Sadr orders militia to reject PM's call to surrender arms
BASRA, Iraq —
Radical Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr on Saturday defied Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s call on his forces to surrender their arms as the premier vowed to press on with his assault against them.
“Sadr has told us not to surrender our arms except to a state that can throw out the (U.S.) occupation,” Haider al-Jabari of the Sadr movement’s political bureau said in the holy city of Najaf, home to the cleric’s main office.
On Wednesday, Maliki gave a 72-hour deadline to Shiite fighters, mostly Mahdi Army militants loyal to the anti-American cleric, to disarm in the southern city of Basra after launching an offensive against them a day earlier.
The deadline expired on Friday after which Maliki gave the residents of Basra an April 8 deadline to surrender their heavy and medium weapons in return for money in a bid to cut the supply of arms to militants.
The crackdown on areas controlled by Sadr’s militia has severely strained a freeze of Mahdi Army activities the cleric ordered in August, which was one of the main reasons for the overall fall in violence in Iraq since June.
On Saturday, Maliki vowed to press ahead against the gunmen, saying they were “worse than al-Qaida.”
“Our determination is strong. We will not leave Basra until security is restored, those who break the law are punished and those who draw their weapons in the face of the state are punished,” he said in a statement issued in Baghdad.
“Unfortunately we were talking about al-Qaida but there are some among us who are worse than al-Qaida. Al-Qaida is killing innocents, al-Qaida is destroying establishments and they (Shiite gunmen) also,” he said.
“Al-Qaida wants to see that the political process fails and they are planning” the same thing. “We are facing another danger which is in our midst,” he said, referring to the Shiite gunmen.
U.S. and Iraqi officials claim that most of the violence in Iraq by way of car bombs, road bombs and shoot-outs is the work of al-Qaida in Iraq, the local affiliate of Osama bin Laden’s global jihadist group.
Since Tuesday, violence has raged across Shiite regions of Iraq, with nearly 260 people killed as Shiite fighters clashed with troops.
Most of the casualties were in Sadr City, the bastion of Sadr loyalists in eastern Baghdad, the southern cities of Basra and Nasiriyah and the central cities of Kut and Hilla.
The U.S. military said two American soldiers were killed Saturday in eastern Baghdad.
On Saturday night, the Baghdad military command extended the curfew in the capital indefinitely as violent clashes raged, state television Al-Iraqiya reported.
The curfew, which was imposed late on Thursday, was to have been lifted Sunday at 5 a.m.
On Saturday, clashes erupted in the central Shiite city of Karbala where 12 “criminals” were killed, local police chief Raed Jawdat Shakir said.
At least 75 people have been slain in Sadr City since the fighting erupted after the Basra crackdown. Another 498 people have been wounded, said Qassim Mohammed, a spokesman for Baghdad health directorate.
Ahmed, a resident of the slum neighborhood of some two million Shiites, said the situation was deteriorating.
“The hospitals are overflowing with wounded. They can’t take any more. Even the medical stores are closed,” he said.
“There is no electricity, no water or fuel. We are afraid of gun battles. The main markets are also closed.”
Meanwhile, the U.S. military discovered a “huge cache” of Iranian-made rockets south of Baghdad near the town of Mahmudiyah, U.S. commander Colonel Dominic Caraccilo said.
He said the military believed the rockets were intended for militants fighting in Baghdad or in the south.
Fighting continued in Basra for the fifth straight day. U.S.-led coalition warplanes bombed the Al-Baath neighborhood of northwest Basra early on Saturday, killing at least eight people.
There were two more strikes later in the day, British Major Tom Holloway said, adding that at least 50 people had been killed in Basra and another 300 wounded since the fighting started.
The port city is the focus of a turf war between the Mahdi Army and two rival Shiite factions—the powerful Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC) of Abdel Aziz al-Hakim and the smaller Fadhila party.
Baghdad’s Green Zone, seat of the government and the US embassy, again came under mortar bomb or rocket attack, but no information was available on casualties or damage.
