Why do negotiations between Israel, the United States, Iran, and their allies so often struggle to produce lasting results? The usual explanations refer to strategic interests. However, they are not enough to explain why some compromises appear unacceptable to many actors.

Diplomatic negotiations do not face only conflicting interests; they also face symbolic worlds that give war a moral, religious, or historical meaning that is considered superior. Several actors therefore use radical religious literacies that interpret events through messianic, eschatological, or apocalyptic narratives. These narratives are not necessarily the origin of the conflict, but they contribute to its continuation.

This dynamic can be observed in several camps. Among some currents of Israeli religious Zionism, contemporary history is understood through the promise of Greater Israel and the prospect of national redemption. On October 25, 2023, Benjamin Netanyahu stated: “We are the people of light, they are the people of darkness […] we will fulfill the prophecy of Isaiah.” Beyond political rhetoric, this reference places the conflict within a moral and biblical horizon that goes beyond the purely strategic language. For some religious movements active around the Temple Mount, particularly the movement for the construction of the Third Temple (HaMikdash movements or Temple Mount Faithful) and organizations such as Im Tirtzu or the National Religious Movement (Bnei Akiva in its most radical fringes), current events are sometimes interpreted through references to the prophecies of Gog and Magog, a biblical figure referring to a coalition of enemy nations destined to collapse before Israel in the end times, and to the future restoration of the Third Temple, seen as a condition for the coming of the messianic era. This perspective concretely implies the dismantling or relocation of the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, buildings currently located on the Temple Mount, a place that these movements call the Temple Mount and claim as an exclusively Jewish sacred space intended to host a new sanctuary. From this perspective, war is no longer only a response to a security threat; it becomes part of........

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