A strong statement?

Yes I'm not sure I agree with that either but as Luckygirl said it does send out a message.

But it sends an important message.

A natural reaction, I think, phoenix. At my most cynical I wonder if it is seen as a way to avoid backlash against the respective mosques of the terrorists.

I've no truck with the hypothetical situation put forward by m0nica. If gods who forgive exist then the god in question will forgive if there is repentance regardless of what happens to the dead bodies of the criminals.

I just feel sorry for any relatives of such people, especially if they tried to bring up their sons properly, but I don't think the kind of funeral they get will make any difference to the agony and shame they must feel.

I do not support this approach. At the heart of almost all religions is a belief in the love and forgiveness of God and in Christianity, a belief that even at the last minute the sinner may have seen the light and realised the wrongness of their actions.

IRA bombers were always granted catholic funerals.Sometimes, admittedly, they became ceremonies of glory and that I do think unacceptable, but I see no reason why these men should not be given a muslim funeral quietly, possibly at night, and their bodies consigned to unmarked graves. Many of these men have families who did not support them and tried to change them and funerals are as much for the living as for the dead.