We're still fighting the Crusades

Trump's invasion of Iran has emboldened some republicans to express their true feelings. Even before the bombs started dropping TheBulwark published A Green Light for Anti-Islam Bigotry for Trump’s GOP. More recently a candidate for Texas attorney general has said “ Islam is not compatible with Western civilization ”. It's all in keeping with White Christian Nationalists' belief in the superiority of their one true religion, and that followers of any other faith are therefore at best deluded, and at worst just plain evil. Funny isn't it, that's exactly the same way the Iranian theocrats think.

And both sides have been thinking the same way since Pope Urban II launched the First Crusade more that 900 years ago. That crusade ushered in 300 years of bloodshed and suffering, all in the name of "my religion is better than yours", each side assured that they we're doing God's will and would be rewarded in heaven. Each side firmly convinced that the others were evil, sub-human, infidels.

Fast forward 600 years and we're still at it. We think we can just bomb our way towards getting the middle east to forsake Islam and all become good little Christians. We fail to see that modern "radical Islam" grew in the wake of Christian imperial nations conquering their lands, steeling their natural resources (oil), and exploiting their people. How do you think they're going to react to Trump's bombing campaign? Trump's war will no doubt unite Islamists in a way nothing has since the Crusades. If in the past groups like ISSIS in Iraq, or the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, thought "well, we don't like Iran either", you can be sure they are now going to put aside their differences to defend their lands from the infidel invaders.

Like an old phonograph record when the needle gets stuck in the groove, or the Groundhog Day movie, humanity is stuck in an endless loop of hatred and violence that we cannot seem to break free of.