Iraqis protest US military’s presence

[unhappycamper]

Iraqis protest US military’s presence
By Tim Arango and Khalid D. Ali
New York Times / April 10, 2011

BAGHDAD — A day after Defense Secretary Robert Gates suggested that American troops could remain here for years, tens of thousands of protesters allied with Moqtada al-Sadr, the radical anti-American Shi’ite cleric, flooded the streets demanding an end to the American military presence.

The protests were scheduled before Gates’s comments — made on Friday during a visit to troops in northern Iraq — although his statements may have fueled some of the day’s fervor. The protesters were whipped up by comments drafted by Sadr, who is continuing his religious studies in Iran but sent a message to the crowd threatening to reconstitute his militia, the Mahdi Army, if the American military did not leave this year.

“The first thing we will do is escalate the military resistance activity and reactivate the Mahdi Army in a new statement which will be published later,’’ Sadr’s representative, Salah al-Obaidi, told the crowd. “Second is to escalate the peaceful and public resistance through sit-ins.’’

A demonstration against the American invasion is held each April 9, the anniversary of the fall of Baghdad in 2003 and the date when Iraqis, with the help of American Marines, pulled down a statue of the dictator Saddam Hussein in Firdos Square in Baghdad.

Posters that proclaimed “Down with America’’ were distributed to the crowds, and some people burned American flags and chanted slogans like “Get out! Get out! America the great devil!’’ Others spoke of their “religious duty’’ to “expel the occupier.’’

[Lasher]

1. Didn't anybody tell them we only have 47,000 noncombat soldiers there?

They don't count, you see, because we're calling them noncombat soldiers. Somebody tell them so they'll be happy.

"When Iraq is costing each household about $100 a month, you're paying a price for this war (in Iraq)." - Senator Barack Obama, March 20, 2008 in Charleston, WV.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2008/apr/01/iraq-war-100-month/

Cost of war in Iraq since 2001: $784 billion.

http://costofwar.com/en/