Every year, just days after Tisha B’Av, when Jews mourn the destruction of the First and Second Temples, comes Shabbat Nachamu—the Sabbath of Consolation. The haftarah opens with God’s promise: “Comfort, comfort My people.” And the Torah portion is always Va’etchanan, containing perhaps the most important words in Judaism:
The parasha begins with one of the Torah’s most poignant moments. Moses pleads to enter the Promised Land, but God refuses. He will see the Land from afar, yet die alone on the eastern bank of the Jordan, separated from both the land he longed to enter and the people who would continue without him. Rather than dwell on what he has lost, Moses spends his final days giving Israel what can never be taken away.
Just after today’s Jews remember what was destroyed on Tisha B’Av, the Torah turns to the covenant between God and the Jewish people.
The Shema is recited every morning upon waking and every evening before sleep, fulfilling the Torah’s command to speak these words “when you lie down and when you rise.” Many Jews have long sought to make it their final words before death. The Shema frames a Jewish life—from its first waking moments to its final conscious breath.
Before reciting its opening verse, Jews traditionally cover their eyes.
One explanation is that removing visual distractions allows the words to be heard more completely. But perhaps the custom also captures something about the moment itself.
With eyes covered, we become vulnerable. For an instant we stand alone, unable to rely on what we can see. It is precisely then that we declare: Hashem Echad—the Lord is One.
Not better than another. Not merely the only God. Simply One: singular, indivisible.
At that moment, the person saying the Shema also stands as one—alone before the One. The moment becomes a deeply personal connection; in Genesis, created in the image of God, and today, retiring together with God.
That may be the deepest consolation after Tisha B’Av.
Enormous empires destroyed the Temple and powerful armies scattered the Jewish people. Yet they could not destroy the simple words Moses taught. They are still whispered every morning, every night, before sleep and, if blessed, with a final breath.
Judaism is designed to be a humble faith, one in which individuals know that their God is not only there to empower them when they need to fight, but console them when they are bereft and alone.
Shabbat Nachamu reminds us that consolation does not begin with rebuilt stones or a visit to Moses’ gravesite. It begins with a people who still know they can close their eyes and connect with God as they say Shema Yisrael, Hashem Elokeinu, Hashem Echad.
Thousands of Jews visited the Temple Mount in Jerusalem this week during normal visiting hours on Tisha B’Av, the day commemorating the destruction of the First and Second Jewish Temples that once stood on that very site.
That is the basic fact. Everything that follows depends on how news organizations chose to describe it.
Outlet
Who?
Place
Action
The Guardian
“Jewish extremists“; “far-right” ministers
“Al-Aqsa mosque compound”
“Storm”
Reuters
“Israel’s Ben Gvir”; “National Security Minister”
“Al-Aqsa Mosque compound” (also notes Jews call it the Temple Mount in article)
“Visits”
Haaretz
“Far right Israeli acitivists“
“Al-Aqsa/Temple Mount Compound”
“Visit”
Arab & Palestinian media
“Settlers,” “far-right” or “extremists“
“Al-Aqsa Mosque“
“Raid” / “Storm“
The pattern is clear. The same event is transformed through language in the Muslim and Arab world: Temple Mount becomes Al-Aqsa; Jewish worshippers become “settlers” or “extremists”; a regulated religious visit during visiting hours becomes a “raid” or “storming.” And the results are laid out as “very dangerous” and “the global community has a shared responsibility to prevent Netanyahu’s ‘provocative acts.'”
This has a long ugly history and is expected in the radical Muslim press.
What is becoming more commonplace is for Europe to join this antisemitic framing. The United Kingdom’s The Guardian reported on the visit with the shrill tone and narrative of the Islamic world in a news article, not an opinion piece.
The visitors did not storm the site. They entered through Israeli security during established visiting hours. The Jews never entered the Al-Aqsa Mosque itself. They visited the Temple Mount – the holiest place in Judaism and site of the First and Second Jewish Temples – on a Jewish holiday about that specific location.
