Show of Shia power unnerves the allies](Latest news & breaking headlines | The Times and The Sunday Times)
SCENES of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Shia Muslims expressing their newfound political power on the streets of Iraq’s cities are causing growing concern in Western and Arab capitals.
A fortnight after American and British troops deposed Saddam Hussein’s regime, there is a growing consensus that the only credible force to have emerged in the country is the Shia clergy and its followers, many of whom advocate the creation of an Iranian-style Islamic state.
“There is real concern,” a senior British official said. “The Iraqi Shia are the only group to have made any real impact so far. There was a feeling that the Shia were more secular than those in Iran. Now we are not so sure.”
The United States and Britain have vowed to replace Saddam’s dictatorship with a democratic government representing all of Iraq’s ethnic and religious groups.
Jay Garner, the retired US Army general in charge of Iraq’s civil administration, said: “The new government of Iraq will have one leader, one army, one government.”
But that vision of a multi-ethnic democracy could be seriously challenged by the Shia, who make up more than 60 per cent of the Iraqi population and traditionally have been excluded from power by the minority Sunni Muslim community.
Brutalised by decades of oppression by Saddam, the Shias have wasted no time filling the power vacuum left by the overthrow of the Baathist regime. Already Shia clerics are in complete control of the Baghdad suburb of Sadr city, a slum of two million people. They also run several southern towns, including al-Kut and the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala, where a million Shia pilgrims are expected to worship today.
They have also told American and British forces that they will not tolerate any prolonged occupation of Iraq. “In the begining, our opposition to foreign occupation will be expressed by peaceful means,” Sheikh Qaazem al- Nasari, a leading Shia, said. “If, after a certain point, non- violence produces no result, we will then have to decide what to do.”
The threat will not be taken idly. Martyrdom is an integral part of the Shia culture. In the 1980s Shia militants used suicide bombings against US Marines and the American Embassy in Beirut to drive the US out of Lebanon and later Israel.
Three main Shia factions have emerged in Iraq over the past weeks. Sayed Muqtada al-Sadr, 22, whose father and two brothers were killed by Saddam in 1999, is the newest and most aggressive political force in the land. His followers are blamed for the murder of Abdul Majid al-Khoei, a rival Shia leader with close links to Tony Blair and the Bush Administration. He is also accused of intimidating Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the most senior Shia religious leader in the country.
Ayatollah Muhammad Baqr al-Hakim, who heads the Supreme Council for Islamic Resistance in Iraq, is supported and armed by Iran. Some Iraqis fear that he plans to return home from exile in Tehran to emulate the late Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini, who seized power after the revolution that overthrew the Shah of Iran and established a strict Islamic state.
Ari Fleischer, the White House spokesman, made clear yesterday that America would not tolerate an Iranian-style theocracy hijacking its plans for democracy in Iraq. The Iraqi state “has to be in accordance with those principles of democratic freedom and tolerance”, he said. “That is not inconsistent with a state that has religious elements to it.”
He added: “Iran certainly is not an example of democracy or a country in which people are free. So certainly we want to make certain that (Saddam’s regime) is not replaced by another type of dictatorship.”
The US military authorities insist that they have plans to address the problem. On Saturday they will host a meeting of Iraqi leaders in Baghdad — part of consultations to encourage leaders to form an interim authority. However, most of the main Shia groups have boycotted the process.
Faleh Jabar, an Iraqi academic at Birkbeck College, London University, said: “These people are winning by default because nothing is being done to encourage the silent majority in Iraq, those who favour a civil administration. What we are witnessing is mob rule. Unless something is done to counter it, the country could be plunged into civil war.”
Nevertheless, the Bush Administration insists that it is still too early to write off hopes of building a democratic future for Iraq. Sources in Washington played down the Shia demonstrations as a predictable expression of post-Saddam fervour, rather than evidence of an overwhelming political force for theocracy.
US officials driving post- conflict policy in Washington see the protests as one of the many political trends among Iraqi Shia. They believe that the more democratic Islamic forces, who hold strong religious views but do not believe in imposing them on others, form a quieter majority that will hold sway in the end.
Washington believes that Shia hardliners, who include a violently anti-Western faction, are so splintered that they will be unable to present a unified position. Officials also believe that ties between the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, one of the more hardline groups, and Iran will loosen as Iraq’s new government emerges, reducing the influence of Tehran’s conservatives on Iraqi politics.
The line-up of Shia leaders
Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani
The most senior Shia religious figure in Iraq, he was held under house arrest by Saddam for 15 years. Sistani, 73, is based in Najaf, the centre of Shia religious thought for more than a thousand years. His belief that clerics should advise but not govern is popular with the Americans.
Muqtada al-Sadr
The son of the revered cleric Ayotallah Mohammed Sadeq al-Sadr, murdered by Saddam’s secret police in 1999. Men loyal to al-Sadr, 22, were implicated in the murder last week of Sheikh Majid al-Khoie, a Western-backed rival. He is believed to be behind a move to force Sistani into exile, and is popular with young Shias.
Ayatollah Mohammed Baqer al-Hakim
In Iran since 1980, al-Hakim, 63, is head of the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq, and is backed by Iran. Before the war he was the most prominant Shia leader but many are suspicious of his links with Iran.