[lit-ideas] Re: comments the DEMs must defend
- From: "Judith Evans" <judithevans1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 14 Feb 2007 16:30:30 -0000
>(I believe you have also propagated the notion that Saddam was
> secular but haven't explained why he went to the gallows with a
> Qur'an - asking that it be given to his friend after his
death - and
> intoning the shahadah.)
("A secular"? Are you "a religious"?) Saddam's regime was
secular.
His government was secular. He was a Pan-Arabist, not a
"Pan-Islamist".
His sometime Deputy Prime Minister was an Aramaic-speaking
Chaldean
Christian (who was a Pan-Arabist).
"Saddam saw himself as a social revolutionary and a modernizer,
following the Nasser model. To the consternation of Islamic
conservatives, his government gave women added freedoms and
offered them high-level government and industry jobs. Saddam also
created a Western-style legal system, making Iraq the only
country in the Persian Gulf region not ruled according to
traditional Islamic law (Sharia). Saddam abolished the Sharia law
courts, except for personal injury claims."
None of this is incompatible with religious belief and
observance.
>Here is a slew of links
I read the first three. The first is Mylroie (again...), whose
conjectures
have been rebutted but whose detailed points would if true not
prove what you want to
believe. The second and third are basically identical (i.e. they
report the
same indictment). If they are true then they show that while
Iran and the
Sudan actively supported Al Qaeda, Iraq had a "mutual hands-off"
policy.
The UK government had (to the anger of, in the face of the
warnings of,
the French) such a policy towards radical Muslim resident aliens
here,
because it needed all its SB/MI5 powers to cope with the IRA, who
were of
course financed in part by NORAID.
your post is a reply to Julie's
> > he neither represented, assisted, nor sponsored Militant
Islam
certainly, he did not represent Militant Islam (yes he could be
said to
be a militant sort of person and also he was raised a Muslim; I'm
a fairly militant sort of person and was raised a Christian, a
Marxist activist friend who was raised a Hindu
died with the Vita by his side; neither of us should properly be
called
a "militant Christian/Hindu"). I doubt he sponsored much Muslim
terrorism
-- he may not have sponsored any more than the US has. Did he
"assist"
Militant Islam? That all depends on what you mean...
Did the US support Saddam? Undoubtedly.
you said
>Saddam Hussein had a history of supporting terrorism and
> therefore militant Islam
non sequitur
Judy Evans, Cardiff, UK
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