With the rising tensions between Iran and Saudi Arabia over the execution of Sheikh Nimir al-Nimir, there is a wonderfully ironic element as Iran has accused Saudi Arabia of stifling free speech by a cleric who merely disagreed with the regime. Iran of course is the government that has beaten and killed protesters calling for basic rights. We have regularly commented on Saudi Arabia’s medieval Sharia system as well as Iran’s suppression of free speech. Both countries regularly decapitate people and hang or crucify people in the name of Islamic values. Now both countries are exchanging insults about how the other is an extremist regime.
Al-Namir was a key leader in the Arab Spring protests in Saudi Arabia before his arrest in 2012.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei condemned the execution and said that al-Nimr “neither invited people to take up arms nor hatched covert plots. The only thing he did was public criticism.” You will recall that this is the same Khamenei who stood back and watched as a cartoonist was arrested for mocking the Parliament and protesters were beaten for seeking freedom.
In the meantime, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, which has been routinely connected to terrorism, compared Saudi Arabia to ISIS and denounced Saudi Arabia’s “medieval act of savagery” in putting al-Nimir death. Sort of like the medieval savagery countenanced under Iran’s Sharia legal system like pouring acid in the eyes of prisoners or throwing men down rocky hills in a burlap bag.
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi went to Twitter to proclaim how “peaceful opposition is a fundamental right. Repression does not last.” That will come as welcomed news to those people rotting in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison.
Oops, the content and statistics of question 3 is from this article http://www.huffingtonpost.com/akbar-ganji/the-united-states-israel-_b_7740794.html
Now to answer Karen, since she too is more interested in throwing out veiled attacks than in the truth:
Olly, let me know if you have a follow up question.
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Bahrain has a shiite majority, so does Iraq and Azerbehjan… so there goes that conclusion…
1- Karen, in which ways is Iran repressive?
What do we mean by repressive? Autocratic? Dictatorship?
Iran is a democracy! Elected leaders are, yes, elected.
Now compare it to china, which I brought up in my original post.
The flaws in China’s political system are obvious. The government doesn’t even make a pretense of holding national elections and punishes those who openly call for multiparty rule. The press is heavily censored and the Internet is blocked. Top leaders are unconstrained by the rule of law. Even more worrisome, repression has been ramped up since Xi Jinping took power in 2012, suggesting that the regime is increasingly worried about its legitimacy. The Atlantic.
So I ask the same question again, in which ways is Iran repressive other than the obvious requiring the hijab and gender separation? If that is what she means by repressive, then we agree, but since I still don’t know what karen means…
2-How is Iran a real threat to us?
Still waiting…seems to the whole word, outside of the US, Israel and S. Arabia that those three are more of a threat to Iran than the reverse.
All three routinely demonize Iran and push for bombing it…Israel even suggesting a nuclear attack on Iran. Us and Israel routinely hack Iran’s nuclear system and Israel has killed many Iranian scientists
So, who is the threat to whom?
.
3-How is anti-semitism taught from birth?
Research by the Anti-Defamation League has shown that, in the entire Middle East (except Israel obviously), anti-Semitism is the least in Iran, and that Iran is not even among the top 20 countries in the world when it comes to anti-Semitism. One of the questions that the researchers asked the people of the Middle East, as well as Americans, was whether the Jews speak about the Holocaust too much. 16% of Yemenis, 18% of Iranians, 22% of Americans, 22% of the Saudis, 23% of Egyptians, 24% of Kuwaitis, 26% of Lebanese, 29% of Jordanians, 33% of Iraqis, 42% of Omanis, 45% in the United Arab Emirates, 51% of Bahrainis, 52% of Qataris, and 64% of the Palestinians living in the West Bank responded affirmatively. So, even the Americans believed in the issue more strongly than Iranians.
Of course, the criteria that are used for identifying anti-Semitism are central to reducing or increasing the spread of the phenomenon. Suppose, for example, that one criterion is whether the Jews have won more Nobel Prize than any other people. If someone responds positively to the question, would he/she be an anti-Semite? Netanyahu tells anyone who is willing to listen that anyone who opposes Israel’s Jewish Settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem is anti-Semite. Is that a valid argument?
