Where are all those who were oh so concerned about the museum in Baghdad when George Bush took the war to the Taliban in 2003. As it happened, every one of the museum’s historic treasurers had been preserved. Now where are these same leftist scum when mankind’s dwindling stock of historic sites is set upon by Islamist vandals. See the real thing in action. From Reuters: With sledgehammer, Islamic State smashes Iraqi our history. And do please note that as they wrote the headline, it is merely Iraqi history, once again covering up both for the Islamists and for the American President who does the least possible he can get away with:
Ultra-radical Islamist militants in northern Iraq have destroyed a priceless collection of statues and sculptures from the ancient Assyrian era, inflicting what an archaeologist described as incalculable damage to a piece of shared human history.
A video published by Islamic State on Thursday showed men attacking the artifacts, some of them identified as antiquities from the 7th century BC, with sledgehammers and drills, saying they were symbols of idolatry.
“The Prophet ordered us to get rid of statues and relics, and his companions did the same when they conquered countries after him,” an unidentified man said in the video.
The smashed articles appeared to come from an antiquities museum in Mosul, the northern city which was overrun by Islamic State last June, a former employee at the museum told Reuters.
And now there is this to add to the above: Islamic State jihadis bulldoze ancient Assyrian city of Nimrud.
THE Islamic State group began bulldozing the ancient Assyrian city of Nimrud in Iraq on Thursday in the jihadists’ latest attack on the country’s historical heritage.
IS “assaulted the historic city of Nimrud and bulldozed it with heavy vehicles,” the tourism and antiquities ministry said on an official Facebook page.
An Iraqi antiquities official confirmed the news, saying the destruction began after noon prayers on Thursday and that trucks that may have been used to haul away artefacts had also been spotted at the site.
It’s from an AFP story, and again the telltale diminishing the story to merely one of local Iraqi interest, nothing to do with the historic stock of our common human heritage. It is we too who are amongst the barbarians if we cannot find it within ourselves to fight these people until they are defeated and ground into the dust.
Barbarism Update: I suppose we should be grateful that these things even get a mention:
It’s a brief seven para story from an unknown news source. If you are looking for some kind of context not just for the barbarities themselves, but for the lack of any serious reaction across the entire spectrum of our media-political elites, let me draw your attention to Roger Scruton’s Culture Counts: Faith and Feeling in a World Besieged which I have just read. Like everything of his, I have come away with a sense of conservative reality I seldom find in the world in which I am personally surrounded by.
Law of Markets 