By Ali Ahmed al-Baghli
This commentary was published in The Arab Times on 21/04/2011
This commentary was published in The Arab Times on 21/04/2011
Some religious bigots, who claim to be Salafist Jihadists, left the entire world in sheer disbelief when they engaged in appalling activities, while the Arab region was being consumed by public revolts against tyrant rulers. A group of Palestinian Salafists, who call themselves the “followers of Hammam Mohammad Bin Muslima”, recently kidnapped Vittorio Arrigoni - a 36-year-old Italian who left his beautiful country in 2008 to help the ravaged citizens in Gaza.
He arrived with loads of humanitarian aid for these people in August 2008. Arrigoni was abducted by the Salafist group that gave Hamas (of the Muslim Brotherhood) a grace period of 20 hours to release the detained Salafists, including one of their leaders. They threatened to kill the hostage if their demand was not met within the given period, and they did! The remains of the Italian were found by the Hamas authorities hours after he was strangled to death by the Salafist gang that follows the ideologies of Zarkawi and Bin Laden.
Arrigoni was a member of the pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement. Founder of the movement Howaida Harraf said “I was shocked when I heard the news and I cried all night. I never imagined that they will kill a man who dedicated himself to the Palestinians”. Silvia Todeschini, Arrigoni’s friend and fellow member of the movement, told Reuters, “They killed a person who came here for their sake. They will never chase us away from here; we will stay.”
We pray that the deceased will be blessed and his family has the fortitude to bear the loss. To his colleagues we say, “Some of our Palestinian brothers are ingrates. Ask us, the Kuwaitis, how most of them denied us when Saddam invaded our country. We gave them everything without asking for anything in return. We condemn the behavior of this cruel and ungrateful group which knows no law or civility. This is what is being instigated by some Salafist ideologies falsely attributed to ‘jihad’, which separates itself completely from them!”
Embattled Yemeni President Abdullah Saleh - who has been in power for 32 years through a free and fair election like that of the US, France and Sweden - has also resorted to this fake religiousness. I was flabbergasted when he said, “Those who protest against me are armed robbers. They must prevent the mingling of men and women because this is prohibited in Sharia!”
In response to this, the Yemeni opposition, including a large number of women, staged a series of protest actions in many cities and towns, describing the president’s statement as frantic and baffling. They accused Saleh of disregarding the chaste people of Yemen, alleging that he had shot himself in the foot. They asserted Saleh was just trying to play a new card to save himself and his drowning regime.
We want to ask Saleh now, “Where is religion in your citadel? Your regime is known for corruption and bloody repression, away from the teachings of Islamic Sharia which promotes tolerance.”
He arrived with loads of humanitarian aid for these people in August 2008. Arrigoni was abducted by the Salafist group that gave Hamas (of the Muslim Brotherhood) a grace period of 20 hours to release the detained Salafists, including one of their leaders. They threatened to kill the hostage if their demand was not met within the given period, and they did! The remains of the Italian were found by the Hamas authorities hours after he was strangled to death by the Salafist gang that follows the ideologies of Zarkawi and Bin Laden.
Arrigoni was a member of the pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement. Founder of the movement Howaida Harraf said “I was shocked when I heard the news and I cried all night. I never imagined that they will kill a man who dedicated himself to the Palestinians”. Silvia Todeschini, Arrigoni’s friend and fellow member of the movement, told Reuters, “They killed a person who came here for their sake. They will never chase us away from here; we will stay.”
We pray that the deceased will be blessed and his family has the fortitude to bear the loss. To his colleagues we say, “Some of our Palestinian brothers are ingrates. Ask us, the Kuwaitis, how most of them denied us when Saddam invaded our country. We gave them everything without asking for anything in return. We condemn the behavior of this cruel and ungrateful group which knows no law or civility. This is what is being instigated by some Salafist ideologies falsely attributed to ‘jihad’, which separates itself completely from them!”
Embattled Yemeni President Abdullah Saleh - who has been in power for 32 years through a free and fair election like that of the US, France and Sweden - has also resorted to this fake religiousness. I was flabbergasted when he said, “Those who protest against me are armed robbers. They must prevent the mingling of men and women because this is prohibited in Sharia!”
In response to this, the Yemeni opposition, including a large number of women, staged a series of protest actions in many cities and towns, describing the president’s statement as frantic and baffling. They accused Saleh of disregarding the chaste people of Yemen, alleging that he had shot himself in the foot. They asserted Saleh was just trying to play a new card to save himself and his drowning regime.
We want to ask Saleh now, “Where is religion in your citadel? Your regime is known for corruption and bloody repression, away from the teachings of Islamic Sharia which promotes tolerance.”
No comments:
Post a Comment