Calling thousands of Jewish worshippers “extremists” because they ascended Judaism’s holiest site on Tisha B’Av is itself an extraordinary editorial choice. The remarkable inversion is that the descendants of the people whose temples stood there are portrayed as intruders, while their religious observance is framed as an act of aggression.
Newspapers do not report that Muslims “stormed Mecca” during the Hajj or that Christians “stormed” the Vatican during Easter. Yet when Jews gather at Judaism’s holiest site, peaceful pilgrimage suddenly becomes an extremist assault.
This is especially troubling in Britain, where antisemitism has surged since October 7. British officials have repeatedly warned that the demonization of Israel spills into the demonization of British Jews, while chants of “jihad” and “intifada” have echoed through the country’s streets. The concern is no longer theoretical. Britain’s deadliest recent synagogue attack was carried out by an Islamic State adherent whose communications revealed deeply antisemitic views. More than half of Britain’s recorded antisemitic incidents in 2025 referenced Israel, “Palestine,” Hamas or the Gaza war.
The Guardian is not simply another British newspaper. It is one of the world’s most influential English-language news organizations, with most of its readership now outside Britain, including Ireland and Australia. Its reporting helps shape how millions understand events in Israel. Media watchdogs including CAMERA and HonestReporting have repeatedly criticized its language and framing on Israel and Jerusalem. Yet despite years of such criticism—and against the backdrop of rising antisemitism and repeated attacks on Jews in Britain—the newspaper chose to describe Jews observing one of Judaism’s most solemn days at their holiest site as fanatical Jews coming for Islamic holy sites. That framing does not remain confined to Britain. It travels with The Guardian‘s global audience.
Journalism’s first obligation is to help readers understand reality before interpreting it. When The Guardian abandons that duty in favor of inflammatory framing, it bears responsibility for contributing to the climate of hostility that encourages anti-Jewish hatred and violence.
For nearly 2,000 years, Jews have fasted on Tisha B’Av to mourn the destruction of the First and Second Temples, the loss of Jewish sovereignty, exile from Jerusalem, and a long chain of national tragedies.
Jewish tradition also teaches that the fast will not last forever. The prophet Zechariah envisioned a day when the fasts commemorating Jerusalem’s destruction would become days of “joy and gladness and cheerful festivals.” Many rabbis have understood that era to arrive with the rebuilding of the Temple.
No one knows when that day will come.
Yet the last century has witnessed changes that generations of Jews scarcely dared imagine.
The Jewish people returned to their ancestral homeland. The State of Israel was reborn (1948). Jerusalem was reunited under Jewish sovereignty (1967). For the first time in nearly two thousand years, Israel is home to the world’s largest Jewish population (2012).
Israel has also become increasingly accepted by its Arab and Muslim neighbors, establishing diplomatic relations with Egypt (1979), Jordan (1994), the United Arab Emirates (2020), Bahrain (2020), Morocco (2020), Sudan (2020, pending implementation), and Kosovo (2021). Meanwhile, the United States (2018), Guatemala (2018), Honduras (2021), Kosovo (2021), Papua New Guinea (2023), Paraguay (2024), and Fiji (2024) have moved their embassies to Jerusalem, while other countries (Slovenia and Nauru) are considering doing the same.
Last year (2025), more than 75,000 Jews ascended the Temple Mount – a modern record that would have been unimaginable only a generation ago.
The Golden Gate in Jerusalem’s Old City exterior wall (photo: First One through)
The Temple remains unbuilt and Tisha B’Av remains a day of mourning.
But it does raise a question that previous generations could scarcely have imagined asking: Will this be the last Tisha B’Av fast?
Perhaps Jews a century from now will still be asking the same question. Or perhaps they will look back and realize that ours was among the last generations to mourn the destruction rather than celebrate the restoration.
For almost two thousand years, that possibility seemed unimaginable. Today, it no longer does.
