January 14, 2015

"The lion cubs of the Khilafah."



One of the saddest photographs I've ever seen. It's a still from an ISIS video, via "ISIS Films Child Soldier Purportedly Executing Russians."

92 comments:

rhhardin said...

In Lord of the Flies, the kids reverted to normal when the adults showed up.

It's the opposite with Islam.

exhelodrvr1 said...

This is why diplomacy will not work with them. (And hashtags, Michelle - how naive can you be?)

Will we realize that in time to save our civilization?

Anonymous said...

One thing it's going to do is piss Putin off. When the KGB gets pissed off, things get very very direct. e.g. the Taking of Russian hostages in Lebanon in the 1980's...

pm317 said...

If this does not wake up governments and politicians and leaders all around the world to come together to develop a strategy to counter this social evil of our times, what will? Where the fuck is the outrage?

In here, they are squabbling over what to call it -- the right saying left is not labeling the fight the right way and the left (Obama) baiting the right by continually not using the right words to describe what is happening. This is insanity. What a nightmare!

Rae said...

These groups really are barbaric, as in they are willing to reject civilization in pursuit of their goals. They also run the risk of being treated how barbarians historically are.
But that wont happen until and unless they manage another really major strike.

pm317 said...

I hope Putin gets royally pissed off and we know Obama will not. Putin in Syria can get rid of the safe heavens for these mfers, because he does not care whether he is helping Assad and where will they go? To Iraq? Set Iran and Russia again to Iraq to get these mfers. Because we know Obama will not. A world coalition is what is needed and Obama is incapable of putting it together.

YoungHegelian said...

The crushing of any sense of conscience, of empathy, of a shared human bond between victor & vanquished has always been a feature of totalitarian ideologies (Nazism, Bolshevism, Maoism). ISIS is no different. The class, racial, religious enemy are simply vermin.

Hitler, indeed, boasted that he'd turn the youth of Germany into magnificent beasts of prey.

Bob Ellison said...

George W. Bush got us started on this road.

exhelodrvr1 said...

Absolutely, Drill Sgt.

Ears in the mail, wasn't it? And it worked.

But our people get prosecuted if they leave the lights on too long in the prison cells!!

pm317 said...

saddest photographs? saddest does not even come close. This should evoke survival instincts for the whole civilized world. Paris march was a good start and it should energize the power players all over the world to get rid of this evil. Will it?

Fuck the lefty media.

pm317 said...

youth of Germany

Were there children? Youth have already been taken by these mfers.

traditionalguy said...

This is a reminder that Obama enacts sanctions to weaken Putin's Russia, but for any excuse he let's Iran out of sanctions so it will realize its nuclear future.

Anonymous said...

@exhelodrvr1 said...

The Russians have always believed that few military ops fail because of too much force, and few demolitions from too much explosive.

Russians may be great chess players, but given the choice between finesse and brut force, force is always preferred. (sort of Slavic Marines :)

I expect explosions in ISIL Land with no planes being spotted. And the explosions won't be SDB's




Eric the Fruit Bat said...

Executing a Russian is one thing but slapping a girl is quite another.

Drago said...

Is this the JV team obama told us not to worry about?

rhhardin said...

Derrida had the nicest take, a leftist destroying every leftist argument in short order, when asked if he would take sides :

