Hostilities Begin!

“This is a proactive alert to prepare the public for the possibility of missiles being launched toward the State of Israel,” the IDF said.

Iranian media reported strikes targeting the IRGC Intelligence Directorate, as well as hits in central Tehran. The country has closed its airspace in response to the strikes.

That certainly sounds like the start of war to me.  National Review confirms the report with more detail in the last few minutes.  Apparently Iran has already begun to retaliate:

Iran already has launched retaliatory strikes against Israel and U.S. bases. American and Israel reportedly plan to carry out several days of attacks, and Trump cautioned that while the administration is taking every step to minimize risks to America personnel, “we may have casualties.”

And so it is upon us at last.  No doubt we will soon begin to hear from certain quarters about the “tragedies of war.”  Any loss of life is tragic, regardless of circumstance.  But death is an inevitability for all of us.

Hopefully, the tragedy is counterbalanced by circumstances.  Death from “old age” is balanced by a life well lived.  Death in military conflict is counterbalanced by the sacrifice for home and hearth.  It is a good death, tragedy notwithstanding.

We have come in this country to far too often deal only with the tragedy of death and ignore the circumstances.  I am struck this morning by how utterly selfish that is.  Such reaction is about how the death makes us feel, not about the death itself.  This pattern is repeated over and over of late, not just with military deaths, but in situations form the death of George Floyd to the death of Renee Good.  In such times those people cease to be people, they become objects of our emotions.  As Christians we are called away from selfishness.

If lives are lost in this conflict, which is certainly possible, probably likely, those that lose their lives will be heroes.  They should be celebrated as they are mourned.  Their deaths while tragic will be good.  Good outweighs tragedy every time.

As to the leftover articles of the week, I have toyed with dropping them altogether given the gravity of the situation.  But there are some good reads in there and while this conflict continues so do our lives.  But this week I will drop the snark and simply reprint the headlines with the links:

LA County Judge Blocks Plan to Clear Out Homeless RVs

Was Climate Change the Greatest Financial Scandal in History?

Beloved candy company closes corporate office, lays off dozens

Massive Analysis of Medicaid Claims Finds L.A. Mental Health Dept. Is Biggest Filer

Nerd section:

Fukushima’s Radioactive “Super-Boars” are Using a Genetic Cheat Code to Take Over

Is time a fundamental part of reality? A quiet revolution in physics suggests not