DAMASCUS - The war continues between
Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army and the Iraqi army,
resulting in nearly 1,000 dead in the Shi'ite slum
of Sadr City in Baghdad.
Prime Minister
Nuri al-Maliki, who is waging war on his former
ally Muqtada, said, "The suffering will not be
long in Sadr City. We will save our brothers."
Additionally, 20 US soldiers have been killed
since April 1. According to a spokesman for the
Iraqi government, there have been 925 killed and
another 2,605 wounded.
This is a sharp
increase in violence, from the 1,082 killed in
March, and the very high 721 dead in February. The
results have not been satisfying, to say the
least, for Maliki. When the onslaught began,
Maliki was ill-advised. Somebody told him
he
would
be able to crush the Mahdi Army in a breeze.
Instead the Mahdi Army has not
disintegrated, nor has it laid down its arms. It
continues to fight - a war of survival - against
Maliki and many uniformed Iraqi troops have laid
down their arms and decided to stop fighting. In
some cases, to the horror of the Americans urging
Maliki to continue the war, some have even shifted
sides, and taken up arms with Muqtada.
The
young cleric insists his aim is to fight the
Americans, not fellow Iraqis in the Maliki
government, which he helped prop up in 2006.
Gunmen had been attacking US troops, prompting
Lieutenant Colonel Steve Stover, a spokesman for
the US military, to say, "We have every right to
defend ourselves. The problem is that they are
using houses, rooftops and alleyways [as cover]."
He added, "We are not preventing food, water,
emergency vehicles from entering or exiting Sadr
City."
Residents of the Shi'ite slum claim
otherwise, saying that for the past week they have
been left with no water or electricity.
Lawlessness and chaos prevail, and the authorities
recently found more than 100 bodies in two mass
graves, one in al-Gab, 80 kilometers north of
Baghdad, and another south of the Iraqi capital.
Most of the bodies had their hands tied, with
gunshots straight to the head - at close range. It
is unclear who is behind these assassinations, the
Americans, the Sadrist, Iraqi men in uniform, or
all of the above.
Maliki realizes the
Shi'ite rug has been snatched from beneath his
feet. Muqtada is now king among Iraqi Shi'ites. He
knew this was coming; the handwriting had been on
the wall since 2006, but he never had the courage
to confront - let alone fight - Muqtada. The
cleric is powerful, becoming increasingly rich
(not for personal indulgences but to distribute
among his followers) and is using symbols that
enflame Shi'ite emotions, which made Maliki snap,
"I don't know how these people use the [Shi'ite
religious] names we respect like Mahdi and Sadr."
He was referring to Muqtada's father, Mohammad
Sadiq, a very popular and respected Shi'ite leader
who was killed by the Saddam Hussein regime in
1999.
This circus cannot go on for long.
Maliki has threatened that the Sadrists, who
control 30 seats in the 275-seat parliament, will
be disqualified from the October provincial
elections unless the Mahdi Army is disbanded.
Barham Salih, the deputy prime minister, denied
any attempt at rooting out the Sadrists, stressing
that Maliki wanted to rid himself of the militias
only (meaning the Mahdi Army), saying; "The Sadr
movement is an indigenous, major political
movement of this country. Attempts at isolating
them or excluding them will not serve Iraq's
stability and prosperity. It is in our interest to
have the Sadr movement as an integral part of the
political process."
Maliki, he added, was
nevertheless "very serious" about the militias,
claiming he will disarm all of them, making no
reference however, to "good militias" like the
Kurdish Peshmerga, which operates in northern
Iraq, or the Badr Brigade which is loyal to
Maliki's ally Abdul Aziz al-Hakim of the Supreme
Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC).
Salih also
asked parliament for US $5 billion in
reconstruction for Sadr City, claiming that normal
citizens - 2.5 million who are already poor in the
Shi'ite slum - must not pay the price for the rule
of militias and their war with Iraqi troops.
For his part, Maliki laid down four
conditions to end the strife with the Sadrists 1)
Disarm the Mahdi Army 2) Stop all interference in
affairs of state (something which he had
originally tolerated - and encouraged - during the
years 2006-2007. 3) Stop taking the law into their
own hands in districts like the southern city of
Basra and Sadr City, which are controlled by
Muqtada. 4) Hand over all wanted fugitives to face
the justice of the Iraqi government.
"To
refuse these conditions," he said from the
well-fortified Green Zone in Baghdad (co-guarded
by none other than the Badr militia) "means the
continuation of the government's efforts to disarm
them by force." He drew parallels between the
Mahdi Army and al-Qaeda, claiming that both
threatened security and were bringing chaos to
Iraq.
He made no mention of the Americans.
Nearly 50 tribal and political leaders,
representing major parties in the Iraqi arena,
went to Sadr City to show solidarity with its
residents, calling on Maliki to immediately stop
the onslaught. One of the parties represented was
the Iraqi Accordance Front, a leading Sunni group
that fell out with Maliki last August, for failing
to impose far-reaching political reforms aimed at
rapprochement with the Sunni community. For his
part, Muqtada has refused all of the prime
minister's conditions.
Who is behind all of
this? Some claim the Americans asked
Maliki to strike, as a condition for keeping him
in power, so he can bring some law and order to
Iraq before the term of President George W Bush
expires in January 2009.
The Americans
have wanted to eliminate Muqtada from day one, but
were prevented from doing so, first under the
mediation of the Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, then
under Maliki's direct intervention. Maliki needed
Muqtada to obtain legitimacy in the Shi'ite
community when first becoming prime minister in
May 2006.
