Thanks to Professors Guiora and Cliteur, and my colleague and friend Chris Borgen, for their helpful responses to my posts. I find that I can agree with some important aspects of Prof. Cliteur’s most recent response. For example, he advocates a theoretical approach to the problem of religious terrorism – “a scholarly understanding of its nature” rather than the “judicial reactions”...
In response to the previous comments, I very much appreciate the justified concern raised regarding my identification of the danger posed by religious extremists. Prof Movsesian is, of course, correct that non-religious terrorism (the groups he identifies) is also a contemporary reality. However, where we disagree is that I believe the greatest (not only) danger is posed by religious extremists...
So, I finished my book on the Nuremberg Military Tribunals last Friday. Okay, that's a lie. Or at least an exaggeration. I still have about 2,500 footnotes to fix (literally). And a few thousand precious, perfectly crafted words to cut. But I have a very polished first draft of the text. I even printed it out to see how big it...
One aspect of Amos’ proposal that I think needs to be emphasized is that he suggests curtailing certain types of speech because of certain hoped-for practical advantages in counter-terrorism. It is, essentially, a utilitarian argument. However, taking his suggestion on its own terms, I am not persuaded that the U.S. undertaking a new policy of curtailing religious speech would in...
I thank Professors Guiora and Cliteur for their thoughtful interventions. As I see it, the basic distinction Prof. Guiora draws is between terrorism motivated by religious convictions – “religious terrorism” – and terrorism motivated by non-religious convictions – “non-religious terrorism.” Despite their arguments, though, I fear I am still not persuaded that this distinction is very helpful. For instance, Prof. Guiora...
Certainly Professor Guiora has raised very profound issues. It would help me to have a specific scenario of how this would play out. For example - some well known Christian radical fundamentalist preacher (who has been known to call on God's wrath against some group) gets up in the pulpit one Sunday and says; "I have had a direct revelation from God and...
Thank you to Prof Movsesian, Prof Cliteur and Rev. Lentz for their thoughtful and informed comments in response to my initial posting. With respect to Prof Movsesian's concern regarding my identification of religious extremism as posing the primary threat today, I would suggest that analysis of contemporary terrorism clearly suggests that religious extremist actors (in all three monotheistic faiths) are,...
In its motion to dismiss the ACLU/CCR lawsuit, the government argues that the plaintiffs lack standing to bring the lawsuit on al-Aulaqi's behalf, because al-Aulaqi has the option of surrendering to the government and bringing the lawsuit himself: Defendants state that if Anwar al-Aulaqi were to surrender or otherwise present himself to the proper authorities in a peaceful and appropriate manner,...
Thanks to Opinio Juris for inviting me to comment on Professor Guiora's new book. I look forward to the interchange with him and the other participants. Professor Guiora deserves credit for tackling the very controversial and timely topic of religious terrorism. Much of what he says is thought-provoking. He tries to be fair and avoid “religion-bashing.” He concedes that religion can...
As a pastor of a church I find Professor Guiora's words both challenging and problematic. Here are four points: 1. Professor Guiora writes, "Society has historically - unjustifiably and blindly - granted religion immunity." What society? Separating "society" from "religion" is very much a modern issue. Society didn't grant immunity to anything. Rather, society was shaped by religion and was pretty...
Society has historically ---unjustifiably and blindly---granted religion immunity. That immunity has been expanded to include religious extremism; doing so, presents an imminent danger to civil society. In many ways the failure to adequately protect society falls squarely on the shoulders of society; the refusal to directly address religious extremists is purely self-imposed. Religious extremists manipulate society’s sensitivities which, in large...
We are very pleased to host for the next three days a discussion of Amos Guiora's new book, Freedom from Religion: Rights and National Security(Oxford 2009). Amos is probably well known to many readers of this blog, a professor at the University of Utah's S.J. Quinney College of Law and a retired Lieutenant Colonel from the Israel Defense Forces Judge...
