Please take a look at this article from the al-Akhbar English language website. I think that it is extremely interesting as it shows the true face of the Saudi Kingdom, not one of modernism and progress, but one of crass pre-medieval barbarity. Let me point of a few things here:
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| Wahabi crucifixion in Yemen |
a) Crucifixion as a method of executing is legal in Saudi Arabia. Yup, that’s right. What the pagan Romans did 2000 year ago, the Saudi Wahabi still do today, and its all legal.
b) The Saudis practice dismemberment. Now that practice has far more recent precedents, in particular in the European Middle-Ages.
c) The person they want to crucify is a Shia cleric. Yes, you read that right – a Shia cleric. The charges against him? “inciting sectarian strife,” “aiding terrorists,” and “insulting Gulf leaders and scholars.” Translated into plain English these would read: support for the cause of the oppressed Shia minority in the KSA, having contacts with Iran, criticizing Wahabism. In other words, he is clearly a “prisoner of conscience”, a political prisoner, somebody charged with political crimes and not actual criminal violations.
Do you remember Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani? She is an Iranian woman sentenced to death by stoning for the murder of her husband by a court in Tabriz. Her case the entire planet erupted in protests, and even many friends of Iran used all their connections to have this sentence overturned which, eventually, it was. Her final status is still unsure.
Now, as an Orthodox Christian I oppose the death penalty on principle. Furthermore, the idea that the all-loving and infinitely merciful God would want anybody to be executed by stoning, crucifixion or dismemberment strikes me as absolutely preposterous and outright blasphemous. I therefore am absolutely appalled that a court in Iran would be capable of handing down such a barbaric sentence. However, having said that, I do not some striking differences between the two cases.
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| Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr |
Ashtiani was accused of murder. Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr has not committed any violent crime. Then, Ashtiani’s case triggered a huge worldwide wave of outrage. Has anybody even heard about the case of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr? Not the Western “human rights” organizations for sure. They are probably too busy presenting the “Pussy Riot” group as a noble defender of free speech…
I have written many times here that the Zionist entity called “Israel” is an abomination, a stain on the honor of the entire planet, a disgrace for all of mankind: it is the last openly racist state on the planet and it’s ideology actually makes the claim that Jewish racism is God-given. Yes, I still believe that Israel is truly the worst abomination on the planet. But I would rank Saudi Arabia as a clear second worst regime. Both Israel and the KSA are anachronisms is the sense that their true ideology is medieval in its barbarity and fundamentally aggressive and violent by nature.
And yet, these are the closest allies of the USA in the region. The USA, Israel and the KSA – talk about an axis of evil! Talk about “rogue nations”!
And yet, who stands up to these two murderous and crazed regimes? Really only Iran. Everybody else either lacks to guts to say anything, or they actively collaborate with these states and their respective lobbies in the USA.
And in the meantime, while the USA is subsidising these to satanic regimes with billions of dollars, the Zionists and the Wahabis are destablizing countries worldwide. As for Iran, the only country to truly stand up and resist these two abominations, it is the victim of international sanctions under the totally fallacious pretext that one day Iran “might” develop a nuclear weapon while being under the stricest of monitoring by the IAEA.
It is undeniable that the USA is “in bed” with the worst of the worst, regimes which are so evil and corrupt as to justify their worst abominations by claiming that this is the Will of God.
I can only hope that the BRICS countries will now reach out to Iran and help it economically and politically.
The Saker
Don’t know if it’s reliable but Wikipedia claims that Iran has got rid of stoining.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoning
“Iran
Further information: Capital punishment in Iran
The Iranian judiciary officially placed a moratorium on stoning in 2002. In 2005, judiciary spokesman Jamal Karimirad stated, “in the Islamic republic, we do not see such punishments being carried out”, further adding that if stoning sentences were passed by lower courts, they were overruled by higher courts and “no such verdicts have been carried out.” However, in July 2007, the judiciary announced that convicted adulterer Jafar Kian had been stoned to death in Qazvin province.
In 2008, the judiciary decided to fully scrap the punishment from the books in legislation submitted to parliament for approval.”
@Robert: thanks for this information which I was not aware of. Frankly, it is a small consolation for me. At a time when an increasing number of nations are gradually coming to realize that there is no way to legally execute while remaining civilized and that the death penalty needs to be abolished not for the sake of the accused, but for the sake of the whole of society, I find the Iranian situation rather distressing. To say “we have a moratorium on stoning” sounds to me just about as positive as “we have a moratorium on cannibalism” or “we have a moratorium on slavery”.
I am personally very much opposed to a single definition of human rights or for the imposition of one single set of rules or guidelines on all countries since, after all, it should remain the free right of each civilization to live as it wishes to.
So when I hear of the death penalty in a country like Iran, I remain quiet if only because even capital punishment is not, in my opinion, something which all civilized human being have to agree upon.
But stoning?
That for me crosses the line of what I am willing to remain silent about in respect for the local traditions. That is outright barbaric. It combines capital punishment and one of the worst forms of torture, and it does so in a uniquely cowardly way – by having a mob lob stones at a defenseless target. That, in my opinion, is below any definition of “civilized”.
Now, I fully understand the power of the image of “stoning the devil” and, as a metaphor, as a symbol, I fully approve of it. But as soon as this practice is transposed from the theological realm into the legal one I cannot conceive of a justification for it.
I sincerely hope that one day the entire Muslim world will condemn and reject such horrors. A ‘moratorium’ just is not good enough IMNSHO.
Cheers,
The Saker