SANAA, Yemen: Sayyed Assam Al-Imad, Chief of Supreme Shiia Council in Yemen, has revealed to Iranian news agency IRNA the crimes that were committed against Shiias in the country and the Yemeni government-imposed complete media darkness over this.

According to Sayyed Al-Imad, elements of ousted Saddam regime that fled from Iraq are working in the Yemeni military, and that they began their work as military advisors in the army one year back.

He added that these military men advised Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh to kill Shiias in the country as did Saddam in Iraq. He said the Yemeni government acting upon this advice issued orders to tear and burn all Shiia books including Nahj-ol Balagha – a compilation of sermons and sayings of holy Prophet (p)’s cousin and son-in-law and caliph of Muslims Imam Ali bin Abi Talib (p) – and As-Sahifah As-Sajjadiyah – a collection of supplications of holy Prophet (p)’s fourth infallible descendant Al-Imam Ali bin Al-Hussein Zain-ol Abideen (p) which is also known as Psalms of Aal-i-Muhammad (p).

Meanwhile, Worldpress writes that recently the Shiia religious establishment in Holy Najaf, Iraq, including Grand Ayatullah Ali As-Sistani, said the Yemeni government is waging “a kind of war” against Yemeni Shiias.

It said perhaps the Iraqis are referring to a civil jihad that uses the powers of government against the Shiias. President Saleh recently began closing 4000 “underground” Shiia schools serving 330,000 children.

Worldpress says perhaps Ayatullah Sistani is drawing the world’s eye to President Saleh’s current military attack on Saada Province, a Shiia region. The Yemeni military has left behind a wide path of death and destruction. Residents claim that 65,000 people have had their homes destroyed.

In a replica of last year’s bloody siege, journalists are prohibited from Saada, supplies are withheld, houses destroyed, and numerous civilians injured and killed. In a propaganda ploy similar to the Sudan’s, Saleh says he is fighting a rebellion as his warplanes bomb civilians.

Worldpress says Amnesty International noted that many innocent Yemenis were reportedly killed by heavy artillery fire and missile attacks. It cited reports by witnesses that a helicopter gunship attacked civilian targets and a number of people were killed. The region is under strict lock down, with parts closed off for months and international organizations excluded.

A recent pamphlet from Saada residents describes an ugly scene: “The military [is] … using the different heavy and middle weapons like the air and ground missiles, military tanks, planes, and surface-to-surface missiles. They are besieging those areas from all directions; houses inhabited by elderly people, children and women were demolished and whoever could leave them is now homeless with those injured people without medicine.”

According to Worldpress when some opposition parties said, “This bloodshed, destruction of homes and assaults on people are truly regrettable and a cause for sorrow,” Saleh threatened to take them to court.

Transparency International, an anticorruption watchdog in Berlin that publishes an annual corruption perceptions index, notes Yemen as one of the world’s most corrupt states, where President Saleh is also the head of Yemen’s judiciary. WP said perhaps Iraq’s religious leaders are pointing to Saleh’s use of the law as another weapon against the Zaidi Shiias, who make up nearly 40 percent of Yemen’s population.

Thousands are in prison without charges after mass arrests in Saada, and more are taken daily. A Shiia judge, Mohammed Luqman, was sentenced to 10 years in prison after ruling against one of Saleh’s political cronies. A Shiia editor, Abdulkarim Al-Khaiwani, was jailed after a series of articles on governmental corruption. Both men were convicted of sedition for speaking against the bloodshed in Saada.

Worldpress writes a deft master of propaganda, Saleh knows all the buzzwords to feed the West. He called the 4000 Shiia schools “extremist” and said their closure was educational reform. He announced that imprisoning the respected judge was an anti-corruption campaign. He said the outspoken editor was flaming sectarianism by denouncing the violence.

Saleh says the attack on Saada is over as it continues. And life goes on in Yemen with Shiia civic leaders targeted and libraries closed, Internet cafes monitored by undercover security thugs, and Shiia religious celebrations prohibited by military force.

The Jamestown Organization forecasts a bleak future for Yemenis: “While Saleh grooms his son as his successor, Yemen threatens to become a replica of the hereditary Baathist presidencies of Iraq and Syria.”

Worldpress further writes down “Who better than Iraqis to recognize another Saddam?”

It said President Saleh has stolen the liberty of an entire country, but his jihad against the Shiias includes artillery, mass arrests, and forcing children out of school. This is the jihad in Yemen that Iraq’s religious leaders mean to show the world.