By Kam Zarrabi, Intellectual Discourse

 

In my last article, The Wild Kingdom, I demonstrated the parallels between the narratives in the Old Testament and the ongoing events in the Middle East. The same people who were engaged in the ancient legends of the Bible are still at it over two thousand years later. There is really nothing new under the sun, as the Bible says, except for the tools of war and the magnitude of death and devastation that man can cause in the guise of self-defense or under the cloak of a just cause.

 

Again, I must emphasize that Biblical narratives seldom reflect either the actual historical events or follow the timeline of history. Yet, all such stories are representations or reflections of man's hopes and anxieties, aspiration and fears, throughout the ages and to this day.

 

There is hardly any doubt that the story of Esther and Mordakhai is pure fiction, in spite of the fact that a site believed to be the tomb of this uncle and niece in Hamadan, northwestern Iran, is a place of pilgrimage for the local Iranian Jews. Nevertheless, the legend of the proud Mordakhai and the beautiful and cunning Queen Esther has served a fundamental cultural purpose for the disliked and dispossessed Jews for nearly two thousand years. The festival of Purim, the harbinger of spring, represents the celebration of the triumph of a downtrodden people over the cold, gray winter of hatred, threats and persecution.

 

In my previous article I demonstrated that, unfortunately, the triumph of one people is almost inevitably at some other people's demise. In the story of Esther, the Jewish wife of the Persian monarch (best guess as who this king was supposed to be is Artakhshathra I or II, not Xerxes as some believe), upon hearing about a plot to exterminate the Jewish population of Persia, convinces her husband to turn the tables against their ill-wishers. In response, the Jews are empowered by the monarch to destroy those who wanted to do them harm. The story speaks for itself, here shortened for clarity:

 

Esther Chapter 8

 

11 The king granted the Jews in every city to gather and to stand for their lives, to destroy, to slay…. all that would assault them, including little children and women, and to plunder their possessions.

 

Esther Chapter 9

 

5 Thus the Jews killed all their enemies with the stroke of the sword, and slaughter, and destruction, and did what they wanted to those that hated them.

12 And the king said to Esther the queen, "The Jews have slain and destroyed five hundred men in Shushan.  …..Now what is your request further, and it shall be done."
13 Then said Esther, "…let it be granted to the Jews in Shushan to do tomorrow also according to this day's decree…."

15 The Jews in Shushan gathered on the fourteenth day of the month Adar, and slew three hundred men at Shushan….
16 But the other Jews that were in the king's provinces gathered together and stood for their lives, and slew of their foes seventy and five thousand….

 

Initially, it was thought that Israel's all-out attack on Lebanon would require one week (like Esther's first day) to exact retribution against those elements who had dared to attack the Israeli border post and taking two soldiers as prisoners. We now see that Israel requires another week ( Esther's second day) to finish the job of bringing the enemy to its knees. Here the Israelis represent Queen Esther, and the Anglo-Saxon superpowers headed by the United States are acting as the Persian monarch who grants Esther all her wishes.

 

In an article by Pat Buchanan, appearing in antiwar.com web site, he criticizes columnist Lawrence Kudlow, who believes that "Israel is doing the Lord's work."  

 

Now let's see how the current scenario could possibly evolve into a regional conflagration with global implications. By that I mean the very real possibility of stretching the current confrontations in Lebanon to engulf Syria and, if Yahweh, in His wisdom, doesn't change His mind, into Iran.

 

First, let us refresh ourselves with how Queen Esther managed to convince her husband to vanquish her detractor, Haman. Knowing, through Mordakhai, her uncle, that the Evil One is none other than Haman, she invites Haman, now increasingly under suspicion and disfavor by the king, to the palace in a seemingly friendly gesture.

 

Esther Chapter 7

 

1.So the king and Haman came to drink with Queen Esther.

 

Esther immediately points the finger at Haman and…..

6. … Esther said, "An adversary and an enemy, this evil Haman!" And Haman became terrified before the king and the queen.

7. And the king arose in his fury from the wine feast to the orchard garden, and Haman stood to beg for his life of Queen Esther, for he saw that evil was determined against him by the king.

8. Then the king returned from the orchard garden to the house of the wine feast, and Haman was falling on the couch upon which Esther was, and the king said, "Will you even force the queen with me in the house?" ……

 

Well, that cunningly staged performance convinced the monarch to agree to all Esther's biddings, ergo the gruesome details of the following events in Chapters 8 and 9.

 

Today's Haman is represented by Iran. Iran, just like Haman, once a favorite of its patrons, has been in disfavor and regarded as a member of the Axis of Evil by the big monarch in the world stage. Suspected of attempting to develop nuclear weapons, Iran is now under scrutiny and criticism by its detractors. And, just like Haman, Iran is invited to present its case in front of the G-8 and possibly the Security Council, to share some pomegranate juice with Israel and the U. S.

 

So what might our shrewd Esther or Hadassah, do this time to unleash the monarch's wrath upon her ill-wishers?

 

Suppose the runways in the main airport in Damascus are preemptively bombed by Israel, and the Syrian Mediterranean coastline becomes blockaded by the Israel naval, nuclear-armed forces. Of course, George W. Bush, Tony Blair, Condi Rice and John Bolton, as well as the entire U. S. Congress will immediately voice their support for this action that is viewed as a defensive move by Israel.

 

Syria reacts by sending its air force to confront Israel's far superior air power. Next, both CNN and Fox channels will show the site of a major explosion somewhere in Israel, with radioactive debris detected for several miles around the point of impact of the long-range missile that delivered that low-yield payload. The site will be either a center of population or an unpopulated desert area, depending on what it would take to convince the world of the impending nuclear holocaust if no counteraction were taken immediately.

 

Upon further examination, the pieces of the missile found at the site are found to have the unmistakable markings of the Islamic Republic of Iran!

 

The evidence is now irrefutable, just as was the case when the King entered and found Haman attempting to molest Queen Esther right there in the King's own chambers!

 

No matter what Iran might do or how it would plead its case, the planted evidence will win the day, paving the way, with global approval, to attack Iran. The cost to those who might stage such a cunning scenario might be an Israeli village or small settlement of perhaps mostly Arab population. But, the rationale would be the ultimate benefits - the extermination of the sources of trouble once and for all.

 

With only less that 2% genetic separation between the chimpanzees and us humans, what do you expect? At least our animal cousins don't pretend; their wild instincts are never masked like ours under a phony, self-serving veneer of righteousness.