Sunday, November 8, 2009

Thinking the unthinkable











Can it be hatred? Pure, unadulterated, Jihadist hatred? In this piece by William Murchison on the Fort Hood massacres, he goes where few writers have dared, while this breaking story in The Telegraph reports on a link between the suspect and the mosque where 9/11 terrorists prayed.
The mass slaughter of innocents is un-American (save in decisive instances such as Hiroshima). We basically don't get it. Surely it can't be on account of hatred. We explore alternative possibilities. The poor guy suffered from lack of love. Others were mean to him. He was mentally confused. He snapped -- yes, maybe that was it. He snapped, as with various school and post office massacres.
None of which speaks to the terrifying possibility that particular killers particularly hate and scorn and despise the victims, as on 9/11, as with the London bus bombings and the commuter rail bombings in Spain. And the Fort Hood massacre?
That we can't know yet. A careful society, nevertheless, mindful both of human lives and human freedoms, has to brace itself for the possibility that in the war on terror a new domestic front could be opening.
Responsible Muslims, to their undoubted credit, have denounced the Fort Hood massacre. That hardly means other Muslims do not rub their hands in satisfaction as they await future opportunities to gun down soldiers and civilians engaged in shoring up civilization. Murderers of any and all religions hate civilization as a living reproach to ... themselves and their notions.
The war on terror isn't over or even much abated, for all the domestic recoil from waterboarding and Guantanamo and "unconstitutional" assaults on civil liberties.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

the london bombers had close links to islamist groups in and outside the UK

let us know when that info materialiazes about this guy

you are just another blogosphere purveryor of distortion and rumor

 
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