I have been trying since yesterday to open a thread here to no avail on the recent stampede in Saudi Arabia which in reality was not a stampede but a massacre of pilgrims orchestrated by Saudi security forces on Iranian pilgrims who were protesting the Saudi Govt's killing of shiites in Yemen. This may seem far fetched but, the facts are there. The real casualty figures are about 1,417. The stampede began in a tunnel entrance to the grand mosque where a procession of Iranian pilgrims where being shot at by Saudi security forces. This is why the Saudi govt hurriedly buried the dead and purposely downplayed the figures. The Iranian govt over the years has been sending pilgrims not to perform hajj but to stage political demonstrations against the Saudi monarchy. Read this 1987 NY Times article on how Saudi security officials killed over 400 Iranian pilgrims but will later blame it on stampede. The Saudi kingdom is the heart of satan's throne in the world. [size=18pt]400 DIE AS IRANIAN MARCHERS BATTLE SAUDI POLICE IN MECCA; EMBASSIES SMASHED IN TEHERAN[/size] By JOHN KIFNER, Special to the New York Times Published: August 2, 1987
CAIRO, Sunday, Aug. 2— More than 400 Moslems died when clashes broke out Friday between Iranian Shiite Moslem pilgrims and Saudi riot policemen in Mecca, Islam's holiest site, Saudi Arabia announced Saturday.
After hearing reports of the deaths, Iranians rampaged in Teheran, attacking the Saudi and Kuwaiti Embassies there. Some reports said four Saudis had been abducted from the embassy.
Iranians were also reported to have stoned the French Embassy and to have torn down the French flag over the building's entrance, in an unrelated dispute with France.
In Mecca, the street battles beside the Grand Mosque came on the eve of the annual pilgrimage, or hajj, which marks the high point of the Islamic year. Support for Iraq
While Iran is controlled by radical Shiite Moslems, the rulers of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait are conservative Sunni Moslems who support Iraq in its nearly seven-year-old war against Iran.
The clashes come at a time of growing tension over the gulf war, rising Islamic fundamentalism and United States efforts to escort Kuwaiti oil tankers through the Persian Gulf. The violence in Mecca raises the possibility of open conflict between Shiite Moslem forces and Sunni Moslem regimes.
The clashes began when Iranian pilgrims massed after Friday's midday prayers for a political demonstration, which is forbidden by the Saudi authorities. The pilgrims chanted ''Death to America! Death to the Soviet Union! Death to Israel!'' and brandished portraits of their leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. There are 155,000 Iranian pilgrims among the more than 2 million Moslems, mostly Sunnis, at the pilgrimage. Iranian and Saudi Statements
[size=18pt]Official Iranian statements said the Saudi riot police then opened fire on ''an innocent demonstration.''
The Saudi Information Minister, Ali Hassan al-Shaer, speaking after a special Cabinet meeting called by King Fahd, said the deaths were caused by trampling and insisted that ''not a single bullet was fired.''[/size]
Whatever caused the violence, fragmentary reports from the scene spoke of fighting going on for hours. Slippers, shoes, identity cards, scarves and even wheelchairs littered the streets after the clashes, according to reports from Iran's official Islamic Republic News Agency.
The Saudi television tonight broadcast a 15-minute videotape in which Iranians were shown throwing rocks at the police and then charging into them.
An official Saudi statement said 402 people were killed, including 275 Iranians, 85 Saudi citizens and security men, and 42 pilgrims of other nationalities. It appeared likely that Shiites from Lebanon and Pakistan may have joined the Iranians in the demonstration. The Saudi statement said 649 people were wounded.
The Iranian press agency reported that 200 Iranians had been killed and more than 2,000 wounded. It said the Saudi police opened fire on a ''peaceful march'' with automatic weapons and tear gas.
Earlier, the official Saudi press agency said only that ''some fell'' when police moved in on Shiite demonstrators who were burning cars and fighting with other pilgrims.
Saudi Arabia, whose royal family adheres to a puritan line of the majority Sunni branch of Islam, repeated Saturday that there was a total ban on ''demonstrations, rallies or any kind of marches.''
Like most leaders in the Arab world, the rulers of Saudi Arabia have supported Iraq in its war against Iran, which began in September 1980. '2 Glorious Demonstrations'
Teheran has sought to export its brand of Islamic militancy to other Arab nations.
Ayatollah Khomeini's personal representative in Mecca, Hojatolislam Mahdi Kharoubi, had called for ''two glorious demonstrations'' in the city to help spread Iran's militant doctrine.
The Ayatollah's designated successor, Ayatollah Hussein Ali Montazeri, declared that Moslem religious leaders should wrest control of Islam's holy sites in Saudi Arabia from the royal family.
But in Iraq, the ruling Revolutionary Command Council, ostensibly an organ of the secular Baath Arab socialist movement, declared that Iranians should be barred from Islam's holy sites. Fires Are Started
The Iranians who stormed the Saudi and Kuwaiti Embassies in Teheran smashed furniture and started fires. They threw pictures of King Fahd from the roof of the Saudi Embassy and smashed air-conditioners. At the Kuwaiti Embassy, the intruders set fire to documents.
