{"id":1251,"date":"2004-08-16T13:38:03","date_gmt":"2004-08-16T20:38:03","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2004-08-16T13:38:03","modified_gmt":"2004-08-16T20:38:03","slug":"defending-the-imam-ali-shrine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2004\/08\/16\/defending-the-imam-ali-shrine\/","title":{"rendered":"Defending the Imam Ali Shrine"},"content":{"rendered":"<div align=\"center\"><font size=\"2\"><font size=\"2\"><\/font><\/p>\n<table border=\"0\" cellpadding=\"0\" cellspacing=\"0\" width=\"10%\" align=\"center\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td><img decoding=\"async\"  src=\"http:\/\/ancapistan.typepad.com\/unfairwitness\/images\/081604najafshields.jpg\"  border=\"0\" \/><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td valign=\"top\">\n<p align=\"left\" style=\"margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 12px;\"><font face=\"Verdana\" size=\"1\" color=\"#800000\"><br \/>\nA crowd of unarmed volunteer human shields made up of Shi&#8217;ite Muslim followers of radical Iraqi cleric Moqtada al Sadr, chant anti-government slogans in the courtyard of Imam Ali&#8217;s shrine in Najaf August 16, 2004. With his militants and human shields holed up inside one of Shi&#8217;ite Islam&#8217;s holiest shrines, radical cleric al-Sadr is playing a shrewd waiting game ahead of an expected American-led offensive. Photo by Chris Helgren\/Reuters<br \/>\n<br \/><\/font>   <\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p><\/font><\/div>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;We will not leave the shrine until the Americans get out of Najaf. We will kill,&#8221; said Ugil Abdel Hussein, 32, a member of the Turkmen minority from the northern city of Kirkuk.<\/li>\n<li>Hundreds of tribesmen met inside the shrine and vowed their support.  One of them called on all of Iraq&#8217;s tribes to hold a national conference Wednesday to end the Najaf crisis.\n<p>  &#8220;All Iraqi tribesmen are invited to try and end this bloodbath in Najaf,&#8221; said Sheikh Kassim Khafaji, addressing more than 100 tribesmen.<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;These people are a deterrent to the Americans because they are civilians. They are here so that the Americans won&#8217;t attack the Imam Ali shrine,&#8221; said Sheikh Ahmed Shaibani, a senior Mehdi Army commander and top aide to Sadr.<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;I will lie on the ground in front of the tanks, or I will kill the Americans to defend Sadr and Najaf,&#8221; said Fadil Hamed, 30, standing among a group of men who said they walked to Najaf from the southern city of Basra.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A crowd of unarmed volunteer human shields made up of Shi&#8217;ite Muslim followers of radical Iraqi cleric Moqtada al Sadr, chant anti-government slogans in the courtyard of Imam Ali&#8217;s shrine in Najaf August 16, 2004. With his militants and human shields holed up inside one of Shi&#8217;ite Islam&#8217;s holiest shrines, radical cleric al-Sadr is playing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[676],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-1251","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-antiwar-movement"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1251","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1251"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1251\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1251"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}