Navy Cruiser Seizes Huge Iranian Arms Cache in Arabian Sea

Discussion in 'Latest US & World News' started by Trump Gurl, Feb 16, 2020.

  1. Reasonablerob

    Reasonablerob Well-Known Member

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    1. Yes I did, both have committed numerous international crimes, did you read my list?

    https://www.osenlaw.com/content/24-hamas-attacks

    https://www.aipac.org/-/media/publi.../fact-sheets/hezbollah/hezbollah-timeline.pdf

    2. Both are equally valid grammatically.
     
    Last edited: Feb 26, 2020
  2. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Thank you for the informed and nuanced distinction between AQ and MB.

    Keep in mind that the claim I was responding to had suggested that AQ got its ideology from MB ( a nonsense claim as you pointed out).

    In the context of the conflict of Syria the purpose of fighters under either banner was the same - to get rid of the cancer of "Secularism" from the ME - and turn Syria into a Strict Sharia Wonderland .. like El Saud - AQ and MB were on the same side of the fight - as was ISIS.

    AQ and MB are both Islamist - want to forced their religious beliefs on others through physical violence (Law) - have a system where the Authority of Gov't comes from God.

    Not all Muslims are Islamist. The Islamist hates the founding principles - has no respect for individual liberty.

    I don't care about "Assad was a bad guy" - What did the Syrian People think ? - In talking to an acquaintance of mine - who had just returned from Syria as the protest movement was going on - returning there after leaving when he was 20 - was "disowned" for leaving - had gone back to reunite 20 years later - .. ended up buying a chicken farm as an investment - bad timing.

    He said the people of Syria don't like Assad much - but they hate and fear the extremists far more - adding especially the Christians.. and that is when I started following the conflict. Read this article - and said "Wow" - that is exactly what the Syrian fellow had told me. https://www.christianpost.com/news/...om-anti-government-protestors-in-syria-50104/

    Two sides in this conflict - those who want to keep their freedoms - listed in numerous of my posts - and those who want to take them away.
    Those wanting to keep their freedoms were fighting for Assad.
     
  3. Pisa

    Pisa Well-Known Member

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    I know a lot more than you about the Middle East. I've been researching this topic for quite some time, and unlike you I don't reject any source out of hand just because it's biased in the opposite direction. I'm quite familiar with all the theories, fantasies, hatred, conspiracies, lies and deceptions, on all sides. I admit there was a time when I couldn't tell propaganda from truth, but that's way behind me now.

    By the way, "propaganda" is not a dirty word. Not all propaganda is on the dark side. What about propaganda for women's rights, or for minorities' rights, or for cleaner air and water? Is all of it bad too?

    Nope.

    Wahhabism is just one of the Islamic creeds in the general Salafiyya Islamic movement promoting a return to the purity of Islam in the time of the first Muslims. All Wahhabi Muslims are Salafi, but not all Salafi Muslims are Wahhabi.

    Pakistani extremists are Deobandi, not Wahhabi. The Taliban also practice a form of Deobandi Islam. Deobandi is a Salafi creed, but its roots are in India, not in Saudi Arabia (which didn't exist in the 19th century when the Deobandi school was founded).

    Boko Haram are old school Salafis (very old school - their founder followed the teachings of a 15th century Islamic scholar). The founder promoted non-violence, but the ideology of the group has greatly changed, with factions quarreling over finer ideological points. In the last decade the group pledged allegiance to ISIS, meaning they now adhere to Qutbism.

    The Muslim Brotherhood's mainstream ideology promotes a quiet gradual takeover using the democratic structures until they gain enough power to change these structures and destroy democracy from within. This is what Erdogan did in Turkey, and on a smaller scale what Hamas did in Gaza. The extremist ideologue of the Muslim Brotherhood, Sayyd Qutb, who preached violent jihad, is followed by al Qaeda and ISIS.

    Saudi Arabia has indeed worked hard to spread Wahhabism all over the world, and there's no doubt that many of the extremist Muslims in Western countries had been radicalized by Wahhabi imams, but to blame the Saudis for all forms of extreme Islamic ideologies is a bit of a stretch.

    May I gently but firmly remind you that I'm writing posts on a forum, not a post doctoral dissertation. If the level of the conversation doesn't satisfy your higher needs, please use google and/or public libraries to quench your thirst for intellectual superiority.

    Everybody has connections to someone else. Everything has connections to something else. Nobody lives in a vacuum.

    Have you descended to kindergarten level on purpose to make my life easier? If so, thank you so much, that's very thoughtful.

    Bad wording, my mistake.

    I should have written "Saudi Arabia's initial support for ISIS vanished quickly after the organization's intent to carry out terror attacks in the kingdom.became clear".

    The part of the 2015 article that is not behind a paywall mentions that the terrorist was already wanted for belonging to an ISIS affiliated terror cell, which clearly means that by then the Saudis were already against ISIS.

    There's no way to be certain that private initiatives of Saudi citizens to support ISIS in Syria, if there were any, were not willfully ignored by the authorities prior to the terror attack in 2015. In my opinion, the Saudis fear ISIS more than they fear Iran, because of the support such an organization can win among Sunnis in general and their own Sunni subjects in particular. I find it unlikely the Saudis would fund and arm an organization that openly stated its intention to overthrow the Saudi royal family and take over their country.

