The canonical text itself grants moral license to kill non-Buddhists as subhuman.

Evidence

When Duthagamani laments over the thousands he has killed, the eight arhats (Buddha’s enlightened disciples) who come to console him say: “Only one and a half human beings have been slain here by thee, O lord of men. The one had come unto the (three) refuges, the other had taken unto himself the five precepts. Unbelievers and men of evil life were the rest, not more to be esteemed than beasts. But as for thee, thou wilt bring glory to the doctrine of the Buddha in manifold ways; therefore cast away care from the heart, O ruler of men.” — Neil DeVotta, Sinhalese Buddhist Nationalist Ideology, 77

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The dehumanization is scripturalized as absolution inside a religion famed for nonviolence — the tension the reader’s conviction-vs-bias question hinges on. Arhats, not kings, deliver the sanction.