Terry Jones and the Mob of Kandahar

When Rev. Terry Jones torched a copy of the Qur'an after a bizarre show trial condemning the Islamic holy book, he touched off a firestorm of protests across the Muslim World. The most violent reaction was in Afghanistan, where a violent mob attacked and murdered 10 UN workers before being repelled by compound security guards.

This left me pondering how one event led to the other. What does an attack on UN workers have to do with a book burning in Florida? And what rationale drives such extremism?

Much of the mainstream news reporting I witnessed was extremely subjective in its condemnation of Jones. But it was more disgust at the 'hater' then anything else.  As far as I know he was simply expressing his First Amendment rights and didn't violate any state or federal laws. But everyone acted as if we were all going to reap the whirlwind of radical Islam.

The first time he threatened to pull this stunt everyone freaked out too. U.S President Obama begged him not to do it. One guy even offered to buy him a car.

But I guess even the allure of a shiny new Chevy Cobalt couldn't sway Mr. Jones from his ultimate goal. For Muslims around the world, the burning was the gravest of insults. For the Obama administration, it was feared the event would fire up the Taliban and make their task of converting Afghanistan to a democracy all the more difficult. 

It's not like this is the first time Islam has faced a bit of blasphemy. But I imagine the memories of the 2005 "Muhammad with a turban bomb" Danish cartoon riots got everyone worried. Those events resulted in the deaths of over a hundred people -- all over a few ridiculous drawings. 

If I were Mr. Jones, I'd be taking lessons in dodging radical Islamic assassins from Salmon Rushdie. Apparently even Hezbollah has joined the fray and put a $2.4 M bounty on Jones's head.
 
But it's almost laughable to think about an outrage like this happening in the West. In fact, it just wouldn't. Not that there's a lack of things to get offended about. For starters, there's Charlie Sheen's unscripted Violent Torpedo of Truth tour with its potential throng of the dissatisfied, disillusioned and refund hungry fans. 

And although mobs anywhere are prone to irrational and near instant expressions of violence, something else is surely at work prodding and directing such seemingly irrational behaviour. What is so insulting to the Kandahar mob that they would slit the throats of persons unrelated to the offender himself?

I guess in their minds it is all related. Given, an attack on a UN compound to avenge a perceived religious slight involves a fairly substantial leap in logic -- one I'm certain wouldn't stand a test of law. But in that part of the world honor killings, blasphemy and sacrilege are grounds for justifiable homicide. Somehow insulting a dead prophet or the burning of a sacred text is worthy of bloodletting, even if the target isn't Jones himself. In this case, any Western-ish person or institution would seem to suffice as a legitimate target.

As with the 2003 Canal Hotel bombing in Baghdad which killed 22 UN staff, the violence in both cases seems misdirected and wasteful. But deep seated grievances and hatred are not always rational.

However, this leap in logic is not limited to the uneducated and impoverished
hordes of Kandahar. I remember feeling the exact same sense of disconnect when the neo-con hawks of the Bush administration began constructing their case for war in Iraq back in early 2003. It seems that if you can whip up enough righteous indignation, sprinkle it with a little fear and disinformation and pitch it passionately to the masses -- you may just get away with murder, or something like it.   

I'm not about qualifying levels of intolerance, or trying to understand the madness of the masses, but I'm certain actions that result in the killing of innocents should not turn a book burner into a scapegoat -- no matter how "intolerant" his views are. 

Ironically, the only thing that saved one UN worker from certain death at the hands of the Kandahar mob was his ability to recite verses from the Qur'an.

Perhaps both sides should focus on setting aside their religious zeal and intolerance and base their opinions on actual religious teachings. After all, Jesus' own teaching (who Jones claims to represent and Islam claims as a prophet) states: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God."