The Quick And The Dismembered
The spiritual and temporal head of a guerrilla militia dedicated to a mission of destruction and vicious assault on the sensibilities of his chosen enemy, delighting in taunting through a ghoulish display of primitive savagery. This is the leader of thousands of displaced people whose sense of grievance has been whipped to a fine essence of revenge and murder.What better time to invite the searing heat of terror-inspired tribalism than the sombre and sacred remembrance of Shia Muslims memorializing and mourning during Ashura, as a symbol of submission to the good graces of a loving god of peace and harmony?
Although there is nothing new about bellicose rantings from Islamists for whom the presence of infidels and Jews represents stark blasphemy in a geography sanctified by Allah for Islam and Islamic followers only, Hezbollah leader Sayyed Nasrallah delights in scraping the bottom of the barrel for primitive visual savagery in practise for execution of the real thing.
Thousands of his followers cheered in rapture hearing his words of encouragement and defiance against the State of Israel.
"Oh Zionists, your army is lying to you... your army has left the body parts of your soldiers in our villages and fields", thundered this triumphant agitator. "Our mujahideen used to fight these Zionists, killing them and collecting their body parts. I am not talking about regular body parts. I tell the Israelis, we have the heads of your soldiers, we have hands, we have legs."
A purveyor of body parts in exchange for live, imprisoned Hezbollah terrorists. Pieces of flesh once gracing the bodies of living beings heralded as triumphant exchanges for prisoners of war. Amply illustrating the illogic, the ill grace, the anti-humane and immoral code by which tribalism thrives, naming it tribal honour.
Generosity of spirit and honouring the soul of other human beings quite beyond the mental and spiritual capabilities of primitive mindsets. To exult in the "capture" of human body parts as symbolic of martial victory extends beyond most peoples' belief in the nature of modern human social order.
Mr. Nasrallah knows very well that in Jewish religious law every portion of a Jewish cadaver is required to be buried in acknowledgement that the body once housed a human spirit, sanctified in religious thought. This belief and the tenderly careful seeking out of all portions of a body representing a once-vibrant human is not only a basic tenet in Judaism's beliefs, but that of Islam as well.
Mr. Nasrallah well knows the violent spiritual offence his words bring to the hearts of families whose sons were killed during the Israel-Hezbollah conflict. Revelling triumphantly in the pain caused to one's enemies is yet another symbol symptomatic of tribal revenge-seeking.
So vital in fact is this to the healing process in the belief that Judaic law has been upheld that the government had assured that the IDF had accounted for the bodies of all 119 of its men who were killed during the war, while cautioning that small body parts might not have been retrieved under fire while evacuations were taking place.
The families of the slain soldiers took comfort in the belief their children were buried according to Jewish law. Yet there was this man gleefully chortling over these prized spoils of war: "There is even a near-complete body, a half or three-quarters of a body, from head, to chest to the torso," he burbled.
This is an expression of the cult of victory in death, as he imparted his personal sense of victory seen through the success of slaughter and the mortification of one's enemy, bringing honour to oneself.
Psyches seared in the primal psychosis of hatred, revenge and death as just due for insults, defiling of the tribe's honour. Faith and pride paired with a reason-and-humanity-defying pledge to murder and rampage, taunting an enemy with grim remnants of life's promise.
Demonstrating yet again the proud heritage of ritualized and savage tribalism.
Labels: Middle East, Terrorism
posted by Pieface @ Sunday, January 20, 2008
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