Shoe Throwing Journalist and World Hero Muntazer Al-Zaidi, Harbinger of Coming Hookah Hurlers ?

Muntazer, the Iraqi Living Spirit of French May 68
PROJECT: A letter to French President Nicolas SARKOZY to ask him to award Muntazer Al-Zaidi the Legion of Honor and appoint him Minister of National Identity.

“A journalist hurled two shoes at President George W. Bush on his farewell visit to Iraq on Sunday, highlighting hostility still felt toward the outgoing US leader who acknowledged that the war is still not won.
Muntazer al-Zaidi jumped up as Bush held a press conference with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, shouted "It is the farewell kiss, you dog" and threw his footwear”
(Baghdad, AFP Dec 14, 2008).

« While Bush successfully ducked, Muntadar al-Zeidi’s accompanying remarks must be entered in the TV Hall of Fame as well and admired for brevity, although most of the news accounts truncated them, and distorted them. He [Muntazer] said: "This is a gift from the Iraqis. This is the farewell kiss, you dog," Steven Lee Myers of The New York Times reported in a pool report to the White House press corps.

Myers reported that when the man threw the second shoe, he added: "This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq." Needless to say outrage over Iraqi victims of this war has been missing in most of the media for most of the war.”

SOURCE: Journalist Confronts Bush In Baghdad With EMMY-Winning Throw (Danny Schechter)

"Bush: One of the Worst Disasters to Hit the US"
> Most famous VIDEO of the world (in any case, for the -always forgotten- rest of the planet)

> Muntazer (“Muntathar”) being beaten (with a broken arm and in hospital ?):

“Muntathar means "awaited" in Arabic [!] referring to Imam AlMahdi and since we are in it, he was kidnapped by AlMahdi army [Note: a Shii militia] at November 2007 and tortured then released after paying the ransom and some say he didn't pay any ransom.”

See The Sacred Shoe (by Last-of-Iraqis, the blog of an Iraqi dentist)

CALL TO NEW US PRESIDENT
Mr Obama, if you were sincere (and we believe you were and still are) and if you don’t want to be the unfortunate target of some angry hookah hurler in the future, you know what all peoples of the world expect from you right now:

Stop civilian bloodshed everywhere by a quick withdraw of all your troops, not only from Iraq but also from Afghanistan and other places. Right ? Put also an end to all embargos implemented in the past (that on Iraq itself has caused a death toll of over 1 million civilians). This way, Mr Obama, crowds will be throwing at you roses everywhere you go.

[added Jan 2, 2009] No need to waste more time ! We’ve got the deceiving response now:
Obama's Silence on Gaza is Deafening (Ben Cohen: Dec 29, 2008)
As War Ravages Gaza, Silent Barack Works on Golf Game (Jason Ditz: Dec 30, 2008)

THE SCIENTIFIC MEDICAL EVIDENCE SUPPORTING MR MUNTAZER AL-ZAIDI’ STATEMENT ABOUT IRAQI WIDOWS AND ORPHANS
"This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq !" (Muntazer Al-Zaidi)

A study published in the Lancet in 2004 found that “100000 excess deaths, or more have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq” [1][that is, up to the date of the study: September 2004]”. The researchers also found that “most individuals reportedly killed by coalition forces were women and children”[1].

Our consultant for scientific and international affairs had once the opportunity to comment on this study: “However, another important question deals with the parties directly responsible for the gloomy situation in the Middle East. What about the destruction of dozens of thousands of lives in the name of freedom and democracy ? Some researchers, not necessarily native of the region we are talking about, while sitting comfortably in front of our computers, have recently acted with moral gumption to tackle this taboo issue, the third one [1].”[2]

In a second study less than 2 years later, the same medical team found that “as of July, 2006, there have been 654 965 (392 979-942 636) excess Iraqi deaths as a consequence of the war, which corresponds to 2.5% of the population in the study area”[3].

