So ISIS has taken Palmyra and is giddily executing Allah's enemies therein. http://www.wdam.com/story/29152748/...kes-ancient-syrian-city-of-palmyra-group-says One expects them to do that: it's in the pamphlet, you know. I'm curious, though, as to whether they will blow up the old Roman ruins there in the name of stamping out any remnants of the jahilliyya. What say you? Yes, you, the reader. Will they do it?
Doing things the easy way isn't the best way to get attention. The aim is to terrorize you in your own back yard, not in some old ruins that few people have even heard of.
But their point is also that that pre-Islamic period is one to be despised: one could leave the ruins there to be a manifest source of hatred, of course, but it's just not very common as a strategy. Why do you think this theoretical exercise of theirs is about attention only? They have a mandate, not unpopular among their proles, to enforce. They can't just write their own reasons.
As I said, they could have made that point by destroying the ruins at any time. There was no need to capture them. Capturing them emphasises the threat of destruction but it doesn't make the destruction itself more likely.
I disagree: the ruins are a big place, and up until a few days ago, occupied by Iraqi troops. Now, one can always sneak a few personal-sized bombs past a few Iraqi guards, sure, or even a car bomb. But systematic demolition is a much harder process, especially for something the size of Palmyra. It isn't something that can be taken out with a few sticks of dynamite. Remember the Buddha statues in Afghanistan - large, weighty structures. It required possession - or at least no military contesting for the site - to really get in there and demolish them. They could hardly destroy something so big without having uninterrupted access to properly demolish them, and even then I don't recall whether it was absolute. Correct demolition isn't easy. It takes time and preparation. You can't just fire an RPG at it and call it a day. I think it's reasonable to conclude therefore that their possession of the site makes it much more likely, because it really does grant them the capacity. So, that's the situation we have here: a large site, held at last by an Islamic fascist organisation. It's only now that they have the functional capacity to act in such a way. I assume, probably reasonably, that they have the logistical capacity to actually pull it off - it's a big site, I believe - but now that they're in a position to do something, will they do it?
I expect that they will. They are in the Middle East to stay too, sitting right atop the ancient fertile crescent. I fear that a great deal of humanity's historical inheritance is at risk and is likely doomed.
Well, this might be Phase One of Stupid Inc Society: ISIS 'destroys' famous lion god statue in captured Syrian city of Palmyra... just days after promising locals they would not obliterate ancient monuments Militants fighting for the Islamic State have reportedly destroyed a famous statue of a lion in the captured city of Palmyra - despite promising locals they would not obliterate the ancient city. Following their capture of Palmyra last Thursday, ISIS militants are understood to have won the support of much of the local population by promising not to destroy the city's famous monuments. But it appears that promise was too much for the jihadis to keep, with eyewitnesses claiming they destruction of millenia-old Statues and buildings is already very much under way, with the most significant loss so far being the celebrated Lion of Al-Lat, which dates back to the first century AD. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...almyra-s-ancient-monuments.html#ixzz3bTmCsNCo Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook Mind you, that's from the Daily Fail, but even so, it's kind of a big thing to be wrong about. The MSM might have something about it later tonight. I'm impressed that ISIS did promise not to blow anything up - but then again, that could just have been a truth of the moment. I suppose we definitely will see.
So you also feel that if it doesn't come today, it will certainly come tomorrow: at some point in the future. As a mandate in Islamic fascism, it's on the books: obliterate that which came before. Or maybe 'subjugate' it, somehow. Perhaps they'll bulldoze much of it and build a mosque atop the remnants - similar to the approach of the conversion of Hagia Sofia, which I hear is being turned into a mosque. I suspect this latter way - it appeals to the fascist mindset, to have repressed an inanimate dialectical anathema and incorporate it into one's own theocracy.
It is to bad that none of the leaders of ISIS will be able to see what they are trying to achieve because they will be destroyed before they ever do.
I think the demand for it, in the eyes of the ISIS bureaucracy, is there: if not absolutely, at the very least in proportion enough to make one pause. At the least you know that every goddamn Friday Ahmed is going to bring it up again at the company oasis, every Goddamn Friday, until it gets done. ("Ah, shit: here he comes again, Ahmed. Why can't he just get busy on the Hacking the Heads Off Unbelievers Account like all the rest of us? Everyone's gotta be 'special'.") Which is the point - that's the statement of faith that Islamism has, that previous incarnations of human religion, sociology and philosophy are uber-wrong and uber-bad. Can they sit on their hands while the rank-and-file are busily hacking the heads off women and apostates, bombing Saudi mosques and flipping Kurds the bird across the border river, all the while casting jaundiced eyes (no, literally jaundiced in this case) backwards towards Palmyra and wondering just when the hell management is going to get around to scheduling some fireworks. It's in the book, it's the centrality of supremacist injustice, it's in the Best Practices Towards Unbelieving Structures pamphlet, for fuck's sake. If it's not for the supremacy of their slightly deranged Sky Daddy that they're doing all this, then for what? Where's the satiation of the religious supremacism social contract? And if they won't blow up Palmyra, what's next? Letting infidels walk around not cowering? Homosexuals driving, or breathing? Sassy women prowling the streets, looking for sexually dithering ISIS fighters to harass with unflattering comments about their manhood, or lack of proper orthodontistry? Was it for this, for this, brothers, that we fought and murdered people? And all of a sudden the Arab Fall is on, and ISIS middle management finds itself having to answer a lot of uncomfortable questions about their commitment to the dialectic at the point of a bayonet. Dynamite is cheap. Actions are not. At the least, like I say, it'll be rendered unrecognisable: some of the stuff will be there, but under their feet and severed from all contact with the past. (That'll show those long-dead Romans what's what, eh?) It'll be a mosque, it'll be a mosquey park, or maybe a mosquey outdoors area for religious activities, like praying. That third branch of the medieval economy sure is getting a stimulus, though. Who knew that those who pray would ever be this kind of a growth market?
Satiation is the antithesis of religion. Fundamentalists in particular need a perpetual problem. Solving problems just lessens the need for their gods. ISIS would be best served by being kicked out of Palmyra so they have something to shake their fists at.
In a sense you make sense but these guys are going for full-on domination, not endless frustrated bitching. They want to take over, which is the reason for the shooting and yelling and decapitation-ing. No movement of social or religious fascism is ultimately served by fucking up. It's winner, winner; chicken dinner not almost got it; here's a Hot Pocket. Which doesn't even rhyme, really, and so is doubly bad. I bet ISIS would be opposed to that too.
As long as the ISIS savages are allowed to continue controlling something like 200,000 sq. km of the ancient fertile crescent. They have already destroyed several major Assyrian archaeological sites and there's no reason to believe that they have experienced a change of heart. And sadly, I don't see anyone inside or outside the region able and willing to confront them on the ground. The 'Coalition' airstrikes are all well and good, but they aren't going to defeat ISIS by themselves. So ISIS is there to stay, marching millions of people back to the 7th century, with all of the archaeological destruction and mass-beheadings, until and unless somebody does something about it.