    The rapid rise of ISIS and its appeal for Muslims worldwide was a wake-up call for Saudi Arabia's rulers. They finally understood that aggressively spreading Wahhabi ideology for decades is a double-edged sword. Radicalized Muslims from all over the world, owing no allegiance whatsoever to the Saudi royal family, are now dreaming of a world Islamic caliphate that will bring back the supposed purity of the beginnings, and their ideal caliphate must of course include the two holiest places of Islam, presently in Saudi Arabia. This is a very serious threat not only for the stability of the royal behinds on their thrones, but also for the existence of their country. This fuels hopes that reformists will have the upper hand and Saudi Arabia will become less Wahhabi and more secular in the following decades.

    Right now, Saudi Arabia is less a threat to the rest of the region than Iran. While reforms are being enacted - at the speed of a lame snail, granted, but still - in Saudi Arabia, and a reformist breeze is blowing, the theocratic regime of Iran is destroying a millennia old civilization and threatens to bring its own brand of medieval society to other countries as well.

    The Middle East being what it is, things can change very fast, so please don't hold the above against me in the near future should the situation be reversed.

    The west didn't meddle in Syria for a very long time. Unlike Libya, Syria is not on Europe's doorstep, which made the threat of refugees flooding Italy or Southern France unlikely. Obama was very reluctant to arm Assad's opposition and resisted Saudi Arabia's nagging for quite some time.

    I think my post is long enough as it is. I'll write the next episode of my answer later.
     
  4. Iranian Monitor

    Iranian Monitor Well-Known Member

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    :)
    Anyway, I want to skip over your account about the different sects and movements in the region and address something you wrote about Iran.
    The real fight and dispute in Iran isn't about returning to the past, medieval or otherwise, but to how to best move forward? Whether to try to move 'forward' copying and mimicking another civilization, or building on your own civilization while learning (as opposed to copying) from others around you. Otherwise, every figure of any importance in Iran realizes that by the 18th and 19th century, the great Irano-Islamic civilization they are rightly proud of, had fallen behind the West. But while that is indisputable, let us not imagine that the "medieval" Iranian society you refer to was what you might imagine a 'medieval society' might have been like! Even that "medieval society" was a lot more advanced than you might realize. In fact, one of the biggest crimes against the Muslim world was to pull the rug under so much scholarship that was developed within its realm and boundaries, including especially in Iran, and turn it into mindless parrots copying the West! When, in fact, outside a few subjects, mainly those such as economics, almost everything done in the West that was considered ground breaking for Western civilization (at least, until almost the 18th and 19th centuries), was already done centuries before in the Muslim world. Quite often, by Persian scholars.

    In this regard, there are "medieval" Persian Muslim scholars who are better known to Western scholars simply because their works were used as standards texts in European universities: Avicenna (whose Canon of Medicine) was the standard text for medicine in Western universities until the 16th century; Khawrizimi (whose work gave us the names for subjects such as Algebra, and term for algorithms, and whose work developed and introduced the so-called "Arabic numerals" to the West), Rhazes. Also well known (albeit usually for the wrong reasons) is Ghazali, who had anticipated almost verbatim many of Descartes ideas. But there are many more scholars that you should know about and, if you did know about, you would also have a better idea about the "medieval society" you are referring to. And here I am skipping over the immense treasure that is Persian literature and poetry, of poets whose works speak of a culture that was simply way ahead of anything you might imagine by talking about a "medieval society": people like Rumi, Hafez, Sa'adi, Omar Khayyam, and many others such the author of Iran's monumental national epic, the Shahnameh by Ferdowsi.

    But, here and for now, I am going to focus on just one figure: an actual "medieval" Persian Shia theologian and his works!
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nasir_al-Din_al-Tusi
    Among Tousi's many works was the one discussed in this article:
    https://interestingengineering.com/theory-evolution-originally-created-muslim-scientist
    Theory of Evolution Was Originally Created by a Muslim Scientist
    But it wasn't just Darwin that Tousi had anticipated centuries before. Copernicus owed much to Tousi as well, even if the exact manner in which Tousi's works reached Copernicus isn't known.
    http://www.columbia.edu/~gas1/project/visions/case1/sci.2.html
     
    Last edited: Feb 26, 2020
  5. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    1) I did not reject your source - I merely pointed out how your use of the information from that source was completely misguided - "Saudi's rejecting ISIS in mid 2015" does not change the fact that they were arming Al Qaeda for 4 years prior to that time. Nor does your wording correction change this fact.

    Your initial premise was "Saudi's would never arm ISIS" - a premise that is false because that is exactly what they did in Syria

    2) "The rapid rise of ISIS and its appeal for Muslims worldwide was a wake-up call for Saudi Arabia's rulers. They finally understood that aggressively spreading Wahhabi ideology for decades is a double-edged sword."

    Yes= everything I said was correct - El Saud had been exporting this ideology all over the world for decades.

    3) Salafi/Wahhabi - dame sht -different pile. The groups mentioned Taliban, Al Qaeda, ISIS and so on - ALL adhere to some version of the same Saudi inspired radical "ISLAMIST" ideology.

    There were many different groups that comprised the rebels - many with differing beliefs on some respects - but, they were all "Islamist" - united in their goal to turn Syria into a strict sharia totalitarian theocracy - and that is all that matters with respect to ideology - all however adhere to some variant of the the Mother Ship and cradle of this form of extremist ideology - Saudi Arabia.

    4) and finally - "I know a lot more than you about the Middle East. I've been researching this topic for quite some time" No you don't - not even close - as evidenced by your previously claims rejecting the idea that Saudi Arabia 1) armed Al Qaeda/ISIS in Syria 2) is not the base ideology that drives the aformentioned extremist groups. You also got the connection between MB and AQ wrong - but that is a more technical and complicated issue so is of no moment.

