"Great Evil, America, Wants To Eliminate Islam From The World"
Sunnis dig through a truckload of corpses searching for friends and relatives, after attacks in Mosul.
On March 25, influential Iraq Shia cleric, and American nightmare, Moqtada Al-Sadr delivered a statement during prayers in Najaf. The comprehensive and indispensable Iraqslogger obtained a copy of the statement and got it translated.
Al-Sadr has called for mass demonstrations on April 9, the fourth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad, urging both Shia and Sunni Iraqis to march against the American Occupation of their lands. There are many, many nervous people in the American military in Iraq, and the Iraqi government, likewise, is not pleased by the plans for what is expected to be the largest rally in Iraq since the war began.
Here's the words of al-Sadr, which have been reproduced in dozens of Iraqi newspapers, reaching millions of people.
Iraqslogger notes that translators remarks appear in parentheses.
Moqtada al-Sadr :
"Four years have passed since the occupation of our beloved country on the part of the great evil, America, and its followers who have assigned to themselves the elimination of Islam and of peace from the world, in order that they may live in peace.
"And the words of the great evil, Bush, continue to ring in the ears of the oppressed when he says “America has become more secure,” unaware of the blood that was shed in Iraq, and Afghanistan, and Palestine, and Lebanon, and many other places. Yet, how I wish peace for the people of peace! As the Most High has said (in the Qur'an), “Grant the unbelievers a short respite.”
"Four years have passed and Iraq is still languishing under the yoke of oppression and tyranny. So where are their claims of spreading freedom, from the prison of Abu Ghraib and the rest of the Iraqi prisons, as the prisons are still full of women and men? Is this (imprisonment) due to the misdeeds (of the prisoners)? Is this due to courts that are just? Bombs and explosions continue to resound in the skies and land of Iraq, shedding the blood of the innocent and the honorable, yet leaving the occupier and its partisans in our holy land. Yet how I wish that these humiliations be a call for resistance!
"Four years, and still many struggle for jobs, but these have not and will not save them from the retribution of an awful day (i.e. God’s judgment, a Qur’anic reference), but rather from the suffering of this world and its tribulations, and from the pressures of the occupier that continues to interfere with the political, military, security, social, and religious affairs of Iraq.
"Four years, and Iraq continues without water, without electricity, without fuel, and without security, without tranquility, and is rather in the abyss of strife, which may not strike the ones who oppress (a Qur’anic reference) but rather, as they say, “it wears down the grass and the ground.”
"Years of wasting away have passed in Iraq because of this oppressive occupation, which claims to be removing the specter of ruin and instead brings the specter of “fictitious democracy” and “globalization,” (and because of the occupation that claims) to move away from secret mass graves, (and) to move to openness, and (claims) to remove banned weapons, and (instead) comes with the most murderous and ugly of weapons: terrorism; and terrorism only follows terrorism!
"Years have passed, and rather than hanging in the homes of Iraqis, the picture of Bush remains trampled so that the armies of oppression do not trample the land of Iraq, and do not preside over the Iraqis. And rather than empty the terrorist Saddamist Iraqi prisons, they have built (more) prisons, and have filled Iraq with prisons; this mother cries over her son, and another cries over his situation, as unemployment has filled Iraq, and ruin increases, rather than development.
"But the occupier has not been content with this. he has (also) estranged Iraq from the Islamic and Arab world, and all the (Arab and Muslim) countries still do not care about Iraq as it heads for destruction, as though it were not an Arab or Muslim country in need of defense by whatever they were able to do.
"And how could this be except by the occupation, as it has been able to sow sectarian and ethnic strife between the Arabs and others, and between the Muslims and others; yet how I wish they all would remain brothers!
"But the awakening of the Arab peoples and of their consciousness and conscience calls them, saying: This humiliation is unacceptable to us, and, just as their prophet’s grandson (Husayn) said, this separation is unacceptable to us. Thus we call out to our Muslim Arab bothers in all places to give assistance to Iraq. By their voice and their demonstrations for the sake of Iraq, Iraq will be their protective armor and their great pillar; then the presence of the occupation in Iraq would be the presence (of the occupation) in their own countries and land, and absolutely no one would accept this.
"So, you people of Islam and of peace in all places, call out for assistance to the people, whose blood has flowed, and whose freedom and beliefs of living in the care of Islam and of peace, and freedom, and harmony, have been rent asunder. For here is the fourth anniversary that passes upon us of the greatest sadness and sorrow, leaving behind thousands of killed and injured of your Iraqi brothers and sisters, adults and children. And raise your voices in support of (the Iraqi people) and the resistance from the south of Iraq to its north, from its west to its east, so that Iraq might remain united, independent, stable, secure, and completely soverign, free from the interference of the occupier and others and a refuge from treason and unbelief.
"You oppressed people of Iraq, I hear your captive cry to the world, (saying) that you have rejected the occupation, and the destruction, and the terrorism, for you love Islam, and peace, and freedom. In order that the honor of beloved Iraq and its people remain high, and that you cut out the tongues of lying and deceit that want to take possession of Iraq and its people, come out to a united demonstration on the ninth of April of this year in Najaf, accepting the call of freedom and peace.
"And may you raise the Iraqi flag above your houses, buildings, and public residences, to show the sovereignty of Iraq and its independence, refusing the presence of American flags, and other (flags) from the countries of the occupation in our beloved Iraq, until they depart from our land.
"Finally, I renew my demand for the departure of the occupier from our land, even if the instigator of terrorism -- the American Congress -- decides to stay in our beloved country, because this is not their right, but rather the matter belongs to Iraq and its people. It is not anyone’s right to renew the period (of the occupation), nor to demand that it stay, for the departure of the occupier is the stability of Iraq, and the victory of peace and of Islam, and the abandonment of terrorism and of the unbelievers."
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