AFP
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43 Comments
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0
Sarge
Al-Sadr has defied the wlll of the leader of the freely-elected Iraqi government. Who thinks this guy has the best interests of Iraq at heart?
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SimondB
Iraqi's fighting Iraqis. British and US forces fighting Iraqis. But they can vote! So it was all worth while. Allah forbid that civil war breaks out.....Iraqi's fighting Iraqis.
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SezWho2
The so-called freely elected government of Iraq was installed under the direction of a foreign invader. This is precisely the fear out of which the founding fathers of America reserved to the people the right to keep and bear arms.
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SuperLib
Wow, so Sadr is the Iraqi Thomas Jefferson!
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Taka313
SuperLib, In some ways, yes, al Sadr is, in fact, like Thomas Jefferson.
Thomas Jefferson didn't want a foreign Army occupying his country and he didn't want a foreign government to be calling the shots on the behalf of his country without proper representation.
So, yes, good point. Thank you. In some ways, they are, indeed, similar.
Or....were you shooting for hyperbole? If so, my bad.
Taka
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adaydream
There is so much room here to laugh and to wonder...
Al-Sadr's militia holding off Iraqi's new Army, supplied and trained by American troops. Then they have held off the U. S. Army and their helicopter gunships.
"freely-elected Iraqi government" Oh, who's freely elected... Did they ask the U. S. for their freedom?
Weren't no Shiites killing shiites either.
If we'd had more troops, george bush would have had us in Iran right now. This country would have been stretched into two giant fiascos. There these chickenhawks continue to beat their drums trying to find some victory in their eyes.
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SuperLib
"In some ways, yes, al Sadr is, in fact, like Thomas Jefferson."
Very well said!
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Sarge
"In some ways, yes, al Sadr is, in fact, like Thomas Jefferson"
Wow, Taka just dissed one of our founding fathers. It seems adding 300 to his handle hasn't improved his posts one iota.
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DanManjt
Sez Who
I don't find particularly useful your attempt to connect in the manner that you have Iraq's civil war with the America experience.
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Taka313
and you are ever the cultist sarge. Enjoy your black and white world where all your decisions are made for you.
Some of us don't consider thought a chore. We actually enjoy it and everything.
Taka
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SuperLib
Should Sadr be compared to Thomas Jefferson? No.
Thomas Jefferson should be compared to Sadr, one could argue.
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Taka313
SuperLib, I have to admit, I'm pretty surprised here. I can fully understand sarge being outraged, but I thought you far more intelligent than that.
Obviously, the two are light years apart on most levels but are you really naive enough to think that there can be no similarities at all? Is that such a stretch?
Better yet, explain to me where my first post was incorrect. What did I state that was fundamentally wrong?
Taka
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Sarge
Al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army and their IEDs are responsible for the deaths of many U.S. and Iraqi soldiers. I wish Maliki and the U.S. would quit playing around with this scumbag and his followers and take them out.
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SimondB
Yes sarge, just like in the movies....
Shame real life can be so difficult.
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Zaphod
Sarge, little problem there: This scumbag says he has god on his side, and his followers believe him. And fear of death does not impress people who think they go to paradise for fighting for god.
The US stepped into this mess, insanely relying on religious nuts to create a democracy (a concept that is blasphemy if you believe Gods law should rule earth), and now they are stuck in it.
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Sarge
"The US stepped into this mess"
Yeah, well, somebody had to step in and try to do something about the festering Middle East.
"fear of death does not impress people who think they go to heaven fighting for god"
Maybe death itself will impress them.
Hey, if these scumbags refuse to get with the program and stop making life miserable for everyone else, they forfeit their right to live.
0
Betzee
Taka, Moral outrage is intended to stifle debate when those expressing it lack the knowledge to respond. It's an old trick utilized, ironically, by those who profess to be advancing the cause of freedom.
Sadr and his Madhi Army may have convinced their constituency they were Robin Hoods at one time. There's a class component to this which was never factored in by those in Washington; Sadr City is a teeming slum of "have nots."
