From the WSJ Opinion Archives
Don't
Call Me Violent, or I'll Have to Kill Someone
"Sectarian violence in India's Solapur city, triggered by a protest over
comments by US Baptist minister Jerry Falwell against the Prophet Mohammed,
has left eight dead and over 90 injured," Agence France-Presse reports.
"Police had used gunfire Friday on crowds of rioters of Muslim youths who
clashed with groups of Hindus as the protest against Falwell's remarks turned
violent."
We have no brief for Jerry Falwell, who frequently says idiotic things. But let's think this through, shall we? Here are Falwell's remarks to "60 Minutes" that "triggered" the "protest":
I think Mohammed was a terrorist. I read enough of the history of his life written by both Muslims and non-Muslims, that he was a violent man, a man of war. . . . I do believe that Jesus set the example for love, as did Moses. And I think that Mohammed set an opposite example.
Now, maybe this is a slander against Islam. Certainly Falwell's use of the term "terrorist" is unfortunate, if for no other reason than that it seems to endorse the extremists' interpretation of Islam, which many Muslims dispute. But if Falwell characterizes Islam as a violent religion and Muslims respond by taking to the streets, rioting and killing people, aren't they sort of making his point?
Barbarians
Bomb Bali
In the biggest terrorist attack since Sept. 11, 2001, "bomb blasts ripped
through a nightclub in the Kuta holiday resort area of Bali on Saturday night,"
CNN reports. "At least 187 people are confirmed dead . . . and
hundreds more injured and unaccounted for." The Associated
Press reports that "Indonesia's defense minister blamed al-Qaeda and
its extremist allies" for the attack. Others, however, blamed America:
- Robert Fisk, the Independent: "Australians were the principal victims and their murderers must have known they would be. So why were they targeted? [Prime Minister] John Howard has been among President Bush's toughest supporters."
- Sydney Morning Herald editorial: "The question is whether external actors are manipulating nascent, radical Islam inside Indonesia, or whether international events--in particular US war plans for Iraq--are, themselves, creating a new breed of Indonesian terrorists."
- Abu Bakar Bashir, one of the "leading clerics and scholars" quoted in a London Times report from Bali: "The explosion could not have been carried out by domestic people. Considering the huge power of the explosives used, it must be the work of foreigners, most probably the United States."
- Guardian headline: "America's Obsession With Iraq Leaves Others Free to Kill."
Earth to Fisk et al.: These people are terrorists and religious fanatics. They murder people because they think ridding the world of infidels is a ticket to heaven. There's no need for fancy explanations about how it's somehow the fault of the victims.
Besides, this America-is-to-blame explanation is just the appeasers' flavor of the month. Didn't we use to hear that Israel is at fault for Islamic terrorism, and that the whole problem would be solved if only America would press Jerusalem into accommodating the Palestinian Arabs? It's hard to make that argument about an attack in a predominately Muslim country that isn't Arab and that's thousands of miles away from Israel--though that doesn't stop the intrepid Jew-haters at Indymedia.org, which "reports" that the attack was "a mossad terror operation."
R-E-S-P-E-C-T,
Find Out What It Means to Me
Farhad Qaumi, a 19-year-old Muslim who lives in Berala, Australia, is charged
with raping a 16-year-old girl. The Sydney Sun-Herald reports that Qaumi "took
off his Islamic pendant" before the alleged attack, saying it would be
"disrespectful" to keep it on. No word if he was incited by Jerry
Falwell's insensitive remarks or America's plans to overthrow Saddam Hussein.
Saddam
and the Fifth Plane
This may just be a weird coincidence, but at the very least it's a weird
coincidence. "The authorities interviewing a member of Al Qaeda in military
custody overseas are investigating a new theory of the Sept. 11 plot: that the
suspect, Ramzi Muhammad Abdullah bin al-Shibh, was planning to pilot a fifth
hijacked plane to strike the White House," the New York Times reported
Friday.
