For some around Trump, war on Iran is a Christian calling

In a war against a country led by Shia Muslim clerics, the United States -- which has a constitutional separation between church and state -- is also invoking religion, with some Trump officials casting it as almost a divine mission.

At the event for Holy Week, when Christians mark the last days of Jesus Christ before the resurrection on Easter, the Reverend Franklin Graham told Trump of the Bible's Book of Esther in which he said "the Iranians" -- a Persian king of contested historical accuracy -- ordered the killing of all Jews.

"Today the Iranians, the wicked regime of this government, wants to kill every Jew and destroy them with an atomic fire. But you have raised up President Trump. You've raised him up for such a time as this. And Father, we pray that you'll give him victory," said Graham, son of famed late evangelist Billy Graham.

Unmentioned, the Persian emperor Cyrus the Great, still revered by Iranians, was the first world leader to grant freedom to the Jews, liberating them from captivity in Babylon.

The story of the Book of Esther has also been repeatedly cited by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who used the occasion of Passover to compare his war alongside Trump to the emancipation of the Jews from Egyptian captivity.

Iran's government since 1979 has been explicitly rooted in religion, with a top Shia cleric serving as supreme leader.

Iran's military has drawn parallels between their defenses and the Battle of Karbala, the 680 CE battle in which the Prophet Mohammed's grandson Hussein was killed, an event commemorated by Shia as an act of martyrdom and self-sacrifice in the face of tyranny.
Crusades are back
When George W. Bush went to war against Afghanistan's Taliban after the September 11, 2001 attacks, he called his campaign a "crusade" but quickly backtracked, aware of the historical baggage in the Islamic world of a term often used loosely as a metaphor in the West.

Trump's defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has shown no such compunctions. The former Fox News host in 2020 wrote a book called "American Crusade" in which he called for a "holy war" to rid America of the left.

Among his tattoos are a Jerusalem Cross, a Crusader-era emblem embraced by the far-right, along with the Latin inscription "Deus Vult," or "God wills it," a motto for the Crusaders.

If there was any doubt on his views on Muslims, he also has a tattoo that reads "kafir," or "infidel," in Arabic.

Hegseth, who has vowed to rain down "death and destruction" on Iran, at a news conference called on Americans to pray "every day, on bended knee, with your family, in your schools, in your churches, in the name of Jesus Christ."

Speaking to CBS News, Hegseth said, "We're fighting religious fanatics who seek nuclear capability for some religious Armageddon."

"My Christian faith," he said, "is important in our fighting ranks to give them perspective."
Shutting down diversity
The Pentagon in recent decades has welcomed a diversity of faiths, with chaplains tasked more with offering personal comfort and guidance than on blessing leaders' decisions.

"Someone with command authority asserting a faith perspective in a manner of favoritism, disregarding the diversity of faiths represented in the military and the nation, is at the least disrespectful and careless and at the most an abuse of power," said Kenneth Williams, a former military chaplain who now teaches at Georgetown University.

The religious embrace of war is also deeply offensive to many Christians. Pope Leo XIV, the first American to lead the Catholic Church, has hoped that Trump will seek "an off-ramp" and "a way to decrease the amount of violence."

In his Palm Sunday homily, the Pope said God "does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them."

Asked by an AFP journalist about the Pope's remarks, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said it is "very noble" to pray for troops in a time of war.

Much of the administration speaks openly in religious terms. Vice President JD Vance announced in the midst of the war that he is publishing a book on his embrace of Catholicism called "Communion."

Trump himself is not known to be personally religious. The thrice-married realtor and former television celebrity was raised Presbyterian and rarely attended religious services.

But since entering politics he has embraced the Christian right. Christian conservatives hailed Trump for helping them achieve their priority -- the end of the nationwide right to abortion, thanks to justices Trump appointed to the Supreme Court.