Lard From The Front

Right after 9/11, my pal Mark the Graphics Guy and I were walking around Richfield discussing responses to the government's call for "unconventional responses to terror". My idea; a "sprinkler system" on airliners and other public transit that could, in an emergency, spray high-pressure, liquified pig fat over everyone on board the plane. Pigs are, of course, trayf in Islam; a good, pious Moslem is supposed to go to an Imam if they come in contact with pork or pig byproducts, and get purified; if they die before this is done, they end up in Hell.

Like most of my "comic" ideas, I find I can't make it up fast enough, as we see in this piece Mark sent me:

A prominent Israeli rabbi has proposed hanging bags of pig fat in buses to deter Muslim suicide bombers who may want to avoid contact with an "unclean" animal, an Israeli official said on Thursday.

The idea -- suggested by Rabbi Eliezer Fisher, a rabbinical judge, in a letter to police -- signaled the extremes to which some Israelis may be willing to go to stop Palestinian bombers who have killed hundreds of Israelis in recent years.

Judaism, like Islam, considers pigs unclean. But the ultra-Orthodox rabbi has ruled that special dispensation can be given for placing bags of lard in buses and public places in an effort to prevent attacks.

Of course, suicide is also strictly forbidden in Islam, as is the wanton killing of innocents. These strictures never affected the intifada or the 9/11 hijackers, either.

But it's always nice to be two years ahead of the curve...

Posted by Mitch at February 16, 2004 05:00 AM