But I think most Shia have tired the violence and support Maliki's efforts to put them down. Ironically, this uptick in violence owes to an impending election in October. It was called to allow the Sunni greater participation but will reshuffle things for the Shia too. At one time Sadr's party was expected to make gains in the Assembly. If the Iraqi Army can establish the upper hand against the Madhi Army that will shift support away from Sadr. Of course the reverse is also true. The United States, in contrast to past confrontations with the Mahdi Army, is a bystander (though hardly a disinterested one).
The Bush administration has cast this as a "law and order issue." OK. But then it's hard to argue with the Chinese when they say "we've got a law and order problem here [in Tibet]." Looking at it from a structural perspective, as you did, is much more useful in illuminating what's really going on on the ground than the feeble straw man defense of which we've seen so much of here.
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DanManjt
"quit playing around with this scumbag and his followers and take them out."
Here we have the problem with the right in a nutshell. Problem? Use force. When force doesn't work, use more force. If more force doesn't work, blame it on those who haven't allowed the US turn the place to glasss. Failure is a results of their flawed strategy. It results from not being allowed to implement their fine plan.
Because the Liberals, the French and Santa Claus.
In short, the right are like the kindergarder trying to force a square peg into a round hole. And having a tantrum when they fail.
In truth, "quit playing around with this scumbag and his followers and take them out.," is a bad move because its predicated on a seriously flawed assumption.
The assumption that America has a preponderance of power to enforce her will regardless of any other national or subnational group.
We do not. There are real limits on American power, limits that Bush has crashed straight into in his silly attempt to force Iraq to comply with his will.
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DanManjt
woops
Filure is not a result of their flawed strategy; rather it results from not being allowed to implement their fine plan.
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SezWho2
DanManjt The connection may not be useful. On the other hand, your finding of it being not "particularly useful" in the "manner" that I have made it, doesn't give me much to work with. If it's not useful, you should be able to say why. If you know to a certainty that the real patriot in Iraq is not al-Sadr, you're much more insightful than I am. Al-Sadr's goal--or one of his goals--is to remove the foreign invader and that will most likely not be realized under al-Maliki, under whom the invader is there for the long term. Al-Sadr moratorium on militia activity only saw the invader dig itself deeper into Iraqi life.
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SezWho2
SuperLib,
I don't think that al-Sadr is the Iraqi Jefferson, but--setting aside your unwithering sarcasm--I don't see why he should put down his arms and sacrifice his political desires simply because it is convenient to al-Maliki or because it would save bloodshed.
The bloodshed of our own war against the British was unnecessary. Additionally, it was less popular in fact than in mythology. Necessity and popularity have never been required conditions for military action although in al-Sadr's case he may have the popularity advantage over al-Maliki.
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mareo2
Hmmm... If read it that the Bush administration, pushed Maliki to make the voting before the US vote for show some progress, in exchange maliki asked permission for take down Maliki, because is hes main rival in the Shiites. So like always these smell to a breack the truce for political reasons, not for freedom, democracy or security at all. If I remeber rigth, the enemy of the US is Al-Qaida, the generals said before that they were hapy with the truce with Sadr.
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mareo2
I mean "Maliki asked permission for take down Sadr". Buff I need to sleep more.
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SuperLib
Why are you surprised, Taka? In some ways Sadr is like the Iraqi Rosa Parks, standing up to an oppressive government that he did not vote for. There are a lot of similarities.
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Betzee
"Al-Sadr’s goal—or one of his goals—is to remove the foreign invader and that will most likely not be realized under al-Maliki, under whom the invader is there for the long term."
I'm not sure a society can be stable when it is occupied by a foreign army. It's difficult enough to deal with the tensions which arise when foreign troops are based in another country. But that's different; US troops in Japan and South Korea do not police the locals and get involved in domestic political disputes. Here the US has helped Maliki's government by providing a few strategic airstrikes to help rout the Mahdi Army.
