AhlulBayt News Agency (ABNA): In Tuesday’s procession, hundreds of people gathered to add their voice to the chants.
Shia Muslims from Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and the UK itself came together in mourning.
The organizers were asked to make sure the event was purged of factional messages but to do so would have defeated the message of Karbala.
What happened in Karbala on the day of Ashura has been commemorated in ceremonies like this for 14 hundred years. In many places across the globe, Ashura 2019 has been a trying one with Muslim men, women and children being denied the right to partake in processions like this or met with brutal force for defying the ban.
Today Ashura symbolizes the fight against tyranny, the uprising of the oppressed against the oppressor, which is vital in Islam and people everywhere can identify with.
Also mourned on this day are family members of Hussein Ibn-Ali who were revered for their strength, and piety, and stood by him to the last. His brother Abbas who died trying to get water for the children, and his sister Zeynab known as the "Heroine of Karbala" for her efforts to protect her nephew. The youngest of Hussein’s children, six-month-old son Ali-Asghar, who was shot in the throat, strikes a chord with parents, uncles and aunts most of all. We spoke to people at the procession about their feelings on this day.
On the day of Ashura, on the burning sands of Karbala , after being denied food and water for days, Imam Hussein and those accompanying him, were set upon by thousands of troops loyal to Yazid, the despotic ruler of the time. The women and children were taken prisoner.
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