Let us consider another statistics, those on hate crimes in the United States. A 2013 report by the Federal Bureau of Investigation showed that, of all the hate crimes only 17.4% were religion-related. Surprisingly, 60.3% of the victims were Jews, 13.7% were Muslim, 6.1% were Catholic, 3.8% were Protestant. Thus, in the United States, the most important ally of Israel, Jews are by far the largest group of victims of hate crimes. Does that mean that the U.S. is a strongly anti-Semitic nation?
Olly
So, you’re a glass half empty type. Like I said earlier, I am an observer as well as participant and if you observe through history you will find societal advances, backslides, and in the case of the Middle East and Islam there, abhorrent stagnation and ignorance. Like I said, the world today is like a chronological panorama of human evolution. You can name it however you wish.
Brutality and barbarism are, not is.
Again, more deflection by po to detract from the article at hand, where the unyielding brutality and barbarism in both Saudi Arabia and Iran is perpetuated, supported and guided by the rules and laws contained in Islam. Once again, an attempt to equate all religions and to paint all belief systems with the same brush. I’m surprised that we’re not getting a lecture about the Crusades, like his Muslim brother, Obama, throws about to shame Christians into some semblance of silent compliance as the world is being destroyed and going down in flames by Islam. You can’t control this infidel. Don’t even try.
Bam, and to think I gave you such benefit of the doubt…it is my fault for encouraging you..one should not encourage insanity!
You are really insane with hatred, blinded by it…it’s taken over your being, you are ranting like a lunatic.
Of the two of us, only one is calling a whole group of people, diverse in their ethnicity, their background,
their education, their experiences, “sub-humans”based solely on their faith!
How insane is that?????????????
According to your logic, my buddy Marcus, a Jew who converted to Islam, along with the long, long list of Jews who became Muslims, is “sub-human?”
Is that what you are saying?
SO are you taking me up on my debate offer or too scared 😕
Another rabbi testifying the truth
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zysCuqVmOBs
And speaking of Jews in Iran?
A selective cogitation.
Free speech is in the Constitution.
The requirement that the President be a “natural born citizen” is in the Constitution.
The definition of “natural born citizen” is in the Law of Nations which is acknowledged in Article 1, Section 8
of the Constitution.
When playing Monopoly, are participants allowed to obey or “interpret” the rules they like and ignore the
others?
Don Miguel Ruiz –
“We only see what we want to see; we only hear what we want to hear. Our belief system is just like a mirror
that only shows us what we believe.”
John – I have played Monopoly with people who interpreted the rules in their favor (and sat on a pile of cash before they started the game),
Your CAIR tactics, once again, fail miserably with me, po. Pawn off your diatribes about hate, etc., onto one of your more easily-duped useful idiots. Typical CAIR tactics in use, where anyone raising a flag about the atrocities committed under the religious cloak of Islam, as po puts it, is merely referring to acts performed by an Islamic Extremist. That’s the kicker—Islamic Extremism–as if these loons are committing atrocities and brutal acts not condoned, demanded and instructed by the rules of Islam, itself. It’s not radical Islam, not extreme Islam, just Islam, plain and simple. The CAIR tactic is to bend all into submission, which, of course, is what Islam means–to submit. To condemn, criticize and lambast anyone who dares to speak the truth about this death cult, in hopes that the ridicule will work to silence any critics. The truth is that Islam, upon which both Iran and Saudi Arabia base their rules and punishments, is at the core of this insanity. Not militant Islam, not extreme Islam, not hijacked Islam–just Islam. If that makes me unhinged, as you call it, I’m proud to be it. I would be angry too, if I were you, po, devoting your life to a cult, disguised as a religion, for which you have no exit, unless, of course, you are okay with the threat of death following you for the crime of leaving your cult. You have no safe escape, which, I can imagine, must make you quite unhinged. Pity.
Okay, bam, i’ll bite.
Since you made a unilateral claim that it isn’t militant islam but islam tout court, bring forth your arguments and let’s debate it.
Unless:
1- You have no arguments to present
2- You are afraid I would destroy whatever argument you can glean off islamohobic websites.
——————
It just dawned on me that you are as much for Judaism as Donald Trump is for the republican party. I suspect you are just a hired hand adamant in making sure anti-semitism remains thriving…in that, you are doing a fantastic job. No one who cares about Judaism, knows it history and its legacy, especially in relation to the holocaust can be so hateful of other groups.
As I said before, whatever you say about Islam can be said about Judaism, including the parallel between shariah law and halachic law.
