Sunday, February 26, 2006
Casus riotus
Protest… Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Libya, Sudan, Pakistan, Iran, just name it…. everywhere Muslims filled the streets defying their government, and decrying the evil in the West. They call it Denmark, or the American Satan, or whatever. The reason? The infamous Danish cartoon.
Was that the greatest affront to Islam in recent decades? What about the more direct attack on Islam and Muslims? How about the bombing of a 1200 year old mosque? Yes, the bombing of the Shia Shrine in Samarra. How about the slaughter of hundreds of Muslims? How about burning and destroying dozens of Sunni mosques in Iraq as retaliation? Why is this not more offensive of these stupid cartoons? Isn’t Islam the Religion of Peace? Where are the street riots?
It was quiet in Muslim world… It is hot and bloody in Iraq!
Violence is the time-honored way of solving any dispute, political or not. Diplomacy is not respected. It’s a sign of weakness. This is how it looks now. Isn’t this a far greater sin for Muslims to kill each other and burn mosques and Koran than a disrespectful picture of the Prophet?
This isn’t going to get better. More and more it seems we’re dealing not with a small minority of kooks, but an epidemic of extremism that is bloodthirsty and violent at its core. Call it Sunni, call it Shi’a, call it Wahhabi’s, call it Batheist, call it whatever, I don’t care. It’s all revolving around the nation of Islam and Muslims.
Worse than the colorful infamous cartoons are the ‘human flesh cartoons’. The cartoons that are rioting our streets blindly. The human flesh cartoons that are killing Muslims, bombing and burning mosques. The cartoons which is blaming it on occupation and Israel. Did Israel send troops to burn our mosques? Did the American Satan send troops to kill our Imams and burn our Qur’an?
Shame on you Muslims. Shame that you protest over the Dane cartoons yet shut-up on the Human/Muslim flesh cartoons.
Not that I’m not asking Muslim to go out in protests around the Islamic world. But wondering why Muslims in Iraq are not Muslims enough? Why can they protest against a cartoon, yet do not respect their brother Iraqi Muslims? A tomb build of stones, covered with golden flakes is more important than hundred of slaughtered Muslim, by Muslims all in the name of ISLAM!
Read the comments -- apart from a few shallow American Bush-haters, there is some interesting debate among educated, cosmopolitan Muslims about the state of their own religion.
Haitham Sabbah's blog is a tough read if you are as strong a supporter of our national policy in the region as I am, but that is no excuse for staying away. He writes about all sorts of things from a perspective that would surely benefit American blog readers.
2 Comments:
By 
, at
Sun Feb 26, 09:15:00 AM:
Thanks for the link to Sabbah's blog -- I wasn't familiar with it. I've been reading Healing Iraq lately and have heard a similar note of dispair.
Even William F. Buckley is ready to throw in the towel on Iraq. I begin to think it's all over but the shouting. I'm not happy about it, even though I opposed the war from the beginning. But that's how it looks to me.
By 
sunguh5307, at
Sun Feb 26, 11:14:00 PM:
Too soon to be a bonafide discredit to Islam. But the dissonance takes a lot of effort to maintain. I don't see a reformation anywhwere, so they'll have to cling to their victimization for some time to come.
Still, it's nice to hear that it's not all blocked out. Unless that's why I can't access the page- is the link bad or is the server down? Or did somebody come under pressure to take down the site?
