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There are more than 100 verses on hate, killing and fighting in the Koran. In Islam, the world is divided between the believers and the infidels, between Dar al Islam (“the house of Islam”) and Dar al Harb (“the house of war”). All non-Muslims are included in the "house of war", and thus, can be forced to accept Islam through Jihad, Holy War.

[9.123] O you who believe! fight those of the unbelievers who are near to you and let them find in you hardness; and know that Allah is with those who guard (against evil).

[5.51] O you who believe! do not take the Jews and the Christians for friends; they are friends of each other; and whoever amongst you takes them for a friend, then surely he is one of them; surely Allah does not guide the unjust people.

[4.89] They desire that you should disbelieve as they have disbelieved, so that you might be (all) alike; therefore take not from among them friends until they fly (their homes) in Allah's way; but if they turn back, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them, and take not from among them a friend or a helper.

From where you sit, aqvarivs, Henry's decision to defy Rome was political. In my view, religion, and the power it wielded over people, was the essential ingredient. Obviously there is going to be no common ground if we can't even agree on that simple example.

>>It's all religions fault. And I should vilify religion and then the religious<<

Examining history for the influence of religion is the not the same as vilification, aqvarivs. Unless you want it to be, which is why both sides in a religious discussion - e.g. the Irish - continually invoke ancient disagreements.

>>...Belfast. It's more to do with being ruled by England. if England left tomorrow there would be no strife between Catholics and Protestants<<

In case it had escaped your notice, aqvarivs, Northern Ireland has consistently voted to remain part of the UK, and send MPs to Westminster. That's called democracy. And the army, therefore, is their army, not an occupying force.

They were actually sent there in this round of Troubles, to prevent Catholics and Protestants from killing each other. Now that there has been some form of truce called, it will be interesting to see whether the army's removal will be the start of another round of religion-based internecine activity, or whether the improved economic position of the Catholics is enough to keep them happy.

Reminds me a lot of the present status in Iraq, where the US army's primary role is to prevent Sunnis and Shiites from murdering each other.

But I guess as far as you are concerned, that has nothing to do with religious differences either?

P.S. Pericles, whats on the wall of the Falls Road outside Sinn Fein headquarters is a memorial to Bobby Sands. Not a religious icon.

This is an excerpt from Bobby Sands private diary written during his 66 day hunger strike ending with his death.

“I am standing on the threshold of another trembling world. May God have mercy on my soul. My heart is very sore because I know that I have broken my poor mother's heart, and my home is struck with unbearable anxiety. But I have considered all the arguments and tried every means to avoid what has become the unavoidable: it has been forced upon me and my comrades by four-and-a-half years of stark inhumanity. I am a political prisoner. I am a political prisoner because I am a casualty of a perennial war that is being fought between the oppressed Irish people and an alien, oppressive, unwanted regime that refuses to withdraw from our land. I believe and stand by the God-given right of the Irish nation to sovereign independence, and the right of any Irishman or woman to assert this right in armed revolution. That is why I am incarcerated, naked and tortured.
Foremost in my tortured mind is the thought that there can never be peace in Ireland until the foreign, oppressive British presence is removed, leaving all the Irish people as a unit to control their own affairs and determine their own destinies as a sovereign people, free in mind and body, separate and distinct physically, culturally and economically. I believe I am but another of those wretched Irishmen born of a risen generation with a deeply rooted and unquenchable desire for freedom. I am dying not just to attempt to end the barbarity of H-Block, or to gain the rightful recognition of a political prisoner, but primarily because what is lost in here is lost for the Republic and those wretched oppressed whom I am deeply proud to know as the 'risen people'. “

Now get along Falls Road and tell em it's all about religion.

The way Boaz believes in Himself is very refreshing, in these days of atheism when so many people believe in no God at all.

Thanks Israel Zangwill for the lift.

aqvarivs, mate, if you consider Bobby Sands as a fitting representative of what has been happening for the last forty-plus years in Ireland, then no wonder you are confused.

Bobby Sands had about as much relevance to the Troubles as Guy Sebastian has to the Ring Cycle.

Yes, Guy Sebastian sings, and yes, the Ring Cycle employs people who sing.

But to assume that you can understand Wagner's magnum opus by listening to Elevator Love is to miss the point completely.

And - just by the way - if you think for one moment that Bobby Sands wrote that sententious poppycock, then I have a nice shiny Harbour Bridge that I can sell you.

Very cheap.

Pericles, I wouldn't expect you to understand such sentiment no matter who wrote it. For you everything is about religion and anything that strays from your fixation becomes poppycock. About 550 IRA died fighting for the free Irish State including Michael Collins. Please tell us which of these lives is of no account in the securing of a free Ireland.
The battle for Northern Ireland is no different and is an extension of the 1919-1921 War of Independence, which is an extension of the 1916 uprising, which is an extension of the 1848 Rebellion, and anyone worth their salt can trace the many Irish battles to keep their sovereignty and independence back to the first English invasion. How fortuitous for me to have such brilliance as your to dictate which lives were of account and who's life was given was of no account.
But enough of Ireland for your value of their sovereignty is well established. Tell us about Iraq and who's life and who's death among those fighting for a free and democratic Iraq are of value. Which poor Iraqi soul who picks up a weapon under these circumstances is of value? Or are you one of these punks who hope the terrorist win so America will loose? Oh wait, don't tell me. It's all about religion. No no, wait. It's all about oil. No wait. It's all about American corporate hegemony and McDonald's franchises. Well, I'm sure you'll tell us in your usual contemptuous fashion.