War in Iraq: Protests in the Islamic world - Asia

The Bush administration has made every attempt to convince Muslims around the world that the US is fighting tyranny, not Islam. The response is described in this Reuters dispatch (3/31/03): "Muslim protests against war in Iraq. After fiery anti-war sermons at Friday prayers, thousands of Muslims poured out of mosques across Asia to rally against the war in Iraq in demonstrations that were mostly muted and peaceful. Protesters, some waving black flags, burned effigies of US President George Bush and British leader Tony Blair, paraded coffins, chanted anti-American slogans and held special prayers. More than 50'000 Muslims staged a series of protests in the capital of Bangladesh, one of the world's largest Muslim countries, condemning the war as inhuman, mindless and barbaric, dragging ordinary Iraqis into a humanitarian disaster. They streamed out of Dhaka's mosques after special prayers seeking blessings for Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and his people. Similar protests were held in the southern cities of Chittagong and Khulna as well as most towns across Bangladesh. Protests also swept at least six cities in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, where 10'000 marched through the East Java city of Pasuruan urging a boycott of American goods. At Jakarta's Istiqlal grand mosque, one of the world's biggest, cleric Thahir Azhary said: "What Bush has done shows the kind of man he is. Arrogant. Brutal. Wanting to be God. Bush says he's liberating Iraq, but what he is doing is actually destroying it."

RH: Prayers seeking blessings for Saddam Hussein suggest he is not seen as a villain. Islamic protests against the war should be divided into those in Arab countries, where Arab solidarity is involved, and those in the rest of the Muslim world, the subject of this Reuters report.

Ronald Hilton - 3/31/03