In his recent appearance he looks well. I congratulate him for marshalling the Shia forces under a Fatwa. Very interesting. His father's son.
The foolishness of the Western Press is that upon his return the USA has lead a successful attack on Sadr City. For one, he isn't in Sadr City, which is East Baghdad. He never has been there. So any titles in the media spoken or print or video tempting people of The West to believe the Cleric is under seige in Baghdad is a lie. It's not nice to lie and deceive when American troops lives are on the line while lining the pockets of billionaires. Shame on them all. As a matter of fact the so called attack by the USA into Sadr City was completely botched killing innocent people.
Sadr uses dramatic reappearance to deliver blast of anti-US rhetoric (click here)
Saturday, May 26, 2007
By Patrick Cockburn
The nationalist Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has reappeared before thousands of supporters for the first time in months to call for American troops to end the occupation of Iraq.
In an impassioned sermon to 6,000 worshippers in a mosque in the holy city of Kufa al-Sadr, wearing a white martyr's cloak thrown over his dark robes, he cried: "No, no to Satan! No, no to America! No, no to the occupation! No, no to Israel!"
He had appeared earlier in the morning in the nearby shrine city of Najaf to travel in a long motorcade to Kufa to deliver the Friday sermon.
Mr Sadr, leader of a powerful Shia political movement and the much-feared Mehdi Army militia, disappeared some four months ago, evidently fearing that he would be targeted by the US. But he stood down his militiamen as the US Army introduced a security plan for Baghdad and avoided an all-out confrontation with the US.
In his sermon yesterday he forcefully demanded an end to the US-led occupation and offered reconciliation to Sunni Arabs. The Sadrist movement, founded by Muqtada's murdered father, Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr, in the 1990s, has always been nationalist but the Mehdi Army is hated by many Sunnis for its death squads and sectarian cleansing.
Surrounded by guards and aides in Kufa al-Sadr, Mr Sadr declared: "I renew my demand for the occupiers to leave or draw up a timetable for withdrawal, and I ask the government not to let the occupiers extend the occupation even for one day." He has removed six Sadrist ministers from the government, citing its failure to set a timetable for American departure.
Mr Sadr's demand for an end to the occupation is likely to resonate in Iraq where the Sunni community has favoured this since the invasion of 2003 and the majority Shia community has increasingly wanted a timetable for a withdrawal, according to opinion polls. The Sadrists have been meeting with anti-al-Qa'ida Sunni tribal leaders from Anbar to discuss forming a common front. Sectarian suspicions between Shia and Sunni are so deep and bitter, however, that differences will be difficult to bridge.
There has been escalating intra-Shia fighting in southern Iraq over the past two months with skirmishes in all the main Shia cities. Often the police and security forces are simply militiamen in uniform.
Yesterday, Mr Sadr condemned fighting between the Mehdi Army and Iraqi security forces, saying that this served "the interests of the occupiers". He said that he preferred peaceful protests and sit-ins.
In an attempt to refurbish his reputation as a non-sectarian nationalist, Mr Sadr said he was ready to co-operate with Sunnis "on all issues". He added: "I am completely ready to defend them [Sunnis and Christians] and be their armour against their enemies."
Mr Sadr has been out of Iraq in Iran and Lebanon according to one of his aides, abandoning the Sadrist claim that he never left Iraq. He seems to have returned about a week ago, at which time Iraqis talking to Sadrist leaders noticed that they seemed to be able to reach him rapidly by phone on landlines, though there are no landlines to Iran.
His return now is probably explained by the damage his prolonged absence was doing to his movement. It is very dependent on the cult-like devotion felt towards the 33-year-old Mr Sadr by millions of poor and devout Shias.
Previously unheard of by the outside world, he emerged as a surprisingly powerful leader in 2003 at the time of the fall of Saddam Hussein. He inherited much of the authority of his father, who was assassinated with two of his sons by Saddam Hussein's agents in Najaf in 1999.
The Sadrist movement's blend of Islam, Iraqi nationalism and populism has proved highly attractive to Shia, particularly those who are very poor. The US tried and failed to eliminate Mr Sadr in two armed confrontations in April and August 2004. The Sadrist movement survived and went on to do well in the parliamentary elections of 2005, gaining 32 seats in the 275-member national assembly and six ministerial posts.
A further reason for Mr Sadr's return now is the growing competition between his supporters and those of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC) led by the ailing Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, who has been diagnosed with lung cancer. SIIC, formed under Iranian auspices in Tehran in 1982, has been trying with some success to rid itself of the imputation that it is subservient to Iran. The Sadrists, by contrast, were traditionally hostile to Iran but under US pressure have increasingly come to depend on Tehran's support.
The Sadrists and SIIC are the main components of the United Iraqi Alliance, the Shia front supported by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and the religious hierarchy or Marjai'iyyah. Much though they dislike each other, they will be under pressure from the grand ayatollah not to divide the Shia community.
Iraq is a pilgram's haven. The Shia have their holiest lands in Iraq. There are going to be Iranians in Iraq all the time because of personal pilgramages to their holy land. These Iranians will be armed and I would not be surprised to find they are in possession of substantially armed escorts. Did the USA know there is a war torn nation still in chaos of leadership, food, water and medical care? Maybe they didn't know that to 'get around' Iraq one travels well armed and in multiples to add maximum protection to 'that movement.' Makes sense, huh? So no matter whom in Iraq the USA decides to 'target' is guilty because they carry arms. One would think the NRA is in it's glory in Iraq. Arm the nation. Isn't that the rant of the NRA? Right? Sure, why not?
