Iraq awaits Sadr’s next move

December 11, 2007 8:06 am henrymunsonjr Mahdi Army
Jamie Gumbrecht,  Iraq awaits a fiery Shiite cleric’s next move, McClatchy Washington Bureau | 12/09/2007

BAGHDAD — After Friday prayers in Sadr City, 300 women in black shuffled slowly, quietly down a narrow street toward a billboard-sized photo of Muqtada al Sadr, the fiery young leader of their Shiite Muslim movement. Holding banners and flags, the women protested the U.S. presence in Iraq and the detentions of hundreds of the radical cleric’s followers.

“Anything that comes from Sayed Muqtada is good for us,” said Hannah al Rubaye, using the honorific title for descendents of the prophet Mohammed. “After this step, we expect other orders from Sayed Muqtada. Patience has limits.”

Sadr issued a heated anti-American statement last week, but he instructed his increasingly restless followers not to act. Their demonstration was organized without his orders, and their silence quickly gave way to agitated shouts.

Sadr himself has remained mostly silent since his 60,000-member Mahdi Army militia began a ceasefire three months ago. Sectarian violence and attacks on U.S. forces have dropped as a result, buttressing the case for the withdrawal of some U.S. troops from Iraq and encouraging some to believe that Iraq has had enough of killing.

Now Iraqis and Americans alike are awaiting Sadr’s next move, which could alter both his hold on his own followers and his relations with rival Iraqi leaders and, above all, help to determine whether Iraq is seeing the ebbing of a violent storm or merely the eye of it.

With the U.S. recruiting and arming opposing Sunni volunteer groups, Sadr’s passivity risks alienating his restive followers, the poor and underserved Shiites whose loyalty he inherited from his father, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Mohammed Sadeq al Sadr.

Nevertheless, said Hazem al Araji, an aide to Sadr, the Mahdi Army ceasefire is likely to extend beyond the planned six months. While this would please U.S. commanders and many Iraqis, it would bolster Sadr only if his followers agree that they’re likely to gain more by keeping their weapons in their closets than they are by pulling them out again.

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