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Syria: Another Crusade

Janet Phelan, May 18

54353It is said that every act of magnitude taking place in a political realm is generally overdetermined. That would include an act of war. While the wars raging now in the Middle East are largely considered to be either 1) wars against terrorism or alternatively 2) wars for resources, i.e. oil, there may be other tributaries which are less obvious.

The Middle East has become a powder keg, certainly since the events of September 11. I’ll amend that—the Middle East is actually exploding since 911. The wars against “radical Islam” may in fact be termed as a Crusade, a Holy Crusade to wipe off the earth alternative religion(s). Viewed in the context of a Holy War, one might wish to carefully examine certain aspects of the meme, the religious mentality, of the Crusaders. That would be their Christianity.

Christianity can be seen, in a certain context, as a cargo cult. “Cargo cult” is defined here not so much in terms of the general anthropological definition –the reaction of tribal societies to the impact of contact with a highly technological culture (although currently Christianity certainly exhibits some of these grossly materialistic aspects in some of its forms). Rather, we are focusing on the aspect of cargo cults suggested by J G Ballard in his science fiction story, entitled “A Question of Re-entry.” While invoking the more traditional definition of “cargo cult,” Ballard also implies a more generalized religious aspect to the anticipation of big spaceships hauling goodies, when he describes an Amazonian tribe in the following manner: “Some time in the future they expect a giant galleon or magic bird to arrive carrying an everlasting cornucopia of worldly goods, so they just sit about waiting for the great day.” His images cannot help but invoke the religious idea of awaiting the coming of a celestial Savior, with all that this implies. While it is likely that this aspect of Christianity was introduced at a late date, when determinations were made to make Christianity a state religion, it nevertheless currently pervades many branches of Christianity.

The ethics of ‘loving your neighbor as yourself’ and the implied extension of salvation seen in the Good Samaritan parable are obviously absent from the current Holy War. However, the cargo cult aspect inherent in most current manifestations of Christianity leads its followers towards certain overt actions and non-actions. The idea of awaiting a Savior who will transport the believers into another, better world encourages a particular mind set. This mindset devalues activism, devalues the necessary and difficult work of humanity, which may at this juncture involve the ethic of self-extension and tolerance, rather than clobbering other cultures into non-existence. This mindset also devalues the core concept of Christianity, which is brotherly love.

The cargo cult nature of Christianity, which may indeed have been introduced into the religion at the Nicaean Council of 325 AD, encourages instead a focus on self, the salvation of self and the condemnation of those who are considered to be extraneous to this belief system. As long as one is a true believer, according to Christianity, one is ensured a seat on the celestial spaceship. If your neighbor (or one who has another religious affiliation) is not making the passenger list, well, it must be his own fault. Not my problem, as they say. In a sense, this self-fixation may justify the assault on the Middle East.

As the dominant self-professed religion of the globalists, Christianity serves a number of purposes. It provides a justification for invading countries which adhere to a different religion. It exonerates the practitioners from the necessity of extending the loving aspect of Christianity to their “heathen” adversaries. And it also encourages a form of passivity at the very time when a protest, an outcry against these Holy Wars, should be taking place all over the globe.

The extensively researched and documented use of false flag events to launch these Holy Wars might well provide the launching pad for the necessary global protests against the spurious techniques of the Crusaders. Most recently, we are seeing the false flag efforts in Syria, where multiple gas attacks, attributed to Assad, appear to trace back to the Crusaders and their desire for another war. Not only did emails surface which implicated the Crusaders in the Damascus attack but, having fastened on gas attacks as a means to indict Assad and launch yet another Middle Eastern war, the Crusaders are now declaring that the recent poison gas attack of April 30 must be attributed to Assad because only Assad has helicopters(!) and helicopters were used in the attack

The in-your-face “Just Say Anything” nature of the Crusaders’ pronouncements here reveals a certain smugness, a perception that the reading public is so dumb that it will accept unquestioningly whatever is put into print. This indicates once again the calculated effect of a cargo cult passivity. The fact that the desired war against Syria might well have another impetus, which would be to bait Syria into attacking Israel, implies yet another target for the Holy Warriors—the Jewish state. It’s a classic ploy called “Let’s you and him fight!”

But as long as the Crusaders are on a roll, they might as well annihilate all who are practicing offending religions. When the last bomb has fallen and the rubble is cleared away, we may in fact see the culmination of centuries of effort to create a single dominant religion, flying under the flag of a single dominant state.

Janet C. Phelan, investigative journalist and human rights defender that has traveled pretty extensively over the Asian region, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.