Kingdom of Heaven: The One State Solution and Western Military Intervention in the Holy Land
In this article I argue that in Kingdom of Heaven Ridley Scott creates historical analogies between Saladin's taking of Jerusalem and the Third Crusade, on the one hand, and the Israeli-Palestinian question and American-led ‘War on Terror’, on the other hand. I maintain that Scott pictures the...
| Published in: | Journal of Holy Land and Palestine Studies |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Edinburgh Univ. Press
[2020]
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| In: |
Journal of Holy Land and Palestine Studies
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| RelBib Classification: | KBL Near East and North Africa ZC Politics in general |
| Further subjects: | B
Holy Land
B Crusade B Edward Said B Ridley Scott B Western Intervention B Nur Masalha B Kingdom of Heaven |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (Verlag) Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | In this article I argue that in Kingdom of Heaven Ridley Scott creates historical analogies between Saladin's taking of Jerusalem and the Third Crusade, on the one hand, and the Israeli-Palestinian question and American-led ‘War on Terror’, on the other hand. I maintain that Scott pictures the one-state solution in which both the Israelis and the Palestinians can coexist peacefully as a feasible settlement. By presenting the idea of a shared Jerusalem under the Crusaders' rule in the past, Scott wittingly promotes through a contrived historical analogy to contemporary Western interventionism in the Middle East. Crucially, Scott goes beyond Samuel Huntington's essentialist views of Muslims. He provides variable representations of Muslim characters, fluctuating between characters that are superstitious, on the one hand, and characters that are capable of rational thinking, on the other hand. Nevertheless, Scott seems to be highly convinced about the myth of religious violence, as suggested by William Cavanaugh. This myth suggests that secular violence is rational and useful whereas religious violence is irrational and dangerous. Moreover, Scott proves to be swayed by the idea of the ‘just war’ according to which the use of force can be legitimate. In Kingdom of Heaven, Scott pictures the ongoing ‘War on Terror’ as an incarnation of earlier centuries' European (colonial) ‘civilising missions’ towards the ‘less-civilised’ nations. |
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| ISSN: | 2054-1996 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal of Holy Land and Palestine Studies
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.3366/hlps.2020.0240 |