DAMASCUS - US Vice President Dick Cheney,
ending a week-long trip to the Middle East, said
on Monday that he had won the support of the
countries he had visited for US efforts to
stabilize Iraq. These included the United Arab
Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan; he also
made a surprise visit to Iraq.
Unfortunately, it's the progress of the
Iraqi government itself that is causing the most
concern for the United States.
When
receiving Cheney last week, Prime Minister Nuri
al-Maliki spoke about a united Iraq and promised
to get rid of militias. He
promised "to find ways to
engage the Sunnis and amend the de-Ba'athification
laws". This would enable former members of the
regime of Saddam Hussein, who are predominantly
Sunni, to return to their old jobs in government
and the security services.
Cheney did not
buy it: "There's not a lot of time to be wasted
here, and it's important to move aggressively on
the business of the day."
The reason for
the US concern is that Maliki has been saying the
same thing for the past six months to every
official he meets from the US administration, and
nothing happens.
As if to underscore this,
the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic State in Iraq on
Saturday claimed responsibility for the ambush of
a US patrol south of Baghdad in which four
American soldiers and one Iraqi Army translator
were killed. A massive US hunt has been launched
for three American soldiers believed to have been
taken hostage in the raid.
In his meeting
with Cheney, to show his "seriousness", Maliki
announced that a list of seven candidates had been
prepared to fill the vacuum created by the
resignation of ministers of Muqtada al-Sadr's bloc
last month.
According to London-based
Al-Hayat newspaper, the step is purely cosmetic,
since most of the posts are earmarked for the
dominant United Iraqi Alliance (UIA). Rather than
give the posts to secular Shi'ite technocrats -
let alone Sunnis - Maliki will bring everybody
back to Square 1.
There is no real
difference between a minister from the Sadr camp
and one from the Supreme Council for the Islamic
Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) controlling the
ministries of Health, Transport and Education.
Both aim at a theocracy in Iraq. Both are hostile
to the Sunnis. And worse, the SCIRI, whose leader
Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim heads the UIA, dreams of
partition and in creating an autonomous Shi'ite
district in the south, similar to Iraqi Kurdistan
in the north.
The Sadrists are not pleased
by the proposed replacements, having stepped down
to give Maliki room to appoint ministers who will
be welcome in the Sunni community. Hakim and
Muqtada are traditional opponents in Shi'ite
politics, each seeking supremacy. So Maliki taking
the Sadr seats with one hand and giving them to
Hakim with the other is enough to stir Muqtada's
constituency.
Muqtada, who seems more
serious than Maliki about reconciliation - for the
sake of survival rather than out of love for
Sunnis - has called for major reforms within his
Mehdi Army, designed to rid it of elements
involved in sectarian violence. He has also sent
envoys to Sunni groups, calling on them to
recognize his party as a resistance group, not a
militia.
It is surprising, therefore, that
the Americans still hold on to Maliki, who has
made scant progress since coming to power last
May. Now he has alienated the Sadrists, and
recently heavyweight Sunni politician Tarek
al-Hashemi, who is one of Iraq's vice presidents,
threatened to pull his Iraqi Accordance Front from
the Maliki government if the premier did not
disarm the militias - and soon.
Hashemi
said that joining the Maliki cabinet was his
"mistake of a lifetime". In an interview with CNN,
he said, "I would like to see the identity of my
country restored." He said that if this did not
happen, the Sunnis would say "bye-bye" to the
political process. He said he had had a recent
phone conversation with US President George W Bush
and told him, "Our [Sunni] participation in quite
unfortunately becoming meaningless."
Maliki on Sunday appeared to have averted
the immediate danger of Hashemi walking out by
offering him an "executive role" in the fight
against insurgents in Sunni areas inside and
outside Baghdad. Maliki will remain the armed
forces' commander in chief. The Iraqi
Accordance Front has 44 seats in Parliament.
Combined, the Sunnis hold 58 seats, and if they
managed to walk out en masse, it would be a huge
embarrassment but it would not bring down the
Maliki cabinet.
The UIA has 85 deputies
who will support Maliki until curtain-fall. Also
supportive of the UIA are deputies of the
Kurdistan Alliance, which holds 58 seats.
Together, Kurdish deputies and ones from the UIA
make up 143 of the 275-seat Parliament. A
no-confidence vote against Maliki needs the
support of no fewer than 138 parliamentarians.
Hashemi, who called on the Sunnis to vote in
December 2005, can create serious trouble for
Maliki, but cannot bring him down. At least, not
yet.
The Sunnis need two things to bring
down Maliki. One would be a replacement. Two would
be external backing. Both of them are in the
making. A replacement would naturally be from the
Shi'ite community, since the Shi'ites control a
majority in Parliament, and after tasting power
since the fall of Saddam will not give it up
easily. Since most of the powerful Shi'ite leaders
are with the UIA, the only alternative would be
former prime minister Iyad Allawi, who is a
secular Shi'ite, close to the Sunnis, and allied
to Sunni Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia.
With regard to external backing, the
Sunnis can bet on Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and
Saudi Arabia (depending on how well Cheney
assessed his "positive" reception there).
The Saudis and Americans have drifted
apart recently over Iraq. King Abdullah called the
US presence in Iraq an "illegal occupation" at an
Arab summit in Riyadh, and enraged the Americans
by embracing, rather than isolating, the Hamas
military group in Palestine and hosting it at a
Mecca summit. And more recently, Abdullah turned
down a dinner invitation at the White House.
King Abdullah cannot accept how anti-Sunni
Iraq has become and how powerful the Shi'ites have
become, thanks to Iranian meddling and US
compliance - or helplessness - in Iraqi affairs.
Although Allawi does not have a majority
vote in Parliament, Saudi money could change that.
Syria, too, another regional heavyweight, is fed
up with Maliki and would prefer a strong leader to
control the violence. The fact that Damascus and
Riyadh are living a honeymoon at present adds more
reason to both sides wanting Allawi back in power.
The Bush administration, however, is not
enthusiastic about a "coup" because it is
uncertain what kind of vacuum Maliki's absence
would bring. But for now, Allawi is trying,
touring Arab capitals and at home, talking to
everybody, including the Sadrists (whom he bombed
while serving as interim prime minister in 2004).
Maliki's sudden disappearance might leave
a vacuum. But where the Iraqis are now under his
leadership, there is nowhere left to go but up. It
is believed the Americans have given him a
deadline of June 30 either to change his policies,
disarm the militias, or leave office. It means he
has 45 days in which to change his ways; this is
highly unlikely.
Sami Moubayed
is a Syrian political analyst.
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