"Down with Bush, Down with America"

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Mar 13, 2007
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Protests mark Iraq anniversary


Hundreds of thousands of Shia protesters have burned and trampled on US flags in the Iraqi holy city of Najaf during an anti-American rally called by Muqtada al-Sadr, a prominent Shia cleric.

The rally coincided with the fourth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad - the day when US-led forces symbolically pulled down a statue of Saddam Hussein.
Crowds of men, women and children holding Iraqi flags and anti-US banners massed in Najaf and the nearby twin city of Kufa on Monday to protest what they said was an American occupation of Iraq.

The rally is seen as a show of strength for al-Sadr who has not been seen for more than two months.

Angry chants

Many people, draped in Iraqi flags, set US flags ablaze and some trampled on and struck US and Israeli flags painted on the ground with their shoes, an act considered one of the worst insults in Arab culture.

"In four years of occupation, our sons have been killed and women made widows," cried Ahmed al-Mayahie, 39, a Shia from the southern city of Basra.

"The occupier raised slogans saying Iraq is free, Iraq is liberated. What freedom? What liberation? There is nothing but destruction. We do not want their liberation and their presence. We tell them to get out of our land."

Falah Hassan Shanshil, a MP from al-Sadr's parliamentary bloc, said: "This crowd has come to reject the American occupation and demand its withdrawal."

It was not known whether al-Sadr himself would address the crowds.

In the capital Baghdad security was tight.

A 24-hour vehicle curfew was in place and all Baghdad's key roads and bridges were deserted as people remained indoors for fear of attacks.

Residents of Baghdad who welcomed the invading US troops on April 9, 2003, now blame the rampant bloodshed and chaos on what even some of the country's most senior leaders brand an unwanted US-led occupation.

Al-Sadr has been in hiding since the launch of a security crackdown in Baghdad aimed largely at reining in his militiamen accused of killing Sunni Arabs.

The US military has said he is in Iran but his aides deny the claims.

The cleric, who launched two bloody rebellions against US forces in 2004, is known for his anti-US stance and has emerged as a powerful force in the present Shia-led Iraqi government.

His political bloc has 32 representatives in the 275-member parliament and six cabinet ministers in the embattled government.

Al-Sadr call

On Sunday, al-Sadr reiterated his call to unite against the Americans and end fighting between his militiamen and security forces in the central city of Diwaniyah.

US and Iraqi soldiers have been clashing with his militiamen in Diwaniyah since Friday.

Calling for unity against US troops, al-Sadr urged local forces not to support the "occupier because it is your enemy".

"Iraq has had enough bloodshed. The occupation forces led by the biggest evil, America, is working to sow dissent either directly or through its agents."

On April 9, 2003, US Marines pulled down the giant statue of Saddam by a rope around the neck, in a premonition of his hanging in December for crimes against humanity.

But gone is the praise for George Bush, the US president, for toppling the regime.

Angry chants of "Down with Bush" are a frequent background to brutal Shia and Sunni sectarian strife.

About 80,000 US and Iraqi troops are now patrolling the capital's streets where although the daily execution-style killings are reported to be falling, high-profile car bombings remain a headache for security forces.

Since March 20, 2003, the day the war began, tens of thousands of Iraqis have died in attacks and sectarian violence.

The four years have also been brutal for the US forces in Iraq.

On Monday, the military reported the deaths of six more soldiers in a series of attacks, taking its toll for the month alone to 27 and 3,275 since the invasion, according to an AFP news agency count based on Pentagon figures.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/07A30E52-A6A1-4B62-AB69-9FE34FACE12D.htm
 
Col. Steven Boylan, an American military spokesman and aide to the commander of all American forces in Iraq, praised the peaceful nature of the demonstration, saying Iraqis “could not have done this four years ago,” the A.P. reported.

“This is the right to assemble, the right to free speech — they didn’t have that under the former regime,” Boylan said. “This is progress, there’s no two ways about it.”

He does have a point, Now if the US could leave with a guarantee that there would be no violence, it would be over. TA DAAH.
 
Each can of beer I drink..I come up with different scenarios.

Each Shiite Cleric..or a Sunni..could battle it out as well among there own sect...(tribe)...(smile).

One can see alot of religion behind the way your average joe thinks over there....

They may all hold hands now..but if we left tomorow...It could be brother against brother..neighbor against neighbor..Cleric of the same sect..against another.

All we are doing..is holding the cork in the beehive...sooner..or later who is ever holding it..Gots to take a piss....(Speaking for myself)

Even the government they have in place..is of our doing...If you think shit is gona be like our Senate?...Congress maybe?..Our Judicial System?...A Democratic Society?

There will be no stautue of George Bush there...on Baghdad Avenue...No American Flags...not one ounce of liberation in the Iraqi for the blood we spilled.

Truth hurts...but that's the fact.....Pisses me off...Only profit & return for this fiasco...I'll leave up to your imagination.....

Saddam is gone...that's it....

I got it in my blood..and so does every other American to chase that Osama bin Laden till hell freezes over...

They will rewrite the rule book..once the last soldier gets the hell out there on a chopper...

Mount up boys...This is gona take awhile....

Creek..:)
 
".............There is no possible way in which the US and Britain would permit a sovereign democratic Iraq, just think what policies that would follow, just imagine that there were a sovereign democratic Iraq, what would it do?

Well for one thing it would have a Shiite majority, so the first thing they’d probably do is shore up relations with Iran, they don’t like Iran particulary, but they have things in common and they have no particular reason to want hostility, and another major war or anything like that, so they’ll move to, probably, move toward relations with Iran, a Shiite Iran,

It also turns out that there is a very substantial Shiite population in Saudi Arabia in the regions where the oil fields are, Shiite independence, dominated independence in Iraq right next door, is very likely to elicit reactions in the Shiiite regions of Saudi Arabia, which could very well mean that the worlds major energy resources, the core of the world energy resources, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, the two biggest ones, Iran one of the other ones, will be in the hands of an independent Shiite Government.

the US is gonna allow that?

Its so unimagainable we can't even talk about it. The next thing that an independent Iraq would do is to try to recover it’s natural place as a leading element, maybe the leading element in the Arab world, you go back to biblical times, and there were conflicts between Syria and Mesopotamia on the one hand, and then egypt on the other, the bible is about these little countries in between, canonite and these palestinian which are always, you know being invaded by one or the other, and the question is how do they balance between them?

Those were the two big power centers they still are, well Iraq, its now called Iraq will and if independent is going to try to restore that position.

What is that gonna mean? Well for one thing they’ll re-arm, and for another they’ll probably develop weapons of mass destruction, just first of all as a deterrent, and secondly to counter the main regional enemy which is the US military base by now virtaully in Isreal.

Is the US gonna sit by and allow that?

We can perceive, but the chances that the US and its British attack dog, er whatever the right word is, will sit by quietly and allow any of these things to happen, that possibility is so remote that you can't even discuss it.

Well you know you cant be certain that thats what an independent democratic Iraq would do, but its not unlikely, in fact its highly likely.

That alone is enough to tell you that US and British planners can't possibly be conceiving of a democratic Iraq its inconceivable you ever see any discussion of this? Is it quantum physics? Do you need a deep insight to figure it out?
Its right on the surface, its on the surface, to see it doesn’t take education, intelligence, insight, and so on.

Education and intelligence and so on are required to prevent you from seeing it. Because its right on the surface, instantly there as soon as you think about the situation, obviously in the minds of every planner.

Can you think of a word ever written about it? Not just in the media but in intellictual journals and so on and so forth, no. its unthinkable.............."

Noam Chomsky
 

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