But helping Maliki "take down" the Mahdi Army opens his government up to the charge it's a puppet which will find resonance among Sadr supporters. They are unlikely to accept a result in which the US backed Maliki.
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SuperLib
"I don’t see why he should put down his arms"
Then you should have no problem with the result, which might include a violent death at the hands of US soldiers.
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SuperLib
Looks like he's just called for a cease fire. Smart move.
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outhousejt
It would be better for US to stay out if this as US has the opposite effect as they like to see themselves as. Namely a stabalizing force. Besides according to Albasrah. Regime admits policemen, army troops are surrendering themselves to Sadr Offices rather than fight for US-backed government.
Cheney said to the press that he didn't care about American troops dying in Iraq and since the troops voluntarily joined the army their opinions don't count much. Their life should be compared more of a sacrifice. If you need to sacrifice a few to be able to "win" this war whatever that means I guess a few Iraqis and Americans getting killed is no big deal.
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Betzee
[From Yahoo News AP}: The fact that al-Maliki apparently miscalculated the response casts doubt on his judgment and raises serious questions about his commitment to the U.S. goal of national reconciliation.
Despite the Mahdi Army's unsavory image, a number of key U.S. commanders and officials here have long maintained that it is a mistake to demonize the entire Sadrist movement, which enjoys a substantial following among millions of Iraqi Shiites.
It would be a mistake to assume that U.S. goals and al-Maliki's goals are fully aligned, said Middle East expert Jon Alterman.
"Our (the U.S.) preference is for many voices to be reflected in whatever Iraqi government emerges from five years of conflict," Alterman said. But, "al-Maliki is playing a long-term game for all the marbles."...
Power-sharing is a bedrock of democracy. In the absence of that Iraq's future prognosis for peace and stability are dim.
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Taka313
Superlib, Why am I surprised? Like I said, I thought you were smarter than those who think the world is completely black and white.
I noticed that you offered no rebuttal to show me where my comparison was incorrect.
Funny that, huh?
Taka
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mareo2
Sadr have support in Iran, if Iran think that the US is going to take him out of the picture and replace it with Maliki, is not impossible that they send weapons across the border again. Start a fight with millions of Shiites is not very wise move and something that only can benefits Al-Qaida. Is better that the Bush administration get rigth the priorities, the objective is stop violence, not start civil wars.
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Sarge
"Sadr is like the Iraqi Rosa Parks, standing up to an oppressive government that he did not vote for"
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
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SezWho2
SuperLib,
You are right that I do not have any problem with the result. The result follows quite naturally from the actions taken. I would as soon fault an apple for falling to the ground.
Loss of life, whether of al-Sadr's maverick militiamen at the hands of US soldiers or whether of US soldiers at the hands of the militiamen, is not the point at issue. The point at issue is whether or not people who consider their government to be unrepresentative and who consider themselves to be patriots should give up their weapons.
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DanManjt
Sez Who
al-Sadr is not a patriot in any meaningfull way that Jefferson was a leading patriot. This is so in for two simple reasons:
And they certainly do not see their rivals, their enemies, and those of different ethic and/or religious groups as equal members of a polity or civil society (in the technical use of the term.)
No, the Russian patriotism demand obediance, servitude and demagogery.
BTW You can simply call me DanMan.
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outhousejt
I think Americans are the least qualified people to say who is a patriot and who isnt. US is directly responsible for ruining this country first by a crippling embargo then a bloddy invasion.
The whole insurgery can also been seen as resistance towards foreign occupation. Just as the various resistance resited towards the Nazi occupation.
As long as US is in Iraq there will be no peace.
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Betzee
Hi Dan! I wanted to respond to your conception of the role of religion in society (made on an earlier thread). Your ideas seemed more akin to views drawn from the French Enlightenment, e.g., religion is an impediment to modernity and therefore must be kept out of public life. (Exemplified by state-sponsored secularism in Turkey.)
As Americans, by contrast, we view it through the prism of individual rights and most conflicts, including the one at Harvard which you wrote on, involve balancing the rights of believers and non-believers.