Thank God for these people, true representatives of Judaism, who preach love not hate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBcA2IaZyNg
Olly says:
If they both will do it with or without the force of religion then what is the primary cause? As Bastiat puts it; “stupid greed or false philanthropy.” In short, human nature.””
True!
Centralized power gained through religion is the result of an unenlightened culture. “”
Not really”!
It is always a reaction, either due to the moral failure of secularism or due to the political failure of “democracy”.
The plans differ, the planners are all alike. Bastiat.
isaac,
Everything done in this world by humans is the result of their nature. Human nature has not evolved, it is guided by more enlightened reason. Until the enlightenment era, it was religion and the force of the state that guided the behavior of the people. The pivot point is unalienable rights. It is obvious that secular and theocratic governments are capable of infringing those natural rights and why is that? If they both will do it with or without the force of religion then what is the primary cause? As Bastiat puts it; “stupid greed or false philanthropy.” In short, human nature.
Centralized power gained through religion is the result of an unenlightened culture. Centralized power gained through secular institutions is the result of an ignorant culture. We are not evolving in the least. We are regressing and we’ll stay this way until the people awaken to what they have lost.
Typical CAIR tactic–distract, deflect and change the subject to anything but the topic at hand. The mysterious “religious” cloak, which encompasses both Iran and Iraq, will forever remain a mystery. Any association with Islam is too farfetched. Fear of being called racist, prejudiced, etc., serves to control pointing out the most basic of associations between the wanton brutality and barbarity specifically carried out under that mysterious religious cloak, to which he alludes but refuses to name. Then, of course, he has the b@lls to challenge others to debates, which is comical, especially coming from the most disingenuous contributor here. No wonder most ignore him.
You keep confirming my point about you, bam, hatred has clouded your eyes and your judgement, your bigotry has overwhelmed you beyond the usual norm of what we see here.
You are unhinged!
Completely!
I am avoiding mentioning Islam? As if when we are discussing S. Arabia and Iran, the religion involved in buddhism? What religious cloak do you think is the one I am referring to?
You sound like Ted Cruz…if only obama would call it islamic extremism…you see, I call it islamic extremism”!
Please let the grownups discuss this, like grownups.
If was going well until you hijacked the thread, again, making it all about you,again…as you will hijack the next thread, and the one after that…
Either we debate this once for all and get it out our system, or you will keep being disruptive and obsessed about Islam…please stop being a child.
please!
By the way, bambam, I challenge you to a debate, any topic of your choosing…Islam or Judaism, or both, since those 2 seems unavoidable 🙂
Let end this once for all.
we’ll agree on a couple of people here to moderate it and call us (you) out when we (you) engage in fallacious arguments.
Whoever loses gets to adopt Nick..
Otherwise we’ll just keep arguing over the same exact things over and over again, and though fun…, you are about to ruin another good thread with your islamophobia.
Your irrational ranting is countering every claim yoü have made of Jewish intellectual or ethnic supremacy over all other “races.
If you are in love with me, just say so, I am allowed 4 wives.
Meanwhile:
———————————-
I challenge you to a debate, any topic of your choosing…Islam or Judaism, or both, since those 2 seems unavoidable 🙂
Let end this once for all.
we’ll agree on a couple of people here to moderate it and call us (you) out when we (you) engage in fallacious arguments.
Olly
You missed the magical word, evolution. Power is power and throughout history it has been wielded for good and bad results through the wonderment of religions and through simple out right primal urges. Perhaps mankind had to travel through religion to get to the secular condition of responsibility and introspection. However, that is the path taken and the path some are still stumbling along. My point was one of observation. If you like your stories and they do no harm to anyone then wonderful. If you believe so fervently that those that don’t believe as you do are in some way lesser, then you belong to the past, to those closer to the slime from which we all oozed. For me, I appreciate the art and beauty of religion: poetry, art, architecture, stained glass windows, and above all the link of belief with good. Unfortunately the guys that made all this stuff up included the devil. Perhaps that is what we are witnessing from time to time. The Islamic goings on in the Middle East are certainly not the works of a beneficent higher being. They are pure and simple, the works of power through religion. Thank god we have evolved past that here. Hopefully we will continue.
I recommend going to Wikileaks Twitter and reading up on the info behind this beheadding. We are being lied to by our own govt. No nation involved in this has clean hands on the matter of murder, torture or stomping on freedom of speech.
