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Fallujah leaders condemn gruesome murders amid US threats of revenge
AFP
| 4/02/04
Posted on 04/02/2004 3:34:45 AM PST by kattracks
Town leaders in troubled Fallujah denounced the gruesome murder of four American contractors here, as imams decided to devote Friday prayers to condemn such acts considered sins in Islam. Police and paramilitary forces were deployed across Fallujah, setting up checkpoints at main entrances to the dusty town west of Baghdad, with many anticipating the harsh retaliation vowed by the US Army.
In an apparent move to ease tensions and avoid escalation, town leaders rushed to denounce Wednesday's grisly killings as residents headed to mosques for Friday weekly prayers expected to issue similar condemnation.
"The City Council held a meeting late last night to condemn the acts of mutilation of the bodies," council president Saadallah al-Rawi told AFP.
"We will distribute a statement to that effect later today," he said.
Rawi also said "imams across Fallujah have decided to make a unified Friday sermon today that will condemn the mutilation of the bodies, based on the holy Koran and the teachings of Prophet Mohammed, which prohibit them."
Many Fallujah residents expressed dismay at the mutilation of the bodies which they considered against Muslim teachings, although some justified the acts as a reaction to army raids on homes and mosques in the town.
On Thursday, the army recovered remains of the four slain Americans, after police officers gathered dismembered body parts from various locations around the town, 50 kilometers (30 miles) west of Baghdad.
The four were killed in an ambush by armed insurgents in downtown Fallujah, located in the so-called Sunni Triangle region where insurgents are leading a battle against US-led occupation forces.
Following the attack charred bodies were dismembered and publicly paraded by jubilant residents in this town located in the so-called Sunni triangle where insurgents are waging a fierce battle against US-led occupation forces.
Graphic pictures and footage of the macabre killings and mutilation filled airwaves and newspapers, shocking viewers around the world and prompting Iraqi officials to issue stern condemnations.
Iraq's interim Governing Council denounced the killings as a "savage" act that did not represent the Iraqi people.
Council member Samir Sumaidai said "what happened in Fallujah represents the worst of savage behaviour."
"What happened is very far away from the nature of Iraq and Islam," said Rosch Schaways, deputy to Kurdish leader and council member Massoud Barzani.
US officials have vowed a forceful response to the murders.
Speaking at a graduation ceremony at Baghdad's police academy on Thursday, an angry Paul Bremer, the US overseer in Iraq, said: "Their deaths will not go unpunished."
Top US military spokesman Mark Kimmitt said "we will respond. It is going to be deliberate and precise and it will be overwhelming.
"We will re-establish control and will pacify that city," he added. "It will be at the time and place of our choosing."
Replaying scenes from Fallujah, US televisions noted the similarities with the abuse meted out to the corpses of American soldiers killed in Somalia in 1993 in an ill-fated raid depicted in the book and movie "Black Hawk Down."
Pictures of a dead US serviceman being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu aired constantly on US television at the time, and led to the eventual evacuation of US forces from Somalia.
TOPICS: Breaking News; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: fallujah; iraq; religionofpieces
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To: BuckeyeOhio
Minimally, the US should completely destroy the bridge they used to hang these poor people.I prefer, minimally, that Fallujah be completely destroyed, leaving only the bridge standing.
41
posted on
04/02/2004 5:10:08 AM PST
by
BulletBobCo
(Terrorism is a cancer that can only be cured with a massive dose of radiation.)
To: kattracks; Squantos; Travis McGee; JohnHuang2; Ragtime Cowgirl
Where these so-called leaders the day of the murders! Where were their police. A city of 500,000 has a sizable police force...which they are now showing today at all the checkpoints they are setting up. These leaders could have ordered them into the streets to put down the violence and murdering but THEY chose not to.
Now that Bremer is making it apparant that this city will be pacified, and the military leaders are saying it will be forceful and effective...they come out with this?
town leaders rushed to denounce Wednesday's grisly killings
TOO LITTLE TOO LATE!
Short of them turning over hundreds of people who were seen involved with the murders and descecrations, short of them establishing total martial law and allowing our troops to come into Fallujah in strength to pacify the dissidents...to round them up...to establish interment camps...and then themsleves resigning and humbly and contritely agreeing to an interim government of the town established by US forces and administered by the same until the handover of power on June 30...in short, short of their abject surrender and self abasement before our forces...we should go in their an accomplish all of the same at the point of a bayonette.
