RE: The two mentally disabled Iraqi women who were turned into remote-control bombs in Baghdad Friday.

From CNN:

Two mentally disabled women were strapped with explosives Friday and sent into busy Baghdad markets, where they were blown up by remote control, a top Iraqi government official said.

The bombs killed at least 98 people and wounded more than 200 at two popular pet markets on the holiest day of the week for Muslims, authorities said.

In both bombings, the attackers were mentally disabled women whose explosive belts were remotely detonated, Gen. Qasim Atta, spokesman for Baghdad’s security plan, told state television.

Atta said the women were strapped with dynamite and ball bearings, citing members of the bomb squad. The explosives were detonated via cell phone, he said.

An Atta aide said that people referred to the bomber at central Baghdad’s al-Ghazl market as the “crazy woman” and that the bomber at a second market had an unspecified birth disability.

The aide said authorities believe the women were unaware of plans to detonate the explosives.

There isn’t much you can do when you read this sort of thing except shake your head and try not to puke.

This morning I was reading the comment thread on Hot Air about this story and was surprised (not really) at how many among us are still able (or willing, or both) to rationalize this sort of behavior as being somehow the natural result of our own AMERICAN “barbaric behavior.”

One comment of clarity among all the others jumped out and caught my eye.  From Hot Air reader Amy Cleaver:

I’ve been mulling this over for the last few days…thinking about that “Grizzly Man” who died (along with his girlfriend) while living with the grizzly bears. It seems like it’s a glaring example of those on the left who believe that if we’re just nice to Islamists, or if they get to know us, or if we feed them, clothe them, give them $, they’ll leave us alone. This Grizzly Man truly believed that he had crossed over some barrier and the bears would be his friend.

I whole-heartedly disagree that those who do something like strap bombs on babies or mentally disabled women are animals. They are humans who’ve made the moral choice to live the evil that they are consumed by, so that’s where my analogy breaks down, but if liberals think that just because they hate GWB that the jihadists won’t cut their heads off, they’re just as deluded as the Grizzly Man was. They don’t recognize danger when they’re exposed to it, and I can only hope that hearing about this will make some of them think twice that America (or GWB, or the American soldier) is the bad guy here.

Sickening…but unfortunately predictable. They value death, and we as a nation, indeed as civilization value life. You can bet that if someone had been tipped off that a mentally disabled person was being wired with a bomb, and one of our soldiers had shot them first, it would be all over Al-Jazeera and every other Islamist website and we would be wholly denounced.  [Emphasis added by me.]

I was speaking with my father recently about the nature of war.  I mentioned to him that I have a hard time imagining how frightening it must have been for the average American in World War II as the specter of Nazi Fascism and Japanese imperialism loomed over the nation—especially when the outcome of the war was still in doubt.  I told him that I thought the threat this time was not nearly as frightening.  He told me he thought that it was.  As a matter of fact, he cautioned that the threat this time might be even more insidious than the one posed by Hitler and Tojo.

The more I think about it, the more I think Dad is right.  At least in World War II you could identify the enemy by the uniform he wore (the use of the masculine “he” was intentional).  And in World War II, you pretty much knew where to find the enemy (so you could kill him).

At least in World War II we were able to reach a point where we could say, “It’s done.  We have isolated the enemy and we have killed him.  The survivors have surrendered.  The war is over.”

That just won’t be the case this time around.

Note: Sorry for the title of this post, but it came from another commenter in the Hot Air post.  It might sound crass, but it’s essentially true.

Technorati Tags: mentally disabled, Iraqi women, remote-control bombs, Baghdad, explosives, Baghdad markets, blown up, Iraqi government, official, pet markets, Muslims, explosive belts, Qasim Atta, dynamite, ball bearings, bomb squad, detonated, cell phone, al-Ghazl market, crazy woman, birth disability, barbaric behavior, the left, Islamists, strap bombs, moral choice, evil, liberals, jihadists, Al-Jazeera, World War II, Nazi Fascism, Japanese imperialism, Hitler, Tojo, uniform

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