We, the undersigned

MUSLIMS SCHOLARS, WRITERS, ACADEMICS AND ARTISTS,

all strongly opposed to the US-led occupation of Iraq, urge those holding Simona Pari and Simona Torretta, both Italians, and Ra¹ad Ali Abdul Aziz and Manhaz Bassam, both Iraqis, to release them immediately and unconditionally.


We urge those who are holding them to understand that these four individuals ARE NOT INSTRUMENTS OF THE OCCUPYING FORCES. They are members
of Un Ponte Per Baghdad (Bridges to Baghdad) an independent Italian humanitarian organization that has been working in Iraq since 1992 to ameliorate the conditions of Iraqi civilians even when other aid groups refused to stay in the country. Simona Torretta and Simona Pari ARE NOT SPIES. They are committed peace activists who have risked their lives time and time again to help Iraqis, even in the middle of fierce US assaults on cities such as Falluja and Najaf. They have risked their lives for an Iraq free of occupation and for Muslims to live lives of dignity, respect and a decent standard of living. They have opposed the goals of US, British, Italian and even post-transfer Iraqi governments with great energy and love for Iraq, Muslim culture and the Muslim world more broadly.


The Italians and their two Iraqi colleagues are a crucial link in the world- wide struggle against occupation and oppression, and against US and European imperialism and economic and cultural exploitation in particular. They are among the strongest critics of the occupation anywhere in the world and have worked to challenge it with their minds and bodies at every possible turn.


All four individuals, even the two Italians, are Muslims in the purest sense of the word in that they have totally submitted themselves to the will of Allah to work against the occupation and for justice and peace even at the risk of their lives. We ask our brothers who are holding them, would the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) kidnap or harm people such as this, no matter what a government they have no control over has done to Muslims? Would our greatest warriors, generals and rulers do so, whether the Rightly Guided Caliphs or Salah ad-Din? Surely our sacred revelations, history, traditions and law have taught us not to wage jihad against those
who are working to help Muslims. We beg you to consider this fact.


Moreover, to kidnap and even harm them for actions of the Italian government which they have strongly opposed. Kidnapping or otherwise harming these and other aid workers only serves to deflect attention away from the growing struggle within these various countries to end the occupation and bring the leaders who brought it about to justice. It thus advances the aims of the Bush Administration and its allies in London and Rome, who clearly seek an apocalyptic "clash of civilizations" with the Muslim world that would cement the West's control over the region's oil resources while sewing chaos throughout the region.


Simona Torretta and Simona Pari are not enemies of Islam or the Iraqi people. They are enemies of imperialism who are showing citizens of the West that it is possible to work against the occupation and the large policies of their governments in a positive, creative way. We again urge those who hold them and their Iraqi colleagues to recognize the contribution they have made to confronting the occupation and helping improve the basic living conditions for Iraqis, and to release them to continue their work to help build an Iraq free of occupation and foreign domination and exploitation.


At the same time We call on the Italian government to immediately withdraw its membership in the US-led coalition. We call on the United States and the remaining members of the coalition to end the occupation.



Meisg: Middle east and Islamic studies graduate students
Network of Progressive Muslims
Progressive Muslims Network
Qamar al-Huda, MPAC, Canada
Hadia Mubarak, President, Muslim Students Association National
Dr. Hatem Bazian, Near Eastern and Ethnic Studies Departments University
of California, Berkeley
Laury Silvers
Abdul Rashied Omar, Notre Dame
Joyce T. Lionarons
Jamilla Karim
Munir Sheikh, Islamic Studies, UCLA, California
Ahmed Nassef, Co-Founder and Editor-in-Chief, Muslim Wake Up!
Omid Safi, Prof. of Religious Studies, Colgate University
Abbas Syed, Canada
Itrath Syed, Graduate Student, Centre for the Study of Women's Studies and
Gender Relations University of British Columbia, Canada
Asma Sayeed, Princeton University
Barbara Leviten, California
Abdul-Aleem Somers
Shehnaz Somers
Youshaa Patel
Mike Davis Jon Wiener Zayed Yasin, Harvard Medical School and Lubna Nadvi,
Lecturer and anti-war activist, University of Kwa-Zulu Natal, Durban, South Africa