There is something profoundly human about gathering related things into a single vessel.
We do it with photo albums, where a lifetime of moments is gathered into one book. We do it with museums, where centuries of artifacts are brought together under one roof.
The Jewish calendar does the same with time.
Tisha B’Av is not merely the anniversary of the destruction of the First and Second Temples. Over centuries it became the vessel into which Jewish history poured its sorrows – from the destruction of the Temples to the expulsions from England and Spain, to catastrophes that culminated in the Holocaust. Generations found in Tisha B’Av a place large enough to hold them all.
The Nuremberg Chronicle showing the destruction of Jerusalem
The Temple Mount in Jerusalem became another vessel. Of place.
For much of history, Jerusalem was known as the city of the Jewish Temple. But over time it gathered far more meaning. It became the location of the near sacrifice of Isaac, the destination of pilgrimage, the focus of exile, and the direction toward which Jews have prayed for thousands of years.
Other faiths also poured meaning into Jerusalem. Christians revere it as the place of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. Muslims honor it as the destination of Muhammad’s Night Journey. Layer upon layer, century upon century, Jerusalem became more than a city. It became a vessel carrying humanity’s deepest convictions, hopes, and conflicts.
Temple Mount at dawn (photo: First One Through)
And then there is a unique people.
The Jewish people became a vessel unlike any other. Across thousands of years they carried covenant, exile, learning, persecution, survival, and hope. They preserved ancient language, sacred texts, melodies, customs, and memory across continents and generations. They became the vessel through which memory survived when kingdoms fell, empires vanished, and even the Temple itself lay in ruins.
Every vessel carries something. Some carry water. Some carry treasure. Some carry ashes. The greatest vessels carry what cannot be touched: memory, identity, covenant, and hope.
And that is what the Jewish people, Jerusalem, and Tisha B’Av have become. Three vessels in one elaborate story.
Every generation poured something more into those vessels: not only grief, but hope.
Within them rests the hope captured in the Israeli national anthem, Hatikvah: that the Jewish people will live as a free people in their own land, with Jerusalem at its heart.
And on Tisha B’Av in particular, the vessel holds one additional hope above all others: the rebuilding of the Beit HaMikdash. Not because Jews long merely for stones and walls, but because it represents the restoration of wholeness – between God and humanity, a people and their land, memory and redemption.
Every Tisha B’Av, Jews gather into one day the grief of centuries, turn toward one city, and renew one hope. As they do, they recognize that this is more than a story of three fused vessels. It is that together they carry one enduring promise.
Al Jazeera is the global media company funded by Qatar, governed through a board appointed by the Qatari state and used to project Qatari influence around the world. Its digital arm, AJ+, was built in 2013 specifically for younger Americans who consume news through social media rather than television. By the late 2010s, it had become one of Facebook’s largest news-video publishers, generating billions of views and millions of followers while focusing heavily on race, social justice and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a peculiar cocktail of a socialist-jihadi alliance at that time, which is now mainstreamed.
AJ+ has a long history of peddling Hamas propaganda
In September 2020, the Trump Justice Department concluded that AJ+ was acting on behalf of a foreign principal and ordered it to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). Registration would not have restricted its journalism, but simply would have required public disclosure of its relationship with Qatar and periodic reporting similar to that required of other foreign state-backed media organizations like those from Turkey (TRT), China (CGTN) and Russia (RT).
AJ+ refused to register. Republican lawmakers including Chuck Grassley, Marco Rubio, Tom Cotton, Ted Cruz and Todd Young pressed DOJ to enforce its own determination.
Then, in May 2022, the Biden Justice Department withdrew the order after reviewing additional information submitted by AJ+. What changed has never been publicly explained. DOJ has not identified the decisive new facts, released its legal analysis or explained why AJ+ was treated differently from other foreign state-funded broadcasters.
