Andrew Collingwood:

I think it is important for the world to understand that a large amount of the British population are against an attack on Iraq.

Britain and the US have no justification for an attack on Iraq, as most of their so called evidence is speculation or hearsay.  Secondly, Bush keeps talking about his war on terrorism, yet there is no evidence to link Iraq to terrorism.  Even after yesterday's offer by Iraq to allow weapons inspectors back into the country, the rhetoric coming out of the US is still of a belligerent nature.

September the 11th was a horrific event, but the longer the so called 'War on terrorism' goes on, the death toll in other countries will end up far exceeding that of New York and Washington.

There is to be a large march on September 28th in London calling for no attack on Iraq, hopefully this will prove to the rest of the world the large amount of opinion which is opposed to Britain's backing for US military action.

Hassan El-Najjar:

The US-UK belligerent rhetoric reflects the plans to go ahead with war despite Iraq's acceptance of the return of weapon inspectors. The Bush administration and the British government have declared several times that their goal is regime change, not ridding Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. Thus, war is a goal in itself. There has to be war every about ten years so the military industry and its constituents continue to prosper. There has to be war to help Israel continue its subjugation of the Palestinian people. There has to be war so that British and US oil companies can include Iraqi oil in their portfolios.

War is the paradise of the wealthy capitalist classes and their parasitic beneficiaries but it is the hell of the lower middle classes and the working poor everywhere. It takes away funding from social programs that benefit them, particularly in education, health care, and affordable housing. It takes away funding from the badly needed socio-economic development and divert it to the coffers of weapon manufacturers, oil companies, and Israeli settlers. That is why the middle and working classes should oppose wars in principle but this war in particular. This war is unprovoked, and will be perceived as a naked aggression everywhere in the world, not only in the Middle East. 

This is a perfect example of how wars are launched without moral or objective justifications. Iraq has not been linked to terrorism or to the September 11th attacks. It has been subjected to an embargo and economic sanctions since 1990, which weakened that country to the extent of possible disintegration in case of war. Hundreds of thousands of people may be killed in the war and the country may be totally destroyed. More dangerous is that the oil-military industry-Israel axis of horror may be encouraged to continue with its plans to expand Cold War II to include more wars on other Arab and Muslim countries. 

People everywhere in the world should make their voice heard well by the war hawks in Washington and London. The September 28th London and October 26th Washington anti-war demonstrations are two steps in that direction. There should should be other demonstrations all over Europe and North America between these two dates. As important is calling and writing to representatives in parliaments to win them to the cause of peace.

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* In interactive editorials, the editor of Al-Jazeerah answers questions and or responds to comments of readers, which are more general than readers' responses to specific articles or issues. It is an effective method of interaction in electronic journalism.

Dr. Hassan El-Najjar is the editor of Al-Jazeerah.