British Nationals Murdered Abroad.

[Khandro]

Figures from the Foreign Office show that around 60 British nationals are murdered abroad each year. Does the murder of one, no matter how grotesque the circumstances, justify going to war?

[naomi24]

Here we go again, Khandro. Your spiteful little stabs are always a sure sign that you’re all out of ideas.

[vetuste_ennemi]

Pheonician flying machines, eh? There's the bull. How did I come up with Pasiphae rather than the obvious Europa last night?

[Khandro]

Might have been the chianti. I think your P. was a bit of a witch.

[vetuste_ennemi]

"What Phoenician princess appears as a hologram on the 5 euro note?". Last night's University Challenge. Yes, the synapses were seriously confused (but not totally so).

[vetuste_ennemi]

Incidentally, why do you describe (in your OP) the circumstances as grotesque? The Holy Koran exhorts the faithful to behead oppressors, doesn't it? As this method of execution has been explicitly prescribed (certainly endorsed) by Allah, then to describe it as grotesque seems to indicate an overly fastidious,vitiated (and possibly irreverent) Western view and not an authentic Islamic one. The only relevant question about the murders is not how they were effected, but whether a British aid worker and an American journalist can be properly classified as oppressors in the context in which the Koran advocates this form of punishment. I can refer you to a scholarly exegesis (posted earlier on a different thread) if you wish.

[sandyRoe]

Is Europa not the embodiment of, well, Europe? Can she really be from the Middle East?

[vetuste_ennemi]

Come now, Mr. Roe - you must know the Zeus and Europa story.

[sandyRoe]

It's a load of bull. But I had imagined Europa in the form of a shapely golden skinned Guernsey heifer.

[vetuste_ennemi]

That was Io, Sandy, wasn't it?

[sandyRoe]

Google tells me it was. I see Zeus was the bovine element in that tale. My memory must be going