When a Palestinian teen shed the last traits of humanity

[shira]

What brought a 16-year-old West Banker to such vicious depths as to murder the sleeping Israeli man-child in the adjoining seat on a bus on Wednesday? The drip-drip poison of incitement

I cannot get the vision of Eden Atias, stabbed again and again and again, and bleeding to death in his blue fabric seat on a bus at Afula bus station on Wednesday morning, out of my head. And I’m sure I’m not alone in the abiding sense of horror and despair.

A young man, conscripted into the Israeli army just two weeks earlier, fast asleep in his seat on a bus inside Israel, knifed over and over by a Palestinian teenager so consumed, so spilling over with hatred as to have truly lost “the image of God.”

All killing is foul, all terrorist murders indefensible. But this assault is particularly depraved and depressing. For it sickeningly demonstrates an atmosphere and a mindset evidently prevalent, among at least some Palestinians in the West Bank, that leaves no room for optimism in the short-term. And it underlines the nature of the task ahead if there is to be any substantive change for the better in the medium-term.....

....Almost nobody, no matter how flawed, how skewed, how filled with hatred, sinks so low as to take a life in cold blood.

....The main enemy of Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation is the hatred for Israel that is being nurtured daily in the hearts of so many in the West Bank and Gaza — the constant peddling of the narrative that says Israel has no right to exist, and that its people are rapacious invaders who must be struck down. Sixteen years filled only with that despicable falsehood brought Hussein Rawarda to the moment, on Wednesday morning, when he shed the last vestiges of his humanity and took away Eden Atias’s life.

http://www.timesofisrael.com/when-a-palestinian-teen-shed-the-last-traits-of-humanity/

[Scootaloo]

1. So, would you estimate him to be? Ratte oder schwein? n/t

[shira]

2. Obviously, those who'd stab a random 18 year old boy to death are doing the dehumanizing....

...as well as those who tend to understand and relate to the murderer.

[Scootaloo]

3. Dehumanizing the victim or his murderer is uncalled for, Shira

It's really just that simple, I'm sure even you an understand it, even if we both know you will refuse to apply it.

[shira]

4. The murderer is being dehumanized? You've lost it.

I don't think you're capable of telling reality from fiction anymore.

[Scootaloo]

5. Shira... read your fucking article.

The title of the article: When a Palestinian teen shed the last traits of humanity
Some excerpts:

a Palestinian teenager so consumed, so spilling over with hatred as to have truly lost “the image of God.”

Hussein Rawarda killed Eden Atias because he was so consumed with hatred for this sleeping man-child that none of those last human failsafes, those final limits that protect us from shedding the last traits of our humanity, none of those could compete with his cold insistence on taking that life.

Sixteen years filled only with that despicable falsehood brought Hussein Rawarda to the moment, on Wednesday morning, when he shed the last vestiges of his humanity and took away Eden Atias’s life.

Horovotz' entire point is that this kid is no longer human, but something inferior. Did you miss that, when you typed in the title, and selected your excerpts from this article?

Rawarda is a murderer. Only human beings can be murderers.

[shira]

6. You equate the 2 views; the murderer w/ the victim. There's something really wrong with that. n/t

[Scootaloo]

7. I'm not sure you know the meanings of the words you're trying to use n/t

[shira]

9. You're equating the writer of the OP with the murderer and those who incited him....

....to hate and want to kill Jews. On one side are the Palestinians who constantly incite others to want to hate and murder Jews. They dehumanize these Jewish "pigs and apes". On the other are concerned people and critics who point out that this incitement is very wrong and quite evil.

Therefore, these 2 types of dehumanization, as you see it, are equivalent and thus both are abhorrent.

Reminds me of your argument from last week about the new antisemitism (anti-zionist hatred of Israel) having nothing to do with everyday antisemitic acts like the murder of this teen on the bus. Your irrational obsession with Israeli Zionists and their supporters who are not antizionists (none of whom in your view are liberal) leads to dehumanization resulting in senseless antisemitic murders like this one.

The murderer was taught early on that Jews are the enemy, they're all racists, all supporters of ethnic cleansing and apartheid, who act like Nazis against the Palestinians. Basically, your political view on all that is I/P in a nutshell. But it's only criticism, right? Not dehumanization. Certainly not antisemitic. And MOST certainly in no way would ever lead anyone to see Jews as subhumans unworthy of living.

Wake the fuck up.

[Scootaloo]

11. Hardly, Shira

The author didn't murder anyone, at least not that I'm aware of. He's hardly classed with Rawarda in my mind.

I'm saying, simply, that to declare him to be non-human, indeed sub-human... is unacceptable. You seem to be struggling with this, which I suppose isn't terribly surprising.

If it's any consolation to you, I'm not making a special case for this kid. I loathe the American tendency to classify criminals as "monsters," or "animals." Plenty of 'em are pretty awful people, but that doesn't mean they stop being people.

[Violet_Crumble]

8. Have you checked out the comments section? It's even worse...

Quick question. I'll ask you as you actually do the answering questions thing.

I haven't read much about this. Was there a political motivation for this murder? It reminds me of that murder in Canada a few years ago where a guy sleeping in his seat was repeatedly stabbed and decapitated. But in that article and one other I saw, there were multiple references to 'terrorism' and 'Arab', so I'm wondering if this is politically motivated or whether any crime committed by an Arab is automatically labelled terrorism...

[Scootaloo]

10. This is the first I've heard of this particular killing

But yeah, it does remind me of the one you're talking about.

In 2008, Tim McLean was sleeping aboard a greyhound bus crossing Manitoba, when the passenger behind him, Vince Weiguang Li, attacked him, stabbing him in the neck until his head nearly came off. Then Li reportedly began eating.

Li was found to be not criminally responsible, and was remanded to a high-security mental hospital.

There were no articles proclaiming him to be subhuman (that I know of) and certainly none that concluded it to be a uniquely Chinese pathology. PETA, ever-classy, did compare the murder to the consumption of livestock, but... you know, PETA.

This article is reminiscent of how, here in the US, our media has a tendency to talk about "black" things - "black poverty," "black fatherlessness," "black crime," "black gang culture," that sort of thing. Abagond lays this out better - and with more posts - than I'm able to.

[oberliner]

12. "... he stabbed the soldier because his uncles were in an Israeli jail."

From Al-Jazeera:

They said he boarded the bus on the Nazareth-Afula route and attacked the 20-year-old soldier as the vehicle arrived at its destination.

Army radio cited the Palestinian as saying he stabbed the soldier because his uncles were in an Israeli jail.

Hamas, the rulers of the Gaza Strip, congratulated the suspected attacker.

"Congratulations to the Palestinian West Bank hero who killed an Israeli soldier in Afula this morning," Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhoum, wrote on his Facebook page.

"This is a heroic act of resistance showing that all methods of oppression and terror have not and will not succeed in stopping our people from carrying out jihad and resistance."

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2013/11/israeli-soldier-killed-bus-stabbing-2013111391938335810.html

[azurnoir]

14. also his families home has been ransacked his village declared a 'closed military zone' and

several of his relatives detained

http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=647084

[azurnoir]

13. perhaps her understanding is more in line with being

umm Subliminal