    I have followed this conflict from the time of the Protest movement - An acquaintance of mine had just returned from Syria - after being away for 20 years - to reunite with his family who had disowned him for leaving when he was around 20. Opened up a Chicken farm - "bad timing" Armed conflict had not yet broken out.

    Over a few beers I asked what is going on over there - he said the people don't like Assad much and want change but, they hate the radicals far more - and the Christians are terrified. A short time after armed conflict broke out - in my research (which included a whole lot more than just a few wiki pages) which describes the situation on the ground prior to armed conflict breaking out - and it was exactly as the Syrian Fellow had described. https://www.christianpost.com/news/...om-anti-government-protestors-in-syria-50104/

    5) The bottom line - something you completely avoid - is that the conflict in Syria had two sides. On one side you had the people of Syria who wanted to keep their freedoms - these people fought for Assad - on the other side you had the radical Islamist Jihadists who wanted to take those freedoms away - and that is the side that the US, El Saud and a coalition of numerous other nations were supporting.

    As per a Declassified Defense Intelligence Agency memo from early 2012
    So much for your claim (and MB's claim to be fair) that they were for gradual peaceful change. Notice the word "insurgency" rather than civil war was used. (another thing you got wrong) - there were no "moderates" of any significance on the anti-Assad side of the conflict - the moderates were fighting on the side of Assad - including 50% of Assad's regular army which is Sunni - so claiming this was a "Sunni/Shia" conflict is BS as well.

    From the NY-Times in 2013
    This article (and numerous others all saying the same thing) was prior to Obama's "Moderate Rebel Lie" being the mainline Establishment propaganda narrative. One which you obviously bought into. Unfortunately - this narrative was a complete lie and a falsehood - and the administration new it.

    The MSM also knew it - but propped up this false narrative anyway. The NY-Times and others completely forgot their original reporting.

    Then you have the classic Biden gaff - accidentally contradicting the Establishment narrative.

    https://mideastshuffle.com/2014/10/04/biden-turks-saudis-uae-funded-and-armed-al-nusra-and-al-qaeda/

    Joe does manage not to mention that we were facilitating the Saudi's in their efforts to arm AQ and the other extremist nut jobs -a fact that was not well known at the time.
     
  6. Iranian Monitor

    Iranian Monitor Well-Known Member

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    @Pisa,
    I remember you once said you "almost fell out of your chair" reading a post of mine which alluded to Nietzsche and his 'final man' and 'superman'. I understood your reaction given where Western and German philosophy led, but I couldn't at that fully explore the Persian antecedents to the point I was making.

    In my last message, I dealt with an actual, medieval, Shia Muslim theologian, namely Tusi, and not what any of these labels would imply in the 'Western imagination'. I especially want to emphasize, here, his theory of evolution, not merely for anticipating Darwin, but in explicitly seeing humans as some 'intermediate' type creatures in the evolutionary path. If Nietzsche, in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, talked about the "last man" and the "superman", Tusi had already dealt with the issue in a more reasoned, less fictional, and more scientific manner. Except, the 'superman' for Tusi would not be the same kind of non-spiritual creature that Nietzsche and western philosophy would paint but its opposite.

    Another point, along the way, that I wanted to stress (especially for @Giftedone) is how wrong is this idea that secularization and westernization equals true modernity and progress in the Muslim world. In fact, that is often simply a tool for imperialism: 'secularization' and 'westernization'had as one of its cornerstones throwing away centuries of scholarship in places like Iran and having Iranians instead copy and memorize what was being done in the West. Our traditional universities (our seminaries) were disparaged and, as though Iran was also was persecuting its versions of Galileo, Copernicus and Darwin, and never mind that these were actually being produced through our seminaries, even the narratives given about them became narratives which copied the struggle between "Church and State" in the West.

    Anyway, a figure that exemplifies the evolutionary path to learning', using independent thinking and knowledge acquired from sources all around you, is another medieval Persian polymath, named Biruni. Someone who was a Leonardo da Vincini, Marco Polo and Galileo wrapped into one!

    https://www.britannica.com/biography/al-Biruni
    Al-Bīrūnī
    PERSIAN SCHOLAR AND SCIENTIST
    I actually don't think Biruni was the 'most original polymath' that the "Islamic world has ever known". Unlike Tusi, who in things like his theory of evolution and his version of the 'final man' and 'superman', was being more or less totally original (pre Islamic Persian mythology and historiography, however, explaining the story of creation, had given it an evolutionary description already), Biruni (while even more inquisitive and curious) usually worked explicitly form works done by others, whether it was Ptolemy and the ancient Greeks, or the ancient Indian sages, or even work done by the Jews, correcting and coming up with rather interesting insights along the way. For instance, based on calculations he made, he posited that the 'known world' was only two thirds of the real world and there were other parts of the world not yet discovered. Which explains some sensational titles such as this one:
    https://www.disclose.tv/abu-raihan-...nd-500-years-before-columbus-600-years-315917
    Abu Raihan al-Biruni discovered America & the Earth is round, 500 years before Columbus & 600 Years before Galileo
    Or slightly less sensational, but historically clueless (at the time, this region of Central Asia was four square part of the Persian and Iranian worlds), titles such as:
    https://www.worldbulletin.net/histo...merica-500-years-before-columbus-h126242.html
    Muslim scholar discovered America 500 years before Columbus

    But leaving the more sensationalized and speculative descriptions about Biruni's work aside, what stands out for me is how much truly improved on the works of those he wanted to summarize and explain.

