This Night in Fallujah: Lailat Al Qadr in Ramadan

Tonight, in Fallujah
We wait
For the known
For the follow-up
To the fighter planes
To the rockets
To the long days of shelling
To the depleted uranium killing us slowly,
We wait
To see their tanks
Their tanks will come first
They remind us of the Israelis
They remind us American planes killed our cousins
In Palestine
Killed them with American rockets,
Now
They have come for us
 
We were living
Just living our lives,
With our wives and children,
Just like the Americans
They went to school, they did their lessons
They ran innocently
In the schoolyards
And on weekends the boys
Would tease the girls
In the marketplace, but
Dare not let the mother or
Father of the girl see, the girls
Would twist their
Hair, their smiles
And blush
Away from the eyes
Of their mothers
 
We were just living
Not looking to fight, just
Wanting to be
Left alone
But they came
Hunting us, like
Animals, like wild
Things, they came
Shooting, randomly,
Dropping 500 pound bombs
Destroying our mosques, our
Churches, our schools, our
Hospitals, our water, our
Electricity-they bombed
Us back 300 years
 
But, we
Just wanted to live
Just wanted to pray each day
In our mosques, raise our
Children, take care of our
Wives, our old fathers and
Mothers, we are not for
Fighting-but now
There is no
Choice-what good
Would it be to run
To be shot down
Like an animal on the run,
Now it is time, even with
The small weapons
We have, we shall stand now
To protect what we have
To claim our own homes, to claim
Our own peace
 
 
They are strange
These Christians, not like
My cousin's wife
Who is Christian, in our
Christian churches, they say
Jesus said, "Blessed are the peacemakers,"
"God's greatest gift is mercy,"
but these men come
with large crosses on their chests,
their ministers teach them songs about
killing and killing for Jesus, these
Americans are strange, we had
Always heard
They were peaceful people, people
Who wanted what we wanted,
Peace, life, justice,
Decency, education,
We had heard---- 
 
So now they come,
Loudspeakers on their jeeps, loudspeakers
And louder music, drums banging,
They tell us to surrender or die, they have
Iraqi slaves among them, some of whom
Will, at the last minute, turn on these
Americans, kill some
And themselves be killed,
We have on our side, Allah
We have on our side, our families,
Our homes, our thousands of years
Of having to defend ourselves
From Persians, from Greeks, from
Romans, from Mongols, from Crusaders,
From Turks, from British�now
This new evil, this new devil
Flying their flags, red, white and blue,
Blaring their music and harsh words,
We see their eyes now,
They are young, like
Us, they are afraid, yet
They want to kill us, we
Are "ragheads,"  "we are animals,"
We are "assholes," "we are terrorists"
And every other name you can think of
And they have come to kill us
To wipe our city off the maps of the world,
Off the map of Iraq, they say
They come at the order of the exile
The Americans sent to rule us, Iyad
Allawi, Iyad the whore, Iyad the munafik,
Iyad the devil-and yes,
We shall die, but Allah knows
Who is the evil one
And who is the one who fights in his name,
There is always that short term victory
For the devils
But their long run is not long
And they to shall die 
 
We do not want to die, but
We understand dying is only
Part of living, death is always 
Waiting, sometimes
Patiently, other times
Takes us swiftly, but we understand
This is the will of Allah
Some of us must die
So that others will
Understand
Just what is going on
So that others will see
So that others will resist even more
 
Our deaths will echo in Saudi Arabia,
In Kuwait, in the Muslim halls of the world, in
The cries of our women, in the history of our
Muslim people, in the Khutba's on Friday�s
Prayers-they know
That we die during Ramadan, they know
We die gloriously at the hand of the heathens, at
The hands of the unbelievers, for the sake of
What the Qur'an taught us,
To protect our families, our homes, our country and
Most of all to protect our mosques
And Islam
 
So we have stayed to fight
And die during Ramadan, this
Most holy of months, this Ramadan
That requires so much
Discipline and faith, this Ramadan
That is the month of  our sign of commitment
To Allah, it is a glorious month
In which to fight, and if necessary
To die
 
