Word: moqtada
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Sunday's deal was more notable for who wasn't involved than who was. The agreement didn't include representatives from the bloc loyal to Shi'ite politician and militia chieftain Moqtada al-Sadr. A senior Western diplomat earlier this month praised Maliki for distancing himself from Sadr, widely viewed as the Shi'ite leader most responsible for sectarian violence, but American officials are well aware that Sadr and his followers cannot simply be marginalized...
...break and after delivery of a situation report by U.S. General David Petraeus, expected in September. Speculation is rife that Britain is heading as fast as possible for the exit. "The British have given up and they know they will be leaving Iraq soon," the radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr told the British daily The Independent, on Aug. 20. His gleeful tone contrasted with the increasingly irritable mood music in Washington. A British pullout "will be ugly and embarrassing." That was Stephen Biddle, a senior fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations and military adviser to President Bush...
...wildest of wild cards is Moqtada al-Sadr. The firebrand Shi'ite cleric has no interest in holding office himself - he regards himself as being above politics - but he is the country's most powerful player, and will likely have a major say in who gets Maliki's job. None of the 30 members of parliament from Sadr's bloc seems to be of prime ministerial caliber, but then, neither did Maliki...
Wednesday's raid in Sadr City targeting a so-called "secret cell" of Moqtada Sadr's Mahdi Army was a reminder that even as they press their campaign against al-Qaeda aligned Sunni militants, U.S. forces are ramping up operations against what they see as a more serious long-term threat: Shi'ite militias supported by Iran. The attack killed, by the U.S. military's count, 30 men allegedly involved in receiving weapons and training from Iran. Attacks of that scale in the militia's stronghold are not unheard of, but they are rare. Since the two sides declared...
...last week after Maliki failed to take any visible steps to address the faction's longstanding concerns, which revolve mainly around the fate of Sunni detainees held by the government and a lack of services in Sunni areas of the country. In the spring, six other ministers loyal to Moqtada al-Sadr abandoned Maliki's government in protest over the Prime Minister's refusal to take a stronger stance against the presence of American forces in Iraq...