For the first time since 1945, a regional war is threatening to engulf the entire world.

On every continent, governments are being forced to take a side: either with the Americans and Israel, or with Iran and its fellow autocracies.

The consequences for global trade, to say nothing of global security, are enormous. The world economy is far more complex than it was during the Second World War.

As the pandemic exposed, many countries, including Britain, operate a ‘just in time’ policy of importing energy and food as they become needed. When a crisis disrupts the supply chain, the impact is felt in empty shelves and soaring prices.

Donald Trump will be under pressure from many in the US and elsewhere to declare victory and end the attacks. But Iran, whose brutal Revolutionary Guard Corps show no sign of being ready to relinquish power, might not agree to a ceasefire.

They have already shown themselves capable of raining hell on the civilian populations of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and other Gulf states – and may well be planning terrorist atrocities in the West. As the war heads into its second week, the tremors seem set to shake the planet.

The U.S.

ANTI-IRAN: America’s technology, especially in partnership with Israel, is second to none. Its missiles are accurate and its power to wreak destruction colossal.

But Iran’s drones cost as little as £3,750 apiece and can be manufactured by the hundreds daily – while a single interceptor rocket to shoot one down can cost £15million.

Trump claimed this week that US stockpiles are limitless. This is false. Iran’s drone supply could ramp up faster than America’s defences – which could be pivotal for the outcome of the war. Importantly, US politicians – among them many Republicans – are far from uniformly behind Trump. Isolationist Vice-President JD Vance has, for one, been very quiet.

Voter reaction has also been mixed – and US losses are likely to mount. In the week since the US’s attack launched on February 28, six American soldiers have been killed in Iran, with almost $2billion worth of military equipment lost.

Brazil and Mexico

PRO-IRAN: Brazil, the most populous country in South America, is an economic powerhouse.

It has good relations with Iran and is suspicious of US influence, particularly since Trump gave vocal support to imprisoned hard-Right ex-president Jair Bolsonaro.

Meanwhile, many Mexicans retain longheld sympathies for Palestinians, and see Israel in the same light as the US – as a colonial oppressor. While officially neutral, the country will privately support Iran.

Argentina

ANTI-IRAN: South America – Donald Trump’s backyard – is not a disinterested observer of a war thousands of miles away.

Argentina has been ferociously anti-Iran since at least 1994, when a Tehran-sponsored suicide bomb killed 85 people at a Jewish community centre in Buenos Aires – an atrocity orchestrated by the regime as retribution for Argentina’s decision to stop sharing nuclear secrets.

Even though his economy is reliant on cheap energy, especially for the agricultural sector, Argentinian president Javier Milei is loudly pro‑Trump and pro-Israel.

Azerbaijan

ANTI-IRAN: Only about 60 per cent of Iranians (roughly 55million people) are ethnic Persians. A further 25million are Azeri – who form the majority in Azerbaijan. If the regime in Tehran crumbles and civil war breaks out, tribal conflict between the Azeris and the Persians could quickly spread across the border. War between Iran and Azerbaijan could then sever a crucial pipeline bringing oil from the Turkish coast – with BP one of the main beneficiaries – into the Mediterranean.

Since European airlines can’t fly over Russia or Iran, Azeri airspace is a vital corridor East to West. If a passenger jet is shot down here, the route will be closed.

Britain, France and Germany

ANTI-IRAN: In a joint statement, the three major European nations deplored Iran’s attacks on Gulf states and made a qualified offer to assist the US-Israeli efforts. However, Britain in particular failed to offer support fast enough to appease Trump, who called PM Keir Starmer ‘a loser’ and ‘no Churchill’. Germany claimed to have been warned in advance of the strikes (as was Poland, a firm US ally with a strong military) but Britain and France were not.

Spain

NEUTRAL…BUT: Spanish PM Pedro Sanchez is hardly an advocate for the ayatollahs, but he initially labelled the strikes an ‘unjustified, dangerous military intervention’ that contravened international law, refusing to let America use joint Spanish military bases. A furious Trump then threatened to suspend all trade.

On Thursday, a Spanish Patriot anti-aircraft missile battery helped to shoot down an Iranian missile. But Spain’s hostility to Israel – an ancient enmity worsened by modern politics – is unlikely to shift.

Ireland

NEUTRAL: Sinn Fein has denounced the US-Israeli action as ‘an act of aggression that threatens to set the entire Middle East ablaze’. Yet the government has stopped short of condemning strikes, with Taoiseach Micheal Martin – due to meet Trump later this month – saying: ‘We believe in immediate de-escalation.’

