The Roaring Lion of Amos

The IDF’s name for its twelve-day campaign against Iran last year was Am k’lavi, officially translated “Rising Lion,” but meaning literally, “a nation like a lion.” The reference is both to the pre-1979 Iranian flag and to the opening of Numbers 23:24: “Behold, the people shall rise up as a great lion.” For the operation that began in February, Jerusalem chose the name Sha’agat ari, “the Lion’s Roar,” taken from a verse in the book of Amos: “The lion hath roared, who will not fear? the Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy?”