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The Sack of Mosul
ISIS isn’t satisfied with destroying modern-day Iraq. They also intend to destroy its history.
The terror group uploaded a video Thursday of men smashing statues, pulling artifacts from walls and attacking Mosul antiquities with sledgehammers and power tools. To justify their violence, ISIS classified all these representations of man and beast as idols. Some of the irreplaceable works date back to the 7th century B.C.
Here is video of the iconoclasts in action, provided by Tunisian news agency Al-jarida.
http://youtu.be/O0GBkdb-Nwk
“The Prophet ordered us to get rid of statues and relics, and his companions did the same when they conquered countries after him,” an unidentified man said in the video.
The smashed articles appeared to come from an antiquities museum in Mosul, the northern city which was overrun by Islamic State last June, a former employee at the museum told Reuters.
The militants shoved stone statues off their plinths, shattering them on the floor, and one man applied an electric drill to a large winged bull. The video showed a large exhibition room strewn with dismembered statues, and Islamic songs played in the background.
Lamia al-Gailani, an Iraqi archaeologist and associate fellow at the London-based Institute of Archaeology, said the militants had wreaked untold damage. “It’s not only Iraq’s heritage: it’s the whole world’s,” she said.
“They are priceless, unique. It’s unbelievable. I don’t want to be Iraqi any more,” she said, comparing the episode to the dynamiting of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Afghan Taliban in 2001.
As well as Assyrian statues of winged bulls from the Mesopotamian cities of Nineveh and Nimrud, Gailani said the Islamic State hardliners appeared to have destroyed statues from Hatra, a Hellenistic-Parthian city in northern Iraq dating back around 2,000 years.
Axel Plathe, the director of UNESCO’s Iraq office, said ISIS’ continuing crimes were an attempt “to destroy the identity of an entire people.”
Statuary isn’t the Islamists’ only target in Mosul. Last week, ISIS sacked the city’s library and burned more than 100,000 historic manuscripts and documents. Many residents tried to prevent the destruction, only to see their invaluable collection set ablaze. Afterwards, terrorists blew up the building.
What strikes me about these fanatics is how incredibly insecure they are about their beliefs. They claim to be the most faithful among us, yet still believe their god is so frail that he’s offended by hunks of stone and leaves of paper.
If you truly believe in a divine Creator, it seems the best way to emulate Him is to create. Instead, like the enemy they represent, ISIS seeks only to destroy.
Published in General
It’s more a belief that they must purify society, it’s not an issue of cowardice. Iconoclasms like this are nothing new (Islamic societies have done it before, Byzantium did it twice, Maoist China of course, the Soviets, etc.) – societies in the grip of fear or fanaticism throughout time have gone on similar purges, believing that they must cleanse themselves in order to achieve salvation or rescue. You might say “it’s the principle of the thing” in cases like these, believing not that God might be threatened, but that they have offended God.
FJG,
BHO must be working on the Infinite Improbability Drive. His grasp of the Random is so profound.
Regards,
Jim
Obama is helping Iran get nukes. The day after Iran gets the bomb, George Bush will be blamed for nuclear terrorism.
How much of the ISIS situation is Obama’s fault?
He would argue that he inherited a bad situation from GWB, and he tried to make it better (for the US) by getting us out of Iraq, as he had promised. But I don’t think he gave a moment’s thought to whether that would be better for Iraq. Furthermore, he didn’t think much about what might happen after we left. In the same way GWB can be criticized for failing to sufficiently anticipate the post-invasion problems we would face in Iraq, BHO did not sufficiently consider the post-withdrawal problems, though he was warned about it by his own military commanders and by his political opposition, and even a few knowledgeable Democrats.
But then BHO compounded those problems by leaving no forces behind, and then later failing to heed the warnings of his military intelligence people in ignoring the ISIS threat, not just calling it a JV team, but believing it was not a threat even after they took Falujah.
BHO’s biggest character flaws are: 1) his inability to take timely action (on anything), leaving small manageable problems to spiral into large intractable ones, and 2) his reluctance to listen to the advice of people with experience because he thinks he and Valerie Jarrett know everything that one needs to know to solve any problem.
Thus, the ISIS problem deserves to be placed almost entirely in Obama’s lap.
Bamiyan. Nobody gave a darn about Afghanistan until some (magnificent, enormous, priceless) statues were dynamited. I generalize here for brevity, but it’s a real dynamic.
Human beings are the ultimate renewable resource. This fact keep their market value reasonably low.
What we have here…
Actually, I believe that frank discussion about the conquering and enslaving nature of Islam is common among its adherents. They will discuss the obligations laid upon them as a sort of “Shi’ite Man’s Burden” to save the rest of humanity, no matter how many Wall Street coolies must be broken on the wheel. They don’t use these terms, of course. But they don’t deny that they have a duty. They argue about the means, but not the goal.
The chorus of denial, on the other hand, comes from three groups, listed here in increasing size (as far as I can tell):
1. Muslims in the public eye (CAIR, etc) who knowingly whitewash unpleasant facts in the pursuit of propaganda goals in favor of Muslim conquest.
2. Non-Muslims in the public eye who willingly forward these arguments, regardless of their own belief if any about the matter, in pursuit of propaganda goals against the paradigm of Western Civilization.
3. Muslims and non-Muslims alike who genuinely believe the Religion of Peace litany through ignorance of the awful parts, whether within or without the Ummah.
The President is not likely in the third group, and has repeatedly affiliated himself with the first two groups. So good luck with “Let’s do something”.
With dollar bills tucked into its man-thong.
As a matter of fact, I doubt this is any more Mr. Obama’s problem. I think it’s the problem of the next Commander-in-chief. I don’t think this crisis is comparable to Iran ’79, but it’s really bad. Does anyone think the contenders for 2016 are going to be asked what is to be one about IS? What should the man who wants your vote say?
Except their own books . . .
I would add 3) his refusal to believe (or acknowledge) that Islam had any role in the recent atrocities we’ve seen. When he does, it’s a moment so rare, you wonder if he slipped up. Obama is more than willing to talk about the terrible acts committed in the names of other religions, so why not Allah?
The Iraqi National Museum re-opened. A ray of hope?
The winged bulls of Assyria:
http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/me/c/colossal_winged_bull.aspx