CAIRO, Aug 22: Ninety-three prominent Muslim figures opposed to US troops in Iraq called on Muslims around the world to support resistance to US forces and to the Iraqi government installed in June.
In an appeal received on Sunday from the offices of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, the Muslim figures from nearly 30 nations, from Germany to Indonesia, said the aim should be to "purify the land of Islam from the filth of occupation".
The signatories included senior members of the Brotherhood, leading Qatari-based moderate Youssef Al Qaradhawi, Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah of Lebanon, Khaled Mashal of the Palestinian group Hamas, two Egyptian opposition party leaders, Sheikh Abdeslam Yassine of Morocco's Justice and Charity Group and Yemeni Speaker of Parliament Sheikh Abdullah al-Ahmar.
Others came from Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Bosnia, the Comoros, Germany, India, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Libya, Malaysia, Mauritania, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Syria, Tajikistan and Tunisia.
The appeal said that Muslim rulers had been silent to the point of complicity in the face of what it called Anglo-American and Zionist aggression in Iraq and the Palestinian territories.
"(The signatories) call on our Arab and Muslim peoples and all religious authorities and liberation forces everywhere to oppose the occupation and savage crimes in Iraq and Palestine, by providing all kinds of material and moral support to the honourable resistance ... until God's victory comes," it said.
The statement called the Iraqi government "subordinate and installed, a mere shadow of the occupation, designed to impose hegemony on Iraq and its resources." The signatories called for democracy throughout the Muslim world through free and fair elections, with respect for pluralism and the dignity of citizens. -Reuters
