TT Muslim scholar: Blame Saddam for US war

THE  Head of the World Muslim League, local scholar Dr Waffie Mohammed, has delivered a stinging blow to Iraq’s Saddam Hussein saying that the current war against his country was of his (Saddam’s) own making.

Mohammed, who addressed muslim worshippers at the weekly prayer (Juma) service at Jama Mosque, Queen Street, Port-of-Spain, said Saddam’s leadership had witnessed many atrocities and aggression committed against his own muslim followers. But despite this strong viewpoint, Mohammed said that the United States’ invasion of Iraq was a right it had usurped upon itself. He also accused the US of practicing double standards in its relations with the Middleast.

Mohammed told the large congregation: “We have had in the leadership of Saddam Hussein, examples of atrocities and aggression on believers. He was a faithful servant of the Kuffar — mutilating his own people. He never observed the law that Allah ordained for taking lives.” “Hussein has held on to political power in Iraq like other rulers,” he added, “by force and aggression. But all evil does ‘fall’,”  the WML chairman said, “and when they do “it is a relief for the people, the land and the animals”. But severely critical of United States policy in the Middle East, Mohammed told the congregation that the US did not have a right to invade and by so doing, destroy the country’s infrastructure.

He accused the US of practicing double standards, saying that the ultimate aim was to their benefit. Mohammed noted that the US had accused Iraq of having weapons of mass destruction, but were assisting Israel in building similar weapons. Mohammed said that after the destruction and invasion, “the US will now purchase Iraqi oil at a price to be decided by itself”. And more than likely, he added, use the revenue to pay its own people to rebuild the country. But Mohammed anticipates that such development will only serve to stir more anti-American hate globally. Mohammed called upon muslims in Trinidad and Tobago to pray for the people of Iraq  in their time of need and suffering.