"A time comes when silence is betrayal. And that time has come for us in relation to Iraq."

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. - "SILENCE IS BETRAYAL" Speech

"Each day the war goes on the hatred increases in the heart of the people of Iraq and in the hearts of those of humanitarian instinct.

The Americans are forcing even their friends into becoming their enemies. It is curious that the Americans, who calculate so carefully on the possibilities of military victory, do not realize that in the process they are incurring deep psychological and political defeat.

The image of America will never again be the image of revolution, freedom, and democracy, but the image of violence and militarism."

And finally, as I try to explain for you and for myself the road that leads from Montgomery to this place I would have offered all that was most valid if I simply said that I must be true to my conviction that I share with all men the calling to be a son of the living God. Beyond the calling of race or nation or creed is this vocation of sonship and brotherhood, and because I believe that the Father is deeply concerned especially for his suffering and helpless and outcast children, I come tonight to speak for them.

This I believe to be the privilege and the burden of all of us who deem ourselves bound by allegiances and loyalties which are broader and deeper than nationalism and which go beyond our nation's self-defined goals and positions. We are called to speak for the weak, for the voiceless, for the victims of our nation and for those it calls "enemy," for no document from human hands can make these humans any less our brothers.