. And surely no credit where credit is due.
Only the Iranian people, Iranians in the diaspora, and Israelis can fully comprehend and wholly appreciate what has been taking place.
If Trump were to win a Nobel Prize for making the world a more peaceful place by his removal of Soleimani, al-Baghdadi, Maduro and Khamenei—and possibly ending the Castro regime in Cuba—half the people in the United States will simultaneously throw up. (The Nobel awarded to Barack Obama preceded his presidency! He received it for nothing more than filling out his annual March Madness bracket.)
Ladies and Gentlemen, we have once more crossed over into a new dimension of derangement and entered: “The Twilight Zone” of Donald Trump Haters.
Yes, that mix of absurdism and irrationality, reflexive rejection and disavowal of fundamental truths. Iran posed no “imminent threat?” It has never not presented a guaranteed peril! This war didn’t commence last week. It began in 1979 with an earlier Ayatollah declaring war by ransacking the American Embassy in Tehran and taking 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.
We are hastily calling this a war against Iran, but it is really a continuation of the War on Terror that commenced in 1979, reached its zenith on 9/11, and is still ongoing. What do you think the recent mass shooting in Austin, Texas—with the assailant wearing a “Property of Allah” hoodie—was really about? Molotov cocktails thrown at Jews walking along the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder, Colorado. Two murdered Embassy staffers outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C.
Just ask the world’s most famous fatwa recipient, novelist and American citizen Salman Rushdie, whether Iran was maintaining peaceful relations with the United States. A few years ago, in upstate New York, Rushdie lost an eye and the use of one of his hands when an Islamist savagely reminded him that an Ayatollah’s death sentence is never forgotten.
Where were the outrage and solidarity from American novelists and artists? No campus protests demanding justice for Rushdie? Where’s Mark Ruffalo when he can’t blame Jews for some contrived claim of genocide? If not for faulty vision emanating from a Twilight Zone where Jews and President Trump can do no right, these people might take to the streets and cheer on Operation Epic Fury.
Europeans understand this all too well. And Australians, after the Bondi Beach ambush, finally do, too. The West has too slowly come to realize the ticking timebomb of those whose core beliefs erode Western values and are wholly incompatible with liberal democracies. Sharia courts are in session. No-go zones stop the police in their tracks. Grooming gangs have their way with white women.
Since 1979, there have been nearly 70,000 Islamic terrorist attacks worldwide, killing nearly 250,000 people. The fall of the Twin Towers and the bombing at the Boston Marathon in America; gunmen, suicide bombers and car rammings laying siege to subways, a concert hall, a major stadium, bars, restaurants, and Christmas markets in Europe; and the massacre at the Nova Music Festival in Israel, are merely the best known.
Yes, terrorism is terrifying and rightly generates phobia about Islam.
Was Hitler an “imminent threat” to the United States in late 1939? Should it have taken the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor two years later to finally draw America into the fight? Many credit the United States for winning World War II. But might the Third Reich have come to a sooner end—making Japan’s entry superfluous—had the United States not taken an isolationist, America First stance?
Remember, the Nazis always spoke in euphemistic language: “The Final Solution to the Jewish Question,” and not Jewish genocide; “resettlement” and not death camps; “living space” and not global expansion. Perhaps there was cause for America to hesitate. Did we know for sure where this would all lead?
Iran, however, has never disguised its intentions with euphemisms. Just listen to what Islamists openly say in state rooms and mosques around the world: the clear intention to bend the will of Western nations toward Islamic teachings; manipulating the freedoms of democratic societies for duplicitous ends; and the killing of all Jews and infidels.
Hitler’s speeches were rife with Jewish scapegoating. But he never once spoke of “wiping countries off maps” or announced what he had in mind for Auschwitz.
Iran has never been coy. Trash-talking threats are always imminent. There is but one God, one prophet and one truth, and none of it has room for Judeo-Christian traditions.
With moral clarity not clouded by anti-Trump, anti-Israel hysteria, everyone should be able to get behind this just war against Iran—not unlike Israel’s just war in Gaza. For half a century, Iran has been begging to be defeated. That day has finally arrived. And it has come all wrapped up with the added bonus of expanding the list of Abraham Accord nations—Arabs and Jews coming together to fight a common enemy.