The problem with bringing this perspective to Iraq is that there are no non-believers, rather two schools of belief that have difficulty coexisting as equals. We've always viewed the violence as springing from the ancient Sunni-Shia divide and ignored the class aspects of what is going on. Now that we see Shia and Shia violence it may be time to move away from the religion paradigm.
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SezWho2
DanMan,
I think that Jefferson was a patriot after the fact. If Iraq is a failed state, the US was a non-state. However, those people that we now call patriots did not have a common vision of the state they wanted to create.
The rebels of 1776 did manage to create a common vision without civil war--which has not been the case in Iraq. Nevertheless, the presence of restive factions in Iraq does not mean that the individual leaders have no sense of patriotism. It only means that they cannot agree on what being a patriot means.
Al-Sadr has a vision that is different than al-Maliki's and different still than that of many of the Sunnis or Kurds. Asking al-Sadr to have his militiamen surrender their arms at this time makes no sense. And it makes no sense precisely because it is the presence of those weapons which may make it possible for al-Sadr--whether he uses the weapons or not--to achieve his political objectives.
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SuperLib
"I noticed that you offered no rebuttal to show me where my comparison was incorrect."
There's incorrect and there's inappropriate. I mean one could argue that Sadr is like Martin Luther King in the way he inspires passion from his followers. And an unwaivering focus on the end goal could be a good way to say that Bush is just like Ghandi. Your "one could argue" and "prove I'm wrong" and "one could say" form of comparison is like putting lipstick on a pig.
But I'm sure having a lot of fun with it. One might say I'm like the Dave Barry of Japan Today. Prove I'm wrong.
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Taka313
Well this is rich, superlib.
Who was the first person to make the "inappropriate" comparison between al Sadr and Thomas Jefferson.
Well, I'll be darned. it was YOU.
Amazing.
Taka
0
DanManjt
Hello Betzee.
Sorry for the delay. In response to your post::
I do not view religion as an impediment to modernity. I think Jefferson got it right when he famously wrote on behalf of the Danbury Baptist association:
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man & his god, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state
The question is how best to maintain the wall of separation between church and state, to, yes, preserve individual Liberty and a free republic. Robespierre was a monster like Torquemada; Communist tyranny as odious to democratic sentiments as the Inquisition. I believe we Americans have largely found a wholesome and productive balance between the secularism of the state and the religiosity of the society. We have taken religion out of the state, but not gone down the fools road of taking religion out of politics.
All this directly relates to our discussion of Iraq (the matter at hand): the problem is not only when the degree of ethno-religious division threatens the governability of land. Most nations struggle with such diversity. The problem is further compounded by the inability to ameliorate those divisions through power sharing in and through politics ( i.e a representative republic). In a country lacking power sharing institutions, power comes through the barrel of a gun.
And that is why a fellow like Saddam Hussein ran the place. His reign of terror was a natural, organic outgrowth of Iraq.
And Bush him. And put nothing in his place.
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DanManjt
woops
And Bush removed him. And put nothing in his place.
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DanManjt
SezWho
Many Americans may have been patriots (and traitors in the case of Torries who repatriated to Canada) after the fact. But not men like Jefferson, Franklin, Adams, Henry and women like Dolly Madison. They identified the emerging American identity, and, critically, understood the necessity of articulating that identity and the justness of their cause. That is why we have the Declaration, which begins:
when in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
To compare the American revolutionaries with Iraqi power-brokers is misleading to a point beyond meaninglessness.
Its dangerous.
It supposes a commonality between our two nation's which simply does not exist. And this false presumption of the Iraqi yearning to be free in the way that we Americans concieve of freedom has and will only continue to lead to failed policies.
The rankling against a foreign occupier does not make one a patriot. The desire to replace the foreign rule over your brother with your rule does not make you patriot.
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DanManjt
woops
The desire to replace the foreign rule over your brother with your rule over your brother does not make you patriot.
It makes you a tyrant.
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