``What appears to me unacceptable in the ``strategy'' (in terms of weapons, practices, ideology, rhetoric, discourse, and so on) of the ``bin Laden effect'' is not only the cruelty, the disregard for human life, the disrespect for the law, for women, the use of what is worst in technocapitalist modernity for the purposes of religious fanaticism. No, it is, above all, the fact that such actions and such discourse _open onto no future and, in my view, have no future_. If we are to put any faith in the perfectibility of public space and of the world juridico-political scene, of the ``world'' itself, then there is, it seems to me, _nothing good_ to be hoped for from that quarter. What is being proposed, at least implicitly, is that all captialist and modern technoscientific forces be put in the service of an interpretation, itself dogmatic, of the Islamic revelation of the One. Nothing of what has been so laboriously secularized in even the nontheological form of sovereignty (...), none of this seems to have any place whatsoever in the discourse ``bin Laden.'' That is why, in this unleashing of violence without name, if I had to take one of the two sides and choose in a binary situation, well I would. Despite my very strong reservations about the American, indeed European, political posture, about the ``international terrorist'' coalition, despite all the de facto betrayals, all the failures to live up to democracy, international law, and the very international institutions that the states of this ``coalition'' themselves founded and supported up to a certain point, I would take the side of the camp that, in principle, by right of law, leaves a perspective open to perfectibility in the name of the ``political,'' democracy, international law, international institutions, and so forth. Even if this ``in the name of'' is still merely an assertion and a purely verbal committment. Even in its most cynical mode, such an assertion still lets resonate within it an invincible promise. I don't hear any such promise coming from ``bin Laden,'' at least not one in this world.''

``Autoimmunity: Real and Symbolic Suicides'' _Philosophy in a Time of Terror_ p.113

Unknown said...

Reminiscent of Cambodian "Year Zero."

Unknown said...

Good for Jacques Derrida.

Anonymous said...

The Putin Way

Michael K said...

We will not have to wait too long before such videos will be made in this country. The political left has limited imagination. They cannot believe that such events are possible and that these children will melt when offered love and cuddly toys.

Look at Huffington Post to see what is important to them.

Brando said...

Smart move--it's not as though the Russians ever strike back twice as hard.

Much as I don't like the U.S. getting involved in foreign adventures, maybe in this case we could cut a deal with the Russians--we use our boats and planes to deliver their troops to the war zone and we promise to look away.

Kevin said...

It shouldn't only make you sad.

It should make you mad as hell.

William said...

Charles Taylor used child soldiers. He used them to rape little girls. Then he used the child soldiers to cut off the arms of the little girls they had raped.....The media was not supportive of such tactics, but neither did they go out of their way to report them......An atrocity depends not on the nature of the atrocity but rather on who does what to whom. During WWI , the Germans committed a certain number of atrocities in their occupation of Belgium. But, of course, such atrocities were just a minuscule fraction of the atrocities that Belgium had committed in the Congo.

irishguard said...

Bob Ellison said, "George W. Bush got us started on this road."....Or was it 9/11 that started Bush?...or was it our bombing an aspirin factory? Or was it before all that?

pm317 said...

And who made Syria what it is today? Saudis? Turks? and whose side was Obama on? What led to Syria becoming a safe heaven for this evil..and of course spread to Iraq easily..

exhelodrvr1 said...

The lack of an effective response to ISIS, which has resulted in events such as this, is what we get for electing Obama.

Drago said...

Any discussion about the rise of radical islam that does not include a significant discussion around Sayyid Qutb and the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood is probably not worth reading.

Drago said...

My last comment was related to irishguard's post.

Anonymous said...

exhelodrvr1 said...
Absolutely, Drill Sgt.

Ears in the mail, wasn't it? And it worked.


They sent the Russian Delta Force... (wiki version)

Six years later, in October 1985, Alpha Group was dispatched to war-torn Beirut, Lebanon. The Kremlin was informed of the kidnapping of four Soviet diplomats by the militant group, the Islamic Liberation Organization (a radical offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood). It was believed that this was retaliation for the Soviet support of Syrian involvement in the Lebanese Civil War. However, by the time Alpha arrived, one of the hostages had already been killed. Through a network of supporting KGB operatives, members of the task-force identified each of the perpetrators involved in the crisis, and once identified, began to take the relatives of these militants as hostages. Following the standard Soviet policy of no negotiations with terrorists, some of the hostages taken by Alpha Group were dismembered, and their body parts sent to the militants. The warning was clear: more would follow unless the remaining hostages were released immediately. The show of force worked, and for a period of 20 years no Soviet or Russian officials were taken captive, until the 2006 abduction and murder of four Russian embassy staff in Iraq

pm317 said...

