Don't confuse those that are permanently disabled (multiplication, division, bitwise operations, string operations) with those that are not relayed (flow operations, stack operations, addition, subtraction, crypto functions).
I understand the difference.
They should have temporarily disabled them. For example, they could have disabled them for 50000 blocks (1 year). That would give them time to test for any bugs. They could extend the deadline via a soft fork later.
Scripting doesn't really achieve very much, as I posted
here enabling all the scripting operations only really allows more complex multi-signature transactions and proof of work in order to spend transactions.
I think progressive enabling of opcodes would be safest.
Atomic cross chain trading requires non-standard transactions. After giving it even more thought, I was able to squeeze it into a protocol that requires exactly one non-standard transaction.
OP_IF to allow multiple choice release and hash protection would be nice to have operations.
Yeah, I don't get why they permanently disabled multiplication. The explanation says it's because of possible bugs, but come on, it'd be pretty hard to fuck up a simple multiplication.
Disabling them was zero risk.