Remembering the Bamiyan Buddhas of Afghanistan

Some piquant commentary:

When they blew to pieces the gigantic Buddhas of the Bamiyan Valley in Afghanistan, much of the world learned for the first time about the darkness at the heart of the Taliban. Suddenly, they acquired an air of menace in our collective imagination. 

That was 10 years ago this spring, half a year before 9/11. Like 9/11, the obliteration of the Buddhas was an atrocity that sprang from Islamic rage, an assault on culture and history. It was a blatant refusal of magnanimity. The message was clear: The Taliban had no tolerance for tolerance. It was also an attack on memory itself, that cornerstone of civilization. The fact that it was so graphic gave it special force. This erasure of unique ancient icons was more chilling than a book burning.

You'll remember, of course, the idea that people who burn books aren't that far from taking out their hateful impulses on those who read and write such books.  The Bamiyan Buddhas had stood there since the 6th century before they were erased in a willful, evil act of blind, wanton hatred and a narrow-minded thirst for destruction.  Is it such a leap from the twin Buddhas to the Twin Towers?  It's the same dreadful underlying ideology that is the enemy of all decent people the world over.