And where is the lefty media in this country reporting on things like these? When the press self-censors, there is no free speech. American media/press and in general America ought to be ashamed. There is no free speech here. For all its God given wealth in intellect and physical riches, much more than any country in the world has amassed in such a short time, America has degenerated into a sophisticated dictatorship, no longer free or just or brave or benevolent. What a shame!

Balfegor said...

There was a photo, wasn't there, of the son of one of the Syrian rebels playing with the decapitated head of a soldier? It's horrible, but we're talking about horrible people.

dreams said...

Coming to a neighborhood near you?

Michael said...

I sniff some judgmentalism here.

MayBee said...

Indeed, reminiscent of the Lost Boys.

Question: we see what they are willing to do in the name of Islam.
Does the US government refusing to call them Islamic help fight against this mentality, or play into it?

I say play into it.

AllenS said...

Obama needs to draw a line in the sand.

dreams said...

And we might have a sleeper cell in the White House.

http://pjmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2015/01/12/sleeper-cell

Drago said...

garage will be along shortly to explain why this is all Israel's fault and that his pointing it out should not be considered anti-semitic because lots of American Jews are democrats.

dreams said...

"Obama needs to draw a line in the sand."

Do you know for sure which side Obama is on?

dreams said...

I still say it wasn't a good idea to elect an enemy of our country to be our president.

Ann Althouse said...

"If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea."

dreams said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
virgil xenophon said...

William@1102/

I see you've fallen prey to bad history. The stories of German "atrocities" in WW I in Belgium have long been proven by more than one historian to have been largely British war propaganda..

FleetUSA said...

And Choom still doesn't want to call them for what they are and go after them with vengeance.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

Kevin said...

It should make you mad as hell.

Of course it makes the Professor mad as hell. ( Not the part about forcing the child to execute hostages. Just the part about using a child in their PR campaign. )

jr565 said...

Bob Ellison wrote:
George W. Bush got us started on this road.

Right, because prior to bush no one said Islam was a religion of peace.
Bush was separating Al Qaeda and their ilk from those who aren't joining Boko Haram. Many of it's victims are in fact muslims.
So, Bush was of course right to make the distinction.
The problem though is that its getting harder and harder to determine who the muslims perverting the religion are. Is it the muslims just praying in the mosque down the street or the jihadists chopping off peoples heads.Maybe it's the secular muslim that is the perversion.

Unless a president wants to wage war against the entire ME he can't say that ALL muslims are fundamentalists.
At least he called terrorists terrorists.

jr565 said...

"Obama needs to draw a line in the sand."
LOL. Why, so he can not enforce it when people step over the line. Because we all know he isn't going to.

jr565 said...

If that kid was shooting people, I have no problem if someone wastes that kid with a bullet to the stomach. And hope he dies a painful death.
Yeah yeah, its a kid. Not any more he isn't. He's just a soldier younger than most.

jr565 said...

Was he even forced to kill those prisoners? I bet he did it willingly and lost little sleep over it.

n.n said...

Sexualized and weaponized at an early age. Watching pro-abortion rallies to empathize with their enemy's debasement of human life. Islamic extremism is a projection of Western liberalism, both universal and violent; but its propensity to execute its procedures outside the privacy of a clinic is offensive to Westerners' delicate sensibilities.

Kirk Parker said...

jr565,

"bullet to the stomach"

What a stupid thing to say. If the kid's holding a gun and shooting people, you want to make him stop in the quickest way possible.

SDaly said...

I don't think this kid was a believer in Jesus's divinity, so it seems unlikely that the millstone quote applies. This also seems an odd exercise in your "pick and choose" Christianity. The quote would better apply to those trying to normalize homosexuality in Christian culture.

