A bizarre twist when first heard. Two versions of Hamas command followed the 23 Oct 7 sneak attack. Two contradictory news bits over the wire. First, that a Hamas commander ordered the troops not to play with the heads of the victims. Perhaps joy was so unbounded by the heroic slaughter of concert goers that the victorious warriors couldn’t resist playing with the conquered heads. After all, beheading is not uncommon behavior in those parts. But perhaps the commander got nervous about how head play didn’t play so well in the global spotlight. Such was a personal guess.
However, a later contrary news report told that commanders had issued an okay to play with the heads. That also figures. How could any battle-hardened military leader deny his troops, fresh with victory from a sneak attack on a music festival, how could he so heartlessly deny his boys the pleasure of playing with Jakob’s and Sara’s heads? After all, didn’t the victorious conquerors earn the pleasure?
But then a larger question intruded, an essential curiosity involving the two differing versions of the story: Which was worse?
Play with heads/ Don’t play with heads? Which carries the most absurdly bitter taste? A leader who somehow feels some compunction against the sight of supposedly grown men using the heads of innocent victims for soccer— or not? Well, they do it with sheep.
As already suggested, head whackers go back a long way. They follow in the footsteps of one of the greatest historical head-whacking terrorist, Timurlane. That would be a name to strike abject fear in hearing of the approach of the Mongolian general whose braves swept through 14th century Asia up to the gates of eastern Europe, all along the way leaving in their wake pyramids of heads in villages pillaged. Stacks of crania left as reminders. And in order to charge the whole production with the utmost terror, Timurlane ordered each severed head in the pyramid stack be turned face outward. This effect obviously showed the facial moment the unfortunate head received the October 7 treatment. His gruesome theatrics gained historical effect, but the thing Timurlane really lacked for total impact was the internet.
With the advent of televised terror, the effect goes world wide via cyclops TV. That is, every planetary eye gets to share the impact. And what might the clinical aspect of that impact be? In 2008 Dr. Gary Smart addressed that question in his book I-Brain, referring to research of Dr. Jack Nitschke and colleagues at the University of Wisconsin who “have shown not only that viewing gruesome images activates a specific network of cognitive and emotional brain regions, including the prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate, insula, and amygdala, but that merely anticipating these types of images trigger the same neural circuitry.” [italics added] In other words, the shot prints directly on the brain.
Is there any doubt that every person on the planet possesses the horror of at least one image of a beheading?
Nothing like a close-up of a jihader holding up a severed head in a manner that would make Timurlane proud, if not jealous.
On this subject, discussion is deep. Reference to Timurlane in the 14th century shows how historically deep. So it becomes almost academic when Dr. Wafa Sultan, a Syrian-American, sounds brave alarm concerning restrictions put upon Sharia Muslims, and the women especially. Sultan’s notion puts rather bluntly the nucleus of the problem: “The clash we are witnessing around the world is not a clash of religions, or a clash of civilizations. It is a clash between two opposites, between two eras. It is a clash between a mentality that belongs to the Middle Ages and another mentality that belongs to the 21st century.” [Excerpt from interview with Arab-American psychiatrist Wafa Sultan on Al-Jazeera TV, 21 Feb 2006]
One way to gage Sultan’s comparison would be a look at the necessary function of Israel’s Defense Force lawyers. Armed IDF attorneys, trained in combat, function as weird umpires in that clash of centuries Sultan characterizes. The Israeli military lawyer accompanies active troops in order to make judgment calls probing legal sanity concerning attacks against an enemy who sends little kids out with explosive devices and lines up civilian human shields, many of whom— if not all— believe they owe it to their deity. The IDF attorney must offer a judgement call before incursions, and this after all manner of warnings to effected civilians. And, of course, IDF attorneys would negotiate with commanders who decide whether to allow troops to play with heads of former music fans.
Since no Israeli attorneys are available for questions, it remains curious to an outsider what actual rules of combat are involved: international war rules, Human Rights Council, Arab-Israeli agreements, Geneva Convention, Robert’s Rules of Order, Honor Bright, Pinkie Swear? Which deals with head play? Deciding on this, another question might work as an answer: Which side of the centuries are the combatants on?
The degree of repulsion might be a telling factor. Maybe the wrench on human judgment upon hearing that special order, either way— Play with heads! No, don’t play with heads! Which is more repulsive? Maybe one of those sharp IDF attorneys could help out on that call.
