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IRAQ: Shias Rise to Split Power
By Ferry Biedermann
BAGHDAD, May 9 (IPS) - The Shia majority in Iraq has been flexing its muscles
since the fall of the Saddam Hussein regime and the arrival of the U.S. forces.
Their militias now keep the order at many hospitals and other institutions around
Baghdad. But the leadership remains divided.
The Shias were the only group organised enough to jump into the power
vacuum post-Saddam. In Thawra, formerly Saddam City, Shia clerics almost
immediately organised their followers into militias. They were far more efficient
than the tribal leaders, once touted as the possible backbone of a new order in
Iraq.
But the Shia role in guarding the hospitals also brings to light the new
difficulties in Iraqi society. Doctors at the Al Rashad mental hospital, not far from
Thawra, complain that the guards are interfering with the running of the hospital.
Shia guards are said to be prescribing drugs for treatment. The guards say
they are trying to counter illegal trading in drugs. There have been problems
also with treatment of female patients.
The strongly anti-Western Shia cleric at the head of the militia guarding Al
Rashad hospital decided recently that all visitors need his permission to enter
the hospital. The director of the hospital cannot appeal against that decision.
The gap between the Shia guards and the staff is a sign of the distrust within
Iraqi society. The Shias claim that the hospitals cannot function without them.
They say staff who object are the Baath party faithful.
The show of Shia muscle has made many Sunni Muslims in Baghdad
uncomfortable. They see the militias as tools of the clerics in making Iraq a
fundamentalist state, and they say the Shias of Thawra were the biggest looters
themselves.
The greatest Sunni fear is that the Shias will turn Iraq into a second Iran - a
fundamentalist Islamic republic ruled by the clergy. They are willing to turn to
anyone to stop this. Some look to the U.S., and the religious among them to
Saudi Arabia and its virulently anti-Shia brand of fundamentalist Islam.
Both Shia and Sunni leaders speak of the "unity of Islam" but the slogan itself
has become confirmation of deep divisions and of mutual suspicion.
The assertion of Shia power in Iraq was no surprise. The Shias suffered more
than others under Saddam Hussein's regime. Now that the dictator is gone, they
are determined that they will never again be dominated by any other group.
The Shia community itself is deeply divided. The holy city Najjaf is a whirlpool
of competing factions, most of them anti-U.S., though some are willing to
cooperate with the new power brokers for now.
Many of the leading Shia clerics are more virulently anti-U.S. than their
followers. Most common Shias across Iraq are glad the U.S. liberated them form
Saddam Hussein. Many say they want the U.S. to stay and finish the job, hunt
for the remnants of the regime, stabilise the country and only then leave.
The likely participation of the Iran-based SCIRI (Supreme Council for the
Islamic Revolution in Iraq) in the U.S.-supervised Iraqi transitional council is
significant in that context. Its leader Mohammed Baqir Al-Hakim returns this
weekend to Iraq from his decades-long exile in Iran.
There can be little doubt about the SCIRI's pro-Iranian bent. Iran was a haven
for the group while Saddam Hussein was in power. But their decision to come
on board, and the U.S. decision to invite them in may point to a larger degree of
U.S.-Iranian convergence of interests in Iraq than was previously thought.
The SCIRI is by no means the only Shia political movement, and it may not
even be the biggest. The Dawa party has a much longer presence within Iraq,
and its support base among the Shias is said to be vast.
The U.S. often ignores Dawa. The party has not attended the recent meeting of
opposition groups, nor has it been asked to join the interim council. Dawa
members in Iraq sound moderate in their opposition to the U.S. but its leaders
who have come from abroad are known to be more militant.
For the moment many Shias seem to fear a Sunni resurgence more than a
temporary U.S. presence. If the U.S. manages to keep the pro-Iranian element
among the Shias on board, it may contain resistance to its administration of Iraq.
(END/2003)
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