    Going back to the encyclopedia Britannica and its entry on Biruni:
     
  7. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Very interesting subject you have brought up - and you have staked out a position that is clearly opposed to mine - but, done so in a coherent fashion - which I appreciate.

    You covered much ground - I understand enough history to know that the Muslim hordes were ahead in science and technology - one fellow Sulimon something or another - had a Jew as his Chief Visor - very open minded society - at a time when the mind of the 1000 years of horror under Christianity was against "questioning" in general.

    Technological innovation leads to military superiority - and the knowledge hating theocracy in Europe was declining as the Muslim world was advancing - and they kicked ass - for near 500 years.

    Then - for the same reason western society declined into the abyss "Theocracy" - Muslim society followed the same path.

    Secularism - a term that requires a definition.

    The question the Enlightenment thinkers were grappling with was where Gov't authority comes from. They were trying to come up with a justification for the authority of Gov't other than - that did not depend on "God Says So" - Divine Right.

    So then - Secularism is where the authority of Gov't comes from "we the people" Theocracy is where that authority comes from God.

    While it is true that having the authority come from "we the people" allows for manipulation - a tool of imperialism as you stated. It is far more difficult to manipulate this system to the ends of Evil - than it is for a Theocratic system.

    There is no "questioning" God. End of discussion - in a Theocracy.
    In a secular system - Gov't is answerable to the people - and the powers at be must be able to defend themselves against questioning.

    You can not compare the US of today - with the founding principles. This is an easy logical error to make. The US no longer follows the principles of Classical Liberalism/Republicanism... it is a different beast.
     
  8. Iranian Monitor

    Iranian Monitor Well-Known Member

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    Thanks. I am against dogma, whether it takes a religious covering or a secular one. I believe in the quest for Truth, with 'falsehood' something that can be exposed through reason, experimentation and the laws we can discover in the material world, even if the "Truth" itself will always remain elusive and merely a path and not a destination which we can hope to reach at this stage of human evolution.

    For me, the biggest instrument to promote falsehood is actually material power and vested material interests. Without them, lies could never survive and, hence, while learning and controlling the forces of the material world is the sin quo non for us to be able to promote the quest for Truth, the material world is NOT the 'be all and end all' of everything. It is, in fact, the visible or knowable part of a much larger universe which is beyond our reach. It is, however, the limitations of the material world and its laws, starting with its temporal nature, and in modern scientific parlance, in the realization that the material world is only a small part of the larger universe, with greater forces working in opposite of its material laws, along with the thirst or love for "knowledge" for its own sake and not merely for its material benefits, that ultimately helps us in the cosmic struggle between Truth and Falsehood, in the true struggle between "Good" and "Evil".
    Why Muslim society fell in decline, especially in comparison to the West, is a good question. A really good question. But the answer is not what you imagine, at least not in the label you have chosen as there were no "theocratic" governments in the Muslim world when that decline took place. I will deal with this issue later as it requires its own, thorough, discussion. For now, let me say this: Dogma (closing off the avenues to genuine learning and scholarship by forcing some ideology that fits material interests, whether they take religious or secular covering, to retard the quest for Truth) does ultimately leads societies to decline -- and that is, indeed, a part of why Muslim societies declined as well. And why I don't see a bright future ahead for the West either.
    Your definition and paradigm is explicitly 'western-centric'. It in inspired by the battles between a church (with its infallible Pope) and claim to rule in the name of God, and the forces fighting against it. Or it might be informed by the ideas behind the notion of the 'divine right of kings' as existed in the West. Similar things existed in the Muslim world too, including in Iran which I am focused on, but with important distinctions. In Iran, our "church" was an academic institution which held that illiterate and semi-literate or poorly trained people should not act as the equivalent of 'snake oil' salesman and begin selling people false ideas based on how well they could fool the foolish and poorly educated. Hence, we didn't promote an 'evangelical' path to knowledge or learning; an evangelical path for traveling on the road for the "Quest for truth". Instead, that quest was limited to properly trained scholars (ulama) who had published their treatise and had their treatise accepted by their peers. Only after they had gone through such scholarship, could they then act as "sources of emulation" (as figures the common people should look to for guidance). But once they became "mujtahids", they had full academic freedom. None were 'infallible" and it was up to the people to choose between them the one they regarded as their best "source of emulation". The "infallible Pope" in Shia Islam, as it happens, went into occultation in the 9th century.

    But lets take your paradigm on face value. And add a twist to it. What if someone said: true power comes from the people. That God and his representatives aren't with us right now to pick to those who should rule us. That even God's prophets merely told a story for the masses in Arabia -- in the language which they could understand, as any notion of the real "Truth" is no more capable of being imparted through scripture and prophesy than a physicist can teach a 5 year old kid the theory of relativity using his formulas. That scripture is itself basically a collection fables for the masses. But, even recognizing it as such, that our choices shouldn't be limited to those who can find favor among the wealthiest or most powerful material forces, but those who are the most 'scholarly", who have been able to keep their distance from the forces and interests of the material world, and who have a 'love' for knowledge and truth for its own sake?

    The idea, of course, has its western antecedents, especially in Plato's Republic. In Persian tradition, it was what underpinned notions of a "Just King": someone whose legitimacy wasn't merely based on his power but on being just and being in the service of the quest for truth against falsehood. Of course, in ancient times when only a small class of people could hope to be trained in its requisites, the idea of 'hereditary monarchs' had some justification as well. But Persian political philosophy didn't accord legitimacy to any hereditary monarch; only those who were properly trained and who were indeed fighting in the path of justice and the quest for truth. And our current evolution of that concept is explicitly neither hereditary nor someone who is a prophet or an infallible pope or picked by God. He is chosen by an elected "Assembly of Experts" and answerable, indirectly, to the people.