“AJ+’s reporting ‘supports an inference’ that its broadcasts are ‘designed to influence the opinions and perspectives of its U.S. audience as directed by the foreign principals and for their principal benefit.’…
Given Al Jazeera’s and TikTok’s public prominence in the U.S., mounting evidence of their use to advance foreign agendas, and the Biden Administration’s own national security concerns with the two companies, the Committee is puzzled that the Department appears to have either ceased or paused enforcement of FARA registration requirements for the companies without explanation.” – February 8, 2024 letter from the Committee on Oversight and Accountability
The timing naturally raises questions.
Only months earlier, the United States had completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan. Qatar had become indispensable to Washington—hosting negotiations with the Taliban, assisting the evacuation from Kabul and serving as one of America’s principal diplomatic intermediaries in the region.
There is no public evidence that the FARA reversal was connected to Qatar’s diplomatic role but it is reasonable to ask whether a government relying heavily on Doha’s cooperation became less interested in forcing Qatar’s flagship media network to register as a foreign agent.
The same question now confronts the second Trump administration. Although Trump’s first Justice Department initiated the FARA action, his current administration has not publicly reopened the case. That may simply reflect DOJ’s legal judgment or competing priorities. It may also reflect Qatar’s continuing importance as a partner in addressing Iran, Gaza and other regional crises.
A final question – closer to home – may be the most consequential. During this same period, antisemitism reached levels not seen in decades while anti-Israel activism surged across American campuses and social media, principally from young people. And AJ+ was one of the most influential foreign state-funded digital news brands reaching young Americans, peddling such hatred over this time.
The unanswered question is whether Washington accepted greater Qatari influence inside the United States – including directly and indirectly promoting antisemitism – in exchange for Qatar’s assistance abroad.
Whether making Al Jazeera and AJ+ register under FARA would suddenly change these trends is unknown. But it is also unknown and curious why the government stopped asking the Qatari media powerhouse to do so.
For many people, Jewish holidays are family traditions: apples and honey on Rosh Hashanah, a Passover Seder, Hanukkah candles, or a sukkah in the backyard. Yet beneath these customs lies the deeper reality that every major Jewish holiday is connected in some way to the Temple in Jerusalem.
The Temple was not simply a house of worship. It was the spiritual, national, and legal center of Jewish life. Pilgrimages, sacrifices, priestly service, national assemblies, and the calendar itself revolved around Jerusalem. Even after the Temple’s destruction in 70CE, the holidays preserved its memory and continue to point toward it.
Rosh Hashanah marks the Jewish New Year and the sounding of the shofar. In Temple times, witnesses testified before the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem to establish the new month, and the shofar echoed through the Temple courts. Today, Jews still pray that God’s kingship will once again be recognized from Zion.
Yom Kippur is inseparable from the Temple. The High Priest entered the Holy of Holies only once a year to seek atonement for the nation. Modern synagogue services painstakingly recount the Temple ritual, preserving the memory of the day’s most sacred service.
Sukkot was one of the three pilgrimage festivals when Jews ascended to Jerusalem. The Temple hosted the joyous water-drawing ceremony (Simchat Beit HaShoeva), accompanied by music, dancing, and water libations on the altar. Rabbinic tradition describes it as one of the greatest celebrations ever witnessed.
Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah conclude the festival cycle begun at the Temple with Sukkot. While Simchat Torah developed later, it celebrates the Torah that was publicly taught and read in Jerusalem.
“Ki mitzion tetze torah” (כִּי מִצִּיּוֹן תֵּצֵא תוֹרָה). “For instruction shall come forth from Zion, The word of God from Jerusalem.” – Isaiah (Chapter 2, Verse 3)
Hanukkah commemorates the rededication of the Second Temple after it was reclaimed from the Seleucid Greeks. Every candle recalls the restoration of Jewish worship in Jerusalem.
Tu BiShvat, the New Year for Trees, determined agricultural laws whose tithes and first fruits were ultimately brought to the Temple.
