"He's my man, he was great"
"Somebody accused us of hiring him and putting him
there. He was a classic."
- President George W Bush about al-Sahhaf, (interview on
NBC) Thursday 26 June, Al-Arabiya satellite network and
Abu Dabi TV.
----------
"The information was correct, but the interpretation
was not,"
about his own words....
"The time is not yet ripe to say what happened. When
history's ready, then we can talk about it,"
about the fall of Saddam's regime....
"authentic sources - many authentic sources"
about where his information came from....
"The military part of our information network - which
we were accustomed to rely on for exact information - was
the first part of the network to fall apart,"
"It did suffer and it became very weak, while the
reporters from Iraqi radio and television stations were
more active and had more accurate information."
"It was unworthy of our military sources that they
were the first to weaken."
"a difficult situation, not for one individual, but
for everybody"
about the war....
"Everyone could face something that hurts him. But
I don't expect that I will be hurt,"
about the future....
"We will push those crooks, those mercenaries back
into the swamp"
- Just after the Coalition started it's bombing campaign
"With respect to the situation in Al-Faw, the British
told big lies. In Al-Faw, our forces' positions remained
in place."
"These mercenaries and hirelings kidnapped civilians
in the Al-Faw Peninsula so that they might claim that they
captured Iraqi soldiers."
"We counted 19 missiles that landed in a small area
of Baghdad."
(Coalition forces claimed that over 300 missiles and bombs
hit Baghdad that night)
"I think that the Iraqi ground defenses shot down
dozens of missiles. We are in the process of counting all
these missiles quickly"
"These are not ordinary human beings. They are criminals.
As a matter of fact, they are criminals, both by nature
and by training. By nature, because they are not decent.
They are criminals."
"Big institutions in this imperial state, in this
evil US empire, prepare their politicians to become criminals."
"God willing, we will throw them into the sea."
"We will get them stuck in the mud and we will certainly
defeat them."
- Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf,
Al-Jazeera TV 22 March
"A small number of peasants - brave peasants - shot
down two Apaches"
- Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, 24
March
"During the battles last night and at dawn, they [
Ba'th Socialist Party fighters] had destroyed three American
helicopters"
".....they had burnt and destroyed around 30 vehicles,
including tanks and APC's and damaged three enemy helicopters.
God bless the fighters of the Arab Socialist Ba'th Party."
"No one received them [the coalition forces] with
roses.
They were received with bombs, shoes and bullets."
- Al-Jazeera TV 25 March
"Up till now, they are only on dock No. 10, not in
Umm Qasr, not in the city,"
"They want to deceive their people first because now
they are in a very shabby situation,"
"It's a small town, it has only a few docks ... now
they are in a trap."
"Iraqi forces are still in control of the city, and
they are engaging in an attrition war with the enemy."
After the British Brig. Jim Dutton said that the southern
port city of Umm Qasr, where a fierce battle between dug-in
Iraqi forces and coalition fighters raged over the weekend,
is in control of coalition forces.
"Americans are now in disarray"
"They try to engage the world as much as they can
and we will continue until they leave our land."
"They are again in the dirt in the desert"
"They will try to enter Baghdad, and I think this
is where their graveyard will be"
"Their objective is to get to the outskirts of Baghdad.
So be it"
"We will see how the issue will turn out when they
come to Baghdad."
"Iraq will spread them even more and chop them up."
- Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, 27
March
"How can you lay siege to a whole country? Who is
really under siege now? Baghdad cannot be besieged."
"This boa, the American columns, are being besieged
between Basra and other towns north, west, south and west
of Basra. The Americans are the people who are under siege."
"The fact is that as soon as they reach Baghdad gates,
we will besiege them and slaughter them."
"Until now they have refused to do battle with us.
They are just going places."
"One can describe them as a boa: when it feels threatened,
it runs to somewhere else."
"The Cruise missiles do not frighten anyone. We are
catching them like fish in a river."
"...over the past two days, we managed to shoot down
196 missiles before they hit their target."
"We want to tell him [Blair] that we have not executed
anybody. They are either killed in battle, most of them
get killed because they are cowards anyway, the rest they
just get captured."- Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed
Saeed al-Sahhaf,
Abu Dhabi TV 2022 GMT, 27 March
"Let's go and do jihad"
"Whoever dies will be rewarded by heaven."
"Hit them. Fight them. They are cursed; they are evil"
"We will be victorious, and they will be defeated.
"The Iraqi troops and the Iraqi fighters are in control
of all the places, as we have witnessed,
No big change in that. We are fighting against them."
