Donald Trump crossed a line with his Easter rant on Iran. Even MAGA supporters were shocked. (Photo: Gage Skidmore.)
‘’Tuesday will be Power Plant Day and Bridge Day…. Open the fu*kin’ Strait you crazy bastards or you’ll be living in hell… Praise be to Allah. PRESIDENT DONALD J TRUMP.’’
He is quite insane. He’s coming apart. There is so much wrong with this post.
I am not a Muslim, but Trump’s reference to Allah and destruction violates the prohibition against respecting God’s sanctity by, at the least, trivializing the name and invoking it for both selfish and harmful actions.
Trump’s manipulation is disrespectful of Muslims all over the world.
Disrespectful, but why would we expect respect from a man that can’t spell the word? And he could not have picked a worse time than Easter weekend to do this.
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He was born with the sense of a garden slug, and he has lost that as he has aged.
Warfare is by its conduct chaotic, and plans only last so long on a battlefield.
Civilized nations have joined together to create some rules that govern warfare among nations with a goal of seeing the least amount of damage inflicted on civilians.
The president is reveling in his brutal attacks on Iran and its civilians; he enjoys the spectacle and the taking of human life.
He actually cackles with glee, announcing that he will destroy power plants and bridges; experts on the law of warfare warn that by doing this he is engaging in war crimes.
He does not care, he’ll merely seek an opinion from a minion that what he is doing is permissible. He is without morals or any sense of decency.
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Earlier this week, he threatened to ‘’hit each and every one of their electric generating plants.” He threatened to send Iran back to the “stone ages.” Of course, he means Iran’s civilians.
Protocol I of the Geneva Convention requires warring parties to direct their efforts away from civilian targets and populations. Acts or even threats intended to terrorize civilian populations are prohibited.
Military targets are those “that make an effective contribution to military action.” and whose destruction offer is a “definite military advantage.”
Trump‘s advisors are telling him it’s legal to destroy civilian infrastructure such as power plants. We know that his advisors will tell him only what he wants to hear, not what is right, and if he takes any heat over what they have told him, he will blame the advisors for telling him what he wants to hear.
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While the United States has not ratified Protocol I, more than one law professor says that it still has the status of customary law and is binding on all states.
They assert it matters not that the US is not a member of the Protocol, and they claim that the intentional bombing of civilian targets is a war crime. To be fair, this seems to be what we did in Germany and Japan but with less gleefulness.
“… There are reasonable grounds to think they might constitute a war crime,” said the United Nations Secretary General. He was referring to the bombing of civilian targets as threatened by the president.
Sure, the United States would claim that power and desalinization plants served dual purpose-military and civilian-but military advantages must be the real purpose for the attack.
Trump has pretty much eliminated that claim with his social media posts. Even if the claim did exist, proportionality must also be considered by weighing the military advantage against killing power and water for thousands of civilians.
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Attacks intended to punish the civilian population, however, eliminate any consideration that the target may serve a dual purpose.
Trump’s childish social media posts are clear on his purpose to threaten civilian destruction in order to achieve his military goal of opening the Strait.
Even though war crimes would likely be committed, it is unlikely that Trump or any other American would be prosecuted by the International Criminal Court, the would-be prosecutor of war crimes.
Jurisdiction of the ICC exists if member states are involved, or if the crime occurs in the territory of a member. But neither the United States nor Iran are members.
The United Nations Security Council does have the power to refer a case for prosecution to the ICC, but the United States has veto power and referral would not occur.
Nor would Mr. Trump be charged in the United States with war crimes, thanks to the Robert’s court’s immunity ruling. He will pardon Hegseth if he remains useful.
Nevertheless, very recently over 100 experts in international law from top universities around the world met, and published on the website of the policy journal, “Just Security,” their opinion that statements by United States officials, including Trump about their intentions, raised serious concerns about violations of international human rights laws, including potential war crimes.
They cited Trump‘s off the wall comments that he would bomb, “just for fun,” and those by Hegseth that the United States does not fight “with stupid rules of engagement.”
Who says such things when engaged in killing humans?
Sending the Iranians back to the stone ages, as Trump has threatened, is the intention to eliminate any sense of modern society for these people.
This would include elimination of hospitals, food, distribution, water, heat, and other uses of power, all items that do not contribute to the military effort. This is purely punishment of a civilian population.
Trump is killing the same population he expected to rise up against the regime in favor of the United States.
They may not be ultimately prosecuted, but Trump and Hegseth are war criminals and they will take that to their graves.
Perhaps, reading Trump’s posts, he is planning an insanity defense because he does not appear to be tethered to the ground, and he seems to be losing it more every day.
Will United States pilots do as they are ordered and destroy these civilian plants in violation of the international law?
Or will they refuse?