The present landscape of the Persian Gulf is not solely defined by oil routes, stranded ships, and naval manoeuvres. It is also a theological battlefield, where ancient scripture is weaponised as modern ordnance and where the clash of civilisations is livestreamed in 280 characters or less on X.com.
On one side stands the crude, brazen propaganda of Israel and the United States — a blunt instrument of messianic rhetoric that invokes the biblical Amalek, Armageddon, and Donald Trump as a Christ-like figure when he is not depicted as Cyrus the Great.
On the other lies a highly sophisticated campaign waged by the Islamic Republic of Iran. It is a nuanced, hearts-and-minds operation that even co-opts Christian eschatological symbolism. In this theater of competing narratives, the US and Israel lost the war long before the first bombs rained down on Iran on February 28, 2026.
‘Remember Amalek’
During the 12-day Iran-Israel war in August 2025, Israeli propagandists invoked the biblical King Cyrus, promising Iranians that together ‘we will dance again’ but not before a fandango of bombs and missiles rained down from the skies. Israeli leaders openly boasted that their agents were already on the ground, working to foment regime change as Tel Aviv only had the very best of intentions for ordinary Iranians.
Iranians of all ethnicities, including the Kurds, rejected this shameless lie. Weapons sent to the Kurds were gladly accepted, and quickly stockpiled as a future hedge against Turkish and ISIS/Al Qaeda forces across the border.
After a pummeling Israel would never forget, the script flipped. Iran was recast as Amalek in classic Hollywood fashion, where wild amnesiac swings are the house specialty. To boost the new script, Israel justified its perennial and genocidal military campaigns not in existential terms, but in religious ones.
Genocide was now a mitzvah (religious obligation). In October 2023, as Israeli forces commenced their murderous campaign in Gaza, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the nation with words that would reverberate far beyond the Knesset: “You must remember what Amalek has done to you.” These words were also repeated during the second war of aggression against Iran. Nothing rallies the majority of Israelis quite like the mention of Amalek, even when they are ignorant of scripture. And what was Amalek? They were one among a group of extinct tribes noted for their spiritual and genetic corruption — hinted at in Genesis and elaborated in the Book of Enoch. By framing the Palestinians as Amalek, Netanyahu was effectively greenlighting the extermination of his fellow man.
Perhaps Netanyahu, like his fellow warmongers, were ignorant of a notable passage in the Book of Jonah. In Chapter 4, verse 11, God reminds the furious prophet that He wanted to spare not only the citizens of Nineveh (an admittedly wicked city) but also its cattle. Context, however, is often lost in the cauldron of mass religious schizophrenia. But Israel is not the only entity suffering from the same spiritual psychosis.
