Morality and Murder

Israel is immoral, I explain.

Let’s talk about Morality.

First, we must define terms. What is “moral” and what does “immoral” mean. I’m going to ignore “well my holy book said” and “according to Budda” and all the rest of the religious trappings, because I submit that it can be broken down to a more basic theme, and one that any religion that is not a suicide cult can at least grudgingly agree to:

Moral behavior is that behavior that preserves, IN ORDER (this is important) your species, your society, your polity, your family, and yourself. Likewise, behaviors that are destructive to those categories are immoral.

Let’s look at a couple of basic examples: well, murder is so easy as to be a ‘gimme’ so we’ll go instead to a far more controversial ‘sin,’ infidelity. Infidelity destroys the nuclear family. It causes the spouse that was cheated on, to doubt everything about a marriage, and even if the marriage survives, it will never be ‘whole’ again. I can prove, quite easily with case studies, that destruction of the nuclear family weakens and destroys the society involved. Since your society is number two on the “protect it” list, it should be a slam dunk to accept that infidelity is thus, an immoral act. You don’t have to go to your holy writings to see this obvious case.

Theft weakens society, awarding gains to people who did not earn them, by taking them from people who did. Same with “bearing false witness” which is more easily understood by its modern legal definition, perjury. When an innocent man gets punished by society, and a guilty man escapes justice, how can society not be weakened? When we get into the demands by any of the Abrahamic religions that “you must have no other God before me” well, that’s damn questionable, but I can make the case that by ignoring the prevailing religion of the society, you weaken that societies social contract. Personally I don’t buy it, but the case can be made… (then again, I’m not a follower of any of those religions, so YMMV.)

Next let’s look briefly at why I listed them in order. What does it matter if your society survives, if in the doing you have doomed all of humanity to extinction? Likewise that famous Arabic saying “myself against my brother, my brother and I against our family, our family against the world” is, on the face of it, immoral, the philosophy of a suicide cult. If you are willing to end the world, for the brief survival of your family, how long do you think your family will actually live?

News flash Mohamed, there is a certain minimum number of beings to keep a species alive. Otherwise inbreeding and genetic defects doom you to extinction. The number of beings to keep even a World War One tech level is even higher, and I don’t see many Muslim families that know how to repair a tractor or plow a field. Much less keep modern tech running. Of course most of the sects of Muslim are believers that “once the final war starts, Allah will descend and lead his followers to victory, then we’ll have sex slaves and free food forever…” Which is why I call them a suicide cult. They WANT that final war. Many of those sects are actively trying to instigate that final war. See their version of God promises that they’ll magically win.

That insanity aside, lets explore a second concept.

But first, hey, poor yourself something, the booze is in its usual place, same with the soft drinks, and the tip jar is here, if you enjoy the work, please leave a tip or become a paid subscriber, it’s how we keep the beer in the fridge.

So, on to that second concept: What is moral for a society or polity to do that is not moral for an individual to do? With the corollary, is there anything that is immoral for society, but OK at the individual level?

I submit that morals are the same, whether we’re talking about society, or an individual. Is it moral for a person to charge for the work they do? Well, duh. Of course it is.

You should always expect to be paid for your work… Sometimes it’s not in Coin of the Realm, sometimes it’s in “social credit” if you will. Or it’s paid for in self-respect, things that you do in order to be able to look yourself in the mirror in the morning. But you always get something out of the work, or why would you do it?

Likewise, it is thus moral for government to charge for its work. Yes, I understand that I am justifying taxes. Guess what, even the founding fathers allowed as how some taxation was reasonable. It was the taxation without being allowed a voice in what was taxed and how the money was spent that stuck in their craw. Now, what is a legitimate job of the government, and what they should expect to be paid in return, that’s a separate argument.

And,

if it’s a service that no one wants, and no one asked for, but they performed anyway and then demanded payment? Well, that’s an entirely different kettle of fish.

It’s like the guy at the corner in the median who runs out and washes your windshield when the light turns red, then demands payment for a service you didn’t ask for. It’s perfectly reasonable, and you are well within your rights, to tell him to fuck off. Most people don’t, out of some misguided sense of charity, or guilt, or something… Which is what he’s betting on.

But assuming the service is something that the majority of the people want, then expecting to get money to do that, is perfectly moral, at least from where I am sitting.

