As the dust settles from the U.S. strike against three Iranian nuclear facilities over the weekend, attention is turning to the name of the military operation that carried it out: Midnight Hammer. President Donald Trump, who announced the strike via social media and later during a televised address, is once again stirring comparisons between himself and the ancient Persian king Cyrus.
In Scripture, Cyrus was God’s appointed vessel, a battle-axe of divine reckoning. In Jeremiah 51:20, God declares: “You are My battle-ax and weapon of war: for with you I will break in pieces the nations, and with you I will destroy kingdoms,” (MEV). Cyrus not only crushed Israel’s enemies, but issued the edict to rebuild the Second Temple in Jerusalem.
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Could history be repeating itself? Could Trump, like Cyrus, be used to break the grip of hostile nations and clear the path toward restoring what once was?
The operation’s name, “Midnight Hammer,” feels steeped in biblical imagery. Midnight speaks of darkness just before dawn, a time when the world still sleeps but heaven prepares to act. Could this strike mark a turning point, a prophetic shift into a new day when Israel and the United States rise together to fulfill their historic purposes?
On the ground in Jerusalem, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took a bold spiritual stance. Before Israel’s missions against Iran, he visited the Western Wall and placed a handwritten note quoting Numbers 23:24: “A people rises up as a great lion, and lifts itself up like a lion; it shall not lie down until it eats the prey and drinks the blood of the slain.”
The note and prayer send a clear signal: Israel will not relent. The operation’s name, “Rising Lion,” confirms that resolve and aligns closely with the prophetic picture of Israel’s spiritual and military awakening.
But there is another layer, one rooted deep in the history of the Temple Mount. Babylon destroyed the First Temple, and in time, God brought that empire to total ruin. Centuries later, the Roman Empire tore down the Second Temple, and ruin eventually came for them as well.
So we must ask: Will God bring ruin once again to those who desecrate His holy mountain today? Is divine justice already stirring against those who trample the sacred grounds?
New York Times best-selling author Jonathan Cahn previously alluded to this in his book The Oracle, in which he quoted Netanyahu as saying:
I want to tell you that the Jewish people have a long memory. So we remember the proclamation of King Cyrus the Great—Persian King. Twenty-five hundred years ago, he proclaimed that the Jewish exiles in Babylon can come back and rebuild our temple in Jerusalem.
Such questions become even more timely as the Jewish observance of Tisha B’Av approaches, a day of fasting and mourning for the destruction of both the First and Second Temples, both falling on the very same date in history. Could God use this solemn moment to shift attention back to the Temple Mount, this time in the presence of a leader many view as modern-day Cyrus?
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If Israel were to reassert control over the Temple Mount, would it ignite global outrage? Could this move finally set in motion the end-times opposition prophesied in Scripture, where “all nations” turn against Jerusalem?
Only God knows how these events will unfold. But as America wields the hammer in midnight hours and Israel rises like a lion, the shadows of Babylon, Cyrus and Rome seem closer than ever.
James Lasher is staff writer for Charisma Media.
