The "Final Solution" to Moqtadar al-Sadr
The U.S. launched its advertised final offensive against the Mahdi Army militia of Moqtadar al-Sadr on Aug. 12, after a week of intense fighting between the radical Shi'ite cleric's militiamen and the occupation forces in the holy city of Najaf, as well as other Shi'ite cities where he has military strength: Amarah, Nasiriyeh, Kut, Basra, and Sadr City in Baghdad. The first sign of the offensive came when interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi issued an ultimatum for the al-Sadr militias to leave the city. "We think that those armed should leave the holy sites and the [Imam Ali Shrine compound] as well as leave their weapons and abide by the law," he said during a blitz visit there on Aug. 8. Although al-Sadr spokesmen had said they would be open to negotiate a ceasefire, Allawi was intransigent: "There is no negotiation with any militia that bears arms against Iraq and the Iraqi people."
On Aug. 10, the U.S. Army told Najaf residents to evacuate their homes. Speaking of the city's cemetery and the shrine of Imam Ali, one of Islam's holiest sites, the U.S. Marines announced over loudspeakers, "To all Najaf people, these areas will be closed military zones." To al-Sadr's militia, they said: "This is the last warning to all armored militias. This is the last chance for you to drop your weapons and leave Najaf peacefully or death will be your penalty."
Then on Aug. 12, U.S. Marine Maj. David Holahan, executive officer of the 1st Battalion, 4th Marines Regiment, announced: "Major operations to destroy the militia have begun." The declared intention was to force the militiamen to surrender, or kill them.
The actual assault proceeded as planned, with U.S. Marines encircling the Imam Ali shrine, and U.S. planes dropping bombs on the al-Sadr militiamen located in the city's historic cemetery. Attacks were launched simultaneously against suspected al-Sadr strongholds in Kut, where a neighborhood was bombed, leaving 75 dead and twice as many wounded, mainly civilians. And fighting escalated in the other centers of al-Sadr's forces. In Basra, the militiamen threatened that, were the siege of Najaf to continue, they would sabotage oil pipelines and the port, whence Iraqi oil is shipped abroad.
Just prior to the final assault, Ayatollah Al Husseini al-Sistani, the highest religious authority of the Shi'ites, left Najaf to fly to London for treatment of a heart ailment. Both the U.S. forces and the interim Iraqi government wanted the revered leader, noted for his moderating influence, to be out of the picture. Other leading Shi'ite figures of the Marja in Najaf feared al-Sistani's death, had he remained, and urged him to leave when he did. It was mooted that al-Sadr could have sought refuge in al-Sistani's residence, which would have set him up for killing.
Rather than be intimidated by the show of force, the resistance spread. Not only did other cities rise up against the occupation, but political figures from within Allawi's interim government began to jump ship. Masses demonstrated in Nasiriya calling for the ouster of Allawi, who has authorized the attacks, and they set fire to the local office of his political party. At the same time, the deputy governor of Najaf, Jawdat Kadam Najimal-Kuraishi, announced his resignation. On the day of the final assault, he declared: "I resign from my post denouncing all the U.S. terrorist operations that they are doing against this holy city."
Deputy president Ibrahim al-Jaafari had urged U.S. troops to leave the city to end the fighting. "I call for multinational forces to leave Najaf and for only Iraqi forces to remain there," Jaafari said in remarks broadcast on Al Jazeera television on Aug. 11. "Iraqi forces can administer Najaf to end this phenomenon of violence in this city that is holy to all Muslims." He also protested that any orders for offensive action against militants should have come from the Iraqi government, not the U.S. "I think that killing Iraqi citizens is not a civilized way of building the new Iraq, which is based on protecting people and promoting dialogue, not bullets," he told the BBC's "Newsnight" program. He also criticized Zorfi's call for the Shia fighters to leave Najaf, saying "I think decisions like this should have been taken centrally ... in Baghdad."
Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, head of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), a major power in the "new" Iraq, accused the U.S. of using excessive force, and "called for a new security strategy in which tribal leaders had a greater say." Fifty tribal leaders of Najaf had, in fact, met with Allawi on Aug. 8, during his quick visit to the city, and lobbied with him to give them, a traditional force in Iraqi society, a chance to mediate a solution to the conflict. Allawi refused any mediation, and maintained his position that there could be no room for negotiations with al-Sadr.