Purim is the only holiday without a direct Temple ritual, yet its story ensured the survival of the Jewish people who would rebuild and worship in the Second Temple. Jerusalem itself celebrates Purim a day later, preserving its ancient status as a walled city.
Passover was the greatest pilgrimage festival. Hundreds of thousands ascended to Jerusalem to offer the Passover sacrifice before gathering in homes throughout the city for the Seder. Even today Jews conclude the Seder with the words, “Next year in Jerusalem.”
Tens of thousands of Jews at the Kotel Plaza in the Old City of Jerusalem during Passover, as they cannot ascend to the Temple Mount today
Shavuot celebrated the first fruits brought to the Temple in elaborate processions from across the Land of Israel. Farmers entered Jerusalem carrying decorated baskets while choirs sang Psalms of thanksgiving.
Tisha B’Av mourns above all the destruction of both the First and Second Temples. It is the day on which Jews sit on the floor, recite Lamentations, and remember the loss of Jerusalem’s spiritual heart.
Even holidays with no formal Temple ceremony ultimately orbit Jerusalem. They celebrate the survival of the Jewish people, the covenant, the Land of Israel, and the hope of restoration.
Jerusalem is not merely Judaism’s holiest city; it is the organizing principle of the Jewish calendar itself. The cycle of holidays begins and ends with memories of Temple worship, pilgrimages, offerings, repentance, thanksgiving, and national gathering in one place.
For centuries Jews prayed facing Jerusalem, broke a glass at weddings to remember its destruction, left part of a home unfinished in mourning, and ended the Passover Seder and Yom Kippur with the same aspiration: “Next year in Jerusalem.”
The Jewish calendar is more than a record of sacred time. It is a map whose destination is Jerusalem, carrying the memory of the Temple from one generation to the next.
Founded in 1969, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) is a coalition of 57 Muslim-majority nations, making it the second-largest intergovernmental organization in the world after the United Nations. Stretching from Morocco to Indonesia, and from Kazakhstan to Nigeria, it represents roughly a quarter of the world’s countries and speaks collectively on issues affecting the Muslim world.
OIC Member states
One of the organization’s longstanding positions is that extremist groups claiming to act in the name of Islam do not represent Islam. Over the years, the OIC has repeatedly condemned organizations such as:
ISIS (Daesh) — for attacks across Iraq, Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, and Nigeria, all OIC member states.
Al-Qaeda — for attacks in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq, and other Muslim-majority countries.
Boko Haram — for its insurgency in Nigeria, Niger, Chad, and Cameroon.
Al-Shabaab — for attacks centered in Somalia and extending into neighboring countries.
ISIS-K (Islamic State Khorasan Province) — for terrorism in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) — for its campaign against the government and civilians of Pakistan.
The common thread is unmistakable. Every one of these organizations has waged war against governments, civilians, or institutions in Muslim-majority countries, mostly members of the OIC itself.
The OIC has consistently argued that Muslims have been among the principal victims of jihadist terrorism. These groups bomb mosques, seek to overthrow Muslim governments, and destabilize OIC member states are denounced as terrorists and rejected as contrary to Islam.
Yet one jihadi terrorist groups is not called out. It is embraced.
Hamas is an Islamist movement whose founding charter and rhetoric have long drawn on jihadist themes and whose October 7, 2023, attack deliberately targeted civilians. Nevertheless, the OIC has not designated Hamas as a terrorist organization or issued the kind of sweeping institutional condemnations that it has directed at ISIS, al-Qaeda, Boko Haram, Al-Shabaab, ISIS-K, or TTP.
The most obvious distinction is not the use of Islamist ideology or armed violence. It is the target: Israel, the Jewish State.
For an organization that frequently states that terrorism has no religion and that Muslims are among terrorism’s greatest victims, its record reveals a clear pattern. When jihadist groups attack the Muslim world, the OIC is unequivocal in its condemnation. When an Islamist movement wages jihad against the Jewish state, the organization’s response is support.
