What Iraq Needs At This Time
Posted on 04/06/2004 6:38:18 AM PDT by Mark Felton
April 5— Shiite Arabs in Iraq express relatively little support for attacks against coalition forces such as those that occurred Sunday. And while most do express confidence in religious leaders and call for them to play a role in Iraq today, most do not seek a theocracy, and very few see Iran as a model for Iraq.
A nationwide poll of Iraqis conducted in February for ABCNEWS also found that very few Shiites express support for Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose militia mounted the deadly attacks against the U.S.-led occupation. Nine coalition troops, including eight Americans, and more than 50 Iraqis were killed in the clashes.
As reported previously, anger at the United States peaks among Sunni Arabs in Iraq, not Shiites. According to the poll, Shiites are about 30 points less likely to say the invasion was wrong or to say it humiliated Iraq, and 12 percent of Shiites say attacks on coalition forces are acceptable, compared with 38 percent of Sunni Arabs. (That rises to 71 percent of Sunnis in Anbar province, which includes the city of Fallujah, a hotbed of the resistance.)
Shiite Arabs are somewhat less fragmented politically than Iraqis as a whole; 20 percent express support for the Islamic Al-Dawa Party, the oldest Islamic movement in Iraq, which calls for a fundamentalist state. This level of party loyalty is exceeded only among Kurds for either of the two Kurdish parties, the PUK or PDK.
In terms of al-Sadr, a bare 1 percent of Iraqis name him as the national leader they trust most. On Iran, just 3 percent name it as a model for Iraq in the coming years, and just 4 percent say it should play a role in rebuilding Iraq.
Government
Sixty-nine percent of Shiites say "a government made up mainly of religious leaders" is something "Iraq needs at this time" (southern Shiites, especially, say so); that compares with 44 percent of Sunni Arabs. But more Shiites say Iraq needs a democracy or a single strong leader, and about as many say it needs a government of technocrats.
What Iraq Needs At This Time |
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Shiite Arabs | Sunni Arabs |
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| An Iraqi Democracy | 91% | 76% | |
| Single Strong Leader | 83 | 85 | |
| A Government Mainly of Religious Leaders | 69 | 44 | |
| A Government Made Up of Experts | 66 | 65 | |
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Another question asked respondents to make a choice among three systems: a strong leader, an Islamic state or a democracy. A plurality of Shiites picked a democracy. (Still, more Shiites than Sunnis favor a theocracy, 26 percent vs. 15 percent; and again this peaks in the south.)
Preferred System |
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Shiite Arabs | Sunni Arabs |
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| Democracy | 40% | 35% | |
| Islamic State | 26 | 15 | |
| Single Strong Leader | 23 | 35 | |
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Fifty-two percent of Shiite Arabs express confidence in religious leaders, compared with 34 percent of Sunni Arabs. At the same time, about as many Shiites express confidence in the new Iraqi army (57 percent), and more in the Iraqi police (69 percent).
Down South
Shiites predominate in the south — 69 percent of Iraqis in the southern provinces identify themselves as Shiite, peaking at 92 percent in Karbala. Looking at it another way, 63 percent of all Iraqi Shiites live in the south. (A good number of Muslims declined to specify a doctrine; they tend to match up closely with Shiites on a variety of attitudinal questions.)
There are some significant differences between Shiite Arabs in the south and those in other regions. Shiites in the south are nearly twice as likely as those elsewhere to prefer an Islamic state, 31 percent to 16 percent. They're also much more apt to say a government mainly of religious leaders is something Iraq needs now.
At the same time, Shiites in the south — a region heavily repressed under Saddam Hussein's regime — are more likely than those elsewhere to say it was right for the coalition to invade, and to say the invasion liberated rather than humiliated their country.
U.S.-Led Invasion Was |
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Southern Shiite Arabs | Shiite Arabs Elsewhere |
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| Right | 56% | 44% | |
| Wrong | 28 | 47 | |
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Invasion |
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Southern Shiite Arabs | Shiite Arabs Elsewhere |
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| Liberated Iraq | 49% | 34% | |
| Humiliated Iraq | 27 | 53 | |
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What Iraq Needs At This Time |
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Southern Shiite Arabs | Shiite Arabs Elsewhere |
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| A Government Mainly of Religious Leaders | 79% | 52% | |
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Preferred Political System |
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Southern Shiite Arabs | Shiite Arabs Elsewhere |
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| Democracy | 39% | 41% | |
| Islamic State | 31 | 16 | |
| Single Strong Leader | 18 | 33 | |
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Confident in Religious Leaders |
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Southern Shiite Arabs | Shiite Arabs Elsewhere |
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57% | 44% | |
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Nearly all Shiites in Iraq — 96 percent — also identify themselves as Arabs. Sunnis, by contrast, include both Arabs and members of the Kurdish minority.
Methodology
The Iraq poll was conducted for ABCNEWS, ARD, the BBC and NHK by Oxford Research International of Oxford, England. Interviews were conducted in person, in Arabic and Kurdish, among a random national sample of 2,737 Iraqis age 15 and up from Feb. 9-28. The results have a two-point error margin.
Yet the Democrat party continues to aid and assist the enemies of the US. They are the shills of the enemy Sunnis and enemy Shia.
Why is there no such thing as a traitor any more?
The attacks on Bush are more effective by the Democrats than the attacks by Sadr.
That's an irreconcilable difference. They just need to split them up into separate nations. You'll just end up with trouble otherwise.
So Sadr is getting around 99% less support than Saddam did.
ahh..another ABC poll.
From it we can conclude the following:
Shiites oppose OR favor attacks..
AND..
islamic state IS or IS NOT preferred.
This is great news!
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