    The basic ideology of the "Guardianship of the Jurist" (a project in its early years and which requires its own reforms and evolution) isn't to deny the people their right to choose their leaders. But to create avenues for those choices not to be fully corrupted by material interests. In this day and age, by Western hegemonic powers led by the US, but also any materialistic force that seeks to 'prove' the "truth", not by scholarly endeavors, but by force or by its ability to bribe its adherents. Of course, it is in its early stages and its evolution will require a lot of reforms for the idea to reach its potential. It competitors, however, have nothing to favor them compared to it.
    Not really. The American system of government has a lot to its credit and the framers of the US constitution were wise, enlightened, men. Ultimately, the real danger doesn't rest on the basis of the ideology (secular or religious) used to justify the exercise of such power, but its concentration and monopoly. Competition is good. Having checks and balances is good. These are elements that any good system of government should have.

    If there is a failing in the US system of government, however, is that it ultimately gives material interests too much reign at the expense of purely scholarly interests. To be sure, even the US does have its own 'bevy of Platonic guardians" and, as long as they aren't indoctrinated in dogma, those "Platonic guardians" (the US Supreme Court) could fulfill much of the same functions (with their robes and such) as other Platonic guardians, while also not having power of the 'sword or the purse' to abuse their positions.
    The label "secular" no more makes government "answerable to the people" than the label "religious" makes it unanswerable to them. It is not about labels.
    Classic liberal thought had good things to its credit, but any dogma ultimately suffers under the weight of the dogma it preaches. Classical liberal thought is useful to understand many aspects of social, political and economic activities and how to regulate them. But as long as you ultimately make "man" and his selfish interests, the "God" to worship, you end up eventually with those who want to worship the "Tribe" (fascists) and ultimately just themselves (Trump). The overall effect of that culture is this, not its specific teachings. And dogmatic religion is certainly not a check on it either as that 'dogmatic' religion is itself born from the same dynamic.

    I know my answers for now will not be satisfactory or convincing, but I like to come back at this topic with greater attention later.
     
    Last edited: Feb 27, 2020
  9. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    True - and you kind of dance around the main issues - although you do seem to recognize what they are which is good.

    "The label "secular" no more makes government "answerable to the people" than the label "religious" makes it unanswerable to them. It is not about labels. "

    Yes it does - and this is a key distinction. Gov't is about Law - In a secular democratic system law must be justified - by something - preferably Philosophic logic and reason - but something.

    What is not valid justification for law is "God says so" - prove what God thinks ? - and whose God ? Zeus ? Enlil - God of Islam (you know that Enlil is the God of Islam I would hope)

    I will leave it here - but yours is a losing argument - as per the some of the rules of Islam - at least any Muslim that has respect for the Golden Rule - as per the Teachings of Muhammad - Jesus - Buddha - Confucius - Hammurapi's Law Code ..

    Is there compulsion in Islam or is there not ?

    You have not thought about this distinction enough .. but I digress.

    A few thoughts of the founders with respect to "God says so" as Justification for law.

    The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.
    -- Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, 1781-82

    Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch toward uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one-half the world fools and the other half hypocrites. To support roguery and error all over the earth.
    -- Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, 1781-82

    Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind.
    -- John Adams, "A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America" (1787-88 ) , from Adrienne Koch, ed, The American Enlightenment: The Shaping of the American Experiment and a Free Society (1965) p. 258

    As I understand the Christian religion, it was, and is, a revelation. But how has it happened that millions of fables, tales, legends, have been blended with both Jewish and Christian revelation that have made them the most bloody religion that ever existed?-- John Adams, letter to FA Van der Kamp, December 27, 1816

    When philosophic reason is clear and certain by intuition or necessary induction, no subsequent revelation supported by prophecies or miracles can supersede it.-- John Adams, from Rufus K Noyes, Views of Religion, quoted from from James A Haught, ed, 2000 Years of Disbelief
     
    Last edited: Feb 27, 2020
  10. Pisa

    Pisa Well-Known Member

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    Wrong.

    There was a global effort to end the conflict by diplomatic means, hindered by Russia and China. The Saudis have gifted Assad with nearly 3 million rials to prevent exactly what was going to happen. Nobody wanted the conflict in Syria to turn into the bloody sectarian nightmare it became later. Nobody except Assad, of course, who had the most to gain by appearing as a beacon of secular safety comparing to Islamists, which might have been his intention when he released Islamists - some of whom became ISIS leaders - from prison in 2011.

    I'm not claiming that ISIS had somehow been an agent of the Assad regime, nor that Assad knew beforehand what the inmates he released were going to do. He just exploited opportunities.

    Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar funded and armed the rebels in the first stages of the conflict. The US help came later, poorly organized. Some of their weapons ended up in Islamist hands, but that was by mistake, not by design.

    You get the timeline of events wrong. Islamist organizations didn't appear on the scene until 2013, with ISIS rising as an hostile force against al Qaeda and its affiliates. I obviously mean "anti-Assad Islamist organizations", since Hezbollah, an Islamist terrorist organization, was already fighting on the side of that beacon of secular freedom known to us humble mortals as Assad.

    Fun fact: al Nusra, the Kurds, and the Western coalition had been the forces fighting ISIS in Syria most of the time, not Assad's army. Meanwhile, Assad was buying oil from ISIS.

