Steynian wisdom on Iran’s involvement in today’s crisis

Not only does Mark Steyn get it, he does it with such great prose:

The forces at play in the Middle East are beyond the Geopolitical Friars’ Club. The median age in Gaza is 15.8 years old. How likely is it that any of those bespoke Palestinian “moderates” who’ve been permanent fixtures on CNN and BBC Middle East discussion panels for 30 years have any meaningful sway over a population of unemployed uneducated teenage boys raised by a death cult? Israel withdrew from Gaza and, instead of getting on with a prototypical Palestinian state, Hamas turned the territory into an Islamist camp. Israel withdrew from Lebanon entirely in 2000, yet Hezbollah is now lobbing rockets at Haifa.

Why? Because in both cases these territories are now in effect Iran’s land borders with the Zionist Entity. They’re “occupied territories” but it’s not the Jews doing the occupying. So you’ve got a choice between talking with proxies or going to the source: Tehran. And, as the unending talks with the EU have demonstrated, the ayatollahs use negotiations with the civilized world as comedy relief. They don’t get Larry King’s salutes to Red Buttons and Don Knotts on Iranian TV, so entering into talks with the French foreign minister is as near to big-time laughs as the mullahs get.

One of the interesting features of the present escalation is the circumspection of Israel’s Arab neighbors. Once upon a time, it would have been Egypt and Jordan threatening the Zionist usurpers. But these countries have been, militarily, a big flop against the Zionist Entity since King Hussein fired Sir John Glubb as head of the Arab Legion. So after ’73 they put their money on terrorism, and schoolgirl suicide bombers — the kind of “popular resistance” that buys you better publicity in the salons of the West. And one result of that has been to deliver Palestinian pseudo-“nationalism” away from Arab influence and into hard-core Iranian Islamist hands. It’s Iran that wants war, not Egypt or Jordan, So Jim Baker jetting in to shake hands with, say, Jordan’s King Abdullah is a waste of time, because King Abdullah cannot impact on the scene in any useful way.

There’s more of course, so read it here. If not Armageddon, folks, we’re watching its precursor on our big screen TVs.  As life goes on here, life as we know it ends there, with all the ripple effects you can imagine.  In other words, as I’ve repeatedly said, I don’t think this is just a regional upheaval.  With Iran’s involvement, and with Iran geographically placed as a crossroads between West and East, Israel’s success or failure will profoundly affect us all.  If you’re religious, prayer for her victory.  If you’re not, do something superstitious, such as crossing your fingers or rubbing your crystals.  Anything to help….