By Israel Shamir

War is crime, but this is the manly crime defying effeminate mores and rigid
society. The most convinced pacifist can be carried away by the sight of
charging cavalry, attacking troops, roaring tanks and fighter jets taking
off a desert strip. Not in vain, women admired warriors, poets sung their
mighty deeds, and priests anointed their heads. We can fetch a Roman adage
or a Koranic verse, a line from Shakespeare or Nietzsche to praise a leader
of men and disregard the costs of war. We can forgive a bloodshed, it's
sordid affairs that can't ever be forgiven.

Murder of the deposed Arab ruler's young sons is the ultimate sordid crime
of President Bush. It transformed him from a fool into a villain, from the
dubious vanquisher of a disarmed state into a vile murderer, from a deceiver
into a bloody crook, from the vainglorious chieftain on board of the
aircraft carrier into a vicious monster. Whatever we think of Saddam
Hussein, cynical and cruel murder of his sons is an abysmal collapse into
archaic mode. This is worse than Napoleon's murder of young Duc d'Enghien,
worse than the crimes of Richard III. Stalin and Hitler, Churchill and
Roosevelt killed millions, but they did not hunt down children of their
adversaries.

If the president would tear their noble hearts and gobble them dripping
blood on his starched shirt he would not be more disgusting. It is a moral
collapse of the ruling class: his schools, Harvard and Yale, once
aristocratic breeding ground of American gentlemen, reached moral nadir
under the guidance of Lawrence Summers the Platitudinous, Samuel Huntington
the Trivial, Leo Strauss the Godless and Alan Dershowitz the Torturer.
Probably Sing Sing would produce a more suitable ruling class at lesser
cost.
 

It is a moral collapse of the army. Hundreds of heavily armed American
soldiers who participated in the execution brought shame on themselves and
the Armed Forces. Copycatting the Israeli assassins, they shot missiles at
unprotected men. They are not soldiers anymore, their place is with hangmen.
Their cowardly deed will delegate them into lower recesses of Hell, within a
shouting distance from Judas.
 
 

It is a moral collapse of the media. This docile tool of Empire stepped into
moral abyss beyond the cowardly murder. TV pundits discussed price of blood
in dollars and shekels, they argued whether the murder will put paid to the
Iraqi resistance. The TV screens were turned into stakes posting the
bloodied heads of two handsome young men, a scary sight, but even scarier
was the joyous crowd of brokers and investors at Wall Street, celebrating
the Dow Jones' rise by guzzling Arab blood. It was not the first vicious
murder in mankind's history; but the first one met with equanimity; a bloody
sacrifice to Mammon. The healing spasm of moral disgust did not shake the
sick society.

The dead and torn body of the fourteen-year-old boy, a grandchild of Saddam
Hussein, will haunt Bush whenever he looks at his own children and
grandchildren, like Banquo's bloody ghost on Macbeth's feast. Indeed, the
Texan killer of Hussein's sons is but a remorseless replica of the Scottish
murderer of Macduff's sons.

In a Christian land he would be excommunicated, for a vengeful murderer of
his enemies' children has no place in Kingdom of Christ. Not in vain he
befriended Sharon and Perle who are used to laud murder of Haman's children
at the feast of Purim.

Noble and brave, the sons of Saddam Hussein did not escape to a faraway
land; they did not pocket billions for surrender, they did not lounge in
Minsk or Riyadh as the dishonest mainstream media suggested. The Young Lions
of Baghdad, they fought the superior forces of aggressor, and fell defending
their homeland. Kusai and Udai were together in their lives; and in their
death they were not divided. They will be forever cherished in the
collective memory of mankind, with other tragic and courageous fighters
against the Empire from Vercingetorix the Gaul to the Sioux chief Sitting
Bull, from Che Guevara of Santa Clara to Abdel Kader al Husseini of Qastal.
Their last stand and their death redeemed Iraq and returned self esteem to
the Arabs. They died in flesh but remained alive in spirit; their murderers
are but living dead. When the Middle East will regain its independence,
their names will be written on the precious porphyry of our monuments.
 
 

Israel Shamir is an Israeli journalist based in Jaffa. His articles can be
found on the site www.israelshamir.net In order to subscribe to this list
please send blank email to shamireaders-subscribe@yahoogroups.com You may
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