Muqtada legitimized him among
young Iraqis and poor Iraqis, while Maliki
provided a security umbrella. Nobody would harass
the Mahdi Army as long as he was serving as prime
minister. In addition to six seats in the Iraqi
cabinet, and 30 seats in Parliament (all obtained
by virtue of Muqtada's popularity) the Sadrists
were allowed to keep their militia - and often use
it - to settle old scores with the Ba'athists, or
new ones either with al-Qaeda and rising Sunni
militias.
Provided these arms were not
being used against Maliki - or the Americans -
then everybody seemed pleased with Muqtada. Soon,
however, Maliki could no longer control the power
and ambition of Muqtada. The young cleric learns
quickly - too quickly some would say - and started
creating a system that made him the uncrowned king
of Baghdad.
Learning from the Hezbollah
model and inspired by Hassan Nasrallah in Lebanon,
he eliminated any anti-Sunni rhetoric from his
speeches and began calling for rapprochement with
Sunnis. At a time when Maliki was increasingly
unable to deliver anything to disgruntled Sunnis,
they found solace in the words of Muqtada.
Despite the bad blood between them in
2004-2007, especially after Muqtada's team accused
the Sunnis of blowing up the holy Shi'ite site at
Samarra, the Sunnis were willing to work with
Muqtada to bring down Maliki. Muqtada had
personally and publicly challenged the Sunnis by
discriminating against them in government
ministries under his control, like the Ministry of
Health, Commerce and Education. He turned a blind
eye to the death squads roaming the streets of
Baghdad - searching for trouble, with Sunni
notables. He did nothing to prevent attacks on
Sunni mosques, the assassination of Sunni clerics
and the razing of Sunni neighborhoods after the
attack on Samarra.
All the same, Muqtada
seemed less dangerous than Maliki because he was
clear about his agenda and his vision. He does not
tolerate the Americans in Iraq, just like the
Sunnis despise them. He does not want to partition
Iraq and give the Shi'ites an autonomous district
in the south, which had been called for by
Maliki's ally, Hakim. Although he wants a
theocracy inspired by the Iranian model, he
nevertheless does not want the Iranians to meddle
in Iraqi affairs. He wants to maintain Iraq's Arab
identity and strengthen its relations with its
Arab neighbors.
Maliki feared a double
deal; some kind of united front between the Sunnis
and Muqtada, and under American urging, cracked
down on the Sadrists.
The Iranian
angle Others claim Iran gave a green
light to Maliki during the March visit of
President Mahmud Ahmadinejad, to wipe out the
Sadrists. This is a little confusing since
confirmed reports from Iran claim that at one
point during the past six months, the Iranians
began to see an ally in Muqtada. They realize that
their former proxy, Hakim, is aged, ailing with
cancer and unable to control the Shi'ite community
of Iraq for much longer. His successor, Ammar
al-Hakim, is no match to the popularity of Muqtada
and will be unable to keep either the SIIC or Badr
united once Abdul-Aziz parts the scene.
Additionally, the Iranians are afraid that
at one point, their other proxy in the Arab world,
Hezbollah, will get caught up in a civil war, or
another confrontation with Israel that might
severely weaken, if not break, its powers. Or if
Syria signs a peace deal with Israel (something
that is currently a hot issue due to the
initiative of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan), then part of the deal would be a break
between Damascus and Hezbollah.
With Badr
losing its popularity, Hakim marching into
obscurity and Hezbollah in critical waters, the
only credible alternative is the Mahdi Army. Hakim
and Muqtada, however, are not on good terms. They
are traditional enemies, fighting from one
generation to the next, over control of Iraqi
Shi'ites.
Initially, the Iranians avoided
angering Hakim by not making any public gestures
to Muqtada. Hakim has always been loyal to the
mullahs of Tehran and had Badr fight alongside the
Iranian army, against their own countrymen, during
the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-1988.
Iran
started out by sending money to Muqtada, seeing if
he was receptive, and pretty soon, political
support followed. That, along with 5% of income
donated to him by his followers (a common practice
with certain Iraqi Shi'ites), and revenue from the
Majnoun oilfield near Basra (controlled by
Muqtada's men) all started bringing new wealth to
the coffers of the Sadrists.
Muqtada,
learning from Nasrallah, began sending monthly
subsidies to families in need, who in turn pledged
full support, and distributing money at will to
young Shi'ites, either to join his political
movement or the Mahdi Army. It seemed like the
logical and prestigious thing to do. Muqtada has
legitimacy and family history. He is a cleric and
rising in religious prominence, as a result of him
returning to the books to reach the title of grand
ayatollah.
He is nationalistic and wants
to see an end to the Americans in Iraq. And
although he may have become close to the Iranians,
he is by no means a puppet of Iran. If the
Iranians did in fact give Maliki the green light
to crush him, this would have been either 1) to
reach some kind of back-channel deal with the
Americans. 2) They realized that cooperation with
him was limited and he would never allow himself
to become another Hakim.
Rather than have
him as a thorn in their side, the Iranians decided
to rid themselves of him. This would first empower
their original proxies, Hakim and Maliki. Second,
it would send off a powerful message to the
Americans, or at least, whomever succeeds Bush.
This might explain why, on April 30, the
Sadrists came out with a strong-worded statement
against Tehran, accusing the Iranians of "dividing
influence" with the Americans on Iraq. This is
proven, the Sadrists added, by the lack of
objections from Iran to what is happening in Sadr
City or to the Iraqi-US talks regarding a
long-term political and military agreement. Iran
is "behind the nightmares in Iraq".
Either
way, whether Muqtada is under attack as a result
of an American plan, or an Iranian one, he has a
major fight on his hands.
Sami Moubayed is
a Syrian political analyst.
(Copyright
2008 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved.
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