Destruction, A Simple Difference Between Love and Hate

I read the news today, Oh Boy! As if massive beheadings, victimisation of women, church burnings, kidnappings and more were not enough! the ISIS invasion into Mosul and massive destruction of art and historical monuments and artefacts has even the most liberal and atheistic individuals talking. On El Pais' front page we (teachers) couldn't avoid the subject. These priceless pieces of history are now gone forever and for the most part haven't been stolen, but simply ruthlessly destroyed.

There is a simple difference between love and hate. Love builds up and is constructive. Hate tears down and destroys.

“Now there is a final reason I think that Jesus says, "Love your enemies." It is this: that love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. Just keep being friendly to that person. Just keep loving them, and they can’t stand it too long. Oh, they react in many ways in the beginning. They react with guilt feelings, and sometimes they’ll hate you a little more at that transition period, but just keep loving them. And by the power of your love they will break down under the load. That’s love, you see. It is redemptive, and this is why Jesus says love. There’s something about love that builds up and is creative. There is something about hate that tears down and is destructive. So love your enemies. (from "Loving Your Enemies")”

― Martin Luther King Jr., A Knock at Midnight: Inspiration from the Great Sermons of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.

Extremists used sledgehammers and power drills to smash ancient artifacts at a museum in the northern city of Mosul 

Militant uses a power tool to destroy a winged-bull Assyrian protective deity at the Ninevah Museum in Mosul, Iraq. The statue dates back to the 9th century B.C.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2970270/Islamic-State-fighters-destroy-antiquities-Iraq-video.html#ixzz3Sygm6j59

Isaiah 59:7

"Their feet run to evil, And they hasten to shed innocent blood; 

Their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity, Devastation and destruction are in their highways."

Oh, where, Obama, are our Monuments' Men?! 

Today, in the teachers' lounge at my Spanish high school, liberals and conservatives alike have called you a coward, a turn-coat. It's the first time I've heard such negative sentimentality in traditionally Obama-loving Europe. Yet, there it is. Who can respect a president who sits by and lets such atrocities occur, offering only lip-service to the American people and the world? Even Roosevelt and Eisenhower, from opposing ideologies had the huevos to come together to create a strategic plan to act out against the unethical acts of the Nazis. 

*Monuments Men (see the film): "In a race against time, and under mandate from President Franklin D. Roosevelt and General Dwight D. Eisenhower, this group of unlikely heroes—museum directors, curators, art scholars, educators, artists, architects, and archivists—risked their lives on the front lines and worked tirelessly to protect Europe's monuments and greatest cultural treasures from both the destruction of the war and seizure by Hitler and the Nazis. Without vehicles, typewriters, or full authority, they managed to track, locate, and return more than five million looted cultural items. Their role in preserving these treasures stands without precedent."