Word: clericalization
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...Free Elections for Iraq Your article "Dealing with the Cleric" reported on the objections of Iraq's Grand Ayatullah Ali Husaini Sistani to the U.S. plan to turn over control of Iraq by June 30 to a transitional government chosen by a caucus system rather than by direct elections [Feb. 2]. One thing seems clear: President George W. Bush started a war that has claimed hundreds of American lives, and now he wants to have a nice, friendly handover of governance just in time for the U.S. presidential election. Meanwhile, the Iraqis lose out on having a true democracy, something...
...plan - even the IGC has now reneged on its support for the procedure - has left it dead in the water. Discussion is currently under way over an alternative, possibly expanding the IGC to include political actors with significant support that are currently outside of it, such as the firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. The IGC is reportedly also considering the option of a new provisional government being appointed by a national gathering of stakeholders, convened not under the auspices of the U.S. or the IGC, but rather by the UN or the Arab League. Washington's tutelage of Iraq...
...that the country's squabbling factions could accept. A U.N. team arrived in Iraq last week to evaluate the coalition's plans for transition and assess the feasibility of holding broad-based elections before the June 30 deadline. The elections have been demanded by Iraq's top Shi'ite cleric, Grand Ayatullah Ali Husaini Sistani, but are resisted by U.S. officials, who say a general vote cannot be held safely. The intrigue deepened last Thursday when Sistani's bodyguards said the cleric had escaped an assassination attempt outside his home in Najaf. Sistani aides later told U.S. military officials that...
Sistani's background, however, suggests he prefers a different course. Born in Iran to a family of clerics, Sistani started memorizing the Koran at age 5, according to his official biography. In the early 1950s, he moved to the Iraqi city of Najaf, the site of one of the holiest shrines in Shi'ism. He later became a student of Grand Ayatullah Abul Khoei, who would turn out to be Iraq's leading cleric. As Saddam ruthlessly suppressed clerical activism, Khoei advocated "quietism," the belief that the clergy should mainly serve spiritual and social needs, and not focus on matters...
Sistani does have detractors among Shi'ites who argue that as an Iranian, he does not represent Iraqis. Some characterize his quietist approach as cowardly. Chief among Sistani's rivals is outspoken cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who has built a following among poor, urban Shi'ites by calling on them to resist the U.S. occupation...