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Trump’s Lies About the War in Iran Never Stop
Our President opened his mouth the other evening with a short speech filled with lies about the war he started against Iran. He has still to come up with intelligent reasons why he chose to attack that country at this particular time. Reasons exist, but why NOW? And claims that Israel's Netanyahu pushed him into it just don't suffice. Perhaps it was just the necessity of shifting the spotlight away from domestic issues troubling the President.
Trump has made all sorts of threats, as listed in the prior posting of Jackspotpourri, documented on his social media website, presuming our having established total American military superiority over Iran including dominance of the skies over that country.
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| An F-15E Fighter Jet |
Such, unfortunately, is not the case, as the New York Times website reported on April 4:
‘Iran shot down an F-15E fighter jet, its first takedown of an American warplane since the war began. The U.S. quickly rescued one of the jet’s two crew members; (the other was eventually rescued through a brief ground incursion into mountainous Iranian backcountry.) - A Black Hawk helicopter assisting in the rescue was hit by ground fire but was able to keep flying. - And another U.S. warplane, an A-10 Warthog, crashed at about the same time as the fighter jet; its pilot was safely rescued. - Iran is quickly repairing missile bunkers, intelligence reports say, sometimes bringing them back into service just hours after they’re bombed.’
Iran’s apparent military resiliency is on top of its geographic ability to shut off traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, choking off petroleum and other cargo essential to the economies of many nations. Trump and his boot licking appointees lacked the ability to anticipate this, stupidly believing Iran would be just another Venezuela.
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Because President Trump left the Strait of Hormuz problem to the nations that are most affected by it, and declared it not to be a problem for the USA, Eurpeans are seeking a solution.
Based on a New York Times article, here’s a summary of possible European solutions for the Iranian closure of the Strait of Hormuz. The article headlines that they are ‘Few, and Risky.’
By Jim Tankersley
Reporting from Berlin
April 4, 2026
‘When senior officials from 40 countries met virtually this week to discuss how to bring shipping traffic back to the Strait of Hormuz, Italy’s foreign minister had a proposal. He urged them to establish a “humanitarian corridor” allowing safe passage for fertilizer and other crucial goods headed to impoverished nations.
The plan, described after the meeting by Italian officials, was one of several competing proposals from Europe and beyond that were meant to prevent the Iran war from causing widespread hunger. But it was not endorsed by the envoys on the call, and the meeting ended with no concrete plan to reopen the strait, militarily or otherwise.
'European leaders are under pressure from President Trump to commit military assets, immediately, to end Iran’s blockage of the strait and tame a growing global energy and economic crisis. They have refused to meet his demands by sending warships now. Instead, they are hotly debating what to do to help unclog the vital shipping lane once the war ends.
But they are struggling to rally around a plan of action. That partly reflects the slow gears of diplomacy in Europe and the sheer number of nations, including Persian Gulf states, that are invested in safeguarding the strait once the war ends.
Many nations involved in the talks, including Italy and Germany, have insisted that any international effort be blessed by the United Nations, which could slow action further. Military leaders will take up the issue in discussions next week.
More than anything, the struggle reflects how difficult it could be to actually secure the strait under a fragile peace — for Europe or for anyone else. None of the options available to Europe, the Gulf states and other countries look foolproof, even under the assumption that the major fighting will have stopped.
Idea 1: Naval escorts
The plan: French officials, including President Emmanuel Macron, have repeatedly raised the possibility that French naval vessels could help escort merchant ships through the strait after the war ends. American officials have pushed for Europeans and other allies, like Japan, to escort ships sailing under their own countries’ flags. (A French escort for a French ship, for example.)
The catch: Naval escorts are expensive. Also, their air defense systems alone might not be sufficient to stop some types of attacks, like drone strikes, should Iran choose to start firing again. “What does the world expect, what does Donald Trump expect, from let’s say a handful or two handfuls of European frigates there in the Strait of Hormuz,” Defense Minister Boris Pistorius of Germany said last month, “to achieve what the powerful American Navy cannot manage there alone?”
Idea 2: Sweep for mines
The plan: German and Belgian officials, among others, say they are prepared to send minesweepers to clear the strait of explosives after the war.
The catch: Western military leaders aren’t convinced that Iran has actually mined the strait, in part because some Iranian ships still pass through it. So while minesweepers might be deployed as part of a naval escort, they might not have much to do.
Idea 3: Help from above
The plan: Send fighter jets and drones to intercept any Iranian air assaults on ships. American officials have pushed Europe to do this.
The catch: Also quite expensive. Still not guaranteed to work. Iran can attack ships with a single soldier in a speedboat, and if just a few attempts succeed, that could be enough to spook insurers and shipowners out of attempting passage.
Idea 4: All of those, plus diplomacy
The plan: Use negotiations and economic leverage to pressure Iran to refrain from future attacks, and deploy a variety of military means to enforce that. This effort would go beyond Europe. On Thursday, the German foreign ministry called on China to use its influence with Iran “constructively” to help end the hostilities.
The catch: Expensive. Still not guaranteed. Negotiations seem to have done little to stop the fighting. But this may be Europe’s best bet, for lack of a better one.
What if none of that works? Iranian officials said this week that they would continue to control traffic through the strait after the war. They have already made plans to make ships pay tolls for passing through the strait, which is supposed to be an unfettered waterway under international law.