Jeff
To: MrBambaLaMamba
"Kill them all."200 years from now, I want their children's children's children's children
to cower and cringe in fear whenever they hear the sounds of jet engines overhead
because their legends tell of fire from the sky.
I want them to hide in dark caves and holes in the earth,
shivering with terror whenever they hear the roar of diesel engines
because the tales of their ancestors talk about metal monsters
crawling over the earth, spitting death and destruction.
I want their mothers to be able to admonish them with
"If you don't behave, the Pale Destroyers will come for you",
and that will be enough to reduce them to quivering obesience.
I want the annihilation to be so complete that their mythology
will tell them of the day of judgment when the stern gods from across the sea
.. the powerful 'Mericans .. destroyed their forefathers' wickedness.
(Original created by BlueLancer ... 13 September 2001)
(Thanks to HiJinx for the accompanying pictures)
Kill them all ... nits make lice.
(COL Chivington, Sand Creek)
43
posted on
04/02/2004 5:20:31 AM PST
by
BlueLancer
(Der Elite Møøsënspåånkængrüppen ØberKømmååndø (EMØØK))
To: Axelsrd
"Are these the same leaders who were dancing in the streets after the slaughter??? I say...level the town."
I've read a great many news articles in which residents of Fallujah openly praised the murders and the mutilations, and dared American troops to enter the town. There is widespread hatred of Americans in Fallujah, and the town is populated with radical Islamists (Wahibbism, or however the hell it is spelled, is dominat there) and Saddam loyalists, both of whom share a deep-rooted hatred of America and Americans. The residents of Fallujah are our enemy. The imams are town officials are only "condemning" the atrocities because they are scared sh!tless of the Amreican response to come. They now realize that GWB is in charge, not Bill Clinton.
To: kattracks
TOO Little
TOO Late
TOO EMPTY
TOO Bad
ToodleLoo Fallujah
You deserve all you will get
45
posted on
04/02/2004 5:31:42 AM PST
by
DollyCali
("Trying to keep the Freepers pulling in the same direction is like trying to herd cats." Richard Poe)
To: kattracks
Yeah, they better...Or Else:
They go BOOM!
To: freeangel
>>Islam is encouraged to lie to all non-muslims.
Expanding on your point: Arab culture is based on deception, a good liar is held in high esteem as "clever" not as despicable.
They must have loved Clinton.
47
posted on
04/02/2004 5:36:25 AM PST
by
MrB
To: kattracks
To: Jeff Head
I hear ya, bro. My sentiments completely.
To: ought-six
There is widespread hatred of Americans in FallujahThat's what the US gov't wants us to believe...What were they doing in Detroit??? Dancing in the streets by the thousands like they did on 9/11 ??? This is not a Fallujah problem, or an Iraqi problem...It's a muslim problem...
50
posted on
04/02/2004 5:45:10 AM PST
by
Iscool
To: wayoverontheright
punitive and retaliatoryWhile this may be emotionally satifying, it might be better if the response was geared towards exterminating the threat.
Threat extermination may look a little like punishment and retaliation, but the results are far more peaceful. Gather good intelligence, position your forces, and stomp hard precisely where it will do the most good.
Hamas pulled back from public encouragement of attacks on the United States precisely because they knew that they don't want to get into an unlimited war with the United States. These folks in Fallujah may be about to find out why.
51
posted on
04/02/2004 5:51:45 AM PST
by
Tom Bombadil
(There are givers and takers. Be a giver and marry one.)
To: Jeff Head
"Now that Bremer is making it apparant that this city will be pacified, and the military leaders are saying it will be forceful and effective...they come out with this?"
Here's the deal. The power brokers in this city are now terrifed by our cold blooded response thus far. The city is cordoned and the Marines can search one small sector at a time under the protective cover of scout sniper teams and whatever else is needed to make them keep their heads down. When our guys are done there will be no weapons left in this town. We can arrest their leaders including all of the imams and clan leaders and keep them in EPW pens for as long as we like.
These clowns now realize they went too far and they wish they could turn the clock back a week.
52
posted on
04/02/2004 5:54:18 AM PST
by
SBprone
To: kattracks
Turn over to American forces all of the filth who participated in this savagery.Today before sunset! The four were the security team delivering food!