Iranian officials declared that maps had been discovered showing that Kuwait had been spying on behalf of Iraq. No diplomats were in either embassy at the time of the attacks. [ In Washington, an official in the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement Saturday night by the Saudi Embassy there that his Government condemned the violence committed at the Saudi Embassy in Teheran and denounced the Iranian authorities for failing to prevent the incident. [ ''The kingdom considers this attack a violation of all laws and norms, as well as a contradiction of Moslem ethics,'' the statement said, ''and demands that the Iranian authorities interfere immediately to promptly return the four embassy employeess who were brutally attacked and those detained or kidnapped by the authorities in Teheran.'' ] At midday, a crowd burst into the French Embassy and pulled down its flag. France is embroiled in a dispute with Iran over an interpreter who refuses to leave the Iranian Embassy in Paris. He is wanted by the French police for questioning about in terrorist activity.
France and Iran have put each other's embassy under siege. A French fleet is on its way to the gulf. Tension Is Widespread
The clashes in Mecca came at a tense moment for in the area, as American warships continued to escort Kuwaiti vessels, flying the American flag, back through the Strait of Hormuz. One of the Kuwaiti tankers, the Bridgeton, struck a mine on the inbound voyage. There is speculation that the mine was planted in the shipping lane by an Iranian speedboat.
In the emotional atmosphere, heightened by the battles in Mecca, there is concern that the tension could spread to other Shiites in the strategic area.
The vulnerable points are seen as, notably, the oil-producing Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, where there was rioting by Shiites in 1979; in Kuwait, where some of the Shiite minority have joined a pro-Iranian underground that has set off bombs in the oilfields, and in Bahrain, which has a 70 percent Shiite population and is the base of the American gulf fleet. 'American Plot' Is Charged
Iranian leaders immediately declared that the clashes and deaths in Mecca were the result of yet another ''American plot,'' and they stepped up the polemics of recent days against the American escort of Kuwaiti tankers.
''This plot is a U.S.-designed conspiracy,'' Iran's President, Hojatolislam Ali Khamenei, said, emerging from an emergency meeting of his Cabinet this afternoon.
''No doubt the U.S. shoulders responsibility for it,'' he said, adding, ''Of course the Saudi Government is also responsible because it was carried out through the Saudis and their police.''
''Scores of innocent Iranian pilgrims were martyred and many others were wounded when the Saudi police opened fire on a peaceful unity rally,'' the Iranian press agency said.
A Saudi agency dispatch said, ''A number of men and women, pilgrims as well as local residents, were killed as a result of the demagogic stampede.''
The Sunni and Shiite branches of Islam split in the late seventh century in a dispute over whether the Prophet Mohammed's son-in-law, Ali, should carry on as the fourth caliph, or successor. The Shiites - meaning partisans or supporters of Ali - lost, and since then have been a kind of underclass in the Islamic world, nurturing an emotional faith with an emphasis on martyrdom. Trip to Mecca an Obligation
Making the pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in a lifetime, if it can be afforded, is one of the five obligations of a devout Moslem, and the annual hajj occupies an important place in the Islamic world.
Iran has sought to use the pilgrimage to try to spread its Islamic revolution, among others Moslem, to the dismay of Saudi officials. The Saudis have been especially nervous since 1979, when a Sunni fundamentalist, claiming to be the returned Mahdi, or Savior, seized the Grand Mosque with an armed band. A long siege of the mosque left more than 100 dead. 'Break America's Teeth'
Ayatollah Khomeini had urged the pilgrims to carry out a ''disavowal of the pagans,'' over the gulf war, calling for a ''unity rally'' to seek ''deliverance from infidels.'' He urged Moslems, ''Break America's teeth in its mouth.''
Objective accounts of the Mecca clash were difficult to come by. Saudi Arabia has been sealed off since Wednesday night as part of the normal preparations for the piligrimage and, in any case, Mecca is closed to non-Moslems. Saudi officials are traditionally secretive in times of stress.
From the accounts that were available, it appeared that a large number of Iranians gathered after the Friday prayer and began chanting and burning effigies of President Reagan. The Saudi police were reported to have warned them to disperse, then attacked with clubs and gas.
Steel-helmeted policemen were said to be trying to round up Iranians among the sea of tents set up for the pilgrims.
Iran announced that it was sending a high-level delegation to Mecca to investigate the incident and declared three days of morning and a ''Day of Hatred'' for America.
Prime Minister Mir Hossein Mousavi said Iran would mobilize its resources to avenge what he called the massacre of the pilgrims.
In Lebanon, the pro-Iranian Party of God said that Saudi Arabia should pay for the deaths of the Shiite pilgrims.
''It should be punished in a way appropriate to the crime,'' the Party of God said, adding, ''The Moslem uprising has started and the day of conquering has neared.'' http://www.nytimes.com/1987/08/02/world/400-die-iranian-marchers-battle-saudi-police-mecca-embassies-smashed-teheran.html?pagewanted=all
Photo fo Iranian protesters at Kuwaiti Embassy in Teheran (AP)
This stampede is coming at a time of heightened tensions in the middle east between the Shiites led by Iran and the Sunnis led by Saudi Arabia. The Nigerian govt should ask the Saudi govt to repatriate all the dead from Saudi in order to conduct a full autopsy. |