For all the friendliness between the two countries, Irish public opinion seems to stand firmly against President Trump.

Belgium, Bulgaria, Estonia, Greece and Portugal

NEUTRAL: Although Nato members, many European countries prefer to keep well out, wording their responses to the strikes carefully.

Estonia recommended ‘pressure through sanctions’, Greece and Belgium highlighted concerns for the safety of their citizens, Portugal regretted Iran’s ‘unacceptable’ violation of human rights, and Bulgaria worried about ‘dangerous military escalation’. But the longer war drags on, the more likely they’ll be forced to pick a side.

Russia

PRO-IRAN: The biggest winner from the conflict so far is Vladimir Putin. With Iran unable to export much of its oil, soaring global energy prices are again boosting Russia’s war chest for the quagmire in Ukraine.

Iran is a longstanding ‘strategic partner’ of the Kremlin, and has been supplying the Russian military with swarms of Shahed suicide drones. Russia, too, produces thousands of drones and sells them back to Iran, while supplying the mullahs with aircraft, missiles and anti-aircraft systems as well as satellite intelligence. Russia also opens its banks to Iran to dodge American and EU sanctions.

China

PRO-IRAN: This is the most dangerous flashpoint. China needs Iran’s oil for its military vehicles and warplanes, and buys it despite international sanctions. Beijing’s warships are sailing into the Arabian Gulf to escort Iranian tankers.

If, by accident or in an act of self-defence, a US missile hits a Chinese ship, or if China fires on a US plane, the world could be plunged into all-out war between East and West.

Even without that terrifying scenario, Beijing is helping Iran. Its satellites are tracking missile launches from Israeli bases and US carriers in the Indian Ocean – and feeding this crucial intelligence to Tehran. China is also believed to be smuggling aid and ordnance such as ammunition, drones and perhaps missiles to help the mullahs.

Egypt

NEUTRAL: In 1979 Egypt infuriated Iran by striking a peace deal with Israel and offering sanctuary to the ousted Shah.

Egypt has long been subsidised by Saudi Arabia and the UAE, who believe its large army would be useful in a future conflict. But if Iran’s proxies in Yemen, the Houthis, successfully blockade the Red Sea, energy revenues will collapse – and with them much Arab support. Egypt may find that its neutrality cannot hold, and it will be forced to side against Iran.

India

NEUTRAL…FOR NOW: India is successfully walking a tightrope. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has just signed trade and defence deals with Israel. But India is also a major oil importer from the Gulf region, and relies on buying natural gas for making fertiliser. (Delhi also retains strong links with Moscow and has refused to condemn Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.) Whatever its stance, India has much to lose if the war drags on.

South Africa

PRO-IRAN: Since the Nelson Mandela era, South Africa has been hostile to Israel, even bringing charges of ‘genocide’ against it at the International Court of Justice in the Hague, over the war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

The current government, led by President Cyril Ramaphosa, also remembers Iranian support in the apartheid era, when Tehran refused to supply the white supremacist government with oil.

Australia

ANTI-IRAN: While Britain vacillated under Keir Starmer, Australia has publicly supported the US/Israeli action, though it has not sent any forces. Public opinion is widely supportive of America, especially in the aftermath of last December’s Bondi Beach massacre, carried out by Islamist extremists.

However, Australia draws about 30 per cent of its energy imports from the Gulf and exports a lot of mutton there, so the war’s economic impact – with trade from the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait and Iraq all blocked or sharply reduced – will be significant.

Japan and South Korea

ANTI-IRAN: Japan and South Korea are rock-solid US allies. But these big industrial economies – along with Singapore and Taiwan – are energy-hungry importers of oil and gas from the Gulf countries, including Iran. If producers of cars and consumer goods cannot get energy, production will stall. Getting goods to European markets will also be much more expensive if the route to the Suez Canal becomes too dangerous.

South Korea has one of the world’s largest armed forces with 3.5million personnel, should it be needed.

• Mark Almond is director of the Crisis Research Institute, Oxford 

Tucked away in Oxford University’s historic library are the oldest surviving New Testament fragments, papyrus texts nearly 2,000 years old that are among Christianity’s most treasured writings. 

For Dr Jeremiah Johnston, who has studied the Magdalen Papyrus P64 extensively, being one of the few people allowed to hold the pieces of historic scripture was ‘the single most awe-inspiring experience this side of heaven.’

