A basic grasp of world history and Western philosophy may be useful for understanding this piece.
The conflict between Israel and Iran is not fundamentally about territory, resources, or nuclear weapons. Its structure is deeper — a rivalry over the right to carry the true revelation within the shared Abrahamic tradition. At its core, it is a contest over symbolic primacy, a struggle for the exclusive status of Covenant-bearer. This is not international rivalry in the conventional sense but a form of intra-confessional competition.
Primacy and Revision
Judaism is the first monotheistic religion, canonized centuries before the emergence of Islam. The Tanakh establishes a unique covenant between God and the Jewish people, one that does not entail universal salvation. Islam appears over a thousand years later, claiming that the preceding traditions — Judaism and Christianity — either distorted the revelation or limited it. In Surah 9:30, the Qur’an expresses this bluntly:
“The Jews say, ‘Ezra is the son of God,’ and the Christians say, ‘The Messiah is the son of God’… May Allah destroy them; how deluded they are!”
This passage reflects not only polemic but the core strategy of Islamic self-definition: acknowledgment of predecessors in order to negate them. Such a position makes Islam structurally vulnerable to the continued existence of Judaism. The State of Israel materializes that vulnerability — it returns an ancient religious tradition to the space of contemporary politics. This triggers in Iran not only geopolitical hostility but a metaphysical rejection.
Christianity
Christianity emerged as a universalist extension of Judaism: it expanded salvation beyond a single ethnic group. In its early stages, it positioned itself in opposition to Judaism, but eventually came to dominate Western civilization, relegating the Jewish model to the periphery. By the 20th century, Christianity in the West had lost its political-ontological significance — under the pressure of secularization, historical criticism, and postmodern philosophy.
Today, Christianity in the West survives as a cultural backdrop and private identity. It no longer defines state missions. Within the Abrahamic field of religious legitimation, three forces remain: Israel, Shiite Iran, and the Sunni Islamic world. But only the first two build their political subjecthood around the idea of exclusivity and final revelation. In Sunni tradition, such a claim is institutionally weaker and typically takes form not through centralized projects but through fragmented ideological modes (e.g., Salafism or movements of Islamic universalism).
Postmodernism
Postmodernism has leveled truth as a metaphysical category. In its place came narrative, constructs, and local identities. Within this context, Iran and Israel may appear archaic — yet they continue to appeal to the Absolute.
Iran is a state whose political structure is built on a theological model. The expectation of the return of the mahdi — the hidden Imam — is embedded in the legitimation of authority. Israel is a project based on the return of the people of the Covenant to their land, where sacred text continues to shape legal and political practice. Both sides still operate within a framework where truth is possible and must be defended.
This renders them incompatible with an environment where value is assigned not to truth but to interpretation — and simultaneously makes them potentially dangerous to each other.
Ontological Incompatibility
In Shiite tradition, political power is temporary: it is a means of maintaining order until the Imam’s return. Within this schema, Israel constitutes a symbolic disruption. Its existence calls into question the finality of Islamic revelation. It testifies that the Covenant has not disappeared, been revoked, or dissolved in history. Theologically, this is unacceptable.
In this light, the delegitimization of Israel is not merely political rhetoric but an attempt to remove a symbolic anomaly. Holocaust denial, the phrase “Zionist regime,” demands for dismantlement — all these are part of a theological defense structure.
Israel, by contrast, acts differently. It does not call for Iran’s destruction or respond symmetrically. It functions as a completed form: return, restoration, silent presence. This grants it ontological stability. But in a world where politics is based on narrative expansion rather than fact, such a position becomes vulnerable. Israel does not impose interpretation. Iran does.
Israel’s assertive defense of its interests on the global stage — including aggressive lobbying — is not a sign of strength but a mechanism to compensate for political vulnerability.
Conclusion
The conflict between Israel and Iran is not about borders or balance of power. It is an ontological conflict within the broken system of monotheistic succession. Its participants cannot recognize each other without abandoning the foundational premises of their own identity. This makes it fundamentally irresolvable in diplomatic terms.
Mitigation is only possible through the displacement of apocalyptic and exclusivist religious discourse from the level of state identity. Until that occurs, the conflict will persist in one form or another.
That’s the framework. ■