Gahrie said...

"If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea."

Great quote. But most Muslims wouldn't consider killing unbelievers to be stumbling...they would consider allowing non-Muslims to live to be stumbling.

furious_a said...

#StopUsingChildSoldiers

Known Unknown said...

Looks like a Rolling Stone cover to me.

gerry said...

Bob Ellison said, "George W. Bush got us started on this road."....Or was it 9/11 that started Bush?...or was it our bombing an aspirin factory? Or was it before all that?

And can you believe it, Bob Ellison is still blaming Bush?

tim in vermont said...

The picture is so bothersome because the boy is so adorable. Feminists love adorable boys, just not men. Here is an adorable boy engaging in evil. "Does not compute! Does not compute!"

jacksonjay said...

Clearly NASA has failed!

"When I became the NASA administrator, (President Obama) charged me with three things,"...and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math and engineering."

iowan2 said...

Regardless of the outcome of a battle ,war,etc. Muslims never accept defeat. Even in death they live on through their heirs to continue to kill all that refuse to submit to Islam
There is no negotiation, only death.

jacksonjay said...

BTW, ignoring ISIS, losing elections, making law, making regulations, Hawaiian ice, ignoring Paris and MarieHarfsplaining have driven Obama's poll numbers UP.

tim in vermont said...

BTW, ignoring ISIS, losing elections, making law, making regulations, Hawaiian ice, ignoring Paris and MarieHarfsplaining have driven Obama's poll numbers UP.

The game has always been to undermine the basic assumptions regarding a democratic republic, rule of law, and the meaning of the word "freedom."

They are very good at it.

garage mahal said...

BTW, ignoring ISIS, losing elections, making law, making regulations, Hawaiian ice, ignoring Paris and MarieHarfsplaining have driven Obama's poll numbers UP.

Obama's poll numbers are where Reagans were at at the same point in their 2nd terms. Higher than Bush and lower than Clinton.

Hagar said...

Can you top this?
Mayor deBlasio says NYC will issue ID cards to illegal aliens, "because he does not want them to feel like second-rate citizens"!

Matt Sablan said...

This is sad; it shouldn't get turned into a political football.

Drago said...

garage: "Obama's poll numbers are where Reagans were at at the same point in their 2nd terms. Higher than Bush and lower than Clinton"

Apparently the world doesn't care about America's internal poll numbers. Reality continues apace.

Charlie Currie said...

These are not the Muslims you are looking for.

Obama mind trick...

Michael K said...

"Obama's poll numbers are where Reagans were at at the same point in their 2nd terms. Higher than Bush and lower than Clinton."

Let's see where they are in ten years. Obama has been the beneficiary of the dumbing down of the nation's citizens. Eventually, that will change out of necessity.

jacksonjay said...

Yeah, in spite of the brutal press coverage Obama gets everyday, his approval is higher than W.

n.n said...

Michael K:

Obama is the beneficiary of not only "dumbing down", but also mass consumption of opiates (e.g. dissociation of risk). Essentially, the people are dopes and doped.

Mark said...

"This is sad; it shouldn't get turned into a political football."

Agree with you, Matthew Sabian.

It seems like most are using this as ammunition in their partisan war against other citizens.

Same lack of results as always.

Sydney said...

If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

That's in three of the four gospels, so He must have meant it. I wonder where in Dante's hell these people would be? The last and final circle with Judas?

Larry J said...

We're we told that all cultures are equal, except they're better than ours, and that we shouldn't criticize them? Yeah, right. Political correctness and multiculturalism will be the death of freedom unless we stop it.

That's one messed up kid. He's quite possibly beyond salvaging.

gerry said...

"If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea."

This is an interesting post from someone who has likely influenced "little ones—those who believe in me" to morally equate homosexual behavior with heterosexual behavior, perhaps causing them to stumble, to be misled.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

Now you need to add your lightweight religion tag.

The Godfather said...