It turns out this is not the first time someone has alluded to a fifth Sept. 11 plane. On Dec. 7, 2001, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty picked up a Baghdad Television report on a meeting between Saddam Hussein and "tribal chieftains from Basra and Maysan governorates." One of the tribal leaders read the Iraqi dictator a poem, which contained these lines:
From inside America, how five planes flew.
Such a mishap never happened in the past!
And nothing similar will happen.
Six thousand infidels died.
Bin Ladin did not do it; the luck of the president [Saddam] did
This page contains the full text of the poem, and we confirmed this passage with contemporaneous news reports in the Factiva database.
Fair-Weather
Featherbrains
Let's
hear it for the courage of "antiwar" protesters! Not only do they
dare to dissent in a country so repressive that they might actually have to
face criticism, but they aren't afraid of the elements either. "An
estimated 450 people braved chilling winds to walk a half-mile from Market Street
to the [federal] building on Golden Gate Avenue, where the protesters gathered
for a long night of protest songs, anti-war strategy sessions and speeches,"
the Contra Costa Times reports from San Francisco. The protesters "braved
chilling winds" on Thursday, when, according to the National
Weather Service, the low temperature in San Francisco was a frosty 55 degrees.
Wow, that's so cold, the lawyers had their hands in their own pockets! Well,
OK, maybe not, but we hope the antiwar guys at least wore sweaters.
Meanwhile, perhaps the most prominent American yet has signed the "Not in Our Name" petition urging regime continuation in Iraq. We refer, of course, to Mickey Mouse. Also on the list: Youliberal Idiotsare Sowrong (what an unfortunate name for an antiwar activist!) and Sad Misguided Souls.
You
Don't Say--I
"Tour of Suspect Iraqi Plant Offers Only Partial Access"--headline,
New York Times, Oct. 13
Making
the World Safe for Terrorism
If Arabs ever hijack another airplane in America, Judge Florence-Marie Cooper,
Assem Bayaa and the American Civil Liberties Union will deserve part of the
blame for their having gotten away with it. Cooper has ruled that Bayaa, an
Arab-American and ACLU client, is free to sue United Airlines, which removed
him from a flight "because the crew wasn't comfortable having him aboard,"
the Associated Press reports. "The lawsuit seeks an injunction barring
United from discriminating against Arab-Americans."
Bayaa plainly is no terrorist, and it may be that he was the victim of invidious discrimination and nothing more. But the threat of lawsuits or injunctions against airlines creates a perverse incentive to subject Arabs to less scrutiny than other passengers--hardly an effective way of preventing terrorist attacks. Bayaa probably has a legitimate grievance, but in this time of war, the patriotic thing to do would be to put it aside and drop the lawsuit.
Iranian
Dogcatcher
"A conservative Iranian prayer leader denounced the 'moral depravity' of
dog ownership and called on the judiciary to arrest all dogs and their owners,"
Agence France-Presse reports:
"I demand the judiciary arrest all dogs with long, medium or short legs together with their long-legged owners, otherwise I will arrest them myself", the Etemad newspaper quoted the cleric, named as Hojatoleslam Hasani, as saying at a Friday prayer sermon in the northwestern city of Urumieh.
"The abominable people in this country think that liberty means loose morals, for example men and women walk in the streets hand in hand", he added.
In response, an Iranian canine "peace activist" asked: Why do they hate us? Actually, that's a paraphrase. His exact words were: "Arf arf!"
You
Don't Say--II
"Politics May Be Clashing With Intelligence"--headline, Eugene (Ore.)
Register-Guard, Oct. 11
Stupidity Watch
Here's a promo for CNN's "American Morning With Paula
Zahn": "Will Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's future be determined
at the ballot box rather than the battlefield? Iraqi citizens are preparing
to go to the polls to decide whether Hussein stays in office. We bring you the
story in part one of our week-long series, 'Iraq, You Decide.' "
Homer Nods
We goofed twice on Friday and heard from dozens of readers about it. In "Stupidity
Watch," we misidentified the college where the Daily Vidette is the
school paper; it is Illinois State University. (We've corrected this.) Another
item described Alfred Nobel as the inventor of TNT; he actually invented
dynamite.