US military says five Iraqi militants killed in Sadr City raid
US-led forces seized a suspected militant with ties to Iran and killed five others in an early morning raid in the east Baghdad Shiite stronghold of Sadr City on Saturday, the US military said.
However, an Iraqi defence ministry official said an air strike launched in support of the ground raid hit cars lined up to purchase gas at a nearby petrol station, and that those killed were innocent civilians.
The US military statement said the man detained in the raid had been "acting as a proxy for an Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps officer," and smuggling explosively formed penetrators (EFPs) to local militias.
It added that five people were killed when troops called in an air strike after nine vehicles moved into the area following the arrest in an apparent attempt to resist the operation.
The Iraqi official disputed this version and said the cars hit in the air strike had been waiting to fill up with gas, a common pre-dawn scene in a city where shortages are common and lines often stretch for several blocks.
The military official added that several houses were destroyed and six vehicles incinerated, in the raid.
A local hospital official reported receiving three bodies and eight wounded people following the battle.
The United States has long accused Iran of supplying EFPs, sophisticated explosive devices that discharge a ball of molten metal capable of tearing through an armoured vehicle, to Shiite militias.
The United States and Iran frequently accuse each other of fomenting violence in Iraq, but on Monday their respective ambassadors will hold landmark meetings in Baghdad aimed at slowing Iraq's spiralling mayhem.
Saturday's raids came one day after radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr reappeared from a four-month absence to deliver a Friday sermon calling for national reconciliation and the departure of US and British forces.
Sadr called on his forces to refrain from fighting the Iraqi Army and Iraqi police, but a few hours later Iraqi special forces with British support killed one of his senior commanders while trying to detain him at Basra checkpoint.
Sadr's well-armed but increasingly fractured Mahdi Army militia has largely cooperated with a three-month-old US-led security crackdown in the capital, but rogue elements continue to battle coalition and Iraqi forces.
Doesn't anyone beside me recognize propaganda? The article below from The Washington Post outlines what USA intelligence 'estimates' to be expected in Iraq. Where have you heard it before now? Here? Most of it. The al Qaeda mess is irrelevant. The so called "Al Qaeda in Iraq" has proven to be a violent entity against primarily The Shia of Iraq. They are known to be Sunnis. Look. There just aren't that many 'bad guys' in Iraq. They aren't international terrorists. Not even close. There will never be a perfect Middle East until the Shia, Sunnis and Israelis settle their disputes with international intervention promoting good behavior with good economics. Can we please get on with this. It would be good if the USA left Iraq. I don't care how many 'sympathy stories' The Western Media puts out of the hardship in Iraq of the people there. I really don't. Those stories on tell me loud and clear what a mess the USA is making of that country. Sooner or later the USA has to come to terms with it's defeat in Iraq and return to 'the real war' currently floundering badly in Afghanistan. PLEASE GET OVER THIS. Innocent Iraqis are dying in large numbers. The CHAOS in Iraq will end when it isn't confused with an illegal war by Bush and Cheney. Jeeze. The Iraq War, also known as 'Exponential Corruption.'
Analysts' Warnings of Iraq Chaos Detailed (click here)
Senate Panel Releases Assessments From 2003
By Walter Pincus and Karen DeYoungWashington Post Staff WritersSaturday, May 26, 2007; Page A01
Months before the invasion of Iraq, U.S. intelligence agencies predicted that it would be likely to spark violent sectarian divides and provide al-Qaeda with new opportunities in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a report released yesterday by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Analysts warned that war in Iraq also could provoke Iran to assert its regional influence and "probably would result in a surge of political Islam and increased funding for terrorist groups" in the Muslim world.
The intelligence assessments, made in January 2003 and widely circulated within the Bush administration before the war, said that establishing democracy in Iraq would be "a long, difficult and probably turbulent challenge." The assessments noted that Iraqi political culture was "largely bereft of the social underpinnings" to support democratic development.
A Fatwa called and honored will eliminate any meaningful reason for the USA to occupy Iraq any further. The USA is now an enemy to a martyred war. The Shia in the Iraqi military and police will be 'moved' to honor the Fatwa. The Shia in the Iraqi Unity Government will be feeling their obligations in the face of the USA military and their generals. This is not the USA's war. Iraq will divide into there autonomous provinces, the Iraq 'oil obligation' to the USA due to the illegal invasion of Bush/Cheney will desolve along with Iraq's sovereignty. There will be a Shiastan, Sunnistan and Kurdistan. The alliances are clear, Sunni-Saudi, Shia-Iran, and alas the Kurds. Ah, the Kurds. Well, they already have their eyes set on an expansive country encompassing all of Kurdistan including 'Turkish occupied' lands. It's reality. It will happen and there isn't a darn thing The West can do about it except realize 'it's place' and learn to thrive 'within that reality' through abundant and peaceful trade initiatives. I am not going to discuss the Iranian enrichment facility; I have already done that; it cannot be tolerated. Russia has the best option for Iran and any illegitimate nuclear country.
