Conference quark::mennotes-v1

    
    THE FIRST LINE ON MY ENTRY IS IN ERROR IT SHOULD READ
    
    
    I am NOT predudice against any religion. Please forgive the error it
    was not subconsious or intentional.

I suppose the gist is that Muslims should not be killing Muslims when their
time could be better employed killing infidels. During the Iran/q war this
was not an option, so no one dragged it up as a motivation.

Sadam Hussein says its a holy war so it must be true. Meanwhile Stormin Normans
wife is sleeping with Bart Simpson...

Mark

    It's all rhetoric around political expediency. During the war with
    Iran Saddam was trying to unite Arab against non-Arab. (Iran is not
    an Arab country.) Now it's Moslem against Infidel. What ever he
    thinks will work he'll try. He's having a problem making this case
    stick though because of the Moslem governments (Saudi, Egypt, Syria,
    Kuwait, Qatar, and on and on) who see the war as them against Iraq
    rather then the US against Iraq.

    			Alfred

"Iran is not an Arab country."
    
    What is it?
    
    ed

    re .4
    
    Iran is Iranian/Persian.  This is different than Arab.  Actually
    Jews are more closely related genetic wise to Arabs than Iranians are.
    fred();

One should also remember that passions in the Iran/Iraq war were fired
up along sectarian lines; one side was largely Sunni, the other largely
Shi'ite (I forget which was which).  It would be like the Catholics
fighting the Protestants, and then when an outside threat came along
banding together in "Christian Solidarity".

All in the name of political expediency, of course.

--jim

    re: .5
    
    I've always thought Jews were comprised of all those who subscribed to
    a certain religion...whatever their ethnicity.
    
    Perhaps you meant that Hebrew's are more closely related to Arabs than are
    Iranians (who are Persian)
    
    tony

Back to the original question - according to the Koran is is wrong wrong wrong
for Moslems to kill each other. I assume the person mentioned in .0 was coming
from that point of view. There are many many Moslems who condemn the Iran/Iraq
war and the invasion of Kuwait as immoral on precisely those grounds. Regardless
of world leaders' cynical use of religion to advance personal goals, there are
devout believers on both sides - and we should understand the Moslem point of
view if we want any hope of understanding the situation in the near east.

	-- Charles

    re .6,
    
    I think they are both Shi'ites.
    
    Eugene
    

    The majority of Iraqis (slightly more than 50%) are Shi'ites.
    The rest are Sunnis.  
    
    					andrew

   >     <<< Note 560.10 by SSGBPM::KENAH "The heart of the matter..." >>>
   >
   > The majority of Iraqis (slightly more than 50%) are Shi'ites.
   > The rest are Sunnis.  
    
    Sadam and his clan, however, are supposedly Sunnis.  Most of Iran is
    Shi'ite.  I've seen it reported on the News programs (I can't recall
    just which ones though) that most of the troops in the "front line
    bunkers" are Shi'ite while the Republican Guard is made up of mostly
    Sunnis.  How convenient.
    
    fred();

    In a recent discussion with an Iranian friend he explained the
    following, which might help clear up some confusion:
    
    To be an Arab has race implications
    To be a Moslem has religious implications
    
    Iranians may be Moselm, but they are not Arabs.  Racially (genetically)
    they are more related to European/Aryans than Arabs.  I related
    this fact to thinking of Iranians as one more of the "Mediterranean
    Groups" similar to Greeks, Italians, Spaniards.
    
    Iraquis are both Arabs and Moslem.  Some of the Arab nations are
    Iraq, Jordan, Libya, Syria, Kuwait, etc.
    
    Israel is neither Arab, nor Moslem.
    
    Palestine is both Arab and Moslem.
    
    Thus, the whole situation is compounded by how you define yourself
    religiously and racially.  A double bind.
    
    It reminds me of the Irish Catholic/Protestant war, but in this
    case both sides are Caucasian and Irish.  Imagine if this war were
    compounded by having one side being racially different.
    