To: kattracks
The problem remains, though. Muslims, almost universally, are not condemning the murders of the four men as brutal acts of savagery perpetrated agonst those trying to help them. The only Muslims speaking out about the murders in Fallujah condemn it on the basis of the mutilation - and there aren't a lot of Muslims speaking out about that.
Apologies - ya ever notice that people are only sorry for wretched behavior after they are caught? Fits of conscience only occur in the aftermath of violence, never before. This "apology" isn't worth the paper it was written on.
54
posted on
04/02/2004 6:00:31 AM PST
by
DustyMoment
(Repeal CFR NOW!!)
To: freeangel
I'll believe them when they turn the dead bodies of those responsible over to the Marines.
55
posted on
04/02/2004 6:06:19 AM PST
by
Blood of Tyrants
(Even if the government took all your earnings, you wouldn't be, in its eyes, a slave.)
To: kattracks
Top US military spokesman Mark Kimmitt said "we will respond. It is going to be deliberate and precise and it will be overwhelming.
Its easy enough. We have their pictures. Find them, cut off their ears, and make them watch while they are fed to hogs. Take lots of pictures and send the pictures to family members. Its an old Stalin trick that seemed to be very effective.
56
posted on
04/02/2004 6:15:22 AM PST
by
schaketo
(Never skinny dip in the same pond as snapping turtles.)
To: freeangel
They only denounce the mutilation.
57
posted on
04/02/2004 6:22:55 AM PST
by
pitinkie
To: kattracks
Departmental Ditties and Other Verses
The Grave of the Hundered Head
Rudyard Kipling
THERES a widow in sleepy Chester Who weeps for her only son; Theres a grave on the Pabeng River, A grave that the Burmans shun, And theres Subadar Prag Tewarri Who tells how the work was done. A Snider squibbed in the jungle, Somebody laughed and fled, And the men of the First Shikaris Picked up their Subaltern dead, With a big blue mark in his forehead And the back blown out of his head. Subadar Prag Tewarri, Jemadar Hira Lal, Took command of the party, Twenty rifles in all, Marched them down to the river As the day was beginning to fall. They buried the boy by the river, A blanket over his face They wept for their dead Lieutenant, The men of an alien race They made a samadh in his honor, A mark for his resting-place. For they swore by the Holy Water, They swore by the salt they ate, That the soul of Lieutenant Eshmitt Sahib Should go to his God in state; With fifty file of Burman To open him Heavens gate. The men of the First Shikaris Marched till the break of day, Till they came to the rebel village, The village of Pabengmay A jingal covered the clearing, Calthrops hampered the way. Subadar Prag Tewarri, Bidding them load with ball, Halted a dozen rifles Under the village wall; Sent out a flanking-party With Jemadar Hira Lal. The men of the First Shikaris Shouted and smote and slew, Turning the grinning jingal On to the howling crew. The Jemadars flanking-party Butchered the folk who flew. Long was the morn of slaughter, Long was the list of slain, Five score heads were taken, Five score heads and twain; And the men of the First Shickaris Went back to their grave again, Each man bearing a basket Red as his palms that day, Red as the blazing village The village of Pabengmay, And the drip-drip-drip from the baskets Reddened the grass by the way. They made a pile of their trophies High as a tall mans chin, Head upon head distorted, Set in a sightless grin, Anger and pain and terror Stamped on the smoke-scorched skin. Subadar Prag Tewarri Put the head of the Boh On the top of the mound of triumph, The head of his son below, With the sword and the peacock-banner That the world might behold and know. Thus the samadh was perfect, Thus was the lesson plain Of the wrath of the First Shikaris The price of a white man slain; And the men of the First Shikaris Went back into camp again. Then a silence came to the river, A hush fell over the shore, And Bohs that were brave departed, And Sniders squibbed no more; For he Burmans said That a kullahs head Must be paid for with heads five score. Theres a widow in sleepy Chester Who weeps for her only son; Theres a grave on the Pabeng River, A grave that the Burmans shun, And theres Subadar Prag Tewarri Who tells how the work was done. |
58
posted on
04/02/2004 6:30:25 AM PST
by
LouD
To: Aeronaut
Yeah. The FR title says they condemn the murder, but apparently in the text, they do not.
59
posted on
04/02/2004 6:36:50 AM PST
by
sam_paine
(X .................................)
To: LouD
Oh, how I love Kipling! Thanks for the poem...which shows that things don't change much.
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