In an announcement for a group of (Hawza) clerics (on New Sabah website) the clerics expressed their strong rejection to the atrocities Muqtada and his Mehdi army comitted in Najaf.

At the beginning I thought that this move is a little bit late, but after a moment of thinking I changed my mind; it Isn't late at all because it wasn't possible to make such an announcement two weeks ago; no one would dare to raise his voice when the fight was on and Mehdi army men controlling parts of the city threatening and willing to kill anyone showing disapproval with them or with their crazy chief.

More over, such announcements can serve in the future because the situation isn't completely solved yet; the weapons are still in Muqtada's thugs' hands and a new crisis can explode at any time. So an announcement like this one can help bring some important hidden facts to the surface to uncover the massacres of Muqtada against Policemen and civilians and at the same time, it can undermine Muqtada's attempts to gather support by showing himself and his army as victims for the "agressions" of the Americans and the Iraqi government.

The announcement mentions that the senior clerics had tried hard to convince Muqtada to give up his plans and warned him many times that he shouldn't disturb the peace near the holy shrines but he refused to listen and insisted on adopting the wrong choice of violence , therefore he's responsible for desecrating the holiness of the shrine and also for the destruction and the casualties among civilians in Najaf.