Posted on 04/03/2003 7:46:32 PM PST by 11th_VA
UMM QASR, Iraq, April 3 — The tall Shiite cleric in white turban and flowing black robes came to this British-held border post from the besieged city of Basra with a message: President Saddam Hussein's Baath Party officials in the city are desperate and ready to surrender.
"They are afraid, but they think once Baghdad falls they can surrender," said the cleric, Sheik Muhammad al-Bouslimi, adding that they are also likely to surrender if coalition forces enter the city. The problem, he said, is that the widely hated party needs protection from mob violence if its members decide to give up.
"What worries them is that there are no means for mediation and no plan for their future," he said. "They are looking for any group that can help them talk to the allied forces."
Sheik Muhammad said he had met with 12 senior military and Baath Party officials in Basra, some as recently as two days ago, before he left the city, crossing the front line a half-hour's drive north from Umm Qasr. The general secretary of Basra's Baath Party branch, Col. Abbas Abu Amer, attended one meeting, the sheik said.
"They are asking for our intervention to secure their withdrawal from Basra," he said. "They have no support among Iraqi people or among the Iraqi tribes. They have no one to support them." There was no independent means to confirm his account because the city, surrounded by British forces, is inaccessible to Western reporters.
When first approached by a reporter, Sheik Muhammad was strolling across an open dirt lot in front of Umm Qasr's squat, cement mosque. He said he and a friend had come to this dusty port town bordering Kuwait to see if there was a refugee camp or other shelter for people there. He agreed to sit in a reporter's car to talk about the war, asking that the car move around the town to escape the curious, possibly hostile crowds that gathered within minutes each time it stopped.
"The political analysts said the Shiites would rise up as they did in 1991," he said. "But neither the Shiites, nor any other Muslims, trust the Americans."
Many people, he added, believe the United States collaborated with Mr. Hussein, a Sunni Muslim, against the Shiites when Washington incited the people to rebel and then left them to face Mr. Hussein's wrath. "In 1991, the Shiites were let down and felt betrayed and that left a deep wound in their hearts," he said, echoing a sentiment repeated across Iraq.
The lean cleric, who didn't give his age but appeared to be about 40 years old, said he was a follower of Imam Muhammad al-Sadr, a prominent Shiite cleric who was killed by the Iraqis in the late 1990's.
That would align him with the Dawa Party, one of two Iraqi Shiite opposition groups. The other is the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, which has ties to Iran.
Sheik Muhammad said the Shiites of Basra and southern Iraq "have no relation whatsoever with Iran. He added that "the Iranians care only about their own interests."
As it grew warm, he unbuttoned the band collar of his shirt and tugged at his threadbare undershirt. His compact white turban was set back on his head, exposing a dark spot on his forehead where it touches the ground each time he prays.
"In 1991, when the Shiites revolted, they were angry because of so many wrong decisions made by the Iraqi leadership, including not allowing people to express the reality of Islam, including what's allowed and not allowed," he said. "There were also many personal vendettas that people had with the Iraqi regime." After the rebellion, he said the "tyranny and oppression" against Shiites increased.
The cleric fingered a pack of Winston cigarettes on the dashboard, but declined to smoke one when offered.
He wasn't sure if smoking American cigarettes was against Islam, he said, pulling a pack of Iraqi cigarettes from inside his black, hand-stitched cloak.
The cleric expressed sympathy for the soldiers fighting the United States and Britain.
"We regard nationalists in the army as defending Iraqi land against invasion and the exploitation of Iraqi wealth," he said as a convoy of British armor rolled by. "They are defending Iraq, not the regime."
He said the military had not taken over the mosques in the city but was using schools for meetings because they are deemed safe from American and British bombs. He added that the city's hospitals are filled with maimed and dismembered victims of the bombing campaign.
Hundreds of people cross between Iraqi and British lines going to or leaving Basra each day, dodging mortar shells fired by Iraqi forces toward British positions. Meanwhile, he said gangs of young paramilitary troops, known as fedayeen, are roaming Basra, killing those deemed disloyal to the government.
The cleric said he had not approached the British forces he had seen on the road to Umm Qasr, or tried to contact local British military headquarters in town because he does not speak English and was afraid of being shot.
At that moment, a pickup truck with two middle-aged, burly mustachioed men drew up beside the car in which the cleric was speaking and stared intently at his face before racing away. Shaken, the cleric said he was sure they were Iraqi intelligence agents. After fingering a string of shiny black prayer beads and murmuring a prayer, he asked to be taken to the local British military headquarters.
As people gathered to watch him wait outside the barricaded, barbed wire gate of the Royal Marines' compound, he admitted that he was afraid, not of the British but of what might await him back on the streets of Umm Qasr or later in Basra.
This is precisely why the leaders of this party would not announce Saddam's death. They are more afraid of what their own people would do with them if they knew Saddam was dead than of what the U.S. military would do to them.
"So far as the reports of threats to the Iraqi Public,
here we have one of Saddam's Special Republican Guards
broadcasting to Iraqi men that if they do not go to
the front and die fighting the Americans Infidels,
she will personaly come to their house and screw them to death."
Too bad, so sad. You reap what you sow. If we wait to enter the city after the party there will be thousands less POW's to process. But, we will have to harvest them from lampposts. Hmmm, decisions, decisions. Lets have a late breakfast and talk this one over at length...
"No, Bones, how does Saddam like his leg of lamb?"
"One each around his ears!"
Bada Bang! Bada Bing!
But the show must go on!
"Hey, Jim Boy? Did you know Saddam was a Frat boy in college?"
"No, Bones, I didn't."
"Yeah, he pledged Faruk A Yew!"
Bada Bang! Bada Bing!
Want a break from war news? Go to the Stark Trek Freeper Post or the New Stark Trek Website for a laugh or two. Then come back refreshed and loaded for bear!
Yes, but they'll have to surrender or be captured first.
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