Is this a holy war?

Yes, it is enough. There are far too many here who see this as a holy war, and the potential for great harm if we do not behave with wisdom is not to be under-rated. Those fanatics among us are few; the fanatics in the world of Islam are few. Se bene geserit--if we are well-conducted we still have much to suffer, but we will not exacerbate the situation. If we treat this as a a holy war, we will play directly into the hands of those ranting fanatics who attempt already to rally the support of their communities by proclaiming that they are defending themselves against yet another crusade.

I believe, in fact, that the majority of the Muslim world was already reconciled to our support for Israel--as long as we were seen to at the least attempt to be the honest broker. I think most of the Muslim world simply had an involuntary reaction of duck and cover after September 11th. But now we have portrayed ourselves, for whatever the intent, as a murderous enemy of Islam, can the demagogues simply convince the population.

Islam is not a world of theocracy--Mullahs can only guide a community which accepts the contention of their righteousness--and the ulama, the righteous men of the community, have always the right to judge. The Mullahs of Iran have corroded and squandered their moral authority by the greedy engrossing of most of that nation's investment capital. Imams, like Rabbis, are seen as teachers, and, unlike Rabbis, their teaching can be rejected, and the people can decide whether or not they consider someone to be a true Imam. The sectaries of Shi'ism are divided by their opinions of what the exact number of true Imams has been. There is no clergy in Islam as there is in Christianity. The community can decide to reject the demagoguery of anyone whom they no longer trust. Muqtada al Sadr has never been accepted by the Shi'ites of Iraq as an Imam, despite the revered status of his father for having just that sort of piety which the Muslim will admire. To halt the potential spiral of hatred and devotion to jihad in the world of Islam, we will have to convince more than 200,000 people that we are ready and willing to act in good faith to clean up any mess we have made, and to genuinely commit to a refusal to support any exploitative regime, as we and the Europeans did with Hussein for a generation.

We have to be honest with them, and we have to make it right. Then we will be safe, and not before.

All holy wars are ungodly, and this one is no exception.

You must have in mind some God other than the abrahamic God.

Which war are you talking about? The war in Iraq or the so-called war on terrorism. They're not the same anymore than Putin's attacking Chechnya was a war on terrorism.

Iraq was in no way connected with the 9/11 attack; even Bush said so. Bush's attack on Iraq was planned early in his administration, and prior to 9/11, as part of a more widespread plan to transform the middle east into democracies. 9/11 was serendipidous for Bush and gave him an oppurtunity to convince a credulous public through manipulitive wording that somehow Iraq was connected to Al Queda and international terrorism. The WMD excuse was a lie concocted to justify immediate invasion.

That Bush was naively motivated by his narcissistic fundamentalism does define it somewhat as a holy war, though his plan is not to convert muslims to christians.

:wink:

In this argument the last thing I would do is bring up "Abrahamic God" whatever that is. I have a hard time swallowing all the wars of the Old Testament myself and I am a Christian.

Setanta

good post