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Iranian cleric reaffirms call for the killing of Salman Rushdie

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By Nicholas Provenzo from The Rule of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

I hadn't planed on coming off my hiatus until Monday, but this AP story made my typing fingers too itchy:

A high-level Iranian cleric said Friday that the religious edict calling for the killing of
Salman
Rushdie cannot be revoked, and he warned Britain was defying the Islamic world by granting the author knighthood.

Ayatollah Ahmad
Khatami
reminded worshippers of the 1989 fatwa during a sermon at Tehran University, aired live on state radio. Thousands of worshippers chanted "Death to the English."

Khatami
does not hold a government position but has the influential post of delivering the sermon during Friday prayers once a month in the Iranian capital. He did not directly call for the fatwa to be carried out.

"Awarding him means confronting 1.5 billion Muslims around the world,"
Khatami
said. "In Islamic Iran, the revolutionary fatwa ... is still alive and cannot be changed."

Then-Supreme Leader Ayatollah
Ruhollah
Khomeini issued the fatwa in 1989, calling on Muslims to kill Rushdie because his book "The Satanic Verses" was deemed insulting to Islam. Rushdie was forced into hiding for a decade, and the edict deeply damaged Britain's relations with Iran. In 1998, the Iranian government sought to patch up ties by declaring that it would not support the fatwa but that it could not be rescinded.

Queen Elizabeth
II's
decision to knight Rushdie drew a complaint from the Iranian government and protests around the Muslim world.

The continued existence of the fatwa against Salman Rushdie is more than just a threat against one man and his publisher; it is a threat against a fundamental tenant our civilization, which is that each individual is free to express himself and his ideas without fear of threats or physical coercion. That Iran's clerics continue to attack the very cornerstone of our civilization reveals yet again that Iran itself continues to be uncivilized. No one had the right to coercively edit Salman Rushdie or any citizen of the West. No government cleric had the right to call for any free man's murder.

Rather than continue to sit idly by while Iran's clerics boast of their savage edict, it's high time that the West respond in kind. At bare minimum, if a jihadist issues a fatwa threatening the life and freedom of a citizen of the West, that jihadist must die.

I think a few 1,000 lb bombs would do the work nicely.

http://ObjectivismOnline.com/archives/002618.html

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By Nicholas Provenzo from The Rule of Reason,cross-posted by MetaBlog

"Awarding him means confronting 1.5 billion Muslims around the world," Khatami said. "In Islamic Iran, the revolutionary fatwa ... is still alive and cannot be changed."

Then-Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued the fatwa in 1989, calling on Muslims to kill Rushdie because his book "The Satanic Verses" was deemed insulting to Islam.

I think they continue to make their position clear because we haven't made ours clear; that is the so called War on Terror is not hitting the target -- specifically Iran and the rest of the Islamic Militants en mass.

Any of us who love to write as the manner of expressing ourselves and who might be threatened because someone might be insulted by something we write ought to take notice of how both the British officials and the United States officials respond to this continued threat. Who knows when any of us might be next because somebody doesn't like what we wrote.

While Rushdie being knighted is at least the British making a token stance, this won't be over until those who want to impose force or fraud onto someone over a disagreement regarding something they wrote are met with harshly.

The Islamic Militants have yet again declared war; when are we going to respond in kind?

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The continued existence of the fatwa against Salmon Rushdie is more than just a threat against one man and his publisher; it is a threat against a fundamental tenant our civilization, which is that each individual is free to express himself and his ideas without fear of threats or physical coercion...

Rather than continue to sit idly by while Iran's clerics boast of their savage edict, it's high time that the West respond in kind. At bare minimum, if a jihadist issues a fatwa threatening the life and freedom of a citizen of the West, that jihadist must die.

I think a few 1,000 lb bombs would do the work nicely.

The Islamic Militants have yet again declared war; when are we going to respond in kind?

Rule of Reason and Thomas are right. This threat -- which effectively vetos our invaluable freedom of speech beliefs -- is so fundamental and serious that I think Amercia or Britain should respond by taking out 2 or 3 of their best (i. e. worst) religious universities or mosques -- especially the ones most associated with the Rushdie fatwa and/or Iran's continued low-level war against us. And these jihadist institutions and avatars of evil should be taken out when they're full.

If the threat isn't removed, we should repeat this action every few weeks or months. Make them pay a price for their jihadist aggression. And focus the bombs hard on the Iranian political and religious leaders most responsible.