    ISIS were supported by Turkey, Qatar, the Emirates, and for a while by Saudi Arabia. Never by Western countries. Some American weapons found their way into terrorist hands due to members of the opposition joining terrorist organization, and there was the blunder in Libya, but that's all.

    Many of the weapons ISIS used in Iraq came from abandoned Iraqi army bases. As ISIS approached, Iraqi soldiers abandoned their bases leaving all equipment, including weapons, behind. Knowing that the Iraqi government at the time was in very friendly relationships with Iran, one has to wonder who gave the order to abandon all the equipment and flee instead of facing the enemy in battle. Looking at the big picture, the winners in this mess are Assad and Iran, with Turkey struggling for a third place.

    How is the US allied with ISIS in Syria?

    Rand Paul lost me when he talked about ISIS' allies in Syria. ISIS never had allies in Syria, they were fighting against all the other rebel groups. He's clueless.

    Obama and his administration made all the possible - and some impossible - errors in their dealings with the Middle East. But absent evidence of intentional aid to ISIS - proof, not opinions - i can't believe such allegations.

    Of course there was a lot of propaganda, on both sides. I don't believe half of it. Unlike you though, I don't see one side as good and the other as bad. They're all equally bad at this point.

    Lost again in conspiracy theories wasteland, yay!

    The Syrian conflict began with peaceful demonstrations against the regime, turned into an armed insurgency after those peaceful demonstrations were brutally repressed by the regime, and became a civil war when the legitimacy of the opposition was recognized by Western countries.

    https://www.britannica.com/topic/insurgency
    https://www.britannica.com/topic/civil-war
     
  11. Iranian Monitor

    Iranian Monitor Well-Known Member

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    My view is this: Laws are ultimately justified by the power that is behind them and allows for their enforcement. It doesn't matter what label you give to the 'law'. That is a basic positivist view of the law. But it is more than just power that will decide which laws endure. The basic idea of someone like Hart in the Concept of Law is closest to my view on this particular issue. And that conception isn't inconsistent with what I have said on the issues we are discussing either, although these aren't issues to fully sketch out on a message board.

    As for justification, let me remind you of the limits of reason, logic and such. What Descartes said (and Ghazali, a Persian jurist and philosopher had said the same earlier) is true: "I think therefore I am" is basically the extent of knowledge you can gain with certainty through reason and logic. And Hume can never be proven wrong: You simply can NOT 'derive' an ought from an is through reason or logic.

    So, as far as 'religion" is concerned, let me be explicit: if you believe 'scripture' imparts "Truth" and "knowledge" and forms the real basis for the "Law", then what you say is more accurate when it comes to criticizing religion (not to establish the opposite form of 'justification). I don't believe in scripture. And much of Shia jurisprudence, at least in the way I would interpret it and leaving aside dogmatist in its ranks, is about escaping scripture or any other form of received knowledge, freeing the hands of 'scholars' to engage in "Ijtihad". Regardless, however, for me, any 'received knowledge' (to avoid being dogma) needs to stand on its own merit and not on the merit of the 'authority' (God, Allah, king, majority, Trump, USA, UN etc) which proclaims it (or supposedly proclaims it). (How you decide that "merit" is the more difficult issue that I will skip over for now).

    In the meantime, I am well acquainted with the people you like to quote. So while I can't resolve, on a message board, philosophical questions which have bedeviled scholars for several millennia, what I might be able to do is to better acquaint you with people whose views and thinking you might not be really all that familiar with. Lets start with the figure who personifies, in the popular imagination in America, being a backward, medieval, obscurantist, fundamentalist, theologian, namely the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini. I want to do that and ask you to compare the writings I quote from Ayatollah Khomeini, with your imagination or a prior assumptions on his views.

    I will do that in my next message.
     
    Last edited: Feb 27, 2020
  12. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    So Rand Paul just woke up in the morning and made up a story about arming ISIS and Al Qaeda in Syria. That Rand is engaged in some grand conspiracy to Frame Obama - The Pentagon - CIA - and so on - along with at least 14 other - Bipartisan - in congress ?

    Keeewl man ... I want to hear this one - Tell me more about this grand conspiracy ? That Rand and 14 other Bipartisan in Congress - are involved.

    The floor is yours.
     
  13. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    So you are a secularist :) "its own merit" = Some logical justification - something - an "argument" of some kinds - 1)Premise 2) evidence/reasoning/proof that this claim is true.

    How we decide this merit is something addressed in the previous post - "The golden rule" - do unto others as you would have done to you - this is the rule that sums up the law and the prophets - and the rest just commentary. There is no compulsion in Islam.

    A happy union between secularism and religion - be it Christianity Islam Judaism - and so on.

    The golden rule underlies the founding principles and Social Contract.
     
  14. Pisa

    Pisa Well-Known Member

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    So what if Liberman says so? It's election year, politicians say a lot of stupid stuff.

    Nothing wrong with playing "divide and conquer", but Israel has never supported Hamas. Maybe we took a page out of the Iranian playbook recently, seeing how Iran had aided their arch-enemy the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine - aka Hamas - in an attempt to create chaos and paint an image of the Ayatollahs as saviors of the Muslim world.

    Funny that you mention Islamic Jihad in connection with unity and order, since Iran is funding and arming the Islamic Jihad to create an alternative to Hamas. Relationships between Hamas and Iran have been going downhill since Assad's army attacks on Palestinian refugee camps in Syria, with Hamas seeking a comforting shoulder and open purse in Turkey nowadays.

    On one hand you accuse Israel of bringing a foreign culture to the Middle East. on the other you accuse Israel of behaving like every other actor in the Middle East. Odd.

