Word: als
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...Still, tough as his posture may have been on the crux of the deal - his insistence on a firm 2011 date for the withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Iraq, rather than Washington's preferred hazy "time horizon" - al-Maliki's position may not be as solid as it sounds. The 2011 date is "not a 100% time limit," Hammoud says. "It could be changed in the future according to the situation in Iraq," he says, adding that a joint U.S.-Iraqi committee will meet in 2011. "At that time, the government has the right to ask the Americans...
...clever," Hammoud says of al-Maliki. "He is thinking in a realistic way: without the agreement of everybody, the deal is not acceptable...
...Iraqi government acknowledges that its still fragile security forces are not yet capable of providing security and protecting the country's borders without U.S. help. Such successes as al-Maliki's forces have recorded against al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia in Basra and Baghdad have been achieved with support from the U.S. military - and also through political agreements with al-Sadr. Still, the show of force helped extend the predominantly Shi'ite government's control into the south and burnished al-Maliki's image as a strongman and a nationalist, rather than a Shi'ite politician beholden...
...Despite his apparent confidence in his own power, however, al-Maliki has been looking increasingly isolated on the domestic political scene in recent weeks, upsetting friends and foes alike. He has antagonized his Kurdish allies in the ruling coalition by threatening to march Iraqi security forces into Khanaqin, an ethnically mixed town just outside the autonomous region of Kurdistan, currently controlled by Kurdish Peshmerga forces. The Sunni Awakening leaders who played a key role in tamping down al-Qaeda are also growing increasingly wary of what they fear are al-Maliki's plans to sideline them, raising the specter...
...standing up to Washington and annoying key constituencies in Baghdad, what's the source of al-Maliki's confidence? Who has his back? "I would like to know that as well," says Abdul-Karim Samerrai, a Sunni MP who is the deputy chairman of parliament's defense and security committee and a member of the opposition Tawafuk bloc. "A number of hot issues remain that can come to the boil at any time. Al-Qaeda is still here; the Sahwa [Awakening] issue; there are many wanted militia leaders who remain at large...