BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) — Thousands of anti-U.S. protesters marched in the Shiite holy city of Najaf on Monday to mark the fourth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad.
Powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr called for the demonstration, which Najaf police said included tens of thousands of protesters.
The U.S. Army estimated the crowd size at closer to 5,000 to 7,000 participants based on aerial photographs, said military spokesman Col. Steve Boylan.
“[The] peaceful gathering is part of the right to peaceful assembly and the Iraqi people to voice their views,” Boylan said, calling it an example of the “changes occurring in Iraq.”
Marchers joined the protest from Kufa to neighboring Najaf, 100 miles (160 kilometers) south of Baghdad, as Iraqi police watched, according to The Associated Press.
Iraqi flags and leaflets dotted the march route, according to the AP. Some of the leaflets read, “Yes, Yes to Iraq” and “Yes, Yes to Muqtada. Occupiers should leave Iraq,” the AP reported.
One marcher, Iraqi lawmaker Nassar al-Rubaie, told the AP, “The enemy that is occupying our country is now targeting the dignity of the Iraqi people.”
Al-Rubaie, who leads al-Sadr’s bloc in the Iraqi parliament, told the AP, “After four years of occupation, we have hundreds of thousands of people dead and wounded.”
The firebrand cleric’s mandate came before a 24-hour security ban began Monday on civilian vehicle traffic in Baghdad.
Al-Sadr: ‘The occupiers … are your enemy’
On Sunday, al-Sadr called on his followers to stop killing Iraqi forces and focus instead on resisting Americans.
In a statement attributed to al-Sadr and released in Najaf the cleric purportedly said insurgents should not be killing Iraqis and that Iraqi police and troops should be on the side of the militias.
“You, the Iraqi army and police forces, do not walk alongside the occupiers because they are your enemy,” the statement said. “I am here to advise you the honest resister hope for two things from God: either victory or martyrdom. But at the same time, the honest resister should not kill a fellow Iraqi.”
Throughout the weekend, U.S. and Iraqi forces battled al-Sadr’s Mehdi Army militia south of the capital in Diwaniya.
The U.S. military said it had captured 39 militia fighters and killed several in the Diwaniya fighting.
“So far, we have achieved great success fighting the terrorists,” said Maj. Gen. Oothman Faroud, who is leading Iraqi soldiers in the Diwaniya operation. “We have freed the people of Diwaniya from the murder and intimidation that has plagued the city 24 hours a day, seven days a week for months.”
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