As for Moqtadar al-Sadr, he continued to fight and urge his followers to do the same. In response to Allawi's demand that the militia leave Najaf, al-Sadr told the press: "I will continue fighting. I will remain in Najaf city until the last drop of my blood has been spilled." Invoking the memory that his father and uncle were both martyred, Sadr told his troops: "Keep fighting even if you see me a prisoner or a martyr. God willing you will be victorious." He said he still wanted Iraq to remain united and thanked "those who tried to resolve the crisis peacefully." Calls by his spokesmen for negotiating a ceasefire fell on deaf ears.
As one leading strategic analyst, Dr. Toby Dodge, from the International Institute for Strategic Studies in Britain, commented to BBC, the actual military position of the United States is "unenviable," and the resistance is spreading. He listed the Sunni strongholds of Fallujah, Ramadi, and Samarra as all under the control of the resistance, whereas Mosul is contested. Regarding the Najaf offensive, which was supposed to establish an "example," Dodge noted: "Moqtada Sadr's main base of support is not the Shia holy cities, but instead the Baghdad suburb of al-Tharwa (Sadr City). This slum of up to 2 million people will become the battleground against Mr. Sadr and his Mahdi Army. U.S. forces have had great difficulty operating here, fighting in crowded and narrow streets, with a lack of local knowledge." Thus, he concluded, a "two-front revolt" will further deteriorate the situation, and Mr. Allawi "will become little more than the mayor of Baghdad."
If one adds that the southern cities of Basra, Amarah, Nasiriya, and Kut are increasingly under the al-Sadr forces' control, it is a bleak picture for an occupying army.
In addition, the polarization of the southern cities dominated by pro-al-Sadr elements, against Baghdad—which is viewed as totally under U.S. occupation control—has led to alarming developments. It was reported in the Arabic press that the deputy governor of Basra, Salem al-Maliki, himself an al-Sadr representative, ordered the closure of the Southern Oil Company, which effectively shut down production. Furthermore, he reportedly called on fellow Shi'ites in Kut, to join with Basra, Amarah, and Nasiriyeh, in an "autonomous" southern region, independent of Baghdad. Were this to materialize, it could constitute the first step towards disintegration of Iraq as a nation.
The U.S. launched its advertised final offensive against the Mahdi Army militia of Moqtadar al-Sadr on Aug. 12, after a week of intense fighting between the radical Shi'ite cleric's militiamen and the occupation forces in the holy city of Najaf, as well as other Shi'ite cities where he has military strength: Amarah, Nasiriyeh, Kut, Basra, and Sadr City in Baghdad. The first sign of the offensive came when interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi issued an ultimatum for the al-Sadr militias to leave the city. "We think that those armed should leave the holy sites and the [Imam Ali Shrine compound] as well as leave their weapons and abide by the law," he said during a blitz visit there on Aug. 8. Although al-Sadr spokesmen had said they would be open to negotiate a ceasefire, Allawi was intransigent: "There is no negotiation with any militia that bears arms against Iraq and the Iraqi people."
On Aug. 10, the U.S. Army told Najaf residents to evacuate their homes. Speaking of the city's cemetery and the shrine of Imam Ali, one of Islam's holiest sites, the U.S. Marines announced over loudspeakers, "To all Najaf people, these areas will be closed military zones." To al-Sadr's militia, they said: "This is the last warning to all armored militias. This is the last chance for you to drop your weapons and leave Najaf peacefully or death will be your penalty."
Then on Aug. 12, U.S. Marine Maj. David Holahan, executive officer of the 1st Battalion, 4th Marines Regiment, announced: "Major operations to destroy the militia have begun." The declared intention was to force the militiamen to surrender, or kill them.
The actual assault proceeded as planned, with U.S. Marines encircling the Imam Ali shrine, and U.S. planes dropping bombs on the al-Sadr militiamen located in the city's historic cemetery. Attacks were launched simultaneously against suspected al-Sadr strongholds in Kut, where a neighborhood was bombed, leaving 75 dead and twice as many wounded, mainly civilians. And fighting escalated in the other centers of al-Sadr's forces. In Basra, the militiamen threatened that, were the siege of Najaf to continue, they would sabotage oil pipelines and the port, whence Iraqi oil is shipped abroad.
