Posted on 07/05/2004 10:28:25 AM PDT by ApesForEvolution
BAGHDAD, Iraq - The spokesman for militant Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr tempered threats to continue fighting Monday, saying his movement only planned to wage "peaceful resistance" against the interim government.
Al-Sadr issued a statement Sunday from his office in the Shiite holy city of Najaf calling the new interim Iraqi government "illegitimate" and pledging "to continue resisting oppression and occupation to our last drop of blood."
But Sadr's spokesman in Baghdad, Mahmoud al-Soudani, called a news conference Monday to clarify that the statement was not a call to arms. He said that many of al-Sadr's supporters in Baghdad had begun taking up arms again and he needed to correct their misperceptions.
"We are still committed to the cease-fire," al-Soudani said.
Before Sunday, al-Sadr had made conciliatory statements to the government of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, a fellow Shiite, and members of his movement had suggested they might transform his al-Mahdi militia into a political party.
Al-Sadr has made contradictory statements in the past.
His al-Mahdi militia battled American troops for nearly eight weeks leaving hundreds of people dead in the Shiite heartland until a cease-fire was reached last month.
Sadr said Sunday that "there is no truce with the occupier and those who cooperate with it."
Al-Mahdi fighters accepted cease-fires in most Shiite areas including the Baghdad district of Sadr City after suffering huge losses at the hands of the Americans.
But al-Soudani said the militia can only be disbanded with the approval of its religious leaders or if all foreign troops leave the country.
Allawi had announced that all militias should disband by the end of 2005
Al-Soudani did reiterate Sadr's statement that "the interim government is illegitimate."
Although Iraq (news - web sites) regained sovereignty last Monday, about 160,000 foreign troops, most of them Americans, remain here under a U.N. resolution to help the new government restore security.
"Our peaceful resistance will continue as long as occupation troops are in Iraq. It started when the occupation came, and will only end when the last foreign soldier leaves," he said
We should answer his peacefulness with a JDAM.
I always wonder whether he said these things in Arabic, or only in English. Arafat's old trick was to say in English stuff like, "We Palestinians recognize that hatred breeds only hatred, so we entreat the state of Israel and the United States to be fulfill their commitments for peace" while in Arabic he'd turn around and say, "We must not rest until we have pushed the filthy Jews into the sea, and the ocean is read with the blood of the infidels!"
A long time ago IMO. Biggest mistake of the whole thing surrounds handling of the al-mahdi suiciders their nutbag Sadr - Fallujia, Najaf in particular.
Good question. Their duplicitness is second only to their lusts.
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"peace-full" eh?
As in the interior of a HumVee after a RPG hits it?
Typical Islamofascist lies.
Why is this scumbag still alive?
Why hasn't he been taken out already?
*frustrated*
"When you encounter the enemy leader, you have to eliminate him--then and there."
...and even if that "there" happens to be a mosque.
Hmmm,....I'll take "I used to be a CONTENDER, before my MOAB enema" for $1000, Alex !!
Just hearing about a new bombing of a safe house in Fallujah..4 or 5 precision weapons...as many as 15 killed or injured.
All the years these demon-possessed crazies just spouted off and no one took them seriously apparently. Now that the actions match the rhetoric, I believe that we need to shut off the loudest and most influential voices that threaten our men and quit the PC B.S.
This fat blow hard al-mahdi leader (google search al-mahdi militia and study their 'mission' - and see what we're really up against) Sadr has emboldened a status quo in the insurgency. Has he taken losses? Of course we've attritted the forces WE KNOW ABOUT! How about the hodge-podge of foreign 'mujahideen' that keeps finding it's way into Iraq to join forces with these mutants? Always decapitate the enemy, always.
Politics, starting with the IGC, leading back to Bremer and then all the way to the White House...
Mosque's maybe used to be a place of worship, however, I see more proof all over the world that they are a base of terrorist operations, from brainwashing to hate-education, from recruiting the most militant to actually storing caches of weapons and planning tactical operations, they simply abuse our 'good virtues' against us.
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