Blessed Are the Peacemakers

“I would never hurt anyone unless I had to. My life's motto is: don't hurt me and I won't hurt you”.

– The Peaceful Porcupine

On June 13, 2025, Israel initiated a preemptive military strike on Iran and its nuclear facilities, military sites, and commanders.  Yet, despite universal agreement that Iran has not developed a nuclear weapon, Israel and the United States are proceeding as if they have.  In fact, on March 25, the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, testified before Congress that based on the Intelligence Community's Annual Assessment, Iran was, indeed, not building a nuclear weapon.  By June, however, Trump was dismissing her statement without fact as unimportant.  And, that he would be deciding in the next two weeks whether or not the United States would be joining Israel, in full or in part, in a bombing campaign against Iran. 

Of course, Iran has been using outside proxy militias in Lebanon (Hezbollah), Palestine (Hamas), and Yemen (Houthis), to name a few, to do its dirty work.  A decided shift away from the West and Israel, following the overthrow of the Shah of Iran in 1979, has led to inevitable showdowns that have been smoldering ever since. 

In Julie Borowski’s 2020 children’s book, “The Peaceful Porcupine”, Borowski lauds the peacemakers in a tale of a porcupine who has trouble making friends due to his frightening appearance and intimidating reputation.  Suitable for children ages 3-7, the story begins with Nappo, the porcupine, whose sharp claws and long quills make it difficult for him to expand his network.  After several attempts, a lost baby rabbit would allow Nappo to prove his peacefulness as he protects his charge from predators until the baby is reunited with its mother. 

A solitary animal, the porcupine's defense includes a coat of 30,000 sharp quills, some as long as a foot, allowing it to protect itself from enemies who wish it harm.  With a hook shape on the ends, a porcupine’s quills are easy to penetrate and yet difficult to remove, providing a visible deterrent from attacks. 

In fact, you could say the porcupine’s quills serve as nature’s idea of “peace through strength”, a strong outward presence to deter aggressors, much like our foreign policy in the past, imitative of the Roman Emperor Hadrian, who first used walls as a buttress to discourage his assailants.  President Ronald Reagan, himself a proponent of the policy, said that since weakness tempts tyrants, a strong military is needed to repel any armed attempt against the United States. 

Another policy, one of foreign interventionism, calls for bombings and regime change, running up a sea of debt, which has only saddled America with perpetual war.  Since the 1970s, Neocons, mostly identifiable as Republican hawks, have been those who favor this strong confrontational approach.  Doves, on the other hand, oppose wars as a means of resolving conflicts, advocating for negotiations, conciliation, and arbitration using a neutral third party to bring together rather than to tear apart.    

Trump ran as a peace President, condemning entanglements around the globe, especially in the Middle East.  In his Riyadh speech in May, Trump called out the war hawks and interventionists, saying, “The so-called nation builders wrecked far more nations than they built, and the interventionists were intervening in complex societies that they did not even understand themselves.  They told you how to do it, but they had no idea how to do it themselves.”  Now, Trump seems to have pivoted from his Peace Through Strength to the neocon dreams of chronic interventionism, himself seemingly using the United States as a military proxy for Israel. 

Noting Iran’s desire to meet to work out a deal, it would behoove Trump to accept, not only on behalf of the nearly 100 million Iranian citizens, but also for Americans’ wallets, who cannot and do not wish to support another war overseas.  If Trump truly wants to “Make America Great Again”, he should focus his attention on America First and stay out of international conflicts that don’t threaten us directly. 

Like the porcupine in today’s story, his quills only acted in self-defense when confronted with a direct threat.  And when he wasn’t in conflict, he instead showed his humanity in helping the helpless rabbit, doing more to bring peace and friendship to his neighborhood. 

Peace should always be the preferred option.  Its efforts should never be exhausted.  To be at peace with as many men as possible makes the world a better and safer place for all.