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Rule of Reason and Thomas are right. This threat -- which effectively vetos our invaluable freedom of speech beliefs -- is so fundamental and serious that I think Amercia or Britain should respond by taking out 2 or 3 of their best (i. e. worst) religious universities or mosques -- especially the ones most associated with the Rushdie fatwa and/or Iran's continued low-level war against us. And these jihadist institutions and avatars of evil should be taken out when they're full.

If the threat isn't removed, we should repeat this action every few weeks or months. Make them pay a price for their jihadist aggression. And focus the bombs hard on the Iranian political and religious leaders most responsible.

Maybe we should just genocide the entire Middle East? I mean, that way the threat will definitely be permanently removed.

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Maybe we should just genocide the entire Middle East? I mean, that way the threat will definitely be permanently removed.
You clearly don't have an understanding of the nature of the problem, or the nature of proper government. Israel, for one, has not acted agressively against the US and it does not deserve to be obliterated. There is also no basis for destroying Egypt or Morocco. Even in Iran, the problem stems from the religious radicals who rule the country, and not Iranians in general. Your "kill them all" solution ignores that basic fact, and worse, ignores the fact that there is a viable solution to the problem which rains fire down on the guilty parties, and does not assign collective guilt to innocent Israelis and Iranians because they live in the "Middle East". The destruction of the religious centers would be quite adequate, and your advocacy of genocide is totally inappropriate.
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You clearly don't have an understanding of the nature of the problem, or the nature of proper government. Israel, for one, has not acted agressively against the US and it does not deserve to be obliterated. There is also no basis for destroying Egypt or Morocco. Even in Iran, the problem stems from the religious radicals who rule the country, and not Iranians in general. Your "kill them all" solution ignores that basic fact, and worse, ignores the fact that there is a viable solution to the problem which rains fire down on the guilty parties, and does not assign collective guilt to innocent Israelis and Iranians because they live in the "Middle East". The destruction of the religious centers would be quite adequate, and your advocacy of genocide is totally inappropriate.

Many of the guilty parties live in large well populated cities filled with women and children. There is no practical way of separating bad Muslims from not-so-bad Muslims, so even with conventional weapons will inflict much collateral damage. We would have to accept this. During WW II, the last just war, the Allies killed 700,000 civilians, many of them children, because the dumb bombs had to dropped in salvo to hit anything (think of a musket volley). "Bomber" Harris (a hero of mine) had no compunction about dropping bombs on residential areas in order to de-house and disable workers. As he said: The Germans have sown the wind, and in due course they will reap the whirlwind. Yup. Even with modern precision bombs we will kill women and children who are placed on otherwise kosher military targets, just to make us -look bad-. Collateral damage in inevitable. Saddam placed 500 civilians in a command and control center in the later Gulf War II. We killed most of them in a precision "surgical" strike. Such are the infelicities of modern war.

We would not only have to bomb people, we would have to destroy infrastructure. The lack of water, sanitary facilities (flush toilets) and similar such items would bring about death by disease. We would have to bomb distribution systems (roads, bridges, railroads, airports). This would create food shortages which would kill infants. So your "quite adequate" approach would be as thorough as genocide (almost as thorough) with one major disadvantage. Enough would survive so that the children would seek revenge for the death of their father's and mother's. Outright genocide would preclude that.

Here is the fact: There is NO WAY to separate bad Muslims from not-so-bad Muslims. If we make war on Islam, and I think we should, we won't end up killing them ALL, we will end up killing MANY. So be it. Kill first, regret later. Such are the requirements of this culture-war. But be prepared to fight the same war in the next generation. Whatever else Islam is, its adherents never never ever forget what they consider a wrong. They still refer to us as "crusaders".

Bob Kolker

Edited by Robert J. Kolker
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Many of the guilty parties live in large well populated cities filled with women and children.
That's fine. We can eiminates the mosques and seminaries in Qom and Isfahan, and leave the majority of Tehran, Tabriz and Sanandaj alone since they aren't the sorce of the problem. And we don't need to wipe out Israel as he suggested.
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Here is the fact: There is NO WAY to separate bad Muslims from not-so-bad Muslims. If we make war on Islam, and I think we should, we won't end up killing them ALL, we will end up killing MANY.
The fundamental requirement for victory is not the bombing of a whole lot of people, but the clearly demonstrated willingness to do whatever it takes to eliminate the threat. The need to actually kill bad guys flows more from the need to demonstrate such willingness than from the need to have the bad guys dead. If the willingness is obvious in a completely "duh! don't do that, the U.S. will kill us all", local populations will take care of the bad guys for us. For every passing year that the U.S. demonstrates the lack of such willingness, it will simply have to do more to prove that willingness later.