"They are achieving nothing, they are suffering from
casualties. Those casualties are increasing, not decreasing,"
"Fight them everywhere. Don't give them a chance to
breathe until they withdraw and retreat."
- Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf, 1
April.
In a statement on Iraqi TV
"They are lying every day. They are lying always,
and mainly they are lying to their public opinion,"
"What they say about a breakthrough is completely
an illusion. They are sending their warplanes to fly very
low in order to have vibrations on these sacred places."
- 2 April
"The authority of the civil defense ... issued a warning
to the civilian population not to pick up any of those pencils
because they are booby traps,"
"I am not talking about the American people and the
British people,
I am talking about those mercenaries. ... They have started
throwing those pencils, but they are not pencils, they are
booby traps to kill the children."
- The Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf
said that coalition forces were throwing booby traps in
the form of pens and pencils into Iraqi villages and townships.
"I can assure you that those villains will recognize,
will discover in appropriate time in the future how stupid
they are and how they are pretending things which have never
taken place"
- 2 April
"They've not been able to control any Iraqi city.
We're waging war against this snake and we will be victorious."
"They are going to surrender or be burned in their
tanks. They will surrender, it is they who will surrender."
- I 3 April
"Make the land of Islam a burning fire that burns
their faces and feet wherever they pass"
"We are determined to defeat them and destroy them
on the walls of our capital, as we are determined to destroy
their miserable armies in every Muslim spot."
- 4 April
"The criminals will be humiliated... To hurt the enemy
more, raise the level of your attacks."
- 5 April
"Today we slaughtered them in the airport. They are
out of Saddam International Airport,"
"Those who ran away are now outside the distant perimeter
wall of the airport. Now they're outside the wall and the
heroic Republican Guard is now in control of the whole area
of Saddam International Airport. So where are those villainous
louts, those mercenaries?"
"The force that was in the airport, this force was
destroyed."
"We have crushed the whole force which dared to venture
there. They were on the runway at Saddam International Airport.
That force was crushed"
"Their casualties and bodies are many. Their equipment
and vehicles, several were destroyed,"
"They are still trying to bomb with artillery and
rocket-propelled grenades to hit the Republican Guard who
are controlling Saddam International Airport."
"God willing we'll slaughter them all"
- 6 April
"The infidels are committing suicide by the hundreds
on the gates of Baghdad... Be assured, Baghdad is safe,
protected. Iraqis are heroes."
"One hundred infidels committed suicide as they entered
the holy city of Baghdad. Their tanks will become their
tombs."
"We will in fact encourage them to commit more suicides.
We have given them death and poison."
"There is no presence of the American columns in the
city of Baghdad at all. We besieged them and we killed most
of them."
"As our leader Saddam Hussein said, "God is grilling
their stomachs in hell.""
"The soldiers of Saddam Hussein have given them a
lesson they will never forget,"
"These mercenaries, I swear by God, those who are
still in Washington, they have sent their troops to be burned."
"The Americans, they always depend on a method what
I call ... stupid, silly. All I ask is check yourself. Do
not in fact repeat their lies."
"Don't repeat the lies of the liars."
- 7 April
With American tanks occupying the Baghdad parade ground,
he stood calmly a couple of hundred yards away, on the roof
of the Palestine Hotel, to tell reporters that none of this
was really happening.
Miscellaneous funny quotes by the Iraqi Information Minister
"We will welcome them with bullets and shoes."
"My feelings - as usual - we will slaughter them all."
"Our initial assessment is that they will all die."
"These cowards have no morals. They have no shame
about lying."
"We will slaughter them; Bush Junior, and his international
gang of bastards!"
"The insane little dwarf, Bush."
"The midget, Bush, and that Rumsfeld deserve only
to be beaten with shoes by freedom loving people everywhere."
"Bush is a very stupid man. The American people are
not stupid, they are very clever. I can't understand how
such clever people came to elect such a stupid president."
"Bush, Blair and Rumsfeld; they are the funny trio."
"There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!"
"I blame Al-Jazeera. They are marketing for the Americans."
"The American press is all about lies! All they tell
is lies, lies and more lies!"
"Let the American infidels bask in their illusion."
"They are most welcome. We will butcher them."
"Saddam Hussein's soldiers and his great forces gave
the Americans a lesson which will not be forgotten by history.
Truly."
"Washington has thrown their soldiers on the fire."
"I speak better English than this villain, Bush."
"Our estimates are that none of them will come out
alive unless they surrender to us quickly."
"They are becoming hysterical. This is the result
of frustration."
"They think we are retarded. They are retarded."
"Yesterday, we slaughtered them and we will continue
to slaughter them."
"Today, the tide has turned, we are destroying them."