Extending
the Franchise
South Dakota is a small state with (this year anyway) big political importance.
The Senate race between incumbent Tim Johnson and Rep. John Thune is one of
the Republicans' best hopes for picking up a seat. The statewide House race
for the seat Thune is vacating is also a toss-up. The Sioux Falls Argus Leader
reports that "state and federal authorities are trying to determine the extent
of voting irregularities in and around Native American reservations." Indians,
who make up more than 8% of South Dakota's population, tend to vote overwhelmingly
Democratic in an otherwise heavily Republican state. Reports the Argus Leader:
Auditors in several West River counties raised concerns about some of the documents submitted to their offices. An initial investigation revealed that absentee ballot applications had been filed for people who don't exist or had recently died, Attorney General Mark Barnett said Friday.
"We started receiving complaints, concerns, allegations . . . generally out of counties that are in reservation areas, either on the reservation or nearby," he said. "There was one county where a lady had apparently registered in two different counties. There was one document that was sent in where a lady supposedly sent in an absentee ballot some days after she was actually killed in a car accident."
Imagine! Just because someone is unlucky enough to be killed in a car accident, the mean old Republicans want to disenfranchise her!
You Don't Say--III and IV
"Police Hunt Sniper After Latest Shooting"--headline, Reuters,
Oct. 11
"Police Say Sniper Is 'Extremely Violent' and 'Doesn't Care' "--headline, Canadian Broadcast Corp. Web site, Oct. 12
Chutzpah
Watch
Remember that "anti"-racism conference in Barbados where delegates
voted to kick out all white people? Now the Barbados Advocate reports that the
group that sponsored the conference "will be turning to the local white
community to pay off its $200 000 debt":
President of that organisation, the Congress Against Racism (Barbados) (CARB), Reverend Aaron "Buddy" Larrier, contending that the amount is pocket change for any of the large local companies, indicated yesterday that white-owned businesses have an obligation to assist those in the black community because it is on those persons they depend for the survival of their businesses.
Not
Too Brite--XI
"Questions are being asked at the Hotel Dieu hospital in Paris where a
plumber working in the basement last week came across a decomposed corpse wearing
hospital pajamas," Reuters reports. Oddly enough!
Unidentified
Frying Objects
Americans, says Hugh Ross, are "gullible about the possibility that extraterrestrial
life exists without having scientific evidence to prove it." Ross, a hardheaded
skeptic, doesn't believe little green men have visited Earth:
Hugh says that he uses the scientific approach called "the process of elimination" to answer the question Is there a place where extraterrestrials could live in the universe? Over the years, science has made some significant advances. "The number of candidates for life sites within the Milky Way grows smaller each day," says Hugh. At one time, biologists speculated that extraterrestrial life forms might be based on exotic chemistry, not carbon as earthly life is. But today the conclusion is that all conceivable life forms must be carbon-based. And if life forms exist on other planets, they must be planets like Earth, orbiting a star like the sun in a galaxy like the Milky Way. "Ongoing research shows that this seems less possible as each year passes," says Hugh.
But don't worry, Ross offers what "The 700 Club" calls a "rational Christian" explanation: "Fallen angels, or demons, intent on distorting God's authority and purpose," appear in the form of UFOs in order to "draw attention away from God and the gospel and are an identifiable source of explanation." The club's report adds: "One reason why research scientists may be reluctant to say specifically that demons exist . . . is because that answer points too directly to a Christian interpretation of the problem."
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Today on OpinionJournal:
- Review & Outlook: Terror hits Indonesia. Will Jakarta join the fight against it?
- Robert Bartley: In the West, freedom isn't necessarily on the rise.
- Brendan Miniter: If Democrats are so popular, why can't they win elections fair and square?