    I hope this explanation helps out.  It sure help me to understand
    some of the sensitivities.  If anyone can add more information,
    please do.
    

re .12

>   It reminds me of the Irish Catholic/Protestant war, but in this
>    case both sides are Caucasian and Irish.

You might want to be a little more accurate here.  Both the Irish and English 
are Caucasian, as is practically every other European race.

    	As a minor correction to .12, originaly all Jews were racially
    the same as Arabs - Semitic. While they may claim to be Gods chosen
    people there was never any suggestion that they were racially different
    from their surrounding tribes.
    
    	As a result of the diaspora and intermarriage, and some periods
    when they were actively evangelical seeking outside converts most Jews
    are not now racially the same as Arabs. However, probably a large
    proportion of those that *are* now live in Israel.
    
    	If you use a racial definition for "Arab" then you should say that
    Israel is only partially Arab. I would not care to guess the
    proportion.
    
    	The Moslem, Jewish, Christian and other major religions have
    members from most races, and in most countries.

    To add a bit more to the confusion...

    Iraq's ruling party (Bath?) is not religiously grounded to
    the best of my knowledge.  It is a secular government and
    Hussein is a secular leader (though I suppose he is a follower
    of Islam to some extent).  As a result, Iraqi laws are not, 
    apparently, as offensive to westerners as are those in Saudi 
    Arabia or Kuwait (Ex: women have more freedom).  That the brutal
    and repressive policies of the Iraqi government are NOT based 
    on religion would seem to offer little comfort to Iraqis.

    This makes it all the more surprising that any Moslem would
    give credence to Hussein's cynical declaration of J'ihad.

    The citizens of that part of the world may approach religion
    with far more passion and fanatic zeal than we in the west, 
    but that certainly doesn't translate into superior moral and
    intellectual integrity.

    IMHO of course.

    /Greg

    RE: .12 Palestine is is Moslem, Christian, and Jewish. And
    has been for thousands of years.

    		Alfred

    An addendum to .14 - on the Semitic background of Jews and Arabs
    
    Post-diaspora Jews tended to become more like their neighbors, through
    inter-marriage, rape, etc. In Europe this meant the Jews became more
    European, but in Africa they became more black. A few years ago the
    Israelis did a massive airlift of starving Ethiopian Jews, who look
    like Ethiopians! And there are many Jews who lived in Arab cultures and
    are to all appearences Arab. These last actually comprise a majority
    in Israel, at least until the recent infusion of Soviet Jewry, but the
    Arab Jews were politically dominated in Israel by the better-educated
    and more affluent Europeans. Much of Israeli politics is set off this
    distinction of European vs Arab Jewish background.
    
    - Hoyt

    	I enjoy being pedantic ;-}  re: .16    No country has been Moslem
    or Christian for "thousands of years". Palestine has been partly or
    wholly Jewish for thousands of years, and America has been partly or
    wholly pagan for thousands of years.
    
    	It will be about another 50 years before you can make your
    "thousand" plural for Christianity, and rather longer before you can
    make it plural for Moslem. Though there is a theory that some of those
    who were believing in the Messiah before he arrived were believing in
    the right one, and were therefore Christian.

    1.95 is sufficient for a plurality of "thousands of years" :-P

    Re: .10
    
    Iraq consists of a more broader spectrum than just Shi'ites and Sunnis.
    There are some Christian, Hebrew and others there as well.
    
    Pete.

    re:.20
    I thought of that, too.

Both the Christians (who generally call themselves "Assyrian") and the Iraqi
Jews have been persecuted to the point that they are VERY small minorities in
Iraq at this point - especially the Jews who, I believe, number less than one
thousand. Iraq is 95% Moslem and approximately 5% Christian. Israel, in
contrast, is less than 85% Jewish. So unless you are going to stop calling
Israel a Jewish state, it's ludicrous to call Iraq anything other than a Moslem
country.

	-- Charles