Just prior to the final assault, Ayatollah Al Husseini al-Sistani, the highest religious authority of the Shi'ites, left Najaf to fly to London for treatment of a heart ailment. Both the U.S. forces and the interim Iraqi government wanted the revered leader, noted for his moderating influence, to be out of the picture. Other leading Shi'ite figures of the Marja in Najaf feared al-Sistani's death, had he remained, and urged him to leave when he did. It was mooted that al-Sadr could have sought refuge in al-Sistani's residence, which would have set him up for killing.
Rather than be intimidated by the show of force, the resistance spread. Not only did other cities rise up against the occupation, but political figures from within Allawi's interim government began to jump ship. Masses demonstrated in Nasiriya calling for the ouster of Allawi, who has authorized the attacks, and they set fire to the local office of his political party. At the same time, the deputy governor of Najaf, Jawdat Kadam Najimal-Kuraishi, announced his resignation. On the day of the final assault, he declared: "I resign from my post denouncing all the U.S. terrorist operations that they are doing against this holy city."
Deputy president Ibrahim al-Jaafari had urged U.S. troops to leave the city to end the fighting. "I call for multinational forces to leave Najaf and for only Iraqi forces to remain there," Jaafari said in remarks broadcast on Al Jazeera television on Aug. 11. "Iraqi forces can administer Najaf to end this phenomenon of violence in this city that is holy to all Muslims." He also protested that any orders for offensive action against militants should have come from the Iraqi government, not the U.S. "I think that killing Iraqi citizens is not a civilized way of building the new Iraq, which is based on protecting people and promoting dialogue, not bullets," he told the BBC's "Newsnight" program. He also criticized Zorfi's call for the Shia fighters to leave Najaf, saying "I think decisions like this should have been taken centrally ... in Baghdad."
Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, head of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), a major power in the "new" Iraq, accused the U.S. of using excessive force, and "called for a new security strategy in which tribal leaders had a greater say." Fifty tribal leaders of Najaf had, in fact, met with Allawi on Aug. 8, during his quick visit to the city, and lobbied with him to give them, a traditional force in Iraqi society, a chance to mediate a solution to the conflict. Allawi refused any mediation, and maintained his position that there could be no room for negotiations with al-Sadr.
As for Moqtadar al-Sadr, he continued to fight and urge his followers to do the same. In response to Allawi's demand that the militia leave Najaf, al-Sadr told the press: "I will continue fighting. I will remain in Najaf city until the last drop of my blood has been spilled." Invoking the memory that his father and uncle were both martyred, Sadr told his troops: "Keep fighting even if you see me a prisoner or a martyr. God willing you will be victorious." He said he still wanted Iraq to remain united and thanked "those who tried to resolve the crisis peacefully." Calls by his spokesmen for negotiating a ceasefire fell on deaf ears.
As one leading strategic analyst, Dr. Toby Dodge, from the International Institute for Strategic Studies in Britain, commented to BBC, the actual military position of the United States is "unenviable," and the resistance is spreading. He listed the Sunni strongholds of Fallujah, Ramadi, and Samarra as all under the control of the resistance, whereas Mosul is contested. Regarding the Najaf offensive, which was supposed to establish an "example," Dodge noted: "Moqtada Sadr's main base of support is not the Shia holy cities, but instead the Baghdad suburb of al-Tharwa (Sadr City). This slum of up to 2 million people will become the battleground against Mr. Sadr and his Mahdi Army. U.S. forces have had great difficulty operating here, fighting in crowded and narrow streets, with a lack of local knowledge." Thus, he concluded, a "two-front revolt" will further deteriorate the situation, and Mr. Allawi "will become little more than the mayor of Baghdad."
If one adds that the southern cities of Basra, Amarah, Nasiriya, and Kut are increasingly under the al-Sadr forces' control, it is a bleak picture for an occupying army.
In addition, the polarization of the southern cities dominated by pro-al-Sadr elements, against Baghdad—which is viewed as totally under U.S. occupation control—has led to alarming developments. It was reported in the Arabic press that the deputy governor of Basra, Salem al-Maliki, himself an al-Sadr representative, ordered the closure of the Southern Oil Company, which effectively shut down production. Furthermore, he reportedly called on fellow Shi'ites in Kut, to join with Basra, Amarah, and Nasiriyeh, in an "autonomous" southern region, independent of Baghdad. Were this to materialize, it could constitute the first step towards disintegration of Iraq as a nation.