By Laurence F. Sanford

“Death to America” and “Death to Israel” were chanted in Iranian cities after Hamas Islamic jihadists from Gaza slaughtered, raped, and kidnaped over 1,300 Jews in southern Israel on October 7, 2023. Iranians were seen dancing and celebrating the brutal killings of innocents.

But, of course, Jews are not innocents in Islam. The Quran and Hadiths are full of exhortations to kill Jews and nonbelievers. Therefore, the Hamas killings and kidnapping of women as sex slaves are justified in Islamic ideology in its quest to dominate the world.

Iran is a totalitarian theocratic dictatorship ruled by Shia Muslims with Supreme Ruler Ayatollah Khamenei. China is a totalitarian Marxist dictatorship ruled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) with Supreme Ruler President Xi Jinping.

• Both dictatorships have as their number one enemy the United States.
• Both work through proxies to weaken and attack the United States.
• Both have increased trade and military relationships.
• Both Islamic and Marxist ideologies are anti-Western Civilization.
• Both are sowing chaos throughout the world.

In 1979, Iran’s religious leader Ayatollah Khomeini referred to the United States as the “Great Satan” and to Israel as the “Little Satan” one day after the American embassy in Tehran was seized by Iran. The seizure lasted 444 days and paralyzed the Carter administration. One explanation as to why it lasted so long was that Iran knew Carter had ruled out military action. The terms have endured and are now widely used in the Islamic world. America is the “Great Satan” and deserves “death” because it is the major obstacle to Islam conquering the world.

China, Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, ISIS, and other assorted Islamic terror organizations are “friends” — in the sense that the “enemy of my enemy is my friend.” The common enemy is the United States and Western Civilization.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is no friend of Islam or of any religion. As Karl Marx, the founder of the Communist Party, said, “Religion is the opium of the people.” Religion is a competitor to communist ideology and therefore cannot be allowed except under strictly controlled circumstances. The CCP, in its unrestricted warfare against the U.S., works with “friends” to achieve its goal of world domination.

China and Iran signed an economic and security agreement in 2021 in which China agreed to invest $400 billion in Iran in exchange for oil. China has more than tripled its imports of Iranian oil in the past two years. In addition to deepening trade relations, in 2023 China, Iran, and Russia held joint naval exercises in the Gulf of Oman. Former U.S. Deputy Undersecretary for Defense Stephen Bryen said China “supplies Iran with all the stuff it needs to make all the missiles.”

“Great chaos is needed to achieve great order in the world” is a remark made by the deceased Chairman Mao Zedong of China. The CCP under President Xi Jinping, Mao’s current successor, is a major factor in spreading chaos throughout the world. The CCP has a “no limits” partnership with Russia and is actively supporting Russia in the chaos caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Iran is sowing chaos through its Islamic proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas.

China is actively supporting Iran, which in turn supports Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. The Hamas leader Mohammed Deif, believed to be behind the attack on Israel, received military and weaponry training in China. The Palestinians in the West Bank also receive Chinese aid.

China is following the same playbook in the Middle East that it did in Russia — encouraging an attack on Western Civilization (Ukraine and Israel) and promising to aid the aggressor. Putin visited China just before the Ukraine invasion, and now economic and political relations between the two countries are stronger than ever. Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas visited China in June of 2023 seeking economic aid. He voiced support for Beijing’s repressive policies toward Muslim minorities and repudiated Western concepts of human rights.

Just as Hamas and Hezbollah are proxies of Iran, so Iran is a proxy of China. Xi Jinping is acting out the ancient Chinese stratagem, “Sitting on the mountaintop watching the tigers fight.” The CCP is parroting Hamas’s propaganda that Israel should declare a ceasefire, return to the 1967 borders, and allow the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Summary

China is the leader in the pack of nations creating chaos and seeking to undermine and weaken the United States. The CCP is corrupting and influencing U.S. leaders in government, education, media, and Wall Street with money. CCP gray zone activities that are short of war include financing terror groups, providing military equipment and training, and the Belt and Road Initiative of corruption and economic sabotage.

Iran is developing the atomic bomb and supporting terror throughout the world thanks to Chinese oil purchases and the circumvention of Western sanctions through Russia and China. It is also obtaining monies through the use of cryptocurrencies.

Action

1. Recognize the ideological threats of Islamism and Marxism.
2. Strengthen Western Civilization alliances, including India and Japan.
3. Invest in the U.S. military and gray zone activities.
4. Decouple from China.
5. Stop sending aid to Islamic terror groups.
6. No immigration from Islamic terror countries into the United States.
7. Reciprocity. No Facebook in China, then no TikTok in America.

Laurence F. Sanford is a senior analyst at the American Security Council Foundation.