States a straightforward fact, which the “intellectuals” and “experts” on Islam fail to recognise. Actually these guys are (almost) certainly well aware of reason behind suicide bombers - the unbearable suffering at the hands of oppressors - but prefer to toe the “virgins” line.
"Ever since 9/11, the American mainstream media has been chockfull of instant fixes to Islamic terrorism
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Nicholas D. Kristof, in this shortsighted and ignorant article, claims that the Muslims line up for martyrdom mission because they expect to be welcomed by 72 virgins in heaven. If the martyr-wanna-be’s were to realize the prize in heaven for martyrdom was the Aramaic “Hur” (white grapes) and not the Arabic “Hur” (described variedly as a beauty, enchantress and virgin), argues Kristof, then Muslims would probably would not be in such a rush to kill themselves.
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Never mind the years of humiliation at the hands of Israelis. Never mind the oppressive, violent regimes supported by the United States. Never mind the stripping away of their sovereignty that has left them naked to exploitation since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Take away the virgins, replace them with grapes, and all of this is resolved.
This kind of thinking, which treats the Arab and Muslim as some kind of a hapless, backward, pathetic, and sick creature is exactly the reason why Americans continue to misunderstand and, therefore, prolong the violent tussle which turns friends into foes.
Those who argue that the Quran, or its misreading, are the cause of violent Islamic fundamentalism forget that for over three generations the most violent Arab and Muslim groups coming out of the Middle East were socialist and secular.
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A young leader of the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front, a secular group, told me in Srinagar that the youth were tiring of the frustrations of peaceful protest movements and may soon slip back into the violence of active insurgency.
The fault, Mr. Kristof, is not in their books, whether they be penned by Karl Marx or descended from the heavens. Men and women do not die by their thousands because of the promise of heavenly virgins, but because they believe they are on the right path. Because life is unbearable, and death is a release. Because suffering is unending and being on the other side of a gun barrel, even just for a moment, seems a blessing.
If your children would not embrace death for the promise of 72 virgins in heaven, then why assume the same of Muslim children? Because of their religion or your prejudices?
As many Muslims, radicals and otherwise, have told me: End their suffering and the violence shall also end. And the answer for that does not fit into a sound bite or a tidy Op-ed piece. Or an invasion disguised as a liberation.
The least that the academics and the intellectual elite, growing plump on fat grants and slim on fashionable diets, can do is offer a discourse that is constructive, realistic and grounded in reality.
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http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0805-02.htm