A Tempest in Jerusalem
One never knows what kind of a vipers' nest of outrage will be raised through a generally perceived insult among Muslim populations.One does not take the image of the Prophet Mohammad in vain, the world has learned after Denmark's misfortune leading to massive riots throughout the Muslim world. Muslims feel somehow free to deface and to demolish places and symbols sacred to other religions, but since Islam is the one true religion, it seems to make good sense to their leaders to insist that Muslims rise up in righteous anger to visit violence upon those threatening the same to Islam's holy sites.
Even if no real threats actually exist, the very idea that they might, conceivably, is sufficient to ensure that there will be hysterical denunciations of infidels and Jews followed by fervid insistence on jihad against the unbelievers. The most urgent duty of Muslims is to protect Islam's holy places, and Muslims take this responsibility seriously indeed. Rabidly accusing non-Muslims of evil designs against the sacred divinity of Islam, with dire consequences to follow.
Grievance, victimhood, hysterical denunciations, eagerness to give up one's life for the greater glory of Islam seems to mark the duty of the true Muslim. And when Israeli authorities decide to dedicate their own sacred places for protected status, the result is a certain pathology of rabid fury. Accusations of plots to destroy Muslim sites, to impinge upon Palestinian sovereignty (at least that part has a ring of reality) accelerates to violent insurgency.
When Israeli police clear out the area of the Temple Mount/Dome of the Rock of its violent, masked 'protesters' to ensure that innocent people are not wounded or killed as a result of the violence, this too is a offence against Islam, and calls for a renewed Intifada ring out from Qatar to Jordan to Egypt to the Gaza Strip, as violence is urged to "protect our Islamic holy places" from Jewish claims of ownership. Tourists visiting the Temple Mount are seen as "extremist groups" planning to defile Islamic holy sites.
To Jews the Temple Mount represents the place where, in antiquity, the original Temple of Solomon stood, and was re-built, then destroyed again, with Muslims insisting that no such temple ever stood there. The Temple Mount, the most sacred site in Judaism, is to Muslims the Dome of the Rock, where the Prophet Mohammad ascended to heaven, and where the Al-Aqsa Mosque now sits, protected by the State of Israel.
To be sure, there has been provocation, with some fundamentally Orthodox rabbis planning to campaign to rebuild the ancient temple. Activity which has been condemned by the greater majority of Israeli religious and political leaders.
Labels: Human Relations, Israel, Realities, Religion
posted by Pieface @ Monday, March 01, 2010
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