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Iraq

Radical Poem On Sharm El Sheikh Usg

Juan Cole 05/11/2007

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Radical Poem on Sharm el Sheikh

The USG Open Source center has paraphrased an ironic poem by a Muslim militant about the Sharm el Sheikh conference on Iraq. The frankly racist remarks about US Secretary of State Condi Rice and the implication that any male Middle Eastern politician who cooperated with her was effeminate and dominated by a woman, underline the reactionary character of this ‘radicalism.’

Kuwaiti Cleric Hamid al-Ali Publishes Poem on Sharm al-Shaykh Conference
Jihadist Websites — OSC Summary
Friday, May 11, 2007

Terrorism: Kuwaiti Cleric Hamid al-Ali Publishes Poem on Sharm al-Shaykh Conference On 6 May, a forum participant posted to a jihadist website a poem written by Kuwaiti cleric Hamid al-Ali entitled “Does Sharm al-Shaykh Teach Us Lessons,” in which Al-Ali mocks the conference of Iraq’s neighbors, the Sharm al-Shaykh Conference, and writes it off as a humiliating experience in which the Arab leaders were simply following the orders of the US Administration.

A summary of the poem follows:

In his poem, Al-Ali describes the Arab leaders who have participated in the Sharm al-Shaykh Conference as men who are carrying out the orders of the American Administration headed by Mr. Bush and throwing themselves at the feet of the Christians like many before them. He adds that with this attitude, the Arab leaders “promised the infidels that the (Land of) The Two Rivers would be entirely theirs.” He mocks them for taking orders from “the old woman with the flat nose (REFERENCE to Condoleezza Rice).” He wonders what happened to the men whom history remembers as brave lions who were accustomed to war and to victory. He goes on to describe the victories that were realized by the Muslims over the centuries in their confrontations with the Romans and the Persians and asks, “Does the Sharm al-Shaykh (Conference) teach us lessons? No, by God, we will turn it into ruins. With the edge of the sword, we shall teach the enemies a lesson.”

Filed Under: Iraq

About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

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