One million signatures to drag foreign troops out of Iraq (al Sadr)

[bemildred]

Can't find this anywhere else, but it seems worthy.

Amman- Iraqi Shiite leader Moqtada Sadr has launched a campaign to collect one million signatures demanding the withdrawal of foreign troops from Iraq. This initiative comes at the time when Adnane Al-Janabi, member of the commission drafting the new Iraqi Constitution, announced that the commission reached a consensus on the new Iraq's identity, an integral part of the Arab-Moslem nation. In turn, the secretary-general of Shaheed Allah Association and one of Moqtada Sadr�s lieutenants, Saheb Al-Ameri announced: "We will start to collect one million signatures in every Iraqi city to demand the withdrawal of the multinational force from Iraq." "Any foreign army that invades a country must first and foremost have the approval of the people�s representatives, which is not the case in Iraq," he underlined, adding that the multinational force "is an occupying force that has come to exploit Iraq�s wealth, and as such, it must leave."

APS

[knowbody0]

1. way worthy, bemildred

would it not be kool to have Iraqi Democrats on this board?

[bemildred]

3. Way cool.

How are you going to spin that?

[berni_mccoy]

2. Bishop Takes Queen, Check.

What will Bush's response be?

[bemildred]

8. Well, I haven't seen any original moves in quite a while now ... nt

[daleo]

10. He will say that he doesn't listen to focus groups.

Or, isn't it great that they now have the freedom to complain about military occupation?

[oasis]

12. Bush doesn't respond to "focus groups".That's what he said when 10 million

worldwide protested the upcoming invasion of Iraq.

[bluestateguy]

4. If he re-activates his militia it's all over

No way the US could handle that other shoe dropping.

[ConfuZed]

11. Not really they will just murder as many people as possible...

call them insurgents and remain for another year

[manic expression]

5. And look at this

http://www.gnn.tv/headlines/3670/Iraq_Signs_Military_Pact_with_Iran

My summary: 100 Iraqi representatives sign petition for US to leave Iraq.

I completely applaud this effort, and although the US will not care what Iraqis clearly want, this is just a great move for Iraq and Iraqis.

[mom cat]

6. Great news now we have to drive the illegal occupiers out of the

White House.
edited for typo

[bemildred]

7. That is interesting. Maybe related too.

The thing is this, al Sadr (AFAIK) is an Iraqi nationalist, he wants a unified Iraq independent of Iran, so he's not quite on board with the SCIRI types. But he may consider it's worth it to get the foreign troops out. Who can say? They both seem to have figured out the worth of non-violent political action.

[Warren Stupidity]

9. but they love us

they gave us their waggy blue fingers as a token of their love! They want our merkin freemon-moxy we are giving them to protect them from the surgeons and terrsts and fern fighters.

[roguevalley]

13. he's getting smarter, sadr

[bemildred]

14. "You are surprised I speak your language, eh?"

:rofl:

[Barrett808]

15. AFP: Iraq Shiites in campaign for foreign troop pullout

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Radicals within Iraq's Shiite majority community launched a petition for the withdrawal of US-led troops, which they said was drawing support from across the sectarian divide.

Supporters of firebrand cleric Moqtada Sadr, who led a bloody six-month uprising against the coalition last year, said they were aiming to secure one million signatures inside four days.

"We started this morning and so far we have had a good response, not only from Shiites -- Sunnis and Christians have also been coming to our office to show their support," said Ibrahim al-Jaberi, an official in Sadr's movement.

"We have also received more than 100 calls from Iraqis living abroad in support of our initiative," he said, adding that more than 400,000 people had signed the petition by midday (0800 GMT).

The petition, which Jaberi said would be submitted to the Iraqi government and United Nations, reads: "I hereby declare my rejection of the forces of occupation and demand their withdrawal".

In the radicals' Baghdad stronghold of Sadr City, Zayer Lafta refused a pen, insisting on applying his bloodied thumb to the petition sheet.

"I will sign with my blood, because the country is awash with blood," the 44-year-old said.

"The departure of the occupiers will only benefit the country. Every day they are here the closer Iraq gets to its demise."

Khaled Zuwayed, 23, came with five friends to sign.

"Foreigners have not come to solve this country's problems but to make them worse. We only see car bombs and terrorist attacks," he said.

(more)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050711/wl_mideast_afp/iraqussadrpetition_050711192940%3b_ylt=A9FJqYnELtNCPlIB_gmaOrgF%3b_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl

Must they be called "radicals"?

[bemildred]

16. Thanks, good link.

Of course they are "radicals". Anybody that opposes our decisions is radical.

