CBS:
Ex-Lebanon Leader: Christians Target of Genocide
Says Extremists Are Waging Attacks Without Justification on Christians; Church Bombing Sparks Protests in Egypt
(CBS/AP) BEIRUT - Extremist groups are waging a "genocide" against Christians in the Middle East, a former Lebanese president said Monday, after a New Year's suicide bombing of a church in Egypt killed 21 people.
Amin Gemayel, a Christian who served a six-year term as president in the 1980s, cited the attack in Egypt and recent violence in Iraq as he urged leaders to give Christian communities a larger political role.
"Massacres are taking place for no reason and without any justification against Christians. It is only because they are Christians," said Gemayel, who leads Lebanon's right-wing Christian Phalange party.
"What is happening to Christians is a genocide," he said.
Lebanon, which experienced a ruinous 15-year civil war, in part between Muslims and Christians, that left about 150,000 dead, is deeply divided along sectarian lines. Christians make up about 40 percent of Lebanon's 4 million people and the country is the only Arab nation with a Christian head of state.
The Phalange party, which was founded in 1936 by Gemayel's father, Pierre, fought heavily on the Christian side during Lebanon's 1975-90 civil war.
Militias linked to the party carried out the notorious massacres of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatilla refugee camps in 1982.
Egyptian police are focusing their investigation into the New Year's suicide bombing on a group of Islamic hard-liners inspired by al Qaeda and based in the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria.
Scores of Iraqi Christians have been killed in the past months at the hands of extremists as well.
The bombing touched off riots and protests by Egypt's Christian minority, who feel they are targeted and discriminated against and do not get adequate protection from authorities.
There were signs of beefed up security outside churches nationwide and dozens returned to pray Sunday in the bombed, blood-spattered Saints Church - many of them sobbing, screaming in anger and slapping themselves in grief.
Late Sunday, riots erupted outside the cathedral-headquarters of the Coptic Church after the country's top Muslim religious figures and government officials met with Pope Shenouda III.
Protesters threw bottles and stones at riot police outside the cathedral, injuring 45 policemen, security officials said.
Elsewhere, demonstrators threw stones at cars on two main highways, and hundreds marched in other parts of the capital, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the press.
Egyptian newspapers warned on Sunday that "civil war" could break out unless Christians and Muslims close ranks.
1 comment:
Islam's one and only foundation is the credibility and resultant authority of Mohammed. If you can undermine that credibility and turn Mohammed into a figure of ridicule and derision, then you have destroyed Islam.
ALL of Islam derives from Mohammed and nowhere else. Even aspects of Islam that appear to derive from Christianity and Judaism are actually corrupted versions of those religions which have been twisted and perverted to suit Mohammed's psychopathic agenda.
There are three ways of attacking Mohammed (1) Ethical Arguments (2) Rational Arguments and (3) Undermining his leadership.
(1) Ethical arguments are not as effective as they might at first seem.
By our standards, Mohammed's actions were evil. But Muslims live in a different moral universe from the rest of us, where the very definition of good and evil are determined by what Mohammed (the Perfect man) did and said. Islam aims to completely destroy the conscience and free will of the Muslim and replace it with the cloned behavior of a psychopathic megalomaniac.
(2) Rational arguments are no better. Muslims are taught from an early age that faith is superior to reason, and that it is a sin to even question the Koran ('Bi-la kayf' or 'Bi-la kaifa', which means Mohammedan contradictions and absurdities must be accepted without asking how or why) . Apart from which, the majority of Muslims are below average intelligence due to genetic damage caused by generations of inbreeding.
Even though the Koran is full of contradictions, Muslims are quite happy with them.
(3) Undermining Mohammed's leadership...
(3a) Nobody likes to be conned, and when they find they have been conned they turn against the conman. Muslims are naturally suspicious to the extent of paranoia and much given to conspiracy theories, so if you can show Mohammed as a person who deceived his own followers (as well as deceiving the kuffars - which is OK), then you will have more seriously undermined their faith than any rational or ethical argument could.
(3b) Nobody likes to be a laughing-stock. So if you can make Mohammed into a figure of ridicule and derision he will no longer appear to be 'The Perfect Man' and role model. This is why the Motoons were so effective.
DISCUSSION...
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