No, we are not mad
We do not wish to die
We have more desire to live
Than these devils who have invaded our land
Attacked our fathers  and mothers, who
Have raped our women, who have
Tortured our cousins and brothers in their
Prisons, all in the name of
"democracy,"  and "liberty," and "freedom"-
how hollow their words
how hollow their lies
how hollow their attacks on us
 
 
they do not realize
we do not die, we
live, we live
on now, as martyrs, as
heroes, as men who
were not afraid to die, as men
who believed in the Deen, in Allah,
in the same God they proclaim but do not truly follow-
but his wrath is coming
his wrath shall be coming upon them-
if they survive our fight, they
are being poisoned, just as we have been poisoned,
the depleted uranium has poisoned their blood,
has poisoned the eggs in their sperm,
has poisoned their lives
so when they have deformed children, the
children will be witnesses to their killing
us, to their killing of their own souls,
to their killing their own families, and
what of those who will go mad, whose
nightmares will not let them ever sleep
another peaceful night
 
 
and what will their faces tell them
when they look in the mirror
when they look on their dressers
and see the pieces of metal
they were given for killing us
in our own homes, in own cities, in
our own mosques and churches,
what will their eyes say,
what will they say when their twisted
lies are uncovered, when the rest of the
world speaks of their massacres of
women and children, of old men, of
bombing hospitals, what will they
do when they see the smirking face
of their presidents, their senators, their
leaders who have allowed them to do this,
have ordered them to do this
 
-and
what will they say to Jesus
when he speaks to them on Judgement Day
when he asks why they killed-
why they did not say, NO
why they did not prefer prison over killing of innocent
civilians, and to the pilots who
fly freely, without concern of any reprisal, F16s rocketing
our city day after day, night after night, surely
they will not fly with the angels, but
shall burn even worse than the rest"
 
and so we hear the rockets and hear the bombs
during our maghrib prayer, we have heard since our fajr
prayers, we do not much feel like iftar, the food
has lost some of its taste, no one wants to die,
no one wants to leave their wife and children,
no one wants never to see their father or mother again,
no one wants to have to fight, just to live,
no one wants to have to kill another human being�at least
none of us,
we were living peacefully in our city,
we did not attack anyone,  we
did not do anything worse than defend ourselves,
and for that
now we know we must die, we
know that unless Allah produces a miracle
or sends legions of angels to protect us
that the planes will attack
with the tanks that will crush us
with the rockets and snipers who
will split our bodies into pieces, whose
concussions will split our heads open,
whose noise will puncture our eardrums
until we bleed
and like our blessed Prophet Jesus, who came
before our blessed Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him,
we shall die, just as Jesus
was martyred-we shall be martyred
by the new Roman, the new crusader army,
on this Night of Power, where Allah's message of
righteousness and courage is clear, where
we renew our commitment to our God,
where we know he gives us everlasting life
though we may die tonight on the earth,
we shall live forever, in Allah's hands,
 
We shall live
in history, and the world, yea
the world will remember
we stood and fought this day,
knowing we would die
but knowing that death is only a moment
in God's time, in Allah's time
and that those who kill us today
may live long and tortured lives
when they realize what evil they have done
and those evil men
who ordered them on, Allawi, Bush,
Cheney, Wolfowitz, Abizaid, Myers and the rest,
Allah will take care of them
On the earth and on Judgement Day,
And the men who did not have the courage to
Say, No,
They will suffer each hour, each day
For the rest of their earthly days,
For it is written, that whosoever kills a believer
During Ramadan, will suffer hellfire and damnation
For eternity
 
 
So we choose to stand, to die if we must,
But during this blessed month of Ramadan
There is no death to the believer
Only the knowledge that Allah's ways
Are beyond our understanding-we may not
Be on the earth so see what will happen
From our stand, but we will be looking
Down from Heaven
And we shall see Allah visit his wrath
On those who come to kill us in our homes,
In our city, in our country, in our churches, in
Our mosques-and though we may die,
Like these days of our battle,
 Our spirits
Will live forever