BAGHDAD, Iraq: Iraqis protested in the capital city of Baghdad, holy Najaf, holy Karbala and many other cities against defamatory comments about Marja’iyah aired on the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera television.

The demonstrators paraded through the streets chanting: "Sayyed Ali, the people are with you!"

Carrying portraits of Ayatullah As-Sistani and banners calling for a boycott of the television station, they cried on Wednesday: "Al-Jazeera is a Baathist (Iraq's former ruling party) and terrorist channel, and an enemy of Islam!"

In a debate aired Tuesday night and Wednesday afternoon on the station entitled "Against the Tide", Fadel Ar-Rubaei, a London-based Iraqi writer, accused Marja’iyah of conspiring with the Americans against the insurgents.

Sayyed Abdul-Aziz Al-Hakim, head of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, also condemned violations against religious leaders broadcast through one of satellite channels known for its hatred to the Iraqi people.

"Clerics, especially those in the Shia seminary, go to your mosques and don't work in politics. Keep politics for politicians and stop conspiring against the resistance," Ar-Rubaei said adding the Shia clerics were "the biggest conspirators against the resistance. They are the ones who want it to die in its first confrontation with the Americans."

A group of senior religious students in the holy city of Najaf called the program "a provocation and flagrant aggression on the values and feelings of Muslims whether in Iraq or around the world."