For at least half a century, American feminists have considered religious conservatives their greatest rivals in the public square. But Louise Perry points to the greater danger to women from a new kind of post-Christian morality, which, she argues, bears a strong resemblance to the morality of the pagan world before Christians introduce a new sexual ethic with its roots in Judaism:

In historical terms, it is the Christian system of sexual ethics that is an aberration. What the historian Kyle Harper describes as the “first sexual revolution” emerged in a society in which Roman men enjoyed unrestricted sexual access to their social inferiors. The Roman marriage system may (unusually) have been monogamous, but it looked radically different to the monogamous system that existed until recently in our own society, and their sexual morality was even stranger. High-status women were expected carefully to guard their chastity, but all other women were potentially ripe for the picking, whether or not they wanted to be. This was a slave society, after all.

Christians demanded chastity, not only from women, but also—radically, infuriatingly—from men, too. The advent of Christianity really did constitute a sexual revolution, which is exactly why its early converts were disproportionately female, and why the majority of the world’s Christians are female still. No wonder Nietzsche described Christianity as a religion of “women and slaves.” (He did not intend this as a compliment.)

Modern feminism is not an enemy of Christianity; it is its descendent. The moral ideas that form the basis of feminism are derived from Christian values that are, in historical terms, highly unusual.

Analyzing the recent direct Iranian attack on Israel, and Israel’s security situation more generally, Michael Oren looks to the 2015 agreement to restrain Iran’s nuclear program. That, and President Biden’s efforts to resurrect the deal after Donald Trump left it, are in his view the source of the current crisis:

Of the original motivations for the deal—blocking Iran’s path to the bomb and transforming Iran into a peaceful nation—neither remained. All Biden was left with was the ability to kick the can down the road and to uphold Barack Obama’s singular foreign-policy achievement.

In order to achieve that result, the administration has repeatedly refused to punish Iran for its malign actions:

Historians will survey this inexplicable record and wonder how the United States not only allowed Iran repeatedly to assault its citizens, soldiers, and allies but consistently rewarded it for doing so. They may well conclude that in a desperate effort to avoid getting dragged into a regional Middle Eastern war, the U.S. might well have precipitated one.

While America’s friends in the Middle East, especially Israel, have every reason to feel grateful for the vital assistance they received in intercepting Iran’s missile and drone onslaught, they might also ask what the U.S. can now do differently to deter Iran from further aggression. . . . Tehran will see this weekend’s direct attack on Israel as a victory—their own—for their ability to continue threatening Israel and destabilizing the Middle East with impunity.

Israel, of course, must respond differently. Our target cannot simply be the Iranian proxies that surround our country and that have waged war on us since October 7, but, as the Saudis call it, “the head of the snake.”