A deadly blow for Iraqi reconciliation
By Sami Moubayed
DAMASCUS - It seems that Iraq has become an international "inbox" through which
countries, non-state players and Iraqi politicians send messages to one
another.
On Monday, an explosion ripped through the conference hall of the Mansour Hotel
in Baghdad, where Sunni and Shi'ite tribal leaders were assembled to discuss
ways of bringing security to violent al-Anbar province, the largest in the
country and which is boiling with al-Qaeda supporters.
Six notables were killed. They included Sunnis Sheikh Faysal al-Guood of the
Albu Nimir tribe (who was an ex-governor of Anbar),
Sheikh Abdul-Aziz al-Fahdawi of the Fahd tribe, and Sheikh Tarek Saleh
al-Dulaimi, as well as three Shi'ites, Mohammad Awadi, Hussein al-Shaalan and
Aziz al-Yasseri. The last was an adviser to the Iraqi Ministry of Defense.
Also killed was poet Rahim al-Malki, an anchor for Al-Iraqiyya TV who was
making a program about Sunnis working against al-Qaeda in Iraq.
These men were among 54 people killed in Iraq on Monday. Enraged Sunnis
immediately heaped blame on the government for a lack of security.
In turn, the government quickly pointed a finger at al-Qaeda. One Sunni sheikh,
Mohammad Daham al-Fahdawi, whose troops have been combating al-Qaeda in a
district called Habaniya in Anbar province, said the target was Prime Minister
Nuri al-Maliki, because he represents the "national project" of reconciliation.
At first glance, not much analysis is needed to understand what happened on
Black Monday. It does seem that al-Qaeda has struck again, telling Maliki and
the Americans - for the millionth time - that their security plan is down the
drain. The attack seems a serious warning to senior Sunni leaders not even to
think of working against al-Qaeda in Iraq, or with the US-backed government.
Maliki's adviser, Ahmad Chalabi, toured the site of the explosion and expressed
fear that it would discourage prominent Sunnis from working with the Iraqi
government. He said: "This is a message from all the terrorists to all the
leaders in Anbar, Abu Ghraib and Diyala who want to come to terms with the
situation and negotiate with the government. They are vulnerable and in easy
reach even when they are in one of the most secure areas in Baghdad."
A closer look, however, might unveil another level to the bombing. Maliki
represents the Iraqi state. It could be argued that when people are murdered
under the state's watchful eye, then it is responsible.
Why now? The reconciliation process, after all, is not as ripe as some Iraq
observers claim it to be. The assembled clerics were still at the drawing board
and a far shot from actually putting an end to al-Qaeda or bridging the
Sunni-Shi'ite divide. So the reason behind the attack was not fear of
reconciliation's success. Although the majority of the dead were Sunni clerics,
Shi'ites were also killed.
It would be wrong to assume that the attack was only anti-Sunni. That is what
was immediately said by Sunni media both within Iraq and throughout the Arab
world. Coming 24 hours after the death sentence was passed on Saddam Hussein's
cousin, Ali Hasan al-Majeed, it seemed the logical thing to do for Sunnis, who
see all of what is happening in Iraq as part of a long scheme to destroy them.
Shortly after all of this happened, Iraqi police raided the home of Sunni
Culture Minister Asad Kamal al-Hashemi, accusing him of ordering the
assassination of another Sunni politician in February 2005. Hashemi's
supporters claim that the accusations are baseless, citing the real reason as
the minister's political activism in the Sunni political party, the Congress of
the People of Iraq.
Speaking to Doha-based Al-Jazeera, one supporter said: "When they [the
Shi'ite-led government] want to get rid of anybody, the easiest way for them to
do that is to charge him with terrorist activities. They have ready-made
charges, and they use them against us so that they can chase us out of the
country."
Sunnis could claim that first it was the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine in Samarra
last year, which was blamed on Sunnis. Then it was sectarian violence in Sunni
neighborhoods. Then came the execution of Saddam. Then came Samarra this month,
with another attack on a Shi'ite shrine blamed on Sunnis. And now, the death
sentence on Majeed, an arrest warrant for the culture minister, and the bombing
of the Mansour Hotel.
