Word: clerics
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...station and ordered the crowd to disperse. Shortly after?in what proved to be the military's last attempt at a peaceful solution before taking action?one of Narathiwat's most senior Islamic figures, Abdulrazak Ali, arrived to mediate. "They wouldn't listen to me," says Abdulrazak, a cleric. "There were a few radicals among the protesters, controlling the minds of everyone else." Deputy police commander Vuttichai Hanhaboon, a Buddhist who has spent 10 years in the south, watched the events unfold from his perch on the second-floor balcony of the station. "I looked down on the crowd...
Hidden Hand Shi'ite cleric Sistani is the most powerful man in Iraq. Can he help bring democracy to the country...
Sistani proved his authority in August, when Najaf had sunk into chaos. As the fighting began, he abruptly quit the city to seek medical treatment abroad. The rumors started: Sistani was dying; Sistani was afraid; Sistani was losing influence to Muqtada al-Sadr, the brash young cleric whose militiamen were battling U.S. troops to a standstill. But on Aug. 26, as the Americans were on the verge of assaulting one of Iraq's most sacred Shi'ite shrines, Sistani showed he was still the Man. Straight from medical treatment for a heart condition in London, he was driven into Najaf...
...with a power vacuum at the top. The Shi'ite masses naturally looked to Sistani for direction, says Shahristani, and the ayatullah felt compelled by religious duty to step in. "He believes at a crisis time like this, the marja must guide the people," says al-Qurayshi. So the cleric who had shied away from politics all his life began to issue fatwas of profound political importance...
...also encouraged the curious alliance of the religious al-Sadr and the secular Ahmad Chalabi, former U.S. favorite, who see in each other a way to trump Sistani's power. The ayatullah is agitating for changes that would give Islamic parties aligned with him a higher profile. While the cleric has not tried to negotiate the specifics, observers say that is as far into the grit of politics as he has ventured. He has to show Shi'ites that the election can benefit them, says Katzman. If it doesn't, he risks a damaging loss of legitimacy among ordinary...