Cleric Risks a Backlash With Anti-U.S. Rhetoric
July 28, 2003
The Washington Post
Anthony Shadid
BAGHDAD -- With militant sermons drawing tens of thousands of followers, the young scion of one of Iraq's most revered ayatollahs has laid claim to leadership of the Shiite Muslim opposition to the U.S. occupation. But in seeking to rally the most disenfranchised and alienated of the Shiite majority, Moqtada Sadr has embarked on a strategy that his supporters acknowledge risks creating a dangerous backlash.
Residents of the holy city of Najaf have grown angry at the boisterous crowds Sadr's group has shepherded to consecutive Friday sermons, fearing strife in a city that has remained relatively quiet. U.S. officials, aware of Sadr's demands that American forces leave Najaf, have warned him not to go too far. And other clergy, many far more senior than the 30-year-old activist, worry that his calls will bring to the surface bitter divisions among Shiites -- between former exiles and those who remained through the rule of ousted president Saddam Hussein, and between those cooperating with U.S. forces and those opposed.
"It's dangerous," acknowledged Ali Feisal Hamad, an activist with the movement in the Baghdad slum renamed Sadr City after the young cleric's father. "But the Americans have to understand the demands of Iraqis. Who's listening to the opinions in the street?"
Sadr was excluded from the 25-member Governing Council appointed earlier this month by L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. civilian administrator. For Sadr's followers, the omission was his choice; they say he would never take part in a body that leaves ultimate authority in U.S. hands. For U.S. officials, who dismiss Sadr's influence and chafe at his militant posture, the omission was by their design.
Since then, Sadr has railed against the Governing Council, calling it a tool of the U.S. occupation that should be dissolved. He has repeatedly urged the creation of a religious army, albeit unarmed and -- while accounts vary -- probably more akin to a morals police. In his sermon Friday at a sprawling, mud-walled mosque in nearby Kufa, attended by one of the largest crowds gathered since the fall of Hussein's government on April 9, he demanded that U.S. forces withdraw from Najaf and urged the prospective army to resist "submission, humiliation or occupation."
The words marked a dramatic departure from statements made by his group in Najaf only last month. In interviews then, Sadr's deputy, Sayyid Riyadh Nouri, described the 150,000 U.S. troops in Iraq as "liberators." A spokesman in Najaf, Sheik Adnan Shahmani, said the group had "no intention, no wish to make them leave."
Some in Najaf speculate that the shift in Sadr's message stemmed from the cleric's visit last month to Iran. His followers deny that, attributing the change solely to the appointment of the Governing Council.
Sadr has demanded the council be elected, a move that would play into the street-based movement that he has sought to cultivate and that is strongest in Baghdad and the southern cities of Basra and Nasiriyah. His movement has also criticized the fact that a majority of the council's members are former exiles or had lived in northern Iraq, which was beyond Hussein's rule after 1991.
Sadr's calls for U.S. withdrawal play on the discontent many feel over the slow pace of reconstruction, and his group has reached out to a leading Sunni cleric, Ahmed Kubeisi, who was credited with sending followers to the sermon on Friday.
Sadr has stopped short of urging armed resistance or invoking a jihad against U.S. troops, calls that would almost certainly lead to violence and, U.S. officials say, probably his arrest.
In Friday's sermon, he urged the tens of thousands of worshipers not to enter Najaf on their way to Baghdad and other cities, to avoid trouble with residents there who are increasingly vocal in their resentment over the unruly crowds that have gathered the past two Fridays. Outside his office in Sadr City, whose 3 million residents represent his key constituency, a leaflet was posted that denied any connection with recent calls "to cut the throat of anyone who deals with the Americans."
"No one has brought with them even a bullet," said Mustafa Yaacoubi, a Sadr spokesman in Najaf.
Amid the byzantine constellation of religious forces in Iraq and the ever-changing alliances among Shiite clerics divided over the degree to which they should take part in politics, Sadr remains one player among many. Much of his religious legitimacy comes from the prominence of his revered father, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq Sadr, who was believed assassinated by Hussein's government in 1999 with two of his sons.
