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2 British pullout stokes Iraq's
southern fire By Sami Moubayed
over the 2004 budget, he said,
"You're giving away too much and being outrun by
those military bastards!" By simply evacuating his
troops from Iraq, with little regard to
consequences, Brown hopes that this chapter of his
career will be turned - for good.
But
let's go back to when Blair started this phased
withdrawal from Basra in February. He had been
hinting at troop withdrawal since visiting Baghdad
in May 2006. The US insisted then - and
now
- that this does not mean a change of strategy,
nor does it spell failure for the international
coalition in Iraq. American statesmen repeated
that eventual withdrawal was what the West had in
mind for Iraq ever since they got there in 2003.
National Security Council spokesman Gordon
Johndroe downplayed the importance of Blair's
words at the time, saying they were not failure,
but rather a "sign of success". Then, Blair
commented on phased withdrawal, saying, "What all
of this means is not that Basra is how we want it
to be. But it does mean that the next chapter in
Basra's history can be written by the Iraqis."
Let's try to imagine a post British-Basra;
the second-largest city in Iraq with over 2.5
million inhabitants. Blair said that it was safer
than Baghdad because the Iraqi capital was
witnessing at the time what he labeled "an orgy of
terrorism". True, the British in Basra did help
reopen schools, equip hospitals, improve
waterworks and secure oil platforms. Blair said
that in Basra, there is "no Sunni insurgency, no
al-Qaeda base, little Sunni or Shi'ite violence".
This is where both Blair and Brown made
and are making a huge mistake. Blair purposely
ignored all the violence that had taken place in
Basra in 2006. Brown continues to deny the
horrific situation there, claiming that the city -
healed or not - will have to deal with its own
affairs after the American and British messed it
up in 2003.
The Basra that Brown wants to
leave is one dominated by Shi'ite cleric Muqtada
al-Sadr. His pictures are plastered on the walls
and monuments of Basra, showing how powerful he
really is. Alcohol is banned and veiling is
becoming a must; those who refuse are arrested or
beaten by religious militias who act as morality
police squads. Merchants who sell alcohol have
been beaten by the fundamentalists. Some have been
even executed.
On April 21, 2004, a series
of bombs ripped through the British-controlled
city, killing several Sunnis, including a
university professor. Armed men also stormed a
police station, killing 11 policemen, and burning
down two buildings. Sunnis have migrated en mass
from Basra, fearing for their lives, and the
British have been unable to protect them. A report
by the US Department of State in 2006 on Basra
described it saying, "Smuggling and criminal
activity [continue] unabated. Intimidation attacks
and assassination are common. Unemployment is high
and economic development is hindered by weak
government."
Supporters of the British
prime minister point to a six-month truce pledged
by Muqtada, saying there will be no violence in
Basra. They claim that Muqtada is currently busy
purging the Mahdi Army of devious and sectarian
people who infiltrated because of their anti-US
credentials since 2003. The new Mahdi Army will be
one based on principle and character, where
membership is based on strict criteria and
recommendations of an earlier member in good
standing. That is what Muqtada wants the world to
believe, and it is very true - but for different
reasons. Muqtada is conducting a facelift to make
himself look nicer in Iraq. He is doing it to
restructure, organize and empower himself to take
over Basra.
Just because it is not
carrying out military operations does not mean
that the Mahdi Army is gone - or has become
peaceful. On November 15 it reminded the world of
how strong it is with a massive demonstration in
Najaf, attended by tens of thousands of Sadrist
supporters, commemorating the death of their
master's father, Ayatollah Mohammad Baqir al-Sadr.
The young cleric made a statement which
was music to the ears of his supporters, saying:
"I tell the evil Bush, leave our land, we do not
need you or your armies. I tell the occupiers, you
have your democracy and we have our Islam: get out
of our land." He then unleashed a fiery war of
words against everybody cooperating with the
Americans, including Maliki, his Da'awa party and
Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the head of the pro-Iranian
and yet pro-American Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council
(SIIC).
Some analysts in Washington and
Europe claim that Muqtada's "new vision" is being
funded by Iran. They want to transform the Mahdi
Army into another Hezbollah. These speculations
surfaced in late 2006, published in The New Yorker
by veteran investigative reporter Seymour Hersh.
He wrote that the Bush White House had pressured
Israel to wage its war on Hezbollah because he was
afraid of repeating the Hezbollah model in failed
states like Iraq.
All conditions that
enabled Hezbollah to emerge and remain independent
of US policy since the 1980s can be found today in
Iraq. That is why Bush was seemingly very
interested in wiping out the Lebanese group during
the Israeli war - a target that was never
achieved. The Lebanese military group, after all,
has been a tremendous success in Lebanese politics
and has managed to uplift and protect the Shi'ites
of Lebanon since its inception in 1982.
The situation in Iraq is very similar to
that of the Lebanese civil war. There is chaos,
anger, occupation, arms - plenty of them -
indoctrination, Shi'ite loyalties, and a strong
patron like Iran. Riad Kahwaji, an expert on
Iranian affairs, said, "Iran is definitely
interested in having its own proxy political and
military forces in Iraq, just like Lebanon. All
the indicators so far are that Iran has invested a
great deal in the Mahdi Army."
A source
close to the SIIC's Hakim, who in turn is very
close to Iran, confirms that the Shi'ite leader
received assurances from Tehran, at the highest
level, that the Islamic Republic would not abandon
the SIIC in favor of the Mahdi Army. Hakim and
Muqtada have been at odds for generations over
control of the Iraqi Shi'ite community. Muqtada's
spokesman Salah al-Obeidi, based in Najaf, denied
these rumors, saying that although Muqtada admires
Hezbollah, he does not plan to transform his army
into a mirror image of the Lebanese group.
Sami Moubayed is a Syrian
political analyst.
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