As a fragile, two-week ceasefire hangs over the U.S.-Israel war with Iran, Richard Booker, who runs a Christian ministry in Conroe, says he aches for the Iranian people. But that doesn’t mean he stands against the military operation.
“If you have somebody that is calling you ‘the Little Satan’ and America ‘the Great Satan,’ this puts the conflict in a spiritual realm,” Booker said, referring to terms Iran has used for Israel and the U.S. respectively. “So from my standpoint, as a Bible person, the conflict is not just against people, but it’s against an ideology.”
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Booker’s rhetoric exemplifies the belief of many Christian Zionists — or as he would call himself, a “Biblical Zionist” — who see military escalations in Iran as necessary. While precise definitions of the movement are often disputed, a common belief among Christian Zionists is that God made a covenant with Abraham’s descendants to give them a land that would be theirs, and that modern-day Israel is the fulfillment of that promise.
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Some of the most visible figures of the Christian Zionist movement include Texas televangelist John Hagee, who says that returning Jewish people to Israel is an essential step for the end-times and the return of Jesus.
These beliefs are most commonly associated with evangelicals — but not all Christians are aligned with modern-day Israel.
The war with Iran and the ground invasion in Lebanon are amplifying a divide among Christians over their biblical views on Israel and how those stances shape U.S. policy. Some see supporting the nation as a mandate from God, while others say modern Israel isn’t the same as the land God promised to his chosen people centuries ago.
American opinions on Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration are shifting. As of March, 60% of U.S. adults have an unfavorable view of Israel, which is up from 53% last year, according to data from a Pew Research Center survey of 3,507 U.S. adults.
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The split comes as the Trump administration relies on religious messaging in its remarks on the war, with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth recently emphasizing how a U.S. airman was rescued from Iran on Easter Sunday.
“Shot down on a Friday — Good Friday. Hidden in a cave, a crevice, all of Saturday. And rescued on Sunday,” Hegseth said earlier this month. “Flown out of Iran as the sun was rising on Easter Sunday. A pilot reborn, all home and accounted for, a nation rejoicing. God is good.”
Former U.S. Vice President Mike Pence greets Pastor John Hagee on Sunday evening at Cornerstone Church in San Antonio in 2023.
Robin Jerstad, San Antonio Express-News
What is Christian Zionism?
Christian Zionism uses Christian theology and biblical interpretation to justify support for the modern state of Israel as the homeland for Jewish people in historic Palestine, said Ross Wagner, associate professor of New Testament at Duke University’s Divinity School.
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“That very general description can hold a lot of different — sometimes incompatible — theologies under its umbrella,” Wagner said.
The popularized evangelical support for Israel truly took off following the 1967 Six-Day War. Many saw Israel’s victories against its Arab neighbors as a miracle.
But the end-times beliefs Christian Zionists subscribe to can often be offensive to Jewish people, Wagner said, because many Christians believe that people of other faiths can’t enter heaven if they don’t embrace Jesus as their savior.
“They’re either going to convert to recognize Jesus as the Messiah, or they’re going to be destroyed, along with everybody else who’s rebellious,” Wagner said about popular Christian Zionist beliefs. “But it comes across, at least now, as very pro-Jewish or pro-Israel.”
Megachurch pastor Jack Graham of Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano recently spoke about the importance of supporting Israel as it battles Iran.
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“I believe, because I read my Bible, that we are nearing the rapture of the church when Jesus comes,” Graham told his congregants last month.
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Scholarly and media narratives about Christian Zionism often focus on “extreme” versions of it, like the focus on the apocalyptic prophecies. But many Christian Zionists don’t cite the end-times as their primary reason for supporting Israel, said Samuel Goldman, associate professor of humanities at the University of Florida’s Hamilton School.
Instead, many Christians cite Chapter 12 of Genesis in the Old Testament, when God promises Abraham the land.
“I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse,” God says in the chapter. “And all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”
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Understanding the divide
The Rev. Adam McIntosh, pastor at St. David’s Reformed Church in Tomball, wants to see Jewish people — and really those from all faiths — accept Jesus as their savior. It was instrumental to his childhood as he grew up with Israelis and Palestinians when his father served as a missionary.
Despite his experience in that region of the world, he doesn’t support Christian Zionism narratives that include Hagee’s predictions on the return of Jesus, calling them an inaccurate portrayal of biblical truth.
McIntosh says the common Christian Zionist beliefs are relatively new in church history and aren’t based on scripture. In the Old Testament, there was a division between the Jewish people and the rest of the world, or Gentiles, but God no longer saw that separation once Jesus arrived, he said.
He says the U.S. shouldn’t attack Iran for Israel’s sake — even if it means freeing the Iranian people from an oppressive regime.
“If that does happen, praise God. I’m happy for that,” McIntosh said. “But it doesn’t mean that we can do whatever we want to achieve that end. We still have to do what God says, which is a limitation on state power.”
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Brandt Burleson no longer considers himself a Christian. But when he was, he took a job working for the Consulate General of Israel Houston and the Southwest. From 2016 to 2025, he says he spent much of his 40-hour work week speaking with pastors and Christian leaders about the importance of supporting Israel.
He often heard Genesis 12 used to uphold “unquestioning support” for Israel. For Burleson, the experience made him question his own beliefs until he didn’t feel like he was a Christian anymore.
“This isn’t the kind of Christianity (of), ‘Oh, do good work and help the poor people’ that I grew up with,” he said. “This is really people who are kind of rooting for Armageddon to happen.”
The case for the Iran war
For Booker, seeing the shifting opinions among Americans towards Israel is “frightening.”
“If you’re raised in the Bible — whether somebody believes it or not is not the point — it’s there,” he said. “And all through the Bible, it’s very clear that God made this covenant that’s an everlasting, unconditional covenant.”
The Rev. Becky Keenan, senior pastor of Living Hope Houston, said supporting Israel is about backing what she calls the only democracy in the Middle East. The way she sees it, the U.S.-Israel attacks on Iran placed them on the right side of history.
“I support Israel as a Christian, but I don’t divorce my history and my understanding of politics and just common sense,” Keenan said. “They’re our best ally in the Middle East, and we have an opportunity to bring greater peace to the region.”