Hamas: "The Killers' Creed"

A devastating analysis from Robert Tracinski, TIA - The Intellectual Activist

The piece below compares the mentality behind the Palestinian raid on Israel—the refusal to allow Israel to disengage, the continued assistance on picking a fight, no matter how devastating that battle is for the Palestinians themselves—to the mentality of a stalker or a wife-beater, who cannot live without someone to attack and abuse.

My thesis in "The Killers' Creed" begins with a journalistic observation similar to this one, but broader: the parallel between the psychology of a criminal and the violent mentality endemic to the Arab and Muslim worlds.

As described in books like Inside the Criminal Mind, the main characteristic of the criminal mentality is an impossibly grandiose self-image—the criminal sees himself as a kind of god whose whims are law—combined with an actual lack of efficacy in this world: deep down, the criminal knows he is a pathetic loser.

It is the gap between this grandiose self-image and the criminal's actual inadequacy that triggers his murderous rage (particularly in serial killers of the type described in the book Mindhunter).

My thesis is that Islam generates this psychology, not in a small minority of men, but among the masses of its adherents. A central message of Islam is that the Muslim man is entitled to rule—over women, over members of other tribes, and especially over non-Muslims. But his fanatical faith gives the Muslim no guidance for actually being successful and earning power or respect—especially compared to the wealth and power of us infidels in the West.

This is a powerful engine for inducing, among many millions of people, the murderous rage seen only among stalkers and serial killers in civilized societies.

"Hamas Can't Let Israel Go," Alan Kaufman, Los Angeles Times, July 6

There is something psychologically profound about Hamas abducting to Gaza and holding hostage an Israeli soldier, 19-year-old Cpl. Gilad Shalit. You would think that the very last thing the Palestinians would want to import to Gaza is precisely the emblem of their former occupation: a soldier.

And yet, on a psychological plane, this seemingly senseless political act may be symbolically important. Perhaps without the soldier in their midst, the Palestinians in and of themselves feel no existential purpose. Perhaps they have no way to establish their own sense of destiny without the perpetual agony of conflict with Israel….

Each rocket, each murder, is a painful tap on Israel's shoulder from a frustrated former marriage partner who cannot let go and is threatening homicide….

Unfortunately, Israel cannot take out a restraining order against Hamas….

It has become abundantly clear since the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and the advent of the Hamas government, that not even disengagement is enough.

Hamas, like a jilted homicidal lover, will not rest until Israel is destroyed.

Comments

[Lorin Friesen]

This makes great sense to me, the criminal mindset!

I must start subscribing to the IA, just to learn about the sculptor Sandra Shaw.