Standing before a grieving audience, Bono argued that the terrorists wanted more than bodies. They wanted souls. They wanted free people to surrender their openness, joy, and humanity. His message was simple: we cannot become monsters to defeat the monsters.
But that never meant the monsters should be left undefeated.
A decade later, Bono’s words resonate with renewed force. Islamist terrorists butchered hundreds at the Nova Music Festival in Israel on October 7, 2023, turning a celebration of life into a killing field. Yet Nova has refused to surrender. The festival has returned, even as Hamas and its supporters continue to mock the victims and celebrate the massacre.
That is the challenge every free society faces.
Love is not an alternative to defeating evil. Without security, there can be no concerts, no festivals, no freedom to gather. Evil must be confronted and defeated, or it will make love, music, and joy impossible.
The West must therefore pursue twin imperatives: defeat those who seek to destroy civilization, while steadfastly embracing the values of love, creativity, and human dignity that make civilization worth defending. Terror must never be allowed to decide either who lives or how we live.
Noa Beer, one of the SuperNova X music and arts festival organizers.
Shopping used to be simple. You bought food because it tasted good.
Today, every purchase arrives with a moral résumé.
The coffee is Fair Trade.
The chocolate is Rainforest Alliance Certified.
The eggs are Cage-Free.
The tuna is Dolphin Safe.
Soon the carton will tell you whether the chicken enjoyed equitable access to leadership opportunities.
With such established groundwork, the assertive red-green alliance / socialist-jihadi umbrella will undoubtedly develop a new standard for consumers to evaluate purchases:
Ethical Jihad Certification™
I imagine the following questionnaire for companies and organizations to complete, developed by the International Ethical Jihad Standards Council (IEJSC).
Supplier Ethics and Sustainability Review
If your organization employs child soldiers, is recruitment gender-balanced?
☐ Boys and girls equally represented ☐ Nonbinary recruitment targets adopted ☐ Diversity metrics forthcoming
If child brides are supplied, are they ethically sourced?
☐ Local ☐ Organic ☐ Family-owned supply chain
If weapons are stored among civilians, are they distributed equitably across community institutions?
☐ Hospitals ☐ Schools ☐ Mosques ☐ Balanced portfolio across all three
If hostages are held underground, are the tunnels built with recycled concrete?
If political opponents require corrective kneecapping, please confirm that your organization follows an equitable enforcement policy.
☐ Applied without regard to race, religion, gender, or political affiliation ☐ Accessibility accommodations provided during the disciplinary process ☐ Impact assessment completed ☐ Stakeholder feedback incorporated into future kneecappings
If political opponents are subjected to “involuntary rooftop relocation,” (tossed off of rooftops) please indicate which governance standards were followed.
☐ Community stakeholders notified ☐ Staff received annual safety training ☐ Proper signage installed ☐ Liability waivers completed
How does your organization incorporate the LGBTQ+ community?
☐ Rainbow headbands replace green ones during Pride month ☐ Local imams considering ordaining transwomen ☐ Gay men’s decapitated heads disposed of in another jurisdiction
☐ International NGOs ☐ Foreign correspondents ☐ Western university researchers ☐ Social media advocacy networks
Has your organization retained celebrity spokespersons to improve international brand perception?
☐ Actor ☐ Musician ☐ Influencer ☐ Climate activist
Has your organization demonstrated continuous improvement in expanding the number of international agencies, committees, or special offices devoted exclusively to your cause?
☐ Year-over-year growth achieved ☐ Additional mandate secured ☐ Dedicated rapporteur established ☐ Additional entities under consideration
Before issuing historical claims, has your organization completed a Heritage Simplification Assessment?
☐ Archaeological evidence destroyed ☐ Conflicting evidence omitted ☐ Timeline reduced to a convenient starting date ☐ Approved historical narrative distributed ☐ Site renamed in Arabic with only Islamic grounding
Has your organization’s founding charter undergone an independent review for language that may be inconsistent with modern human rights standards?
