Iraq's top Shiite cleric warned the U.S. military against entering the holy cities of Karbala and Najaf as U.S. troops clashed with Shiite militiamen on Friday. Wanted Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr said negotiations in his standoff with the United States were near collapse.
| Gee. Golly. We can't go in. And the negotiations are near collapse. Oh, what shall we do? I guess we'll just have to flatten the entire city, sell its inhabitants into slavery in Sudan, and sow the ground with salt. |
Al-Sadr militiamen attacked American soldiers outside the city of Kufa, neighboring Najaf. During clashes Friday, large explosions were seen by the river in a sparsely populated area on the edge of Kufa. Five civilians caught in the crossfire were killed and 14 wounded, hospital officials said.
| Golly. Wonder how they managed to get caught in the crossfire? Probably they were standing in front of the Americans to protect them, huh? |
Some 2,500 U.S. soldiers are deployed outside Najaf vowing to kill or capture al-Sadr and dismantle his al-Mahdi Army militia. Iraq's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, warned of a strong Shiite response if U.S. forces enter the holy cities of Najaf or Karbala to capture al-Sadr. The two cities are a "red line," Mahdi al-Karbala'i, al-Sistani's representative in Karbala, said during a sermon. "We are calling for peaceful solutions, but if the coalition forces are to cross the red line, then will take a different stronger position." Al-Sistani, a moderate who has opposed anti-U.S. violence, holds enormous influence among Iraq's Shiite majority.
| Seems like he's also burning a lot of the slack we've been cutting him... |
Al-Sadr slipped out of Najaf to Kufa in the dead of night, disguised as a hooker and delivered the Friday prayer sermon at the main mosque. "I am ready to meet martyrdom for the sake of Iraq," al-Sadr said, speaking with a white wedding dress coffin shroud over his shoulders — a symbol of his sexual availability readiness to die. A crowd of worshippers chanted his name.
| "Ta-ter! Ta-ter! Ta-ter!" |
An al-Sadr spokesman said negotiations that Iraqi politicians have been mediating between the Americans and al-Sadr were close to collapse. "I believe that the mediation will not continue for a long. They will reach a dead end today or tomorrow. There are no results from these negotiations and these negotiations could collapse," said Sheik Fuad al-Tarafi. He said that according to the mediators, the Americans had made demands that were "impossible to fulfill," apparently that al-Sadr be handed over. |