In his 2003 Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence, 3rd Edition (Comparative Studies in Religion and Society, Vol. 13) , Mark Juergensmeyer distinguishes between religious violence with its “symbolic targets” and “performative violence” from political violence with its strategic targets and rational aims.

One of the “more rational” causes of war is conflict over land.

The mind boggles: It’s as if the “motherland” and its borders were not regarded as “sacred” even by virtually all rational nation-states.