Any Sympathy For These Guys?

[ToraToraTora]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2754241/Held-IS-five-jihadi-Brits-want-home-Wantaway-fighters-stripped-weapons-marched-punishment-centre.html

[Jeza]

Be careful what you want springs to mind. This surely proves that youth is wasted on the young.

[tamborine]

awww, run out of Tobasco - my sympathies ;p

[andy-hughes]

naomi24 - "But Andy, these chaps weren't fighting to save their people. They're British, and they're traitors."

They are Muslims first Naomi - a fact that a large number of Westerners continually fail to understand and appreciate.

A Muslim in a Muslim first, and last, ethnicity is not the issue.

They are fighting for what they believe to be right - hence my sympathy that have been proved to be so misguided.

[DaisyNonna]

Killing people is right?

[Obiter]

Not a terribly good analogy, but rather reminiscent of Roman Catholics in the 16/17C.

[sandyRoe]

How are they traitors? They went to fight against the despotic Assad regime. I notice one of their complaints was they were killing fellow Muslims. That's likely to be the case when all the combatants are followers of Islam.

[Obiter]

Quite right, Sandy. As have done all the followers of Jesus in the past. I do not say this flippantly, it is a sad fact.

[DaisyNonna]

Who did what to whom does not alter the fact that killing people is wrong.

[Obiter]

No one has said it isn't.

[grumpy01]

Perhaps,having encoraged open door immigration for his own ends,Anthony Blair will come to their rescue.Somehow I doubt it.

[grumpy01]

Srry,typo,encouraged.

[grumpy01]

Sorry.

[douglas9401]

Tony's too busy these days trying to change the staple of rice to a quicker growing pulse as Middle East peas envoy.
He actually makes me want to vomit.

[Obiter]

For anyone who wishes to see the results of such trivial dogmatic difference, google 'archpriest avvakum'. Although Wiki does not mention it, it boiled down to whether you made the sign of the cross with two or three fingers. According to which side you were on you were a heretic and deserving of death.

[DaisyNonna]

The here and now is to which you should be applying yourself, people should learn from past errors, not use them as an excuse.

[bazwillrun]

like ive said before ...these people were never british, they just used the term as a badge of convenience to suit

[boxtops]

I can't see that, baz. They are British citizens, born here - but as andy-hughes says, for people of that faith, ethnicity is irrelevant, they thought they were fighting for a Muslim cause.

[Obiter]

...and now it's likely that they will die for one. Still, 72 virgins and all that.

[boxtops]

You only get 72 virgins if you're a a martyr - but then I guess it depends on the definition of martyr in this context.

[Obiter]

I was told, but I know no Arabic, that it is a mistranslation of the text, as the word for virgin sounds like the word for raisin. 72 raisins aren't worth dying for. Arabic speakers are free to correct me.