Earthshaking events are rocking the Middle East! The United States carried out historic strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities over the weekend. On Saturday night, the Air Force and the Navy launched a surprise attack on Natanz, Isfahan and Fordow. This was the biggest-ever attack by B-2 Spirit stealth bombers and the first-ever use of the massive 15-ton gbu-57 bomb in combat.

In mid-April, President Donald Trump’s administration gave Iran 60 days to enter negotiations regarding its nuclear program. “We gave Iran 60 days to make a deal,” he said on June 13, “and today is 61.” That was the day Israeli forces began their strikes on Iranian military and regime targets in Iran proper. The Israelis were hoping for U.S. help, and some said early last week that if the U.S. struck Iran, it would be this weekend. On Thursday, the administration announced that it would decide “within the next two weeks.” The B-2 Spirit bombers started moving soon thereafter, and U.S. bombs were hitting Iranian targets within 48 hours.

“This wasn’t a Pentagon operation,” one senior administration official told Axios. “This was a Donald Trump operation. He came up with the PR. He chose the plans. He chose the day. … He’s no Jimmy Carter.”

There is still considerable debate over how much of Iran’s nuclear program was destroyed during Operation Midnight Hammer. President Trump said, “Our objective was the destruction of Iran’s nuclear enrichment capacity and a stop to the nuclear threat posed by the world’s number one state sponsor of terror. Tonight, I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success. Iran’s key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated.”

However, the Iranians claim the damage was limited. It is almost certain that Iran has retained enough resources and expertise to continue its nuclear program, but the strikes are certainly a major setback in its attempt to build nuclear weapons.

Former U.S. President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran allowed the mullahs to keep 6,000 centrifuges and allowed the country to continue its weapons research. His administration and his puppet administration through Joe Biden also gave Iran billions of dollars. President Trump’s bold strike against the underground Fordow uranium enrichment plant in particular highlights America’s dramatic turn away from the disastrous policies of the Obama administration. If Kamala Harris had won the 2024 U.S. presidential elections and continued Obama’s influence for a fourth term, the world may have been plunged into nuclear war this year.

“In the pages of human history, this is a moment when the principles of liberty, responsibility and security have triumphed,” said Israeli President Isaac Herzog. “A decisive moment between the axis of terror and evil and the axis of hope. Thank you, Donald Trump. Thank you, United States of America. This brave step serves the security and safety of the entire free world. I hope it will lead to a better future for the Middle East.”

It’s hard to argue with this sentiment. The Middle East is a safer place now that Fordow has been destroyed. Yet it would be naive to think that Iran’s mullahs have given up their nuclear ambitions. Consider what the world’s number one state sponsor of terrorism has accomplished over the last 45 years without nuclear weapons. Iran’s Parliament has voted to close the Strait of Hormuz and the Russian government is saying that other nations may end up giving Iran nuclear weapons. So America’s war with Iran may be just beginning.

Bible prophecy shows us that a 10-nation European superstate referred to as “the king of the north” will ultimately be the power to deal with the threat of radical Islam (Daniel 11:40-43). At some point, America will withdraw from the Middle East and make way for a resurrected Holy Roman Empire to fill the void.

This means that despite President Trump’s impressive show of force, America does not have the willpower to defeat the threat of radical Islam. Therefore, Iran will continue to sponsor terror around the world.

“After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on America, the U.S. targeted Afghanistan, then Iraq,” my father, Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry, writes in his booklet The King of the South. “Both of these campaigns absorbed an enormous amount of America’s resources in its ‘war on terror.’ But where did all this world terrorism begin? Iraq and Afghanistan may be dangerous parts of the equation, but they are not the head of the terrorist snake. It is not enough to destroy the branches of terrorism. To deal with the problem, America should have pulled the terrorist tree up by its roots. That would be Iran!”

Midnight Hammer is the closest America has come to dealing with the head of the snake. Yet without continuous effort, President Trump’s foray into limited warfare will only postpone Iran’s nuclear ambitions.