Don’t y’all just love when po does his usual gibberish about acts performed under “religious” cloak? Ah, yes, religious cloak, by the religion whose name we dare not speak. Just some ambiguous “religious” cloak, as if all religions are responsible for what Iran and Saudi Arabia do on a daily basis. Get used to it. These things are coming to a town near you. As if public beheadings, stonings, hangings and amputations are just daily, run-of-the-mill occurrences in all religions. Yes, just your standard daily fare. We dare not mention that while Iran and Saudi Arabia may have some various cultural differences–Sunnis and Shiites, for example–the common element that they both share, boys and girls, is. . .wait for it. . .ISLAM. Yes, while we snicker at each government calling the other repressive and a host of names, the bottom line is that both brutally repressive regimes are guided by a single religion, Islam. That is indisputable. Po won’t mention it, but I will. CAIR doesn’t pay my bills.
I think her statements have already given you enough to believe they are at least partially, false. On what basis to you believe that? Providing her that information would give her the opportunity to correct, adjust or explain them further.
Yep, as I said above, I think them to be at least partially false.
My options are:
1- challenge those statements outright, oblivious to the chance that perhaps I am missing something.
2- request supporting documentation to make sure I am not missing something BEFORE I counter them.
The fairest thing I can do for this blog and its readers, including her, is to request supporting information for one’s arguments. So 2 is the most rational option, the most logical one, and the best one according to any rhetorical tradition.
The world according to po:
The fairest thing I can do for this blog and its readers, including her, is to request supporting information for one’s arguments. So 2 is the most rational option, the most logical one, and the best one according to any rhetorical tradition.
Odd, since po does not supply supporting information for his arguments.
Paul, show me one instance of me not supplying the supporting info for my arguments?
If not, ironically, your statement would apply to you 🙂
The word debate is kryptonite to bambam…just a mere mention of it and he disappears like a salted witch!
po – deflection is your raison d’etre.
Po,
Your questions are curious ones.
Do you believe Iran is not repressive? How so?
Do you believe Iran is not a real threat to the United States? Or Israel? Or any other sovereign nation?
Do you believe anti-semitism is not taught from birth? Or any age?
Olly
If my questions are curious, what do we think of the statements that inspired them?
Isn’t it logical and normal to ask people to support their statements?
I happen to think those statements are (at least partially) false, but want to give karen the benefit of the doubt, perhaps she can correct, adjust or explain them, perhaps I am missing the truth in them, or she knows something I don’t.
Perhaps you can support my request for an explanation?
Please let me know if my questions to karen were out of place, just want to give her the opportunity to support her arguments.
The Middle East isn’t like the West, they behave differently, barbarically even. I think it’s time we stepped back and left them to it, all of them including Israel who can be worse than the Arabs at times. Maybe once the dust settles again we can discuss peace for everyone. I know that most of the oil comes from that part of the world but more reason to find other ways to power everything.
Iran opposed the execution because they are the only country I’m aware of with a Shiite majority. They supported the cleric because he was Shiite.
Iran is such an interesting paradox. The government is so repressive. And yet the young people are testing their boundaries. The girls push the limits as much as possible with loose roosaries/rain coats instead of the chadors. You can see a lot of their hair now. They like fashion and want more freedom, but the older generation and the religious police keep cracking down on them. The government is a real threat to us, but I have the most hope for Iran as far as change from within. And yet elementary school kids start each day chanting “Death to America”, and anti-semitism is taught from birth. It’s definitely a juxtaposition of extremes.
Bahrain has a shiite majority, so does Iraq and Azerbehjan… so there goes that conclusion…
Karen, in which ways is Iran repressive?
How is Iran a real threat to us?
How is anti-semitism taught from birth?
Nice misdirection, Professor.
The Saudis kill a Shiite cleric for speaking out, but instead of forthrightly condemning this atrocious act against free speech, you dodge any direct criticism and instead finger wag the Ayatollahs for speaking out against it.
Something tells me if the Ayatollahs had killed a Sunni cleric, your focus of your post would not be on the Saudis for protesting it.
The championing of free speech rights should not depend on political favoritism. Yet time and time again on this blog, it seems the degree of culpability attached to a censorship act of a foreign government is in direct proportion to the author’s like or dislike of the country involved.