If ever there was a time to dance the hora, this is it.
Thane Rosenbaum is a novelist, essayist, law professor and Distinguished University Professor at Touro University, where he directs the Forum on Life, Culture & Society. He is the legal analyst for CBS News Radio. His most recent book is titled, “Beyond Proportionality: Israel’s Just War in Gaza.”
Did you enjoy this article?
You'll love our roundtable.
Editor's Picks
Israel and the Internet Wars – A Professional Social Media Review
The Invisible Student: A Tale of Homelessness at UCLA and USC
What Ever Happened to the LA Times?
Who Are the Jews On Joe Biden’s Cabinet?
You’re Not a Bad Jewish Mom If Your Kid Wants Santa Claus to Come to Your House
No Labels: The Group Fighting for the Political Center
Latest Articles
How the World Cup Makes Boredom Look Good
No Wars for Jews
One Wedding, a Heatwave, Fireworks and a Eulogy
In His Fourth of July Speech, Mamdani Asks Everything of America and Nothing of Americans
What Jews Can Celebrate About America, and What America Can Celebrate About Jews
Rabbis of LA | Rabbis Camras and Vogel Will Not Go Quietly
Mem Global Participant’s Jewish Journey, Hebrew Union College Program Honored
Notable people and events in the Jewish LA community.
Archbishop of Canterbury Embraces Supporters of Killers of Christians
To judge by the photos and remarks she posted on her website, she spent a good deal of time in the company of two supporters of a terrorist group—and had only praise for them.
Grateful Are We
An American Jewish Declaration for America’s 250th
Shabbat Shalom, America
In the midst of our parties and barbeques, Shabbat is God’s birthday present to America to remind us that we still live in the greatest country on earth.
The Pinchas Vigilante Roll Call — A poem for Parsha Pinchas
I’m a rule follower. So when the Book says find an unblemished red cow that’s all I want to do.
A Moment in Time: What We Cannot See
Why Is it that the Better We Diagnose Anti-Semitism, the Worse it Gets?
For a people obsessed with fixing problems, it’s disheartening to think that our tireless efforts at diagnosing and understanding the biggest threats against Jews are not making a difference.
A Bisl Torah — Go Out Before Them
No matter if we assign ourselves the title of leader, we each lead in some respect, whether it’s leading as a parent, a supervisor, a friend, or a member of our neighborhoods.
Balaam’s Metaphorical Ass
For America’s 250th Birthday, Jewish Journal Launches E-book “250 Reasons to Thank America”
In our newly-released e-book, we express our gratitude again and again and again, for big ideas and small touches.
Print Issue: What Happened to Loving Our Country? | July 3, 2026
What a gangbuster quarter millennium of a résumé America has assembled. Much to be proud of, and, yet… far too few Americans are lining up to blow out the candles.
From Los Angeles to Jerusalem: Dorraine Weiss Built a New Life in Israel at 62
Today, with several of her grandsons serving in the IDF, she believes there is no other place she would rather be.
A Baharat Scented T’bit
This recipe is traditional and personal at the same time, which feels fitting.
Red, White and Blue Dairy Treats for Your Fourth of July Celebration
These delicious red, white and blue dairy desserts make it worth going parve for your Independence Day barbecue or picnic.
Table for Five: Pinchas
Women’s Rights
Mel Brooks Turns 100, AFI Bumps ‘Blazing Saddles’ to Top of Comedy List
Brooks has spent his career making large targets look small: Nazis, tyrants, bigots, Hollywood annoyances, studio logic, bad taste, good taste and, now, age.
The Limitations of a Housing Act and Two Practical Solutions
America’s housing crisis demands more than incremental turns. By doubling capital gains relief and launching the T.E.A.C.H. Homes Program, policymakers can inject immediate momentum into a market desperately needing it.
What Does the Rise of Democratic Socialists Mean for Jews and Democrats?
The DSA has shown that being anti-Israel, even if a candidate lacks experience, is enough to win.
Remembering Little Big Horn 150 Years Later as Historians, not Prosecutors or Priests
Today, for Americans and Jews, the Battle of Little Big Horn has relevance and resonance.
Rosner’s Domain | Savior No More
The greater the expectation, the sharper the disappointment.
More news and opinions than at a Shabbat dinner, right in your inbox.