Yes, this was barbaric. They are barbarians. We knew that already, those of us who pay attention. So what changes?

The next US president is not going to be elected based on his/her commitment to destroy (not "degrade") ISIS and al Qaida and their ilk, but I pray that we elect a conservative who, in addition to his/her pro-free enterprise domestic agenda, will be committed to leading the civilized world in a crusade (perhaps differently named) against the barbarians. I wouldn't count on either the Russians or the French to do the job for us.

Would you?

The Godfather said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jason said...

Eh. When I was in Ramadi they would hand grenades to 10 year olds and convince them to throw them over the fence at us.

The only people shocked by this are dumbasses who haven't been paying attention to who these people are.

Jason said...

"Quite possibly beyond salvaging."

I am a Christian. There is no such thing as a human being "beyond salvaging."

furious_a said...

Muslims never accept defeat.

They're like Russ Feingold in that way: It's not over 'til we win.

jacksonjay said...

Obama crowed for a year, prior to re-election, about Al Qaeda decimated, on the run. He mocked those who pushed back. He mocked and corrupted the Benghazi affair. He traded Gitmos for a deserter. He released Gitmos. His State Department responded to Boko Haram with hash-tag bullshit. He called these savages the JV. He has responded in a half-assed, I've got a tee-time manner. So yeah, I see why this should not be political.

Marc in Eugene said...

Matthew 18.6 is immediately where my mind went, too, when I saw that photograph last night or this morning; I hoped Althouse would write about this. Thank you!

jacksonjay said...

I failed to mention that Obama wasted the win in Iraq and then tried to blame it on Bush. Left them vulnerable and ISIS filled that void. Kurdish women are now fighting these monsters as the "troops on the ground." He is now, quietly, sending troops back into Iraq. Our brave warriors and veterans are pissed, and who can blame them. Yeah, for me it is political.

David said...

I will take your word for it. No plans to watch.

Ann Althouse said...

@Marc Puckett

I'm glad to find you in this crowd.

Original Mike said...

jr565 said:
"If that kid was shooting people, I have no problem if someone wastes that kid with a bullet to the stomach. And hope he dies a painful death."

Get a grip, man.

Larry J said...

"Blogger Jason said...
"Quite possibly beyond salvaging."

I am a Christian. There is no such thing as a human being "beyond salvaging."

Well, he isn't a Christian, has been taught it's Ok to kill, and has already killed at least two men. That can really mess up a boy's mind.

Be said...

The thing that hits home to me in this propaganda bit is that I could have met that kid (or a kid looking like him) at the last child of friends in Cambridge, MA birthday party I attended.

Be said...

Mr. Drago: A Gay, hypochondriac Frenchman eats a bit of pound cake, drinks some linden tea, and we end up with an amazing semi-biographical history of a Changing Europe.

A (possibly gay; dunno) Angry Young Man gets a Bad Haircut on Study Abroad in Dar al Haram, and we end up with another version of "Mein Kampf."

Be said...

How have folks dealt with rehabilitating kids drugged and sent out to kill in the past? (Aside from the Mongols vs the Assassins, the former being Nominal of the Nestorian Branch.)

Known Unknown said...

Didn't watch the video, but it is verifiably real?

From the screengrab, looks a bit phony.

Known Unknown said...

Well, he isn't a Christian, has been taught it's Ok to kill, and has already killed at least two men. That can really mess up a boy's mind.

He needs us most of all.

Laslo Spatula said...

Be said...
"How have folks dealt with rehabilitating kids drugged and sent out to kill in the past? (Aside from the Mongols vs the Assassins, the former being Nominal of the Nestorian Branch.)"

You're baiting me on my Charles Manson proclivities.

I am Laslo.

chillblaine said...

This image didn't make me feel sad or feel anything. Maybe hopeful that the little monster will be atomized by munitions that I helped pay for, in front of his father. Yes, it makes me feel hopeful for that.