Word: sadr
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...three-week battle looks set to end with a mass march by Iraqi Shiites to "save the (Imam Ali) Mosque" is a telling indicator of how the siege changed Iraq's power equation. Sistani has demanded that the U.S. and Iraqi forces withdraw from around the mosque and that Sadr's gunmen leave before he'll enter. The U.S. and the interim government of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi may have no option but to comply, because alienating Sistani, the most influential cleric in Iraq, would be political suicide. Getting Sadr's fighters out of the mosque would, of course, accomplish...
...More importantly, Sadr has called on his own supporters - most of whom hail not from Najaf, but from the urban Shiite neighborhoods of Baghdad, Basra and the cities in between - to answer Sistani's call and make for Najaf. Ever alert to the political opportunity, Moqtada Sadr appears intent on making sure he emerges from the siege looking not only victorious, but also in lockstep with Sistani and the Shiite clerical mainstream...
...defeated militarily. Reports from the frontline leave no doubt that U.S. and Iraqi forces were closing in on the shrine, while many Sadrist fighters had already fled. But their "defense" of the most revered of Shiite shrines under fire from a widely loathed "infidel" army has further enhanced Moqtada Sadr's already considerable political standing among Iraqi Shiites - a fact that has led the interim government to stress that even after three weeks of violent defiance, it wants to draw Sadr into the political process, for the simple reason that he's too dangerous to them outside. Indeed, the government...
Last week reporter Phillip Robertson was one of the first Western journalists to make it into Najaf during heavy fighting between the insurgent forces of Moqtada Sadr and the U.S. Here is the account of his trip...
...concrete. The bullets made cracking sounds when they hit the wall. After a pause in the firing a group of Mahdi fighters in a nearby alley told us to come closer and take cover with them. From that street corner, it was a five minute walk to Moqtada Sadr's office and the center of Najaf. Half a dozen Mahdi Army fighters walked with us. Long rows of armed young men we passed held their weapons in the air and sang victory songs. They stayed out of the street to avoid U.S. snipers, but they were relaxed and never trained...