Juan Cole has a good post today which is his digest of a long interview that Moqtada Sadr gave to al-Jazeera last night. There’s a huge amount of interesting material there that I would love to analyze at greater length but I’m afraid I don’t have time… I’m working on a special project that JWN readers will most likely be able to profit from from about next Wednesday on. I’ll just note I found these portions particularly interesting:
- Muqtada says that he is not himself interested in holding political office. He says that each member of parliament represents all Iraqis. He says he only offers advice to the Sadrist bloc in parliament, which is responsible to the Iraqi people generally.
The thirty Sadrist delegates must follow their own conscience. He said that each of the Sadrist MPs was free to support either Ibrahim Jaafari or Adil Abdul Mahdi. the important things was that they should support someone who insists on the departure of the occupation army.
…He denies that he opposes the principle of provincial confederacies and loose federalism. In fact, he says, it is a principle approved by the Prophet Muhammad. He is worried, however, that establishing this sort of federalism under foreign military occupation could lead to a very bad outcome. One is that there is a danger that the foreigners will take advantage of it to partition Iraq. They will also just take advantage to intervene more heavily in Iraqi affairs. And if there were a partition, he asks, what would happen to the Turkmen or the Christians or the Sabeans (groups too small to have their on provincial confederacies). He says he opposes sectarian confederacies and rejects the idea of a big Shiite provincial confederacy in the south of the country.
Asked about Kirkuk, Muqtada says that the Kurdistan Confederacy was established in the north because of the then dictatorship. He says that when the foreign occupation ends, and a democratic state is established in Iraq, with freedom of belief and freedom of peoples, there will be no reason to maintain a separate provincial confederacy. And it won’t need to demand Kirkuk. Kirkuk belongs to all of Iraq and all must equally benefit from it. He suggests that it be kept as a province and an example of communal harmony, rather than being partitioned by ethnic group.
… Asked where he stands in the conflict between the United States on the one side and Iran and Syria on the other, and what he would do if open conflict broke out, Muqtada replied “I am in the service of Islam. Whatever they need in their difficulties, I will provide it. . . I will defend all Islamic and Arab states.” But, he said, he would have to be asked by those states to intervene. He wouldn’t just volunteer to do it whether they wanted it or not. That, he said, is what is wrong with volunteers coming to Iraq unasked to fight the occupation, and then staying to kill Iraqi civilians.
I think Moqtada is continuing his “powerful politico’s’ regional tour”. He’s in Jordan where I think today he was due to meet with King Abdullah II, having met with the PM there yesterday. H’mm, and to think that just a year or so ago he was one of the US forces’ “Most Wanted criminals” in Iraq… What on earth is happening to US influence in the region? (A question asked in irony.)
Oh well, back there in Baghdad, the US interveners are working desperately hard, it seems, trying to prevent the coming to power of an elected government that is dedicated to seeking a speedy withdrawal of the US forces. That at least is my first reading of this piece of reporting, by nelson Hernandez, in today’s WaPo.
Hernandez writes,
- since the Shiites voted to choose Jafari, representatives from Kurdish, Sunni Arab and secular parties that include multiple factions said they had met to discuss a broad-based coalition that could potentially overpower the Shiite candidate. The politicians, as well as Western officials, said in interviews that the race for prime minister was far from over.
“It is too early to say who will be the president or the prime minister or anything else,” said Ibrahim Janabi, a member of the secular National Iraqi List. “I think this will take time.”
“We are exploring all possibilities,” said Barham Saleh, a leader of the Kurdish alliance of parties, in a telephone interview just before he headed back into a meeting with other parties on Saturday.
I guess Zal Khalilzad, Iyad Allawi, and a bunch of other US collaborators and opportunists are kind of annoyed that their favorite character inside the UIA, SCIRI’s Adel Abdul-Mahdi, didn’t get the UIA’s nomination for the PM post.
But the idea that all the non-UIA parties might be able to come together and over-rule the UIA is– provided the UIA people hang together– quite absurd and out of the question.
Much more likely than a bloc that marginalizes a significant portion of the UIA would be a bloc that marginalizes the Kurds– and the Kurds know that.
Oh, here’s AP now running with that, “major obstacles for a Jaafari confirmation” story, as well. Looks like Zal and his buddies are taking advantage of Moqtada’s temporary absence to try to spook the UIA into overturning the Jaafari nomination and going the way they want it to?
Colonial bullying politics really is pathetic sometimes. (But also, very damaging to the peoples colonized.)
Meantime, Iraqis continue not to have a governing admionistration that is accountable to them. The DDI counter here on JWN now stands at 66 days.
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/ny-woiraq194633728feb19,0,7350628,print.story?coll=ny-worldnews-print
US interveners are working desperately hard, it seems, trying to prevent the coming to power of an elected government that is dedicated to seeking a speedy withdrawal of the US forces.
http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/news/columnists/trudy_rubin/13905875.htm
They love to bring thier slave to the power Helena, Jaafri no longer loving one…
I think Moqtada is continuing his “powerful politico’s’ regional tour”
I think this tour good for him to build better understanding of regional politics and build relations far from Iranians.
