As American war machines keep rolling toward Iran—aircraft carriers, bombers, missiles, the whole military parade—the message is now clear even to the deaf. This is not flexing. This is readiness. This is the kind of movement that usually ends with bombs falling and governments collapsing.
Donald Trump has never hidden his dislike for Iran, and this level of deployment is far beyond negotiation or warning shots. It is power speaking its own language. We have seen this movie before: first airstrikes, then confusion, then years of instability.
Countries don’t just “heal” after this kind of encounter with American firepower. Many scatter. Some never recover.
But while the world is busy analysing Iran, Nigeria is bleeding like a goat tied for slaughter—and the silence is loud.
From Benue to Plateau, Southern Kaduna to parts of Niger State, and across Nasarawa, Kwara and Taraba, Christian communities are being wiped out bit by bit. Night attacks. Homes invaded. Families butchered. Churches burnt like firewood. Survivors run into IDP camps to count losses and wait for the next tragedy. This has been happening for years, yet it is treated like normal Nigerian news—bad, but not urgent.
Let us stop deceiving ourselves. This is not random violence. It is targeted. It is repeated. It is confident. It looks and smells like genocide.
Yet no American aircraft carrier is sailing toward Nigeria’s Middle Belt. No emergency UN meeting. No loud speeches about human rights. No sanctions. The same global voices shouting over Iran suddenly develop sore throats when Nigeria is mentioned.
That silence is wicked.
At this point, we must talk plainly. Nigerian Christians pray a lot—and prayer is good. But prayer alone has now turned into a burial programme. Are the people killing them spirits? Do they have extra heads? Where did Christianity ban self-defence? Where exactly did God say, “Let them kill you without resistance”?
In Ibadan, we say a maa n fi oogun were wo were. You don’t cure madness with paracetamol. Evil does not respond to gentleness. Oppressors don’t retire because you begged them nicely.
People think they know me, but I know where I stand. I believe in justice and fairness, but I cannot stand oppression. It is foolish—yes, foolish—to cry daily about being killed while refusing to confront those doing the killing. History respects strength, not endless tears.
I have interacted with powerful people in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. One lesson stood out clearly: nobody survives by being passive. You don’t beg evil to spare you; you confront it. Glory does not come without struggle. Peace without resistance is just postponed disaster.
Now look at the bigger picture. America’s massive military movement toward Iran is making some people nervous, and rightly so. Today it is Iran. Tomorrow it could be somewhere else. Africa is always waiting on the list. A weak, divided Nigeria—with religious and ethnic fractures—is an easy target. What people call “restructuring” today can turn into enforced division tomorrow.
If the world can mobilise warships over Iran, why is it blind to mass killings in Nigeria by terrorists ? Why are deaths in Guma, Barkin Ladi, Riyom, Zangon Kataf, Kajuru and many other places treated like routine police reports instead of a national emergency?
The truth is bitter but simple. Global outrage is not about humanity; it is about interest. Nigeria’s dead do not threaten nuclear balance. They don’t shake oil markets or global power equations. So their blood does not trend internationally.
Meanwhile, Nigeria keeps tearing itself apart from the inside. Instead of serious pressure to end the killings, the country is told to “manage” the situation. Manage what?
Vanishing villages? Expanding graveyards? Silence sends one clear message: some lives don’t count.
That silence is dangerous.
A country weakened by constant violence becomes easy to control. The more unstable Nigeria gets, the louder outside voices become about how it should be divided, reorganised, or “reimagined.” What sounds like intellectual debate today can become forced reality tomorrow. History is not kind to naïve nations.
Seen clearly, American firepower pointed at Iran is not just about Tehran. It shows how the world works: power decides who matters. Strong nations are confronted openly. Weak ones are ignored until they collapse.
Nigeria’s Christians are dying not because the world does not know, but because the world does not care.
Every Nigerian should be worried—Christian, Muslim, North, South. Once mass killing becomes background noise, national unity is already cracking. Today it is silence. Tomorrow it may be foreign “solutions” that leave Nigeria broken beyond repair.
Iran may be in the crosshairs today, but Nigeria should not feel safe because it is far away. In a world where power shouts louder than justice, only nations that defend their people and face their problems head-on avoid becoming the next lesson in global hypocrisy.
Mogaji Wole Arisekola Publisher of The Street Journal Newspaper, writes from Ibadan.
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