But it would be wrong to make the connection between the hotel bombing and the
upcoming Majeed execution. His death sentence, along with that of former
defense minister Sultan Hashim, was not intended to provoke Sunnis (which it
did) but rather to appease the Kurds.
The timing comes as Maliki is reaching out to Iraqi Kurds, represented by
President Jalal Talabani and the head of the Kurdistan region, Massoud Barzani.
Maliki needs their support to keep his shaky coalition united, given that
scores of Shi'ite politicians are abandoning him, and the Sunnis simply do not
have faith in his numerous promises to bring them justice, protection and
proper government representation.
Making life more miserable for him is the opposition led by former prime
minister Iyad Allawi, who is backed in his bid to return to the premiership by
a variety of Arab states. Maliki is desperate for Kurdish support, and this
explains why he supports holding a referendum in oil-rich Kirkuk to see whether
its people want to remain part of Baghdad-administered Iraq or be incorporated
into Iraqi Kurdistan.
This year, Maliki even supported relocating Arabs from Kirkuk to other
districts of Iraq to increase the city's Kurdish population, in anticipation of
the upcoming referendum. Nothing pleases the Kurds more than the death sentence
against Majeed, who is known to the world as "Chemical Ali" for once using
chemical weapons against the Kurds, demolishing entire villages and killing
tens of thousands of people in the infamous Anfal campaign of 1988. Majeed is
believed to be responsible for the killing of nearly 180,000 Kurds.
So the Sunnis should not take the execution of the former Saddam loyalist as
personal. It is not directed at them - at least, not at this stage. Maliki has
tried to convince the world that he is implementing the recommendations of
former US ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, who called on him and the Shi'ites to
engage with the Sunnis to create a stable Iraq.
Maliki clearly is not interested in or convinced of the need to court the
Sunnis but has been humoring the Americans to remain in office. They have not
abandoned him - yet - fearing the worst if he should leave. Simply put, Maliki
cannot court the Sunnis. He doesn't have it in him to do so, having accumulated
so many complexities against them while working in the Shi'ite underground
against Saddam in the 1980s.
Last week, in a public slip, he even criticized a US plan to arm Sunni tribes
so that they can fight al-Qaeda, saying this would be "dangerous" because it
would create Sunni militias. These militias trouble him because regardless of
whether they are pro-al-Qaeda or not, they are nevertheless Sunni leaders who
threaten the existence of somebody like Maliki. The prime minister, probably
because of pressure by the US, retracted his statement, saying he had been
"misunderstood", although when reading his original comments in Newsweek it is
difficult to misinterpret the words "dangerous because this will create new
militias".
What militias is Maliki afraid of? Clearly the Mahdi Army of Muqtada al-Sadr or
the Badr Organization of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim do not trouble him, because they
are Shi'ite. They are the "good" terrorists. While he has tried, relentlessly,
to disarm Sunni military groups, he has not lifted a finger to do the same with
Shi'ite militias.
That still creates trouble for him with the Americans, who continue to support
him - with reservations. Speaking to Newsweek, Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari
described the relationship between Maliki and the top US military commander in
Iraq, General David Petraeus, as "difficult". Zebari added, "Who is in charge?
Who decides? The prime minister cannot just pick up the phone and have Iraqi
Army units do what he says."
As long as this relationship is difficult, Maliki will continue to play
double-games, speaking reconciliation with the Sunnis and yet doing his best to
scare them out of the political process altogether.
Perhaps the bombing of the Mansour Hotel came as a blessing for the Iraqi prime
minister. He wants a chaotic Iraq to continue and radical Islamic groups to
exist because this justifies radical Shi'ite groups on his part.
When one has nothing but moderates confronting him, he cannot but speak
moderation. Maliki cannot justify his Shi'ite militias if he is confronted by
an army of Sunni doves. Moderates - such as the ones killed at the Mansour
Hotel - are dangerous to Maliki.
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