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News :: Civil & Human Rights : Government Secrecy : International Relations : Iraq : Regime |
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Four Shot Dead As U.S. Forces Raided a Mosque During Prayers |
Current rating: 0 |
by Dahr Jamail
(No verified email address) |
20 Nov 2004
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Can you imagine the outcry if this had been foreign occupiers raiding a church during Sunday services anywhere in the U.S.? |
BAGHDAD - An eyewitness commentary to IPS during a U.S. raid on a Baghdad mosque Friday gives a vivid picture of what a 'successful raid' can be like.
U.S. soldiers raided the Abu Hanifa mosque in Baghdad during Friday prayers, killing at least four and wounding up to 20 worshippers.
At 12:30 pm local time, just after Imam Shaikh Muayid al-Adhami concluded his talk, about 50 U.S. soldiers with 20 Iraqi National Guardsmen (ING) entered the mosque, a witness reported.
ā€¯Everyone was there for Friday prayers, when five Humvees and several trucks carrying INGs entered,ā€¯ Abu Talat told IPS on phone from within the mosque while the raid was in progress. ā€¯Everyone starting yelling 'Allahu Akbar' (God is the greatest) because they were frightened. Then the soldiers started shooting the people praying!ā€¯
Talat said he was among a crowd of worshippers being held back at gunpoint by U.S. soldiers. Loud chanting of 'Allahu Akbar' could be heard in the background during his call. Women and children were sobbing, he said.
ā€¯They have just shot and killed at least four of the people praying,ā€¯ he said in a panicked voice. ā€¯At least 10 other people are wounded now. We are on our bellies and in a very bad situation.ā€¯
Talat gave his account over short phone calls. He said he was witnessing a horrific scene.
ā€¯We were here praying and now there are 50 here with their guns on us,ā€¯ he said. ā€¯They are holding our heads to the ground, and everyone is in chaos. This is the worst situation possible. They cannot see me talking to you. They are roughing up a blind man now.ā€¯ He evidently could talk no further then.
The soldiers later released women and children along with men who were related to them. Abu Talat was released because a boy told him to pretend to be his father.
Other witnesses gave similar accounts outside the mosque. ā€¯People were praying and the Americans invaded the mosque,ā€¯ Abdulla Ra'ad Aziz from the al-Adhamiya district of Baghdad told IPS. He had been released along with his wife and children. ā€¯Why are they killing people for praying?ā€¯ He said that after the forces entered ā€¯they went to the back doors and we heard so many bullets of the guns -- it was a gun bigger than a Kalashnikov. There were wounded and dead, I saw them myself.ā€¯
Some of the people who had been at prayer were ordered by soldiers to carry the dead and wounded out of the mosque, he said.
ā€¯One Iraqi National Guardsmen held his gun on people and yelled, 'I will kill you if you don't shut up',ā€¯ said Rana Aziz, a mother who had been trapped in the mosque.. ā€¯So they made everyone lie down, then people got quiet, and they took the women and children out.ā€¯
She said someone asked the soldiers if they would be made hostages. A soldier used foul language and asked everyone to shut up, she said. Suddenly, she laughed amid her tears. ā€¯The Americans have learnt how to say shut up in Arabic, 'Inchev'.ā€¯
Soldiers denied Iraqi Red Crescent ambulances and medical teams access to the mosque. As doctors negotiated with U.S. soldiers outside, more gunfire was heard from inside.
About 30 men were led out with hoods over their heads and their hands tied behind them. Soldiers loaded them into a military vehicle and took them away around 3.15 pm.
A doctor with the Iraqi Red Crescent confirmed four dead and nine wounded worshippers. Pieces of brain were splattered on one of the walls inside the mosque while large blood stains covered carpets at several places.
A U.S. military spokesperson in Baghdad did not respond to requests for information on the raid.
Ā© Copyright 2004 IPS - Inter Press Service
http://www.ips.org |
Copyright by the author. All rights reserved. |
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Raid on Mosque Sparks Battles in Baghdad |
by AP
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
21 Nov 2004
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BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- The Iraqi capital, on edge for months because of unrelenting violence, has shed its business-as-usual veneer and become a city at war.
Last week's U.S.-Iraqi raid on the Abu Hanifa mosque -- one of the most revered shrines for Sunni Muslims -- sparked street battles, assassinations and a rash of bombings.
The chaos has fanned sectarian tension and deepened Sunni distrust of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a Shiite installed by the Americans five months ago. It has also heightened the anxiety of the city's 6 million people -- already worn down by years of sanctions and tyranny, then war, military occupation, crime and deprivation.
