While a lot of folks are going out in the streets of Europe and setting the Danish embassies on fire in several cities of the Middle East (Even Austria's got torched) thus causing the various Nordic and European nations to issue travel warnings and closing their embassies, there are some big name clerics like Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani calling for some restraint in the streets of the region.(I know he complained about the cartoons but what do you expect from a representative of a religion.) Here's what Breitbart.com (AP Newswire Service) had to report of Sistani:
In Iraq, the country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al- Sistani, decried the drawings but did not call for protests.Good for Ayatollah Sistani. It sure beats the stirring of the pot that the mullahs of Iran are contributing to the whole situation. Let's hope the folks of Iraq have their ears open and are more sensible that their fellow Muslim brethren. I'm still keeping my stand against the rabble-rousers calling for the death of Europeans and setting property of others on fire over some cartoons.
"We strongly denounce and condemn this horrific action," he said in a statement posted on his Web site and dated Tuesday.
Al-Sistani, who wields enormous influence over Iraq's majority Shiites, made no call for protests and suggested that militant Muslims were partly to blame for distorting Islam's image.
He referred to "misguided and oppressive" segments of the Muslim community and said their actions "projected a distorted and dark image of the faith of justice, love and brotherhood."
"Enemies have exploited this ... to spread their poison and revive their old hatreds with new methods and mechanisms," he said.
The drawings were first published in September in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. The issue reignited last week after Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador to Denmark and many European newspapers reprinted them this week.
Hat Tip: Mickey Kaus of Kausefiles and Glenn Reynolds over at Instapundit.
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