☐ Terminology modernized without changing intent ☐ Currently undergoing reputation management with select NGOs ☐ Using reputational management software to block viewers from finding foundational charter ☐ We prefer not to revisit founding documents
Has your organization successfully persuaded international stakeholders that your adversaries have no legitimate historical connection, cultural heritage, or rights associated with the land?
☐ Global awareness campaign exceeded expectations ☐ Educational materials updated accordingly ☐ Approved terminology adopted ☐ Further stakeholder engagement required
Has your organization successfully repositioned itself from perpetrator to primary victim in international discourse?
☐ Independent observers persuaded ☐ Media narrative successfully reframed ☐ Stakeholder sympathy increased ☐ Further communications investment required
Successful applicants receive one of four ratings:
Bronze: Mass violence, in recyclable packaging. Silver: Child soldiers recruited inclusively. Gold: Hostage facilities powered by solar panels. Platinum: Calls for genocide delivered with a complete ESG report.
For foods, there is an addition to the consumer label. For example:
Nutrition Facts
Calories: 140 Protein: 4g Sodium: 120mg Carbon footprint: Low Gender equity: Certified Child soldiers: Inclusive Child brides: Ethically sourced Weapons near civilians: Institutionally diversified Support for genocidal jihadists: Values-aligned
May contain traces of sesame.
May also contain an entire moral civilization that has forgotten the difference between auditing evil and opposing it.
When Iran offered condolences after the death of former Qatari emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, the gesture appeared incongruous. Iran had recently been firing missiles and drones at Qatar and across the Gulf. So why the words of consolation?
Iran was not primarily attacking Qatar as a Muslim or Arab society. It was targeting the American military presence on Qatari soil. The same pattern has extended across the region: U.S. facilities and assets in Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Jordan, as well as American positions in Iraq and Syria, have come under Iranian attack. Recent strikes included an early-warning installation in Qatar, Patriot systems in Kuwait, a U.S. fuel depot in Bahrain and military facilities in Jordan.
That reveals the real fault line in the Middle East.
It is not simply Sunni against Shia, Arab against Persian or even Muslim country against Muslim country. It is increasingly a divide over how to handle the United States: between governments and movements determined to expel American power and those that invite it in and then seek to shape it.
Iran represents the first model. Since 1979, its hostility has been explicit. It calls America the enemy, demands the removal of U.S. forces and uses missiles, drones and proxies against American military positions. Its war is visible. It announces its contempt and fires at the flag.
Qatar perfected a more nuanced model.
Under Sheikh Hamad, Qatar financed and expanded Al Udeid Air Base, which became central to U.S. operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and across the region. At the same time, Doha built influence inside the United States, financing American university campuses, purchased entry into American television distribution, invested in think tanks and businesses, hired lobbyists and cultivated political relationships. It also hosted anti-Western terrorist groups including Hamas leaders and Muslim Brotherhood figures, and used Al Jazeera to broadcast narratives often deeply hostile to the West and its allies.
Iran attacks American power from the outside. Qatar embraces it corrodes it from within.
anti-American Iranians
Iran seeks direct confrontation; Qatar seeks leverage.Iran’s weapons are missiles and militias. Qatar’s are money, access, prestige and indispensability.
The West is naturally more alarmed by Iran’s model. And Qatar’s model is harder to confront because it arrives as partnership.
The military base protects American interests. The university campus carries a prestigious name. The investment creates jobs. Each relationship is defensible in isolation. Together, however, they create influence on a scale no tiny monarchy could achieve through military power alone.
The broader contest is therefore not between countries that love America and countries that hate it. Iran and Qatar represent different tactics of genocidal jihadists. One strategy attacks the fortress. The other purchases rooms inside it.
Iran’s war is louder. Qatar’s may prove more insidious and enduring.
First One Through 