Civilization.... As soon as Amal protested about letting the dog sniff her bag because of the Quran inside, the soldier grabbed the Quran, threw it out of the bag and proceeded to check it. The lady was horrified and the dozens of employees who were waiting to be checked moved forward in a rage at having the Quran thrown to the ground. Amal was put in hand-cuffs and taken away and the raging mob was greeted with the butts of rifles.
[...]
How would the troops feel if Iraqis began flinging around Holy Bibles or Torahs and burning crosses?! They would be horrified and angry because you do not touch a person's faith... [Baghdad Burning]
Another problem caused by the failure of the Feds to provide adequate training to the soldiers occupying Iraq. This time, they've managed to make even their collaborators angry with them.
However, I'm sure it wasn't deliberate. What Riverbend doesn't seem to know is that most Americans are not very religious at all. Allthough the majority of them say they're Christian, it's really just something they give lip service to. Only someone like a Fundamentalist Christian might have forseen how the Iraqis would react. I doubt the soldier in this incident ever considered that throwing a book on the ground would cause such a problem.
Of course, if the Feds had taken the time to provide even the slightest instruction in what religious taboos where likely to make Iraqis really upset, the soldier would have known to handle things differently.
1:04:27 PM 
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