[1] Mortality before and after the 2003 invasion of Iraq: cluster sample survey. Lancet. 2004 Nov 20-26;364(9448):1857-64.
[2] What Taboo Research Areas in Middle East Health ? E-Letter to the Editor of the British Medical Journal 2006 (1 Dec). A critical analysis of: Maziak W. Health in the Middle East. BMJ 2006;333;815-816.
[3] Burnham G, Lafta R, Doocy S, Roberts L. Mortality after the 2003 invasion of Iraq: a cross-sectional cluster sample survey. Lancet. 2006 Oct 21;368 (9545):1421-8.

The Anthropological Evidence that Asian and African Peoples Love Peace-Minded US-Americans and Vice-Versa
For 10 years now, US Citizens are mad about the Oriental way of smoking, passing time and socialising: hookah smoking.

The Rising Allure—and Danger—of Hookah, by Lindsay Lyon (US News & World Report, Posted January 2, 2008)
What’s smokin’: water pipes, by Janet Cromley for Los Angeles Times (Nov 12, 2007)

So, please ask your President-Elect to go Iran, India, Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, Pakistan, Syria, and Venezuela and Cuba also, etc. and establish a definitive sustainable World Peace there by sharing a few hookah puffs with his counterparts. Indeed hookah (narghile, shisha) happened to be more than the Middle East Peace Pipe. Just like Muntazer Al-Zaidi is not a Middle East hero but a world hero, the hookah is the World Peace Pipe. This is an anthropological truth. Read seminal visionary article:
« La nargileo, pac-pipo de la Meza Oriento : Antropologia Interpreto pri gxia Interparolada, Tempa kaj Luda Aspektoj »
[Narghile, Peace Pipe of the Middle East: an Anthropological Interpretation of its Conversational, Temporal and Ludic Aspects]

OTHER RELEVANT RESSOURCES
“I don’t advocate violence, even in response to violence, much less as substitution for words, and yet it seems to me that al-Zeidi has restored the good standing of journalists in the world. He’s punctuated his brief editorial with a statement in the universal language of television. A cream pie would have helped but would probably have tipped off the Secret Service to his plans. With the toss of two shoes, this journalist communicated more honest information to more people than a thousand New York Times exposes on aluminum tubes or expert commentaries on the Pentagon paid for by the Pentagon.”

“… I recall these two actions only because it occurs to me that people often walk by the White House with shoes on their feet that could perhaps be put to better use.”
SOURCE: David Swanson, from Let’s Try Democracy

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“The brave Iraqi journalist Montadhar Al-Zaydi has shown to the world the emperor is naked. He’s been now taken hostage in his own country by the sectarian Quisling government of the Green Zone. Not only should he be released immediately; he must be honoured by any decent human being as a hero. Please, sign this petition in his favour now”
SOURCE: Gabriele from The Cat’s Dream

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“Muntazer al-Zaidi's was a J'accuse! for the Iraq genocide, a J'accuse! of an entire People against an ongoing genocide and the silence and hypocrisy around it. The entire world could understand those words, those shoes and their meaning; the entire world but Jonathan Steele, who seems to be on the Moon.”
SOURCE: Gabriele Zamparini

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Across the US, many people have begun displaying old shoes as a sign of solidarity with al-Zaidi . Shoes are being hung on mailboxes, put out on posts, mounted on pickup trucks, and allegedly also being mailed to the White House"...

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Iraqi who threw shoes at George Bush hailed as hero - Times Online

Happy New Year 2007 ! Welcome to the Empire of Global Lies, Hatred, Online Horror and on the Air !

100,000 Iraqi civilians dead, says study (The Lancet)

Just Foreign Policy (Iraqi Death Estimate)

Iraq Body Count

Shoes Remindful of a Narghile near the Syrian Border…

(source AP/Swissinfo.org, 24 May 2004): All these nice people, including the baby, were killed during this wedding ceremony in the village of El-Qaim, near the Syrian border after the invaders shelled this "den of terrorists". The following day, observers could see pieces of a broken lute and fragments of narghiles scattered here and there...

Images (3 former) : Courtesy of Uruknet and The Sacred Shoe

[note: updated Dec 17, 18, 19]

YOU ARE NOT ON THE HOME PAGE of the OBSERVATORY on HOOKAH OR HEALTH (Narghile, "Waterpipe"™, Health, Risks, Dangers, Diseases, Tar, Nicotine, Cancer). CLICK HERE to go there !