At best a junior cleric, Sadr lacks his father's decades of religious scholarship. In spiritual matters, he is far overshadowed by Ali Sistani, an Iranian-born cleric who remains the most senior and influential ayatollah in Najaf. In politics, Sadr competes for influence with Mohammed Bakir Hakim, the leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, which holds a seat on the Governing Council and boasts a sophisticated organization honed by decades of work in exile.
But Sadr's followers say that in coming months his group will seek to build alliances with other groups -- Sunni as well as Shiite -- and clergy left without a voice on the council. Even Sistani has insisted that any entity charged with writing a constitution should be elected, not appointed, although U.S. officials say he has remained neutral so far. More militant ayatollahs, such as Kadhim Husseini Haeri in Iran and Sheik Ahmed Baghdadi, who returned from exile in Syria, have denounced the council in terms no less stringent than Sadr.
In Najaf, a backlash against Sadr has ensued. The city council warned him against inciting the crowds who arrived Friday. Some residents have threatened to expel him, although most acknowledge that is unlikely. "Even his supporters, even those who back him, don't agree with his slogans -- no to America, no to occupation, no to Israel, no to the Governing Council," said Abu Majid, the owner of Najaf's Dhu Fiqar hotel. "They say this is dangerous."
Sitting across from the sacred shrine of Imam Ali at a store selling amber rings, Ahmed Abdel-Sahib called Sadr's rejection of the council hasty and his demands for U.S. withdrawal misguided. Like others, he counseled patience. "We've been through torture and prison," he said, as pilgrims kissed and touched the shrine's two-story wooden doors, a gesture believed to bring blessings. "Now is not the time to face the Americans. We're happy, we're rid of Saddam Hussein; the torture and executions of 35 years are over. We should wait to see what the Americans will do."
Lt. Col. Chris Conlin, the commander of the Marine battalion stationed in Najaf, dismissed Sadr as a troublemaker. But he said unless the cleric specifically incites violence, U.S. forces will not act against him.
"He's a rabble-rouser, but he has to import his rabble," said Conlin. "He finds people who are dissatisfied, and he brings them along."
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The Siege of the Mohammadi Family
July 28, 2003
Iran va Jahan
Iran va Jahan Network
Paris -- According to Nasrin Mohammadi, the sentence of Manouchehr Mohammadi, the leader of the National Association of Students of Iran, has been increased by two years to a total of 14 years. In addition, although Akbar, Manouchehr's younger brother, has just been released from 17days of solitary confinement for denigrating the Islamic Republic while making an outside call while in prison, he is suffering from the physical effects of a hunger strike.
At the same time the Mohammadi brothers' father, Mohammad, and younger sister, Simin, have been ordered to appear before the Revolutionary courts for sentencing. The two were first apprehended on July 9th. While in detention, Mr. Mohammadi senior suffered a heart attack and was released on bail to seek medical attention.
Manouchehr Mohammadi was first arrested following the July 9th, 1999 student uprisings. Akbar Mohammadi, also arrested at the same time for allegedly attacking state-sanctioned vigilante groups who were assaulting the students, has consistently maintained that his "only crime" was to be the brother of Manouchehr Mohammadi. "I have always honestly and genuinely stated that I had nothing to do with these events except to hand out water to the students and even to the security forces", he wrote in a letter from prison.
Since the protests started in early June, the authorities have arrested close to 10,000 citizens. The whereabouts of many are not known. Hassan Zarezadeh, a 24-year-old and the leader of United Student Front (USF), has been missing since July 2 in Tehran. His wife has been unable to find any record of him in various detention centers run by the Prison Authority, the Revolutionary courts and the Intelligence Ministry. Unidentified security agents publicly arrested another Iranian student protest leader, Saeed Razavi-Faqih, at gunpoint on July 10 as he was leaving the office of the Professional Journalists' Association. His whereabouts also remains a mystery. In the past 40 days 15 journalists have been arrested, bringing the total of journalists in prison in Iran to 23.
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