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Explanations of the deadly bombing that took place in
Najaf, Iraq, on Friday, August 29, have varied. While some analysts hold the remnants of Saddam Hussein’s regime responsible for the bombing, others believe that
Al-Qaeda militants have infiltrated Iraq and carried out the blast. Others don’t rule out the possibility that the US occupation authorities in Iraq knew beforehand that such bombing had been planned.
Firas Al-Atraqchi, a Canadian journalist, analyzes the conflict between rival Shiite factions and relates it to the issue of the Najaf blast.
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A
bloodbath in the Garden of Eden would transform Iraq
into the bowels of Hell. |
The next few hours and days of Iraq’s post-war history will likely be the most precarious, the most pivotal, and the most pertinent in determining the course the war-ravaged nation is likely to follow.
On the one hand, Iraq is in a state of chaos, seemingly irreparable and desperate for an infusion of foreign investment, international funding and the enactment of security and judiciary measures. Iraqis and coalition troops die every day. Lawlessness is the rule of the day and economic depravity is rampant.
However, in the aftermath of the devastating bombing in
Najaf, which killed one of Shiite Islam’s most revered ayatollahs and 125 others, the above scenario is the rosy one.
Indeed, given the current utter chaos and confusion, Iraqis today lament the desperation of yesterday and are too terrified to even contemplate the alternative scenario: a sectarian bloodbath.
Every Iraqi I have spoken with in the past 15 months has alluded to the simmering discord between Iraq’s Shiite and Sunni Muslims and the fear that all semblance of unity and rapport between the two could erupt into a civil war.
While everyone suffered under Saddam’s regime, Iraqi Shiites perhaps suffered the most, with religious leaders imprisoned or assassinated, entire villages wiped out by the Republican Guard, and whole religious schools of thought forced to flee to Iran. Saddam’s treatment of the Shiite population seals the 1400-year grievances Shiites have had against the ruling minority; from the Caliphate to contemporary political arrangements.
When Ayatollah Baqer Al-Hakim fled Iraq some 20 years ago and set up office in Iran, he envisioned an Iraq without Saddam that would be analogous to the Islamic Republic which hosted him. He planned, organized and fermented the ideal of an Islamic state in Iraq. The creation of the 15,000-strong Badr Brigade was to assist in the realization of that ideal.
When Al-Hakim was approached by the CIA to join an amalgamation of Iraqi opposition groups, he was loathe to shake hands with the “Great Satan,” as Iranian spiritual leaders had come to call the US. However, Al-Hakim sensed that the US was serious this time. He joined other Shiite groups in tugging along with plans for an invasion, but with a little insurance policy thrown in for good measure. Iraqi Shiites were to realize their political aspirations in a post-Saddam climate – or else. The “or else” was a silent reminder to the US that Iraqi Shiites would no longer tolerate a Sunni strongman sanctioned and supported by
Washington. Many Iraqis around the world believe that Saddam was Washington’s point man who
had gone astray.
However, since entering
Iraq in early May, Al-Hakim modified his vision of an Islamic state. He preached tolerance of all faiths in
Iraq , moderation in an Iraqi civil society, and to the relief of Iraq ’s Sunni population, he urged unity among all Iraqis. This may have angered some in
Iran and others in Iraq who believed Iraqi Shiites should follow another course.
When CENTCOM and the US-led Civilian Authority in
Iraq failed to deliver on promises of security and economic re-stabilization, Al-Hakim sensed the pulse of the nation and preached against an occupation of
Iraq. However, and this is where Al-Hakim became a force of moderation and stability, he urged Iraqis to be patient. He did not urge a military uprising against the
Anglo-Americans. Not yet.
Mere minutes before his assassination in Najaf on Friday, Al-Hakim used the Friday prayers sermon to urge Iraqis to unite and resist outside pressures, pressures on the Iraqis to dissolve into factions and war with one another.
There is a precedent for his choice of words. Reports have been surfacing from numerous sources in
Iraq that a battle of wills was coming to a head among Iraq’s
Shiite factions. These included Iranian Shiite clerics, Iraqi Shiite clerics, and an Afghani Shiite cleric. All had various schools of thought and all approached the presence of coalition troops in
Iraq from different points of view.
The most notorious ideological battleground is the one fought by Al-Hakim, his family and supporters on one front and the fiery militancy of Muqtada Sadr and his supporters on the other.
