The name Israel used for its military operation targeting Iran may have extraordinary meaning for the people of Iran, who have suffered under the tyrannical, despotic Islamic regime for 46 years.

The Israelis named the mission “Operation Rising Lion,” derived from Numbers 23:24, in which the prophet Balaam — who was hired by King Balak of Moab to curse Israel, but was directed by God to bless Israel instead — declaimed of the Jewish people, “Behold! The people will arise like a lion cub and raise itself like a lion.”

But the imagery of a lion rising may also have tremendous significance for the people of Iran — the flag of Iran for four centuries before the Islamic regime took over in 1979 was a lion with the sun rising on the stripes of green, white, and red. The Islamic regime replaced the lion with a stylized version of Allah and the phrase “Allahu Akbar” along the edges of the green and red stripes.

Rising Lion is a beautiful name for the operation, reminding the people of Iran that Israel is not their enemy, and looks forward to peace and friendship as the Lion rises to where he was before '79. https://t.co/ORgHrmO760 pic.twitter.com/zlEUs7tD5w

— Eugene Kontorovich (@EVKontorovich) June 13, 2025

The lion and sun flag is still used by some Iranians as a symbol of opposition to the current government. In 1980, after adopting the Islamic flag, the regime made it a punishable offense to use the lion and sun flag.

“There is a common misconception that the Lion and Sun flag is the symbol of the Pahlavi Dynasty,” the National Union for Democracy in Iran notes. “Though the flag was used during the Pahlavi Dynasty, it is an ancient, national symbol the history of which dates back to the twelfth century. It is, indeed, Iran’s symbol. It has been discovered on banners and as being used as a popular coat of arms to represent Iran as early as the fourteenth century. In the sixteenth century, during the Safavid Dynasty, the Lion and Sun first appeared on Iran’s official flag.”

In 2009, a movement arose in Iran to rid the country of the Islamic regime. Called the “Green Movement,” reports said scores of protesters were killed by the regime. Then-President Obama refused to help the protesters. “Behind the scenes, Obama overruled advisers who wanted to do what America had done at similar transitions from dictatorship to democracy, and signal America’s support,” Eli Lake recalled. According to Wall Street Journal reporter Jay Solomon, author of “The Iran Wars,” Obama ordered the CIA to sever contacts it had with supporters of the movement.

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“The Agency has contingency plans for supporting democratic uprisings anywhere in the world. This includes providing dissidents with communications, money, and in extreme cases even arms,” Solomon wrote. “But in this case the White House ordered it to stand down.”

In January 2023, Radio Free Europe reported, “At least 522 people have been killed in four months of anti-government protests in Iran, said a report issued on January 15 by the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA). Among the dead are 70 minors and 68 security forces, the agency reported. Nearly 20,000 people had been arrested, 110 on charges that could lead to a death sentence, it said.”

Dying civilizations reveal themselves in familiar ways. Faith is abandoned, culture is drained of meaning, and the will to defend the home is eroded. But there are two unmistakable signs that a civilization is in mortal danger: when its people cease to build families — and when it tolerates invasion without resistance.

In 2006, Pat Buchanan raised a warning to the American people: “We are entered upon the final act of our civilization. The last scene is the deconstruction of the nations. The penultimate scene, now well underway, is the invasion unresisted.”

What the American people are witnessing in Los Angeles is that penultimate scene. Flying the flags of foreign lands, the barbarians have stormed the gates. They bear no loyalty to America, no reverence for her inheritance, and no desire to become part of her family.

Millions of deportable aliens fill American cities and hold American jobs, but they are strangers in our midst. Not because sanctuary cities like Los Angeles have failed to welcome them, but because they intend to tear down the permanent things that make this nation worth belonging to.

The Republic has been invaded. We need mass deportations. Not someday. Now.

Mass deportations are fiscally responsible, morally just, and politically popular. Flying someone safely home is possibly the most merciful consequence for violating our laws. Mass deportation is not extreme — it is the moderate, moral alternative to chaos that any serious nation would take to defend its borders. And while some might criticize the amount of funding that this endeavor requires, you can’t put a price on the safety and well-being of the American people.

Approximately 18.6 million illegal aliens reside in the United States. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has a backlog of more than nine million pending immigration benefit applications. Another 3.5 million cases are backlogged in the DOJ immigration court system. To restore our immigration system (both legal and illegal), we should pause intake of additional applications, including employment authorization documents. In the meantime, the administration can work to remove all deportable aliens between now and January 19, 2029.

This will take both resources and courage — but the American people support the goal. Six months into the Trump administration, the President’s approval rating on immigration is “surging like a rocket,” according to CNN.

Now, Congress must act — and pass the One Big Beautiful Bill Act with urgency.

The President of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, is calling for protests in the United States and threatening mobilizations over a minuscule 3.5% tax on remittances. In response to such threats, Congress should use reconciliation to increase the remittance tax to at least 15% — as Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-MO) has rightfully proposed. It is immoral for foreigners to break our laws, only to then wire dollars that ultimately fund the regimes and networks undermining us.

Congress must also do its job and deliver all the resources necessary to enforce our laws and restore order: expanded ICE funding for detention beds, agents, transportation, and legal support; the permanent codification of President Trump’s proven border policies; and the end of legal gamesmanship that allows illegal aliens to exploit endless appeals and paralyze the system.

Deportable aliens who are put into removal proceedings should not be granted endless chances to delay justice. They previously had due process opportunities to apply for a visa or refugee protection to lawfully enter the U.S. and, once in the U.S., to seek a lawful benefit, including asylum, with DHS. Once an alien is in removal proceedings, the only question should be: is the alien deportable as charged?

The days of surrendering our sovereignty to process lawyers and activist judges must end.

We must institute mandatory E-Verify. No work permits should be granted unless — and until — an immigration benefit has been lawfully approved. Simply filing an application must not become a backdoor pass to employment in the United States. The rule must be simple: no approval, no work.

Asylum fraud is the Trojan horse of the current crisis. We must close it.

And we must end universal birthright citizenship and chain migration. Only the children of American citizens should have automatic birthright citizenship. And family-based immigration means nuclear family only. Gone will be the days of migration chains that allow aliens, not Americans, to decide who comes here permanently.

Mass deportations are necessary not only to bring back law and order and protect the working class, but also to restore the full political rights of every American. While the Trump administration has rightfully prioritized the deportations of violent criminals, mass deportations require extending far beyond that. Allowing any illegal alien to stay not only erodes law and order but undermines the blessings of American citizenship — especially for those in deep-blue states.

The American people are ready. The President is ready. Now Congress must be ready.

We will not witness the end of the American Republic — unless we choose to.

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Kevin Roberts, Ph.D., is president of The Heritage Foundation and Heritage Action for America.

The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.