Desecration of WW II Commonwealth War Graves in Benghazi

gizmo555

Very sad to watch this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBbB9k7kYc4

BlaasForRafa

Thats really shameful, the dead of any side in the war deserve their peace. I thought Islam was meant to be the religion of peace and respectful of other religions.

Fratton Fred

That's pretty sickening. The grave they showed a close up of looked like a Jewish soldier, I guess that's what they were targeting.

The CWGC keep very detailed plans though and will be able to replace the headstones in the correct place.

Cardinal Richelieu

BlaasForRafa wrote: »

Thats really shameful, the dead of any side in the war deserve their peace. I thought Islam was meant to be the religion of peace and respectful of other religions.

Not when your have Youtube that allows a crowd of morons of any religion to post Vids like that.

Stovepipe

here's a solution: Cameron tells the NTC that not a red cent of aid will come from UK and EU coffers until the deceased are repatriated to the UK with appropriate honours and no further applications for entry into the UK and EU by Libyan citizens will be entertained until the mess has been cleared and the site restored. Not one.
unfortunately, that won't happen so the best thing to do is send over an AC-130...

regards
Stovepipe

citizen_p

Was this recently or during the civil war? I'd expect this from pro Gaddafi forces, But if it was carried out by the rebels I'd find it even more disgraceul after all the help they got from the british Royal airforce during the Civil war.

gizmo555

What a contrast between the actions of these scum and the moving and generous tribute to the dead of both sides at Gallipoli by the great Turkish Muslim soldier and statesman Mustafa Kemal Atatürk in his famous 1933 speech:

Heroes who shed their blood and lost their lives! You are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and Mehmets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours. You, the mothers, who sent their sons from far away countries wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well.

tfitzgerald

Mousey- wrote: »

Was this recently or during the civil war? I'd expect this from pro Gaddafi forces, But if it was carried out by the rebels I'd find it even more disgraceul after all the help they got from the british Royal airforce during the Civil war.

Gaddafi gave the graves the respect for years this is the new rebel army that are currently torturing every gaddafi follower the can

Tony EH

It's a nice bunch that the west have helped take over in Libya. But, this is small compared to other stuff that's going on over there at the moment.

Helping these goons is going to turn around and bite the west in the ass in future years...I'm certain. Was there nothing learned from the Afghanistan -> Mujaheedeen->Al Qaeda->9-11 debacle?

Why isn't this on the news? Funny, Gaddafi's every misdemeanour (both real AND lies) were trumpeted almost daily last year.

Morlar

All along Gadaffi had been saying that there were islamist elements in the opposition trying to take control by force. The media in the west completely played this down. The same was said in Egypt and also ignored. That has since led to co-ordinated attacks by islamists against egyptian christians.

I remember during the Libyan war a reporter one evening mentioning that a bus full of about 30-40 men had been detained by an element of enraged anti-gadaffi supporters, the bus had been travelling down a road into a Rebel area, the suspicion was that the men onboard were plainclothes pro-Gadaffi soldiers. After that nothing whatsoever was heard of those men or that bus. It just fell totally off the radar.

I'd agree nothing has been learned whatsoever. Re the original footage that is disgusting, the families of those men must be utterly sickened at all of this. There are islamic graves in france post WW1 - which have never been interfered with.

jonniebgood1

As per other comments the video is unpleasant and unwelcome. Respect for those who served on any side in war should be understood the world over.

However it is overly simplistic to automatically put this down to the new Libyan regime. It is most likely the actions of some out of control extremists. The regime change was widely supported and I do not believe that actions such as these would have that support. Unless there is evidence to the contrary then why would anyone believe that the new regime are behind this.

Furthermore putting it down as an 'islamic' act is simply lacking in basic understanding of such an act. The actions of any small extremist minority can not be held as representative of a whole religion. This is the same premise that I would apply to some of the comments on the Youtube video- they are not representative of 'western' opinion on how Muslim people should be treated.

Tony EH

Agreed, it is somewhat simplistic to assume that everyone in power (or vying for it) at the moment in Libya would share the sentiments of the people in the video, in the same way the it was simplistic to believe everything that one heard about Gaddafi's regime, or even Assad's at the moment.

However, when one considers that a number of the active fighters in the rebellion were made up of groups with "Islamic" sentiments and "objectives", such as the LIFG (who's leaders, Abdelhakim Belhadji and Al-Hasidi, were members of or had links to Al Qaeda), it's unsurprising that such people could now be carrying out the vile acts that we are hearing about in Libya.

In addition, the nominal head of the NTC (Abdel Jalil) has been quite public in his desire to see Islamic Sharia law supersede the formally secular laws of the nation and form the basis of the country's legislation.

While "Sharia Law" is and has been the subject of much abuse by western nations in the recent past, it still doesn't bode well for Libya, it's people or the region in general.

HavingCrack

Do those idiots not realise that those soldiers died fighting for the liberation of Libya from Italian colonial rule?

Morlar

HavingCrack wrote: »

Do those idiots not realise that those soldiers died fighting for the liberation of Libya from Italian colonial rule?

I believe Muammar Gadaffi wore this in order to remind the Italians of their role in his country:





http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omar_Mukhtar