To open a new church, congregations must comply with state and local zoning and land-use laws, and often must seek approval from special boards or public assemblies. All too frequently, writes Emma Green, communities are unwilling to see a new house of worship in their midst. Bigotry—against Jews, or Muslims, or African-Americans—is sometimes the source of the hostility; but in no small number of cases, objecting residents have more mundane concerns:

One New Jersey lawyer recounted a hearing on an Orthodox Jewish group’s zoning application where an objector stood up, turned to the yarmulke-wearing crowd, and said, “Hitler should have killed more of you.” . . . But many land-use disputes aren’t about explicit bigotry. They arise from concerns about noise, lost property taxes, and Sunday-morning traffic jams. The effect is largely the same, and can be just as devastating as outright hatred: a religious community is dragged into a lengthy, and costly, dispute with a city or town. Religious groups either give up and move somewhere else or prepare for litigation—and the burdens that come with it.

Fights over religious liberty tend to run hot. They are ignited by disputes over speech and sexuality, hate crimes, and school vouchers—issues that divide the American public. But the slow burn of bureaucratic tedium has equal power to test the faith of a congregation. Zoning and land-use conflicts consistently rank among the top reasons why religious organizations end up in court, according to the legal newsletter Church and Tax Law. . . .

Towns can have outdated, discriminatory zoning rules on the books and not even realize it. Local officials can be single-mindedly focused on raising revenue from property taxes, which churches and other houses of worship don’t pay.

These fights matter, because physical spaces matter: they can determine who makes the drive to morning services and who stays home; who remains in the fold and who grows disconnected from their faith; and whether people of all races, classes, and backgrounds are truly welcomed in, or whether the church doors are just too far away for some people to reach.

Early Friday morning, Israel attacked military installations near the Iranian cities of Isfahan and nearby Natanz, the latter being one of the hubs of the country’s nuclear program. Jerusalem is not taking credit for the attack, and none of the details are too certain, but it seems that the attack involved multiple drones, likely launched from within Iran, as well as one or more missiles fired from Syrian or Iraqi airspace. Strikes on Syrian radar systems shortly beforehand probably helped make the attack possible, and there were reportedly strikes on Iraq as well.

Iran itself is downplaying the attack, but the S-300 air-defense batteries in Isfahan appear to have been destroyed or damaged. This is a sophisticated Russian-made system positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear installation. In other words, Israel has demonstrated that Iran’s best technology can’t protect the country’s skies from the IDF. As Yossi Kuperwasser puts it, the attack, combined with the response to the assault on April 13,

clarified to the Iranians that whereas we [Israelis] are not as vulnerable as they thought, they are more vulnerable than they thought. They have difficulty hitting us, but we have no difficulty hitting them.

Nobody knows exactly how the operation was carried out. . . . It is good that a question mark hovers over . . . what exactly Israel did. Let’s keep them wondering. It is good for deniability and good for keeping the enemy uncertain.

The fact that we chose targets that were in the vicinity of a major nuclear facility but were linked to the Iranian missile and air forces was a good message. It communicated that we can reach other targets as well but, as we don’t want escalation, we chose targets nearby that were involved in the attack against Israel. I think it sends the message that if we want to, we can send a stronger message. Israel is not seeking escalation at the moment.