Apparently no one's told Iraq's Shiites that the fate of the Palestinians is supposed be a rallying cry that unites all Arabs against the Great Satan and the Little Satan. As AFP reports:
Thousands of Palestinian refugees in Iraq have been ill-treated, with many of them abducted, tortured and murdered by armed Shiite Muslim groups, Amnesty International said in a report published Monday.
The London-based human rights group issued an urgent appeal to the Shiite-led Iraqi government, US-led coalition and international community to take concrete steps to protect the Palestinians.
The report explains that Palestinians are being targeted because Shiites think they received preferential treatment under Saddam Hussein, who like most Palestinians was a Sunni, or because they're suspected of supporting Sunni insurgents.
The report adds:
Estimated at 34,000 in May 2006 by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Palestinians now number no more than 15,000 in Iraq, most of them in Baghdad but many in Mosul in the north and Basra in the south.
If anyone still needs convincing that the problems of the Middle East aren't about borders, or oil, but about ancient religious hatreds, perhaps this story will help to set them straight.
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