I talked about all that, so that I could talk about this:

Self-defense or the defense of another, using deadly force. Obviously, based on the above discussions, a moral act. You are killing someone who is trying to murder people, either you or others. But let’s take it further than that. Look at the AI generated art at the start of this post. I wish I could have gotten the AI to generate what I really wanted, but this was as close as I could get. So, let’s assume you are at the mall, or some other place where there are a lot of people. You’re armed with a firearm you are proficient with, and by proficient, I mean that at 25 yards, you can keep them all inside the “bowling pin.” And generally in the ten ring. Now, let’s imagine you hear screaming, and look up from what you were doing, to see this guy. He has obviously already killed several and is looking to kill more. He’s not headed exactly your way, but he’s within your competent range. You have a clear shot, the backdrop is free of possible friendlies (because they’re all dead.)

Is it moral to drop this animal in his tracks? You bet your ass it is. In fact, I submit that it is immoral to NOT make his birth certificate a worthless document. Look, he’s already maxed out his immorality card. At this point, one, five, fifty… He can’t be any more immoral no matter what his body count after the first one, all the rest are free.

Ah, but at this particular moment in time, you have the ability to end the deaths. If you refuse to take it, for whatever reason, all the rest of the people this animal kills, those are on you. You could have stopped it and didn’t.

Now, let’s expand that concept in light of the discussion that what is moral for the individual is moral for society, and the corollaries of that. If Society has the possibility of ending the streak of a mass murderer, or a terrorist, and fails to do so, that action is, I posit, immoral, and the weight of any future deaths are on the societies shoulders for failing to do the right thing.

Where am I going with this, you ask?

Just this:

Imad Qawasmeh, 52 (Hamas) – convicted for the 2004 Beersheva bus bombing that killed 16 Israelis.

Qassem Aref Khalil al-Asafreh, 36 (Hamas) – involved in 2019 stabbing murder of yeshivah student Dvir Sorek.

Muhammad Aref Samhan, 55 (Fatah/Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades) – responsible for 2003 Jerusalem bus bombing killing 23.

Ibrahim Muhammad al-Raai, 46 (Fatah/Tanzim) – responsible for 2006 Nablus bombing and multiple shooting attacks.

Rashid Mahmoud Omar, 48 (Fatah) – convicted of murder of a Palestinian collaborator.

Raad Abd al-Aziz, 45 (Fatah) – convicted of murder, attempted murder, and weapons offenses.

Omar Mahmoud Bassis, 60 (Palestinian Islamic Jihad) – responsible for explosives attacks during Second Intifada.

Firas Sadiq Muhammad Ghanem, 51 (Fatah/Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades) – responsible for attacks causing 9 Israeli deaths.

Ibrahim al-Qam, 53 (Popular Front) – serving two life sentences for murder.

Iyad Muhammad Abu al-Rub, 51 (Palestinian Islamic Jihad) – senior PIJ commander in Jenin; responsible for suicide bombings.

Alaa al-Din al-Karki, 52 (Hamas) – jailed since 1993 for multiple attacks.

Zakaria Zubeidi, former Jenin commander of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, involved in shootings and a bombing that killed six people at a 2002 polling station.

Iyad Jradat and Ahmed Dahiri, PIJ operatives responsible for terror attacks in 2003.

Mahmoud Atallah, serving life plus 15 years for killing a Palestinian woman suspected of collaboration, and recently indicted for sexual abuse.

Wael Qissam, Wissam Abbasi, and Muhammad Odeh, Hamas Silwan Squadron members behind five bombings in 2002 that killed 35 and wounded hundreds.

Ahmed Barghouti, operational commander of Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, tied to multiple deadly attacks.

Khalida Jarrar, PFLP lawmaker convicted of multiple terror acts, including a 2019 bombing killing a 17-year-old girl.

Khalil Jabarin, murdered Ari Fuld in 2018.

Mohammed Abu Warda, responsible for the 1996 Jerusalem bus bombing killing 44 and the Ashkelon attack.

Ismail Radideh, Force 17 member, convicted of multiple murders and plots.

Ashraf Abu-Srour, convicted for killing IDF soldier Shahar Vekart in 2000.

This list is just a sample. These guys, on their release, all sang the same song: “from the river to the sea” and “we will not rest until every last Jew in Palestine is dead.”

