Muslims, mobs, murder & misinformation........

 

The US intelligence services continue to swap ignorance over events at our missions abroad. Our President claims the Benghazi and Cairo attacks were spontaneous on one day and were planned on another. Our Ambassador to the UN assures member nations that the demonstrations were only in reaction to an anti-Muslim film trailer that went viral while our Secretary of State is forming a panel to investigate the Benghazi attack to learn the real truth.  Was it not Hilary Clinton who said, regarding the uprisings in Libya, that we need to find out who the rebels are? It would appear as if she still does not know.

 

I suspect the two ex Navy Seals who were killed during the same incident as Ambassador Stevens were contracted to identify internal Libyan and foreign terrorist cells operating in the country. Even the US admits they were not there to protect the Ambassador. Nor were they State Department employees. One can but wonder why the Ambassador was even in Benghazi after having reportedly been party to intelligence that a move on Benghazi was afoot.

 

And what about the Ambassador? Initially, he was said to have been wounded and was taken by Libyans to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead from smoke inhalation. Subsequently Stevens was reported to have been sodomized and later dragged through the streets of Benghazi.

 

When the book comes out, and there will certainly be one, we may finally learn more about the Ambassador and the events surrounding his and his staff's demise at the hands of terrorists. He appears to have suffered from a Lawrence of Arabia complex whereby he alone had the talent, charisma and sensitivities to resolve ancient local and regional disputes among the Arab and Berber tribes.

 

Egypt is another story. In spite of initial claims that the anti-Muslim film was written and produced by an American claiming Israeli Jewish heritage, the real culprit was a Copt by the name of Nakoula Basseley Nakoula also known as Sam Bacile. It would appear as if Nakoula has a serious axe to grind with Egyptian Muslims who he accuses, correctly, of persecuting his fellow Copts. Hence, Nakoula produced the film to get back at the Egyptian Muslims. Judging from his personal history as a fraud and criminal, Nakoula had no regard for the incendiary reaction the film would inspire in the Muslim world. His personal vendetta was more important then its consequences.

 

Sadly, our beloved Egyptians, who I always viewed as the intellectual head of Islam and who were always first in moderating extremist Islamic views, have disappointed us. On the other hand, the theory that foreign terrorist cells in Cairo hijacked what was intended to be a peaceful demonstration, could be correct. No doubt that are foreign cells stirring up trouble among Cairo's faithful. The role and importance of these cells has yet to be determined. What is clear is that Egypt has ruined generations of good will gained through practical diplomacy and is now relegated to the heap of ex-Arab Spring states whose future is a reversion to fundamental Islam.

 

Who would have thought that Tunisia would have joined in the fray? The only bastion of religious tolerance, tourism, culture and commerce in North Africa has gone the way of Libya and Algeria. Nor, according to some reports, is Morocco far behind in reversion to type. To be sure, the French are not helping by printing inflammatory cartoons of The Prophet. What in the world ever prompted some second rate publication to do such a thing?  Especially after the experiences with cartoons in Denmark and the assassination of Theo Van Gogh in Holland for anti Islamic remarks and, most of all, the fatwa issued against Salmon Rushdie for his Satanic Verses. Such behavior might be expected from Hollywood, but certainly not from France.

 

Now there is a worldwide appeal for an international law against blasphemy.