The promotion of the confrontation between Trump and the Iranian «ayatollahs» raises a very interesting question: on what do each side base their actions? There is a widespread view that both the Iranian leadership and millions of Iranians believe in the coming of the «Hidden Imam» and eagerly await his arrival, while the Americans, represented by Trump, are just primitive cowboys who live for picnics and barbecues. According to this view, the Americans, unlike the Iranians, will never go all the way in this confrontation.
However, this is a very distorted view not only of American society as a whole, but of Trump in particular. A recent speech by Trump at a church in Miami, in front of supporters of the «prosperity gospel» movement, serves as an illustration of this. During the speech, he made a statement that affected all religious citizens of the United States — he promised to pass a law guaranteeing the right of students and teachers to pray in all educational institutions in the country.
By defending religious Americans against attacks from atheists and being an exclusive lobbyist for Judeo-Zionist circles (including the Chabad movement, to which his son-in-law Jared Kushner and daughter Ivanka Trump belong), Donald Trump is primarily a creature of American Christian evangelicals, many of whose pastors have already declared him nothing less than the «Messiah». It was representatives of this Christian denomination who gave him more votes than any other community — 80% of all their voters. At the same time, they are the largest religious community in the United States — about one in four Americans identifies with this denomination, which amounts to about 60 million people.
Now let’s compare. The total population of Iran today is about 80 million people. About 90% of them are Shiites who, according to the stereotype mentioned above, are waiting for their «hidden Imam» — and will not wait. But how many of these nominal Shiites are actually, let alone fanatically, adherents of this doctrine? The periodic protests that erupt in Iran reveal the prevalence of anti-clerical sentiments among their participants. Moreover, it is no secret that millions of nominal Iranian Shiites, especially the young, only give the appearance of observing religious rules that have long become a burden to them.
So who is the bigger fanatic — Trump, the self-proclaimed messiah, or the ayatollahs waiting for their hidden messiah? And where are there more real fanatics — in Iran or in the US? That is still a big question. But whatever the answer, the facts we have presented once again confirm that those who rushed to consign religion to the «museum of history» were wrong again…