[Barrett808]

17. Vote it up: Currently 4/5 with 220 votes n/t

[yurbud]

25. Funny--went to vote and another fake Zarquawi aide story

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050713/ts_nm/iraq_usa_capture_dc_3;_ylt=AoVGb2mqAVRGCB1el9e2XXabOrgF;_ylu=X3oDMTA2ZGZwam4yBHNlYwNmYw--

[lumpy]

19. The Shiites are pretty well in

control of the iraq government. While they have the upper hand they want to keep it. The secular Baathist party (Saddams) is now playing second fiddle and the Islamic fundies want to restore their brand of governing (probably with an iron hand).

[meganmonkey]

22. Well, they do follow a 'firebrand cleric'

What else could they possibly be?

I mean, they want a foreign occupier to leave and stop killing innocent civilians! If that isn't radical I don't know what is!

:P

[WhiteTara]

18. very good move

The delivery of 100,000,000 signatures will be so public that I can't wait to see what chimpy and friends will do. Invade Iran maybe?
:popcorn:

[leftchick]

20. Wow! He got those signatures pretty damn fast....

I noticed these photos on yahoo from Saturday....





Iraqi women line up at the offices of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr to add their name to a petition calling for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq during a signature collection Saturday, July 9, 2005. In the coming days Sadr's office plans to collect one million signatures calling for the end of the American presence in Iraq. (AP



Iraqi men line up at the offices of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr to add their name to a petition calling for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq during a signature collection Saturday, July 9, 2005. In the coming days Sadr's office plans to collect one million signatures calling for the end of the American presence in Iraq. (AP

[frictionlessO]

21. Great find Bemildred!!! This is why those who feel that we have

to stay no matter what, are just plain wrong.

If we do not start making reparation and preparations to pull out then things will get a whole lot worse not just for us but the Iraquis themselves.

The people who are pro staying the course, are lacking in empathy but heavy on guilt. Why should Iraq have to continue to suffer just because Americans feel guilty for starting an illegal war and trying to bring in terrorists so the Iraqi people can just suffer more than we can ever dream, just so we can have fairly fals sense of security over here. Why continue to punish them in the name of our torture policies. WHY!?



edit for clarity

[tinfoilinfor2005]

23. Kick

very interesting...thanks!

[yurbud]

24. send to your newspaper

Hillbilly Hitler art:



Blog:

[yurbud]

26. Another angle on Iraqi public opinion and why to pay attention

GRAPHICS: What do Iraqis want? An important Q if teaching democracy



The Coalition Provisional Authority did a poll of Iraqis on a number of questions and one was whether they view us as liberators or occupiers.

The results were pretty grim:




LINK TO POLL DATA: http://wid.ap.org/documents/iraq/cpapoll_files/frame.htm

A Gallup poll done around the same time was only slightly more supportive of us staying.

The only poll that has shown anywhere near majority support for us being there was from a right wing think tank, that has a vested interest in making this Neocon adventure look good.

The argument that we are fighting terrorists there instead of here assumes there's a set number of people who are mad at us, and we can eventually kill enough of them to make the problem go away.

The problem is, at the base of all of it, is a resentment of our involvement in propping up their dictators, who don't share the oil wealth with their own people. All this gets channeled into religion because they have no effective political outlets in most countries over there. So by intervening militarily, we are making more not less people resent and want to attack us.

Polls of reaction in other Arab countries to our invasion of Iraq confirm this. A Zogby poll in 2003 found that 90% disapproved of our invasion
http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20030317-025106-3821r

Zogby's most recent poll of Arab countries shows MORE disapprove with 98% of Egyptians (our allies) disapproving.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A7080-2004Jul22?language=printer

If you want to teach people democracy, you can't do it with a gun in their face.

Gorbachev accidentally showed us an easier way to do it. He told the dictators of Eastern Europe the Soviets couldn't afford to help them oppress their people anymore. Within a few years, those dictators were out of jobs, and those countries were more or less democracies.

And I don't think a single Russian soldier was killed.


Musharraf, Mubarak, the Saudis, various kings and generals, would all
wither away and die without our money and help of our intelligence
services. The results might be messy, but the people over there
wouldn't blame us for it--they'd thank us.

Print this out, and send it to your congressman and senators and tell
them to stop treating us and the Iraqis like fucking idiots.

They are there to steal the oil. Stop it. Don't use our tax dollars
and soldiers lives to enrich a very, very few. Or we'll start
wondering about how seriously they take democracy here.


Hillbilly Hitler art:



Blog:

[WhiteTara]

27. he has already collected 400,000

signatures in the first couple of days!

[billyoc]

28. But how many of those million have a rifle?

Oh, yeah, that's right. Every single one of them...