A continued blockage risks global economic disaster. Countries around the world rely on shipments through the strait for fuel and fertilizer, among other necessities. In some regions, shortages loom. In others, like Europe, high oil, gas and fertilizer prices have raised the specter of spiking inflation and cratering economic growth.’
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Here’s a quote from Simon Rosenberg’s ‘Hopium Chronicles’ leading off his April 4 posting:
“I think the central dynamic in our politics now is the growing realization that Trump is a historic, unserious, out-of-control, vainglorious, addled, dangerous fuck up, and that we must do be doing everything we can to wrest control from him in order to limit the damage he’s doing to the country and the world. The warning signs about where we headed are there for those who choose to see them.”
And continuing in this vein, economist Paul Krugman posted on April 4 that ‘If we had a functioning democracy, this would be 25th Amendment time’ and that he (Krugman) personally was ‘scared’ and that Trump ‘should not have any authority at all.’ He continued to say that Trump was ‘looking like basically a president who is losing it and unfortunately losing it in a way that can really make the world a much worse place very fast.’
These opinions are as good starting points as any in approaching today’s news, from wherever you may be getting it. A question: Is Iran's strategy simply not to lose this war, which to them would be the equivalent of winning it?
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Latest From Maureen Dowd
And the New York Times’ Maureen Dowd writes about Pam Bondi’s joining Kristi Noem on the President’s shit list. See Dowd’s April 4 posting by clicking here or copying and pasting https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/04/opinion/pam-bondi-kristi-noem-trump.html on your browser line up at the top of your screen. It points out that ‘sycophancy has its limits.’
The best possible solution would be if Donald Trump fired himself. Without his being there to threaten retribution, perhaps his successors would show some independent thinking in the Executive branch and respect for the people’s representatives in both Houses of Congress.
If you have trouble with this link, let me know and I will send you her column. Sometimes the Times is overly protective of what it prints.
JL
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Judaism and Zionism
I recently received an online Hagaddah (the prayer book that accompanies the Passover Seder meal), a version in which the Jewish slaves in Egypt were replaced by the Palestinians living in Gaza and Pharoah was represented by the occupying I.D.F. personnel there. It had been forwarded to me by an academic son of a regular recipient of Jackspotpourri. What’s going on, I asked and this posting pursues that question further.
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Jews the world over are examining the question of whether full and unquestioning support for the actions of the State of Israel is essential to their religious beliefs. This question has resulted in rifts between those with differing opinions among individuals as well as among congregations and rabbinical leaders. An article in the April 6 issue of the New Yorker magazine also addresses this subject. You can find it at https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/04/06/at-synagogues-tensions-are-boiling-over or by clicking here.
A good example of the argument that Zionism is essential to Judaism, requiring full and unending support of the State of Israel, is the work of British commentator and writer Melanie Phillips, whose opinions are readily available on the internet and in her books. Many Rabbis believe similarly. Opposite to that, on the extreme left and contrary to most Zionist philosopy, is the JVP (Jewish Voice for Peace) position which many condemn as pro-Palestinian and aggressively against the actions of the State of Israel.
Both of these positions can be explained further by referring to Artificial Intelligence commentary readily available online. I leave such investigations to you.
To many, the answer depends on how one defines Zionism. What is referred to today as Zionism was a movement founded by Theodore Herzl in the late Nineteenth century, responding to European antisemitism, advocating a national home for the Jewish people.
Some believe that it is suffcient for such a ‘home’ to exist as a place grounded in Biblical history for Jews to return to if they so choose, and others believe that true Zionism calls for their actually returning there, a giant step beyond just believing in its availabilty, and the possible exclusion of non-Jews, specifically Palestinians, from there.
These differing approaches are today reflected in the politics of the State of Israel, created in 1948 by the United Nations out of what was once a part of the Ottoman Empire, later a British ‘mandated’ territory, in broad terms fulfilling Herzl’s ideas.
The tragedy of this dichotomy is that both arguments are used by antisemites as tools to use against all Jews whose approaches to Zionist ideas may vary.
JL
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Housekeeping on Jackspotpourri
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More on the Sources of Information in Jackspotpourri: The sources of information used by Jackspotpourri include a delivered local daily ‘printed’ newspaper (now the South Florida Sun Sentinel) and what appears in my daily email; that includes the views of many contributors, including the New York Times and other respected journals.
Be aware that when I open that email, I first quickly glance at and screen out those sent to my very old former email address and those considered ‘promotional’ by Gmail’s system as no more than advertisements or requests for donations.
Besides these sources, I also utilize the Google search engine where I can look up any subject I want. Lately, these search results have been headed by a very generalized summary clearly labeled as being developed by AI (Artificial Intelligence). On occasion I might use such search results, but when I do, I will say that I am doing so. Generally, however, I try not to use such summaries in preparing Jackspotpourri.
Following such ‘AI’ search results, there follows the other results of my search. Unlike the anonymous AI-generated summaries, the sources of these results are clearly identified, giving them a greater credibility than any AI summary.
It comes down to who YOU want to be in the driver’s seat in seeking information: yourself or something else (Artificial Intelligence), the structure of which somewhere along the way had to have been created by others, with whose identity I am neither familiar nor comfortable. At least when I read a column by Timothy Snyder, for example, I know from where it comes, and to some extent, what to expect.
Caution should be exercised in using Artificial Intelligence. Always!
JL
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