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"The project of Washington to bomb Iraq is… against the Iraqi people to control this country for oil," says Benjamin
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BAGHDAD,
October 17 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Arab states must defend
Iraq against a fresh U.S. aggression, three Christian churchmen said
Thursday, October 17, warning of a humanitarian catastrophe.
Jean-Marie
Benjamin, a French priest who organized the first flight to break the
air embargo against Iraq, appealed "to Arab countries to help and
sustain and defend Iraq."
"The
project of Washington to bomb Iraq is not only against [Iraqi
President] Saddam Hussein but against the Iraqi people to control this
country for oil," Agence France-Presse (AFP) quoted him as saying
in a press conference.
Benjamin
predicted other Arab countries would be targeted by the United States
at a later stage.
"The
unity of the Arab world is essential to stop this," he said.
"Muslims and Christians must work together to stop this."
He
denounced the United States and Britain.
"They
declare they are working for peace, but they are preparing every day
to bomb people and for a new war," Benjamin charged.
Monsignor
Hilarion Capucci, the former Latin patriarch of occupied Jerusalem,
warned U.S. President George W. Bush of the fallout for U.S. interests
in the Arab world and appealed to the international community to avoid
a "catastrophe".
"If
he [Bush] unjustly attacks Iraq, the rancor and hate of the Arab and
Islamic world will get worse against him and the interests of the
American people," Capucci said, AFP reported.
He
said he was "praying that President Bush reconsiders his decision
to strike Iraq and spare the Iraqi people the horrors of war."
"I
came to Iraq to say no to war because war is catastrophic for
everyone. Even the winner will be a loser," he said.
He
also called on Muslims and Christians alike to "save [occupied]
Jerusalem and make it a town of peace, not war."
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Capucci urges Bush to "spare the Iraqi people the horrors of war" |
Capucci,
a Palestinian, has lived in Rome since 1977, when he left occupied
Jerusalem under a deal between Israel and the Vatican after having
served three years of a 12-year jail sentence for taking part in
Palestinian resistance operations against Israeli occupation.
He
was a member of the Palestine National Council, the PLO's
parliament-in-exile.
Alongside
Capucci was the patriarch of Damascus Luca Khori and Gino Strada,
executive director of Italian aid agency Emergency.
Strada
said he was in Baghdad to discuss with the authorities how best to
offer emergency surgery services to the civilian population.
He
predicted "exceedingly high numbers of civilian casualties"
if an attack were launched against Iraq, where an estimated 750,000
Christians still live among a total population of 25 million.
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