The fragments themselves are tiny, fragile scraps, browned with age, yet they preserve moments from the Gospel of Matthew, including four sayings of Jesus, key portions of the Last Supper and Judas arranging his betrayal.

During a visit to the library of Magdalene College, Johnston was granted the rare opportunity to hold the three fragments encased in a simple frame, an experience he described to the Daily Mail as life-changing.

‘It was literally taken out of what looks like a shoebox, not even on display, and I had as much time as I wanted with one of the most priceless Christian artifacts on earth,’ he said, recalling the almost ethereal nature of the encounter. 

‘I’m holding that fragment, and to know that it’s 2,000 years old, and to know that it’s true, and that the scales of truth tip in the favor of Christianity, was transformational for me.’

The fragments preserve 24 lines of text from Matthew chapter 26, specifically covering verses 23 and 31, and date back at least to the first century AD, offering an extraordinary window into the earliest written record of Jesus’ words.

Alongside other early New Testament scraps, the P64 also represents the oldest known examples of a codex, a book with individual pages rather than a traditional scroll, underscoring the profound shift in how early Christians recorded and preserved their sacred texts.

The fragments land squarely in today’s debates over how faithfully the Gospels were transmitted, offering physical evidence that early Christians had been preserving these texts for far longer than critics often claim.

And its frayed edges and faded ink reveal that the story of Jesus was being written down earlier than skeptics sometimes admit.

‘It’s a reminder to me that Jesus died for my sins so that I could be forgiven. And so I’m holding that fragment,’ said Johnston, who is set to release his new book ‘The Jesus Discoveries.’

‘It takes my breath away,’ he added, describing the huge significance the specific excerpts hold as part of what Christians call the words of institution, in this case being the lead-up to the Last Supper and Jesus’ crucifixion.

These fragments were given to Magdalen by Charles Bousfield Huleatt in 1901.

Huleatt, a Magdalen alumnus-turned-missionary, was working in Luxor, Egypt, when he obtained the papers. How he acquired them remains unknown, as does their ultimate origin.

Johnston explained that the P64 fragments were dated entirely through paleography, meaning scholars compared the handwriting style of the scribe to thousands of other dated secular documents found in Egypt that have survived from the same era.

He explained that because everything was handwritten before the invention of the printing press, these handwriting comparisons, along with the fact that the fragment is written on papyrus, rather than later parchment, and is formatted as a codex with writing on both sides, allow experts to date it to the late second century AD.

This would mean that they may have been penned ‘a full century’ after Jesus’ crucifixion, which many scholars believe occurred in 33 AD.

However, some experts, such as German archaeologist Carsten Peter Thiede, argue that the same evidence points to an even earlier first-century origin date for the texts, around 70 AD.

Matthew 26 marks the point where Jesus moves from teaching and ministry into the final hours leading to the crucifixion, making it one of the most consequential chapters in the Gospels. 

On the back of Fragment 1, which is from Matthew 26:7-8, the words read: ‘Poured it on his head as he was at the table. When they saw this, the disciples said indignantly.’

The next piece features Matthew 26:10: ‘Jesus noticed this and said, “Why are you upsetting the woman? What she has done for me.”‘

This passage is part of the story of the woman who anoints Jesus with expensive perfume at Bethany, shortly before the Passover.

And the final excerpt, from Matthew 26:15, reads: ‘Then one of the Twelve, the man called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said, “What are you prepared to give me?”‘

The front side of the first fragment, with text from Matthew 26:31, reads: ‘Jesus said to them, “You will all fall away from me tonight, for the scripture says.”‘

That quote is simply Jesus predicting that all his disciples would soon abandon him, as they later did.

The second includes details from Matthew 26:32: ‘I shall go ahead of you to Galilee.” At this, Peter said to him.’

The final piece features Matthew 26:22-3 and reads: ‘They were greatly distressed and started asking him in turn, ‘Not me, Lord, surely?’ He answered, ‘Someone who has dipped his hand into the dish with me.”

Speaking about the translations, Johnston told the Daily Mail: ‘We have four sayings of Jesus within those fragments. Jesus’s name is mentioned twice, Peter and Judas Iscariot’s names are mentioned, and these are the earliest copies in the world where their names are found.’

During his doctoral residency at Oxford, Johnston gained unprecedented access to rare biblical manuscripts through the Bodleian Library, receiving an elite ‘A’ reader card granting full access to special collections.

He believes the cumulative evidence demonstrates that early Christians were committed to accurately preserving the Gospel and that the Magdalen Papyrus attests to that effort.