Unfortunately, the future does not look good here. If the U.S. continues to act like a weakling, it will continue to embolden bad guys. Imagine going down that road: suppose two decades from now Chavez does a deal with Iran to train South American terrorists to hit the U.S., with the U.S. pulling back further into a "fortress America" mode. What then? Chances are that at some point down that road, when the U.S. is hit another time, people will get all upset and react emotionally: bomb them all, indiscriminately. Then, they'll spend another 5 decades apologizing!

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That's fine. We can eiminates the mosques and seminaries in Qom and Isfahan, and leave the majority of Tehran, Tabriz and Sanandaj alone since they aren't the sorce of the problem. And we don't need to wipe out Israel as he suggested.

Um... I'm not the only one that thinks Moebius was being sarcastic... right?

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The fundamental requirement for victory is not the bombing of a whole lot of people, but the clearly demonstrated willingness to do whatever it takes to eliminate the threat. The need to actually kill bad guys flows more from the need to demonstrate such willingness than from the need to have the bad guys dead. If the willingness is obvious in a completely "duh! don't do that, the U.S. will kill us all", local populations will take care of the bad guys for us. For every passing year that the U.S. demonstrates the lack of such willingness, it will simply have to do more to prove that willingness later.

The Japanese leadership never doubted our willingness to bomb them to flinders. But that did not dissuade their leaders from pursuing ketsu-go (fight unto death). Even after two nukes were dropped on Jap cities, there was an attempted coup to prevent the Emperor from issuing a surrender declaration. The more we bombed the more defiant some of their leaders became.

Likewise, Allied bombing did not drive the Germans to surrender. We and the Russians had to destroy their forces in detail to drive Hitler into the bunker and to suicide.

So putting on a show of toughness has not been sufficient in the past. One must actually do damage and fight the enemy until he is physically destroyed.

Hence your proposal is refuted by actual historical evidence.

The surest way to put an end to militant Islam is to kill many Muslims, be they bad or not-so-bad.

Bob Kolker

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You clearly don't have an understanding of the nature of the problem, or the nature of proper government. Israel, for one, has not acted agressively against the US and it does not deserve to be obliterated. There is also no basis for destroying Egypt or Morocco. Even in Iran, the problem stems from the religious radicals who rule the country, and not Iranians in general. Your "kill them all" solution ignores that basic fact, and worse, ignores the fact that there is a viable solution to the problem which rains fire down on the guilty parties, and does not assign collective guilt to innocent Israelis and Iranians because they live in the "Middle East". The destruction of the religious centers would be quite adequate, and your advocacy of genocide is totally inappropriate.

I was being sarcastic. But you're absolutely right.

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You clearly don't have an understanding of the nature of the problem, or the nature of proper government. Israel, for one, has not acted agressively against the US and it does not deserve to be obliterated. There is also no basis for destroying Egypt or Morocco. Even in Iran, the problem stems from the religious radicals who rule the country, and not Iranians in general. Your "kill them all" solution ignores that basic fact, and worse, ignores the fact that there is a viable solution to the problem which rains fire down on the guilty parties, and does not assign collective guilt to innocent Israelis and Iranians because they live in the "Middle East". The destruction of the religious centers would be quite adequate, and your advocacy of genocide is totally inappropriate.

Collateral damage is one of the infelicities of modern warfare, especially aerial attack. Without collateral damage the allies would have -lost- WW II. So I say hooray for collateral damage as long as the bad guys are killed or stopped and the good guys win. As for the "innocent" victims --- those are the breaks.

There is only one law of warfare --- win the war.

"The Germans have sown the wind and in due course they shall reap the whirlwind" -- Sir Arthur (Bomber) Harris

"The only difference between War and Peace is where we place our bombs" -- Gen. Curtis LeMay

"War is all hell" -- Gen. William Tecumsah Sherman

"It is well that war is so terrible, else we should come to like it" -- Gen. Robert E. Lee

Bob Kolker

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Collateral damage is one of the infelicities of modern warfare, especially aerial attack.
That is correct, and a person who lives next to Feyzieh seminary, Islamic Azad university, Imam al-Mahdi seminary etc. may suffer. Genocide and wiping out all life in the Middle East is unjust. Read up on the concept of justice in "The Objectivist Ethics", and make any further reply on this topic relevant to the concept "justice". If you wish to advocate the distinctly anti-Objectivist position that genocide is necessary, you should do that elsewhere.
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