``Baghdad is now a battlefield and we are in the middle of it,'' said Qasim al-Sabti, an artist who kept his children home from school Saturday, which is a work day in Iraq. When he sent his children back to school Sunday, the teachers didn't show up.
In a sign of public unease, merchants in the outdoor markets, where most people buy their meat, vegetables and household supplies, say crowds are below normal. Many shops near sites of car bombings have closed.
Adding to the sense of unease, U.S. military helicopters have begun flying lower over the city. The distant roar of jets has become a fixture of Baghdad at night.
The latest escalation appeared to have been triggered by a U.S.-Iraqi raid Friday on the Abu Hanifa mosque in the Sunni neighborhood of Azamiyah as worshippers were leaving after midday prayers. Witnesses said three people were killed, and 40 were arrested.
The next day, heavy street fighting erupted in Azamiyah between U.S. and Iraqi forces and Sunni insurgents who tried to storm a police station. The fighting, involving mortars, rocket propelled grenades and roadside bombs, raged for several hours and left several stores ablaze, according to witnesses.
Almost simultaneously, clashes broke out in at least five other Baghdad neighborhoods. In all, at least 10 people, including one American soldier, were killed throughout the capital Saturday.
Lt. Col. James Hutton, spokesman for the U.S. Army's 1st Cavalry Division, which is in charge of security in Baghdad, acknowledged that there has been an increase in insurgent activity in the capital.
But he linked the increase to the fighting in Fallujah, where U.S. troops are still fighting pockets of resistance after recapturing the city last week, rather than the raid on the Abu Hanifa mosque.
The government has said the raid was carried out because of suspicions of ``terrorist activity'' there. It appears the operation was part of a crackdown on militant Sunni clerics, many of whom are believed to have links to some insurgent groups and who had spoken out against the Fallujah operation.
The Friday raid came at a time when sectarian tensions in Baghdad were already running high over the assault on the mainly Sunni Arab city of Fallujah. Baghdad's population is a potentially explosive mix of Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds. With frustration mounting over soaring crime, unemployment and poor services, Allawi can ill-afford to allow Baghdad to descend further into chaos.
The signs, however, are not encouraging. With the Jan. 30 national election now only two months away, the rivalry between various ethnic and religious groups is intensifying.
Adding to the public discontent is a fuel shortage -- ironic in a country with some of the world's largest petroleum reserves. Motorists must line up for hours behind hundreds of other cars at gasoline stations throughout the city.
Electricity supplies remain erratic, with frequent outages plaguing the city. Residents of some Baghdad neighborhoods complain there has been no garbage collection for weeks, leaving them no choice but to burn their trash.
A nighttime curfew imposed this month under a 60-day state of emergency empties the city shortly after sunset.
The rising tension has prompted many Baghdad parents to keep their children home from school. College students say many of their classmates never showed up for Saturday or Sunday classes. In areas hit by violence, some shops stayed shut.
``If I am meant to die, then there is nothing that I can do about it,'' said Mohammed Rafid, 18, a computer programing student at Baghdad's Mansour college and one of those who showed up for class Sunday.
Rafid, however, said nearly half of the 46 students in his class stayed home.
Tensions are likely to sharpen as the Jan. 30 election date approaches. The ballot is expected to confirm the domination of Iraq's Shiite community, estimated at 60 percent of the nearly 26 million population.
Victory would allow the Shiites to shrug off decades of oppression by the Sunni Arabs, a powerful minority that had long dominated Iraq. Most Kurds are Sunni, but they are resented by many Arab Sunnis because of their close ties to the Americans and for what are perceived as sucessionist tendencies.
Prominent Sunni clerics are calling on supporters to boycott the vote in retaliation for the fighting in Fallujah. A Sunni boycott would greatly undermine the legitimacy of the vote for a 275-member assembly, whose main task will be draft a permanent constitution for Iraq.
The conflicting interests of the Sunnis and Shiites can be seen in the graffiti, banners and posters in Sunni Azamiyah and across the Tigris River in the mainly Shiite district of Kazimiyah.
In Azamiyah, graffiti and banners praise Fallujah's insurgents as heroes and denounce the Iraqi National Guard, which some Sunnis call ``Allawi's Army'' because of the high number of Shiites in its ranks. ``Jihad (holy war) is the gift of men,'' declares one banner.
In Kazimiyah, home to one of Shiism's holiest shrines, Iraqis are urged to register to vote and to take part in the election.
``A vote is worth more than gold,'' read several banners, purportedly quoting Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq's top Shiite cleric who has pushed hard for elections since Saddam's ouster 19 months ago.
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Eds: Associated Press reporter Omar Sinan contributed to this report.
Copyright 2004 The Associated Press
http://www.ap.org/ |
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