Chilling details of France church attack emerge as hostage speaks

"We are scared,” said Mulas Arbanu. “(But) be we Christians, Muslims, anything, we have to be together.”

Another resident, Said Aid Lahcen, had met the slain priest.

“From the moment when you touch a religion, you attack the nation, and you attack a people. We must not get into divergences, but stay united as we were before,”

It never ceases to amaze me when people talk about how we should be united as societies and then divide societies by promoting sectarian religious beliefs.

This gets people killed.

“I am not speaking of a war of religions. Religions don’t want war. The others want war.”

With all due respect to Pope Francis, "the others" in this case base their struggle solely on religion. Maybe the Catholics or Buddhists or Anabaptist aren't up for a religious war but I think it's clear that for a lot of Muslims it's game on.

No true Religeon call for death of other. This is not a Religeos war, this is a twisted ideology that DOES call for death of innocent people. These cowards hide under the Islam umbrella. It is up to the worlds Muslims to purge the hate from within. It's up to the immigrant Muslims to accept the culture they themselves adopted and assymilate. The adopted cultures need not change for the guest Muslims.

"No true Religeon call for death of other."

Says who? There are plenty of verses in these books calling for the death of others. People say the IS view of what the Koran mandates is 'twisted'. I'm not convinced it is. Those who execute blasphemers, apostates, homosexuals and adulterers must be getting this from somewhere.

Read these books again. Are you sure there is no preaching and intolerance along with strict laws with murderous punishments?

Just from this incident alone, now proves that this is indeed a "religious" war.

It is the "differences" between religions...That means the differences in the way of life, or how to live life (as identified by each religion) that has caused these conflicts. Those who do not believe in and dislike the other-way of life, not willing to accept and recognize the other ways of living as "allowable" (symbiotic relationship) but "detrimental", "harmful" ,"dangerous", "useless", etc. to their own way of life, and willing to "eliminate" the other not by "converting" (change) but by physically "eliminate"the other, can and do resort to terror attacks and ultimately, war. It can even happens within the same religious group if one group cannot accept the interpretation and ways of the other group.

History has proven that to be a continuous conflict. The humanoids killed off each other till the Homo-sapiens dominated. All major "Revolutions" from the French Revolution, to the American Revolution and the Communist Revolution, all has to do with the differences in how to live "a way of life." All has caused conflicts that we identify as wars.

When one group decides to physically eliminate another, one cannot fight or resist or protect one's way of life by "words" alone. Words are powerful in some sense, but we are "physical animals" on this planet that is physical. As in the past, those that were killed off by the Homo-sapiens, "no longer exist". One must exist "physically".

There are ways to "change" violent people, however if violence is that is acceptable as part of a way of life, then the violence and conflict will continue till one or the other totally dominates.

All physical evidence so far point to a "religion" based violence and war. That is now not limited to America as it was initially directed. It is now definitely defined as between Christianity (and Judaism) and Islam.

If one cannot accept that fact, and do something about it soon, then the world is heading toward the something words may not be able to describe.

I'm starting to think that secret police forces who make these people of interest 'disappear' might not be such a bad idea. Not only are they a danger to the public, they are a financial burden.

" “I am not speaking of a war of religions. Religions don’t want war. The others want war.” "

Well Francis, and assorted head-in-the-sand folks: The "others" are profoundly religious, to the point that they love killing and getting killed in order to please their god. Will you EVER wake up?

Religion is the smoke screen. All the Abrahamic religious books have their fair share of violence and bigotry in them but most practitioners, and indeed non practitioners, have grown out of that. This has nationalistic politics at its core. If you offer gullible, excluded people an easy answer to their trials and tribulations, they will do amazing things with relatively little pursuasion

Swiss Toni:

" Religion is the smoke screen. All the Abrahamic religious books have their fair share of violence and bigotry in them "

That is the standard PC slogan, but that is wearing thin. Only one of these has the concept of Shariah law and Jihad to impose it upon the world. Only one of them is explicitly naming and attacking the others in its holy book. In fact, that one is so so profoundly political, it really is a political ideology with a thin religious veneer.

These apologist talking points really only show that those who repeat them have never read up on the issue.

"If you offer gullible, excluded people...."

Many are not "gullible or excluded." Many have good educations, jobs, families who care about them, and comfortable living standards.

Whenever British teenagers run off to Syria, their shaken parents emerge from their middle-class homes to give new conferences, pleading that their kids return home to be with their friends and continue their computer science studies, or whatever.

It's all about... a certain religion.

Swiss Toni,

I’m pretty much on board with most of what you said, especially in regards to nationalistic politics being involved.

The ideological ancestors of groups like IS rose to prominence because of a political alliance between a radical Sunni preacher and an ambitious sheik. The preacher provided the sheik with a religious justification for conquering his neighbors (jihad), and the sheik gave the preacher a vehicle to spread his vision of Islam (sharia). Fast forward to now, and you can see that both sides have, at least partially, lived up to their side of the bargain. The ambitious sheik and his descendents conquered the Arabian Peninsula (jihad) and have installed themselves as the rulers of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. In turn, the Kingdom has spent tens of billions of dollars to build and fund Islamic schools that teach good old fashion Arab style Wahhabi Islam. (sharia) The family of the ambitious sheik have gone pretty much as far as they can, now it’s time for Sunni Wahhabism to finish the job and conquer the world. There is no differentiation between the religious and the political in Islam because Islam is, at its core, a nationalistic political institution.

I would disagree with the image of adherents being  "gullible or excluded." . For sure there are those that are, but there are also some pretty smart and motivated people that see this conflict as a way to advance an agenda that would see them on top in a world ruled according to their ideological perspective. It’s no different than a Christian wishing for a world ruled by western principles and Christians are the home team or a communist striving for a world governed by Marxist ideology where the worker is king. All ideological movements have their  "gullible or excluded" but dummies don’t make it happen. It’s the smart and motivated ones that get the job done and there are some smart and motivated people that believe the vision of a world wide caliphate is a doable proposition. And they want to be on the winning team.

WilliB - "In fact, that one is so so profoundly political, it really is a political ideology with a thin religious veneer."

Is that not what I just said?