The attack on 9/11 demonstrates the urgency in asking the right questions on the causes of terrorism. What can be at the root of such an ill feeling that can generate such monstrous acts?
We have to agree that military and violent acts of revenge don't solve the problem. Actually, all they do is Iraq proves to us is create more hate and despair, needing more violence in a never-ending vicious cycle whose only victor is terror.
I had alot of compassion for the victim's families' as I saw them on TV saying, "It is time to pray because God is with us in these tragic moments." What? So where was this God during the disaster relief, and why didn't he prevent it? If he is almighty, as they try to make believe, then why didn't he intervene? Instead, he did nothing, does that mean he is sadistic and bloodthirsty? If not, it proves he is either not all-powerful, or that he simply dosen't exist.
But while we are on the topic, what God are we talking about?
Are we talking about the God of a few madmen in the middle of their mystical delusions as they crash a plane into a building shouting, "God is great" as they confess their crime to him, or are we talking about the God of the victims who are praying to ease their suffering?
This is exactly the danger: a beleif in an "almighty God" that acts as a lever for the human desire for revenge. But what does God do? Absolutely nothing. If he loves man, why favor some and not others? If he is so powerful, why would he need pilots to destroy buildings and why didn't he protect the innocent people?
The truth is that this beleif in a "almighty God" is the cause of some of the biggest disasters humanity has ever known. It has been happening for thousands of years. Every army in the world went to war claiming that "God is with us". The Muslims did when they colonized Europe, as did the Christians when they mounted their crusades to save the tomb of Christ, the religious wars, the Inquisition, and tody the wars between India and Pakistan, in Cypress, Northern Ireland, in Kosovo, the Middle East, and the list goes on. Everywhere, people are killing eachother in the name of an "almighty God."
This evil especially lies in the "holy" scriptures attributed to this God, which where always written by men, whose meanings were distorted throughout the centuries according to the prejudices and interests of each age.
Whatever text it be, the Old testament, the Scriptures, the Koran, the Torah, all these "holy" books contain elements that encourage hate, intolerance, violence and barbarity.
"An eye for an eye"- right from the start you can see that barbarity showed up. It required Abraham to sacrifice his own son, by cutting his throat, an order from his "loving God". "If your right hand sins, cut it off." "Those who look back will be pillars of salt." There are many examples.
There is no lacking in examples of intolerance in Jewish texts forbidding marriage with non-Jews. Today the automatic entitlement to Israeli natonality for any Jew, and the impossibility of obtaing it for non Jews follow the same goals: ethnic cleansing, today directed against Palestinians.
Muslim writings cleary encourage violence towards non-Muslims as well as women, who they consider "inferior".This is the exact text supposedly given by their prophet:
Quote:
Once the holy months are over, kill the idolaters everywhere you find them, capture them, lay siege to them and ambush them. But if they convert, if they submit to prayer, if they give money, then leave them alone, because God is forgiving and has pity"-- Koran ix.5
Islam officially encourages racism and discimination:
Quote:
O beleivers! Don't take any Jews or Christians for friends; they are their own allies. He who befriends them will end up by becoming like them and God will not be a guide to such perverts"--Koran v.51.
Here is another instruction, where Islam asks its faithful to carry out violence under the pretext that man is supposedly superior to women:
Quote:
You will reprimand those women who you fear are not obedient: you will banish them to separate beds and you will beat them.."--(3) Koran iv,34.
I don't find it acceptable that any religion officially recognizes violence, discrimination, and intolerance.
All the politically correct condemnations of terrorism will change nothing.
