All The More Reason

In this piece the author Brendan O’Neill makes the argument that Iraq has become the world’s first suicide state. Let’s take a quick peek:

The end result is a suicidal state in Iraq, where groups destroy lives and buildings rather than trying to create an independent state built on a clear ideology with the support of large sections of the population. It is not enough to describe these insurgents as ‘evil’, however horrendous their actions might be. We must also interrogate how today’s political crises and the dismantling of the international order contributed to such a ‘perplexing’ violent movement – and find ways to renew the language and politics of liberation, for the people of Iraq and beyond.

I’m not sure it would be fair to criticise a whole piece based on its summarizing paragaph, but let us content ourselves with a sharper usage of the word suicide. If the barbarians in Iraq decided tomorrow that instead of blowing up civilians in mosques or children on the streets that they would instead silently kill themselves in their own dens, then indeed they could own a pretty tight definition of the word suicide. The idea though that a state is wishing to commit suicide implies that it has the consent of at least the majority of its citizens. I would think that their participation in democratic elections would indicate a strong distaste to that idea.

The sheer noise that comes from the self-detonation of jihadists appears to stun some intellectuals long enough as to think that everything around it is somehow part and parcel of that initial cast of murder.

Jonathan Smith