This is not the behavior of someone who has been converted to nonviolence, someone who intends to go forward and work for the betterment of his people, or for mankind as a whole, this is the behavior of an unrepentant terrorist and murderer who will strike again.

When they do, that’s on Israel for not putting these guys in the ground when they had them.

Oh, yes, I know, “an eye for an eye- leaves everyone blind.” “If I kill a murderer, the number of killers in the world hasn’t changed.” Those duckbilled platitudes sound really wonderful, until you’re woken up by some cop in the early morning hours, to be told that your kid, along with a bus full of other kids, just got blown up by some bastard who had been in an Israeli prison a year ago, but was released so that Israel could get some dead bodies back.

If they are tried, and when/if found guilty, executed, they can’t kill again.

It’s time and past time Israel went “Nuremburg” on these fuckers. Quit holding mass murderers, terrorists, in prison to be used as bargaining chips. That just tells the Palestinians that “If I take hostages, I can get the commander of the Dogfucker brigade back from the Jews that captured him.” Yes, it establishes the trade value, one Israeli, dead or alive, is worth 100 living terrorists. That was the trade ratio.

Does this sound like a good deal to anyone, except of course, the terrorists?

Oh, I realize that the US has done this many times before… But usually, it was an American (often accused of spying, whether guilty or not,) in return for a Soviet agent caught by our people. The most recent one, of course, was an American who publicly said that she despised our country, in return for an Arms dealer who was the guy that Nick Cage’s character in “Lord of War” was based on.

See he was one of Putin’s agents, and drinking buddies, so Putin wanted him back, BAD. No one, including Putin, will say Viktor Bout was innocent, he was guilty as FUCK.

No one will say that Brittney Griner wasn’t guilty of bringing Marijuana into Russia. She even admitted it, her only defense was “I was in a hurry and forgot it was there, oops my bad.”

Was her sentence excessive? Oh fuck yeah. But she didn’t break American law (actually, she did, but no one wants to charge her for it.) She broke Russian law. And well, guess what? The country whose law you break gets to decide what to do about it. Don’t like that, DON’T BREAK THEIR LAW. it’s not like she didn’t know, she had been playing on one of their teams for years, going to Russia every year.

We shouldn’t have made that trade. Frankly we should have executed Bout. Every person who dies because of his future actions as the weapons supplier of choice to the douche bags of the world, is on autopen Biden’s Handlers, whoever made the decision.

Defend to the death Americans who are innocent. But if they’re guilty, well that’s on them. Prosecute to the fullest extent those who are guilty, American or not, and if they’re guilty of cold-blooded murder, (not a crime of passion, believe it or not, those are least likely to reoffend) then they should be executed, not as “punishment” because punishment is meant to teach. These people are not teachable.

Not even as a “lesson to others” although if it performs that function, GREAT!

No, it’s strictly self-defense. In the same way that we put down a rabid animal, not to punish it for being rabid, but to defend ourselves from being attacked by something with rabies. If there is any chance at all, in any universe, that a Charley Manson, or a Abu Zubaydah, a Dennis Rader (BTK killer) a David Berkowitz (son of Sam killer) or any other mass murderer might be released or escape, that’s too much risk.

There is only one moral decision.

Don’t do it brutally, this is not Rome, I don’t care if it’s done publicly in the town square, as some of my compatriots would have it done, or privately, with one witness for the state and one for the victims.

Just do it.

This especially goes for Tyler Robinson and Decarlos Brown, but it goes for low profile murderers as well. It’s not only right, it’s the only moral choice.

Oh, and don’t make the bastard wait for twenty years on death row. Yes, that is a wonderful punishment, having the knowledge that your death is ordained, the only thing you’re waiting on is the date… But guess what, that’s a sentence we all carry. Everyone alive is under a death sentence. No one knows the hour of their death, and no sane person wants to… but die we shall.

Besides, these people are beyond punishment, punishment is for someone with a future. The people on death row, at least theoretically, have no future. There is nothing we need to teach them, we have already determined that they are too dangerous to be taught. So why spend sixty, to a hundred thousand dollars a year (dependent on the state) to warehouse a corpse in waiting?

Especially when there’s always a chance that they might escape (however so slight) or be released by some idiot with an agenda, or traded for a dead body.

QOTD: “Justice delayed is justice denied.” William E. Gladstone (I add, Justice for the victim as well as justice for the perpetrator.)

Yours in Service,

William Lehman