    I'm sure we're not done exchanging compliments. The ball is yours.
     
  15. Iranian Monitor

    Iranian Monitor Well-Known Member

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    I wanted to introduce you to the writings of Ayatollah Khomeini, but let me address this post first.
    Yes and No. No, because none of what you mentioned will get you as far as you imagine. I am thoroughly convinced that reason and logic won't take you as far as you imagine. Yes, because I certainly don't take scripture as imparting "Truth".

    But as for the "label" you like, namely 'secular', I don't like it because of its association with a whole baggage of other things which I reject as being the right path for Iran. That doesn't mean that I reject everything that comes under that label. The skepticism that I have already referred to in my earlier message is my starting point as well.
    The "Golden Rule" is fine to me. But the same way I find Rawls and his Theory of Justice interesting and helpful, all such "Golden Rules" stop being as effective as you imagine by virtue of the fact that those whose interests (and power) allows them to ignore the rule, will do so. And that, ultimately, is how things will be once you undercut the power of those who want to establish law by following such "Golden rules". Give power simply to those who owe their power to 'material interests', and before you know it, the Golden Rule you talk about loses its "golden characteristics":) A system that is geared towards empowering material interests will inevitably end up there.
    Law is about compulsion. Without compulsion, there is no law.

    But I am against compulsion as far as limiting knowledge and forcing dogma on people. The way to accomplish that is to have a system that values scholarship above material interests. One which both avoids "evangelical snake oil salesmen' as well as any 'infallible Pope", while also being sufficiently distant from the material forces and powers to chart a path that is more philosophical than purely materialistic. Following your "Golden Rule" (and some others) as best it can, given the particular circumstances in that society.
    Again, the "Golden Rule" is fine with me. How to best implement it is the question? A fable, whether called the 'social contract' that then puts various other things as dogma derived from this Golden Rule (other than Rawls, the rest of the natural law tradition is basically making someone's interests take a 'natural right' label, which is why natural law has found people in opposite sides of every argument), or take a religious label (whatever the label might be) isn't sufficient and is often counterproductive. We need fewer fables. The focus should be on institutions which allow the most dispassionate scholars following this Golden Rule to enunciate their understanding of it and give that understanding as their 'guidance' for the masses. And then have, as is necessary, materially oriented representative institutions, to both check the powers of the "Platonic guardians" as well as to give material interests their due.
     
    Last edited: Feb 27, 2020
  16. Pisa

    Pisa Well-Known Member

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    In my opinion laws are to be judged by the levels of individual freedom and the opportunities created for individual achievements in all aspects of life. Anything else leads to authoritarianism and its faithful companion repression.
     
  17. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    That people ignore the rule - does not make the rule bad ? - This is why we have Law - because without it - violators of the code of conduct would not be punished - not dissuaded from their actions - Anarchy.

    The question of what those codes of conduct should be -is what we are discussing. In Classical liberalism those codes are founded on the golden rule principle.

    What I claim - and you have a greed - is that the law should not be based on "God Says so"

    By definition - Law is Compulsion - So if there is no compulsion in Islam - we can not base law on Islam :)

    It is because Law is compulsion - that we require limitations to the power of Gov't. There are no limitations on "God says so"
    Human's are at liberty to make up what ever they want - the special ones that interpret God's word - speak for God.

    Going back a bit - You never commented on my "Enlil is the God of Islam" comment ;) Muslims do believe in the God of Abraham do they not ? This is more of a question than a comment per say.
     
  18. Gilos

    Gilos Well-Known Member

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    We herd the goats, we don't shag them....., if Iran pays one group, Turkey pays another, EU supports PLO, Qatar and Saudi's have their own - than that's what we have to deal with, why does Iran pay Islamic Jihad but not PLO ? how you call Israel actions dividing but not Iran's who actually pays them ?
     
  19. Iranian Monitor

    Iranian Monitor Well-Known Member

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    The law covers a lot more than just the "Golden Rule" you mention. And the Golden Rule isn't the Supreme Law that is used to invalidate every other law.

    I have no problem with the Golden Rule you mentioned. The question: how do you structure society to best derive, in the most dispassionate way possible, the dictates that can be derived from your Golden Rule? (Along with some other "Golden Rules" which I have).
    Before you decide on the 'content' of the Golden Rule, I am saying you need to devise a system that makes sure the ones giving the "Golden rule" its content are best situated (by training, and being sufficiently divorced from material interests) to enunciate that content.
    We don't disagree on what law shouldn't be based on. Even if I might not have the same issue with the cover it ends up with when it is delivered to the masses.
    I am not sure I follow your point. Law is about compulsion. Whether the law is based on "Islam" (a label to me that is the one our traditions have had to use based on historical events), or based on something else that is supposedly 'secular".
    I have already mentioned that 'checks and balances' and being against monopoly of power are important ingredients to preventing tyranny. But the institutions which are devised need to include one that is focused on the 'quest for truth', in fighting 'falsehood', and which is committed to the Golden Rule (Justice). For that to be the case, that institution cannot be influenced by or chosen based on material interests and powers. Otherwise, as I mentioned, you will soon find the "Golden Rule" not so golden!
    "Muslims" can believe in any "God" they wish. My understanding of God is not derived from Arab or Semitic mythology. I prefer Iranian mythology. Indeed, I think the world would be a better place if Iranian mythology and historiography had more influence compared to the Abrahamic mythology and historiography. But I am not going to throw away centuries of scholarship, enlightenment, and cultural and literary achievement, because of the "label" that was used. After its contact with the Iranian world, Islam was transformed from a tribal Arab religion to a universalist one. Even its historiography had to start competing with the historiography of Iran's national epic, the Shahnameh. Iran is a very complicated society and every issue about it will require something like a book to explain. Especially since an understanding of Iran has always, from the Greco-Roman times to the present, been colored by propaganda and attempts to demonize it by its enemies.
     