The current spate of violence in Najaf may have been predicted when Shiite cleric Abdul Majid
Al-Khoei was brutally murdered in the Imam Ali Mosque in Najaf in
early April. Another Shiite cleric (who had been appointed by Saddam), Haider
Roafee, was also killed. Eyewitness accounts spoke of a barbarity so gruesome that few could stomach what happened:
Al-Khoei was shot, dragged into the streets, had his fingers and hands severed from his body while still alive, and then hacked to death by a savage crowd of some 200.
Last Friday, the same mosque was the scene of the horrific assassination bombing. Eyewitnesses said there was nothing left of Al-Hakim’s body.
Many in
Iraq believed that Al-Khoei was killed because his moderate views and tolerance of the coalition were in stark contrast to a more militant, yet homegrown Shiite faction. Most suspected
Sadr, or someone allied with his ideologies, but the matter was quickly buried.
As the world focused on the number of coalition deaths in Iraq and the bombings on the Jordanian embassy and UN Headquarters, a quiet war was being fought between rival Shiite factions.
Friday’s assassination may have been the first sign of an escalation.
Official Iraqi and coalition sources quickly pointed the finger of blame on Saddam or
Al-Qaeda or an alliance of convenience between both. Within 12 hours of the Najaf attack, Iraqi police announced that it had caught two Iraqis and two Saudis who had admitted ties to
Al-Qaeda. A few hours later, Iraqi police announced that it had caught some 19 further suspects, all believed to be Sunni Wahabists and
Al-Qaeda enthusiasts.
Suspicious and doubtful, say Iraqis. They question is how an unarmed, poorly equipped and under-resourced Iraqi police force (not even a force at all) could apprehend so many suspects so fast, when it has been almost incapacitated in dealing with petty car thieves and looters.
Reading between the lines, and monitoring the “mood” of reports from Arab news services, one senses that there is an effort in Iraq to quickly find someone to blame and move on. Focusing on the Wahabist suspects (said to be Palestinian, Iraqi, Kuwaiti, Pakistani, and Saudi Arabian) may, repeat, may be an attempt to move the public rage away from the obvious, yet unnamed primary suspect – a rival Shiite faction.
Explanations that no Muslim or Shiite would dare attack another Shiite can be quickly dismissed – the killing of
Al-Khoei is proof enough that morality is discarded when it comes to socio-political aspirations.
There are several undercurrents playing themselves out on the Iraqi stage and I would wager a crack at explaining a few of them. On the one hand, the rivalries between Shiite clerics for domination of Shiite ideology in
Iraq can very easily explode into all out war. Local Iraqi women’s groups and other human rights organizations have reported that members of rival Shiite factions have been harassed and attacked in acts of ideological retribution.
This is nightmare scenario number one: Iraq Shiites butchering one another in battles that would reach a new level of ferociousness and zeal.
The second nightmare scenario pivots around the “rivers of blood” theme; Iraqis have always admitted that in a post-Saddam environment an Iraqi civil war would erupt, pitting virtually everyone against everyone else and giving rise to rivers of blood that would run knee-high in Iraqi streets. This scenario is particularly based on open conflict between Sunnis and Shiites, an Islamic holocaust that would not end until millions are dead. No international force could stop the rage, barbarity, callousness, and inhumanity that would result if this sectarian monster were to be unleashed.
The Bush administration is only now beginning to realize that
Iraq will bleed Iraqis and Americans indefinitely. The land where history and culture began can not be brought into stability so easily. Consequently, the
US is trying to push the likelihood of Al-Qaeda complicity in the Najaf bombing so as to divert attention from any further sectarian suspicions.
It seems clear that both Iraqi Sunnis and Shiites are trying to avert a bloodbath by urging calmer minds to prevail.
This is precisely why the next few hours and days will determine whether
Iraq will plunge into a cataclysm of violence or chug along in the status quo.
A bloodbath in the Garden of Eden will transform
Iraq into the bowels of Hell.
(At press time, two men hurled grenades in a packed cinema in the northern Iraqi city of
Mosul, a Sunni stronghold. Iraqi police reported six dead.)
Firas
Al-Atraqchi is a Canadian journalist of Iraqi heritage. Holding
an MA in Journalism and Mass Communication, he has eleven years
of experience covering Middle East
issues, oil and gas markets, and the telecom industry.
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