Word: sadr
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...being viewed in the light of the vicious crimes he committed against his people and his neighbors. Instead, it is being remembered by the sounds heard on the widely disseminated video of Saddam's final moments - Shi'ite partisans chanting sectarian slogans and praising the radical cleric Moqtada Sadr. Saddam's rule has relatively few defenders in Iraq and beyond, yet the serious flaws in his trial and execution gave many the impression of mob justice rather than the rule...
Capt. Erik Peterson knows fighters from the Mahdi Army militia of Moqtada al-Sadr are all around, even though he can't see them. Peterson and his men usually catch only glimpses of the Mahdi Army while on the streets of Ghazaliya, a sprawling neighborhood in western Baghdad where Shi'ite militants are pressing a campaign to drive out Sunnis. Acting on neighborhood tips, Peterson's men search suspected Mahdi Army safe houses, which often have a green ribbon hanging on the front door. Sometimes the signs are even more obvious. One house thought to be a Mahdi Army fighting...
...this for months, ever since the Mahdi Army began pushing westward across Baghdad in the spring with organized campaigns aimed at transforming Sunni neighborhoods into Shi'ite strongholds. But U.S. patience may be coming to an end in the wake of the execution of Saddam Hussein, whose passing left Sadr as the one visible face of opposition to American efforts in Iraq. A Pentagon report released in December described the Mahdi Army as the main threat to stability in Iraq. And the U.S. military upped the stakes with Sadr during a recent raid against the Mahdi Army in Najaf, where...
...fighting usually starts with an attack by the Mahdi Army. A bookish officer who grew up in northwest Indiana, Peterson has made a study of the Mahdi Army over the past several years. Shortly after the U.S. invasion, Peterson was a commander in a tank company that oversaw Sadr City, the Shi'ite slum on the east side of Baghdad the Mahdi Army calls home. Later Peterson spent time in Najaf, where U.S. forces and the Mahdi Army clashed openly in 2004 in battles many on both sides see as unfinished. Peterson says the Mahdi Army, as an organization...
...perceive the JAM to be like the Nazi Party," says Peterson, drawing parallels between Germany in the years before World War II and Iraq today. Peterson sees the political figures loyal to Sadr deftly taking advantage of weaknesses in a nascent parliamentary system. Meanwhile, henchmen exert power on the streets through terror that comes with a brand name and a famous face. "You did have the Gestapo in there," Peterson says of the Nazis. "And if I look at the JAM, that's what they got going on right...