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  20. Pisa

    Pisa Well-Known Member

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    How exactly did the Saudis arm al Qaeda for four years prior to 2015, knowing that al Qaeda didn't get involved in the Syrian conflict until 2013?

    My premise was that Saudi Arabia initially supported ISIS, until it became clear that the organization's goal was the conquest of the two holiest places of Islam, currently in Saudi Arabia.

    Yep.

    Nope.

    Saudi Arabia was founded in 1932.

    Boko Haram, for instance, was founded by a follower of the 14th century Islamic scholar Ibn Taymiyyah, who lived in Syria (not the Arabian Peninsula) four centuries before al Wahhab and six centuries before Saudi Arabia even existed. How's Saudi Arabia the cradle of that?

    Wahhabism is just a variant of a much older Islamic ideology that existed long before Wahhab and his contract with the Saudis Not all Salafists are Wahhabi.

    https://www.counterextremism.com/threat/boko-haram
    https://www.britannica.com/topic/Wahhabi

    I never claimed that Saudi Arabia didn't support ISIS. It did, in the beginning.

    https://www.counterextremism.com/press/enduring-links-isis-al-qaeda-and-muslim-brotherhood

    I live next door to a genocidal offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood for quite some time. I know the difference between a Wahhabi and a Muslim Brother. As far as I know (and I'm quite sure @Iranian Monitor will correct me if I'm wrong and maybe even if I'm not :p) Wahhabism doesn't preach violent jihad.

    I find Clarion Project a better source for the conflict in Syria than the Christianpost, despite its obvious anti-Muslim and pro-Christian bias. Just type your query on the search page.

    https://clarionproject.org/

    The conflict in Syria had more than two sides. Still does.

    The people who fought for Assad didn't fight for freedoms, they fought because they know very well what enraged Sunni Muslims would do to the Alawite community, blaming them all for the brutality of the Alawite ruler. There were some Alawites in the opposition as well, but enraged mobs don't stop to reason.

    That's it for now. I believe I covered most of the rest in another post.
     
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  21. Pisa

    Pisa Well-Known Member

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    I was careful to refer to the theocratic regime brand of medieval society, not the medieval times in Iran. I'm well aware of the high levels of civilization reached by Iranians in medieval times. What I had in mind resembled more medieval Europe, with Inquisition and religious persecutions - not because I think the Ayatollahs are so evil, but because once in power, the theocratic leaders will do everything to remain there.

    I didn't know about Tusi and Biruni, thanks for sharing.
     
  22. Pisa

    Pisa Well-Known Member

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    I wasn't hinting at a conspiracy by Rand Paul or other politicians. My problem with Rand Paul is that he believes in conspiracy theories, not that he conspires on his own.
     
  23. Gilos

    Gilos Well-Known Member

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    There is no way you survey all that happened in Syria for all those years and you come up with something as simple as that bolded line, no way...
    Assad is the lesser evil, he also made mistakes not just during the war but before - as a leader you should hold him accountable at least as much as you hold other countries, and if you agree to that than it's not that simple as "fight for freedom fight for Assad" they had very restrict freedoms under the Assad family, I agreed with you before that Assad is a better option than ISIS but it's a choice between a vampire lord or a lich king, to suggest Assad is a bastion of freedom is a mockery to the dead IMO.
     
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  24. Iranian Monitor

    Iranian Monitor Well-Known Member

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    I honestly don't have much energy left in me to deal with the propaganda and polemics. People can read about the Wahhabis and the Muslim Brotherhood in any neutral site to learn about them if they wish. All I have to say is that all the Islamophobia preached is based on the practices, beliefs and attitudes of the Wahhabis in particular and Salafists more generally. For the Wahhabis, all the 'innovations' by the 'ulama' after the prophet Mohammad were a corruption of the true religion of "Islam". They want Islam to return to its original creed, which was mainly a Arab tribal religion. While they might be more focused on fighting the 'innovations' by 'foreign' enemies closer to home and are particularly upset that a religion they founded became the flag of rulers who assigned the real Arabs and their Arabian wastelands back to being a neglected appendage of the various Islamic caliphates that emerged, and have often worked more closely with foreign colonial powers than other "Muslims" (most of whom they don't consider Muslims, especially the Shia but even those who are adherents of the main Sunni schools of thought), lets be clear: they are the ones who consider Christians, Jews and others 'infidels' who can be captured and enslaved or, if otherwise more expedient, simply beheaded unless they genuinely repent!

    Incidentally, maybe this Wikipedia entry on the founder of the main Sunni school of jurisprudence (there are other schools, but this is the predominant school in the heartlands of the ME and was the school followed by the Ottomans) will give you a clue as to why (besides being politically, culturally and otherwise sidelined) they consider these schools as representing foreign (mainly Persian) corruptions and innovations.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Hanifa
    Abu Hanifa
     
  25. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    The above is mindless gibberish - Al Qaeda (known as Al Nusra in Syria) was there before 2013 - you have no clue what you are talking about.


    What issue do you have with any of the information in the link - and do you have anything other than ad hom fallacy


    They initially supported groups like Al Qaeda and the Islamic Front - as the modern incarnation of ISIS in Syria did not yet exist.

    You are making up more nonsense because you have nothing to say - and are in denial of Reality.
     

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