…He denies that he opposes the principle of provincial confederacies and loose federalism. In fact, he says, it is a principle approved by the Prophet Muhammad. He is worried, however, that establishing this sort of federalism under foreign military occupation could lead to a very bad outcome.
Nope. According to Cole, Sadr says that when occupation ends, Iraq will be “democratic” whatever it means for him (probably, Bathist oppression), and there will be no need for confederacy.
oops… it needs to be absence of Baathist oppression in brackets.
Salah,
Thanks for the link, it was an interesting reading. Particularly these paragraphs near the end :
Salih told me the Kurds will insist that a national unity government include the UIA, the Kurds, Sunni groupings, and the party of Iyad Allawi, a secular Shiite and former interim prime minister. While in office, Allawi sent troops to put down Sadr’s militia.
Jaafari – and all factions – would be required to sign on to a platform meant to hold the country together. This would include a plank that required the Interior Ministry to be run by professionals, not Shiite militias that send out death squads to kill Sunnis. It would set up a National Security Council to supervise the Interior and Defense ministries.
On one side, it may be difficult to hold the UIA together.. but on the other side, the SCIRI wants to keep the interior minister, why would they accept a technocrate in that post ? Also, if they go with the Kurds and Allawi’s party and some secular Sunnis : they will be dependent from these diverses and dissimilars groups to get their policy achieved. I’m not sure they would see that as a better position than staying with the UIA. Further, what about the Sunnis non secular party ? Would they really go along with Allawi’s party ? A government by Al-Mehdi would be just as weak as one lead by Jaafari.
The US is just playing to divide and rule.
Further Muktada is also playing the unity card and he is probably nearer of the heart of the Iraqis than the Kurds.
I think that the first who break the UIA will get a bad point with the Iraqis and the Shiite clerics and none Shiite politicians will want to take public responsibility for that (Unless Sistani says they should fight against the Sadrists, which I doubt he will say).
seeking a speedy withdrawal of the US forces.
“But why should we hear about body bags and death, and how many, what day it’s gonna happen. So, why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?”
Barbara Bush
ABC’s Good Morning America
March 18, 2003
(One day before the invasion of Iraq)
“Colonial bullying politics really is pathetic sometimes. (But also, very damaging to the peoples colonized.)”
So, you want to bring back good old Saddam ?
Did I ever once say that? If you’d been reading JWN carefully, you would have known the answer is “No”.
But no. You don’t rely on logic, memory, consistency, or the facts in your constant attempts to score cheap rhetorical points.
Typographical note: I think bolding is ugly and shrill and should only be used rarely. But if a person has to use it, thanks for using it for my words there, WW, rather than your own.
So, you want to bring back good old Saddam?
Recently, some Israeli official said that situation in Iraq was better under Saddam than now. In fact, it is pretty obvious, for example, oil production is down from pre-occupation level. In what way UIA is more pro-Western than Hamas – is incomprehensible. So, relax and have fun.
WarrenW,
None of Iraq’s neighbors wanted this invasion, except Israel and possibly Kuwait. Saddam Hussein was basicly a problem for the Iraqis and I am not aware they invited the U.S. to invade. This was an illegal act, by the way.
Recently, some Israeli official said that situation in Iraq was better under Saddam than now. In fact, it is pretty obvious
“Pretty obvious” I guess, since “some Israeli official” is nostalgic for Saddam Hussein it must be a fair assessment. Perhaps you might lobby for a re-election campaign?
Meanwhile, the Iraqi people don’t seem to share your view, judging from any number of opinion polls.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4514414.stm
In what way UIA is more pro-Western than Hamas – is incomprehensible.
I’m pretty sure “pro-western-ness” isn’t the relevant criterion. To my knowledge UIA isn’t calling for the eradication of any of Iraq’s neighbors, or sponsoring suicide bombings beyond Iraq’s borders.
[To my knowledge UIA isn’t calling for the eradication of any of Iraq’s neighbors, or sponsoring suicide bombings beyond Iraq’s borders.]
In the whole, UIA and Hamas ideologies are pretty clsoe. Both are basically Islamic resistance movements.
As for WBG, semantic games aside, ever since 1967, it is under the Israeli military control. So, Hamas fights against Israel, but not against anybody else.
In the whole, UIA and Hamas ideologies are pretty clsoe.
Except for the racialist rhetoric, suicide terrorism, leadership in exile, and the fact that UIA –as a political caucus not a party— doesnt have any coherent ideology, let alone one whose centerpiece is the destruction of another sovereign state, I’d agree with you entirely. Like Al Qaeda, both UIA and HAMAS are “Islamic Resistance Movements” and that designation alone sums up their essential properties [???!!!!].
In the same vein, minus the racial superiority platform, the strong support of German industrial leaders, the ban on labor unions and the anti-Bolshevik posturing, Hitler was almost indistinguishable from any of the leaders of the contemporary left, wouldn’t you agree? [I kid.]