Posted on 04/10/2009 9:09:09 AM PDT by Scanian
BAGHDAD — Six years after the U.S. overthrew Saddam Hussein's government, tens of thousands of Iraqis gathered in the rain in Iraq's capital Thursday to mark the anniversary and renew calls for an American withdrawal.
The demonstrators came in response to calls by Muqtada al Sadr, the influential Shiite cleric who's long decried the U.S. military's occupation, but there were also Sunni Muslims in the crowd.
Draped in Iraqi flags and chanting, protesters packed Baghdad's Firdous Square, where six years ago a crowd cheered the destruction of a statue of Saddam.
"No, no to America," demonstrators repeated Thursday. "No, no to arrogance."
Speakers at the rally called on President Barack Obama to "keep his promise to the world" and withdraw U.S. troops quickly.
"I hope that all the sons of the fervent Iraqi people in all their shades — Sunni and Shiite, Arab and Kurd, Christian, Sabian and Muslim — will participate in this demonstration to reject the despicable occupation," Sadr said in a statement announcing the event two weeks ago.
Obama, who this week made his first visit to Iraq since he became president, has pledged to pull most American troops from Iraq by next summer. In Baghdad on Tuesday, he said that a recent uptick in violence in Iraq hadn't changed those plans.
Besides an end to the occupation, rally speakers called for "Iraqi unity."
Police said that many Sunnis, including prominent leaders, took part.
(Excerpt) Read more at mcclatchydc.com ...
We should tell these ingrates to pay their own way already.
...from his comfy home in Iran. Mookie has always been ready to fight to the last Iraqi.
And if the left still protests, let them. They hate us anyway.
We are handling this war the wrong way and not doing it right. Our brave soldiers shouldn't be dying like this.
Why is Mookie still alive?
Why is that fat bat-turd Mookie still breathing air?
“No, no to arrogance.”
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I see they pick their talking points directly
from the lips of Zeros teleprompter
Well, lessee, after throwing hundreds of billions of dollars into that rat hole to free them from Saddam, who wants to bet that, by Christmas of 2010, Iraq will either be under the tryannical control of al-Qaeda, or they’ll be gripped in a murderous bloodbath between the different “peaceful” Muslim sects fighting for control
Thanks, Obama, that’s another 20 tons of money we’ll never see again!!
With the Little Dictators reprehensible actions this week (bow, America not a Christian nation) and his weakness in handling the hostage situation (somali pirates) we can expect to see violence in Iraq and throughout the Middle East flare up. He has snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in his incompetence or hatred for America.
LLS
The demonstrators came in response to calls by Muqtada al Sadr,'Mooky' should have been 'terminated with extreme prejudice' on day one. The day his 'militia' hit the streets Army and Marine Snipers should have been given the green light. And its not like we didn't have the 'ways or means', that mutt was very public back then.
IMO as long as he's sucking air Iraq will be a problem.
Ten thousand Mookie supporters? Iraq’s population is 29 million. Ten thousand is nothing. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still ten thousand too many, and these ingrates don’t deserve what we’ve sacrificed for their country, but this sounds like the media is trying to make things sound worse than they are.
Mookie should have been exterminated a long time ago.
“The demonstrators came in response to calls by Muqtada al Sadr”
McClatchy is trying to elevate this guy, Sadr, in denying their readers the fact that he is losing followers among his own major constituents.
THAT is why he organized the “protest”; he’s losing influence and he needs to try to drum up some new street cred. But, the media cannot tell its readers that.
Even the dumbest Iraqi knows that Chubby Tubby is nothing but an Iranian stooge.
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