TEHRAN – Donald Trump and his Army Secretary Pete Hegseth are portraying themselves as saviors in the war with Iran.
Perhaps under this flag it is permissible, or even necessary, to commit war crimes.
Trump posted an image of himself with Jesus-like healing powers. This came after Pope Leo criticized the “madness of war” against Iran.
The United States has a constitutional separation of church and state, but the Trump administration is violating that law.
Just as ISIS, commonly known as Daesh, felt, and still feels, a divine obligation to oppose what it calls infidels, including Muslims, Christians, and Jews, Trump and his religious fanatics, to a lesser extent, believe or pretend to have a similar obligation. However, the United States has binding laws that limit them.
Fortunately, Western society is largely intolerant of such superstitions. In the face of growing backlash, Trump deleted posts on his Truth social account that portrayed him as a Jesus-like figure. His ardent supporters also reacted to this depiction.
At a special vigil in St. Peter’s Basilica on April 11, Roman Catholic Pope Leo denounced the use of religious language to justify war, saying “the illusion of omnipotence that surrounds us…is becoming increasingly unpredictable.”
Secretary of War Hegseth likes to talk about how the Christian God is on his side.
“The providence of our Almighty God protects these troops and we are fully committed to this mission,” Hegseth said. He said this in an interview with CBS News in March.
Days later, he said the U.S. military “needs a connection to Almighty God in this moment.”
At another event a few days later, Hegseth quoted Psalm 144 at a Pentagon press conference, saying, “Blessed be the Lord, my Rock, who trains my hands for battle, and who trains my fingers for battle.”
Perhaps the Tomahawk missile attack on Minab’s elementary school in the early hours of the February 28 invasion of Iran, killing more than 160 students along with their teacher, could be justified under Hegseth’s bigoted religious views.
If not, why haven’t Trump and the Pentagon chief apologized for this tragedy, which amounts to a war crime and a crime against humanity?
Whether you are Christian, Muslim, Jewish, or Buddhist depends on geography and the religion of your parents. Therefore, this statement by Hegseth at the National Prayer Breakfast: “A Christian nation will remain in our DNA, if we can keep it,” is fundamentally misleading and wrong.
For decades, such designations have lost their meaning as people of different religions have migrated from one country to another or from one part of the world to another.
Additionally, Hegseth’s statements that the U.S. military is armed with an “arsenal of faith” and his description in “X” that the U.S. military is “combatants of faith” are similar to what Al Qaeda and ISIS say about their operatives.
While Iranian and U.S. negotiators were developing a blueprint for resolving the dispute over Tehran’s nuclear program, the Trump administration, in full cooperation with the Netanyahu administration, committed an illegal invasion against Iran. Their joint attack shocked the world, especially Washington’s allies around the world, including Western countries.
“Together with our Jewish friends and Israel’s great military, we Christians must pick up the sword of unabashed Americanism and defend ourselves,” Hegseth wrote, according to CNN.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, another bigoted Zionist religious figure also wanted for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza, told i24 TV News in August 2025 that he feels he has a “spiritual calling” to the Greater Israel project and is “very” attached to this vision.
Trump’s ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, a self-described Christian Zionist, said days before the war with Iran that he would be fine with Israel controlling much of the Middle East based on its interpretation of the Bible’s borders.
========== “Christian Zionist”
During his confirmation hearing last year, Sen. Tom Cotton, a radical Republican, asked Hegseth if he considered himself a Christian Zionist. “I am a Christian and a firm supporter of the state of Israel, its continued defense, and America’s standing alongside Israel as a great ally,” Hegseth said.
The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) reported last month that it had received more than 110 complaints from U.S. service members stationed across the Middle East, including a non-commissioned officer who reported that his commander told his troops that the war was “all part of God’s divine plan,” and quoted the Book of Revelation to declare that “President Trump was anointed by Jesus to raise the alarm that will cause Armageddon in Iran.”
In response to these statements, more than 20 Democratic members of Congress called for an investigation into the report.
Hegseth treats the Pentagon as an instrument of holy war.
Riaz Khokhar, an independent researcher who contributed an article to Al Jazeera’s website last month, said Hegseth described his tattoos, a Jerusalem cross and a deus vault (“will of God”), as symbols of “the modern American Christian crusade.”
Hegses also boasts that he bears the Arabic word kafir (“infidel”), a deliberate provocation against non-moderate Muslims.
Former Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu wrote in Middle East Eye magazine on April 5 that the United States must abandon its ideological war against Iran. He said the Netanyahu-Trump alliance, backed by Zionist and Christian-Zionist ideological networks, “replaced geopolitical rationality with a theopolitical logic of war.”
Just as Trump himself is unqualified for the job, his secretary of war is unqualified to lead the Pentagon. Hegseth is a man who has openly expressed little regard for the safety of Iranian civilians, dismissing “tepid legality” in favor of “maximum lethality.”
He also declared that Iran’s enemies “will not be given any respite”, a move that legal experts say amounts to a war crime.
In the war with Iran, President Trump has portrayed himself as a savior who wants to bring prosperity to the Iranian people, but for years he has punished the Iranian people through a “maximum pressure” campaign. Now facing condemnation from the Pope, who criticized the “madness of war”, he portrays himself as a messenger of God. He adapted to changing circumstances to achieve his greedy goals and ordered a bigoted and flattering Secretary of War to carry out his duties. Its mission includes glorifying war and violence in the name of religion and failing to respect international humanitarian law.