A human voice amongst the savages

Taking an unusual stance, a columnist for the Saudi English-language Arab News criticized Arabs for blaming the U.S. for recent terror attacks in Iraq.

Muhammad Al-Rasheed chastised Shia clerics in a column last Wednesday for blaming the U.S. for the recent attacks against Shia in Karbala and Baghdad, reported the Middle East Media Research Institute.

Arabs tend to "blame others and shun the facts," he said, pointing out prominent clerics, including some in Lebanon, have pinned responsibility on the U.S.

"Mind you, this America is the [same one] the Shia are now talking to so they can finally govern themselves for the first time in 1,400 years," al-Rasheed said.

"If I were a Shia and from Iraq, I'd pray to the Almighty that America remained in Iraq until the country was stable and on its feet again," he continued. "Otherwise, the Karbala massacre will be just a trailer for the full version of an unbelievable horror show."

Al-Rasheed said he found the reaction of the clerics "overwhelming" while "the blood is still hot and streaming down the streets of Iraq."

Bomb attacks March 2 in the Shia holy city of Karbala and in Baghdad killed more than 100 people as millions of pilgrims packed streets for the Ashura ceremony, one of the holiest in the Shia calendar.

Al-Rasheed challenged the clerics to "name names and point fingers in the right direction."

"We are sick and tired of this kind of behavior," he said. "We honestly have had enough of it and cannot blame the world for looking at us and wondering if we retain any shred of humanity. The creed that sanctions blowing up worshipers in mosques (or any other religious venue for that matter, including office buildings since Islam says that work is worship) should be declared the public enemy of humanity. The U.N. should vote on that publicly and let us count the votes and identify those who vote against the motion."

Al-Rasheed called the terrorists who carried out the attacks more barbarous than ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

"The perpetrators have an agenda more vicious than anything Saddam could have dreamed up," al-Rasheed said. "Saddam killed and maimed to maintain his rule by brute force. These people kill and maim to turn people against each other and to satisfy a bloodlust based on elitism in theological terms. In other words, they want to win in this world and go to heaven in the next. I don't think Saddam was that optimistic; otherwise, the Americans would not have found him alive in a hole."

Al-Rasheed said, "Just when we seem to have moved a step forward, something happens to make us take 10 steps back," said. "Sacrificial blood in Karbala and Baghdad is nothing new but the latest atrocity on the most sacred day for the Shia was a criminal act of monstrous proportions. The carnage and the spectacle were on a scale not seen since the last sacking of Karbala over a century ago."

Saudi chastises Arabs for blaming U.S.