Word: sistani
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...government, thus far, to address Iraqis' overriding concern with security. The strong favorite according to most analysts is the United Iraq Alliance, a group led by Shiite religious parties (although including a wide range of mostly Shiite independents) grouped together at the behest of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, and campaigning with his tacit support. To counter its chief rival's use of TV, the UIA looks to rely on grassroots organization around the mosques, and on endorsement by the clergy - and given the fact of Iraq's Shiite majority, whose relative weight will be amplified by the anticipated widespread Sunni...
...wild card in the pack is radical Shiite populist Moqtada al-Sadr, whose organization has mass support among urban Shiite youth in Baghdad. Sadr, who has twice tangled with U.S. forces in epic confrontations, has hedged his bets, with some of his known supporters joining the UIA list under Sistani's auspices, while other spokesmen for his movement have publicly questioned the legitimacy of the election. Sadr appears to be hedging his bets, retaining a foothold in Sistani's alliance at the same time as positioning himself to capitalize on any Shiite unhappiness at the outcome...
...look at the likely winners. The largest political group running in the election, the United Iraqi Alliance (U.I.A.), is a grab bag of parties that have little in common apart from a desire for power and a deep-seated distrust of U.S. motives. Backed by Grand Ayatullah Ali Husaini Sistani, the supreme religious leader of Iraq's Shi'ite majority, the U.I.A. includes the country's strongest Shi'ite parties, among them the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (S.C.I.R.I.) and the Dawa Party, which have close links to Iran. It also includes such wild cards as former Pentagon...
Speculation in the Iraqi media centers on three candidates, all considered religious moderates: the Dawa Party's Ibrahim al-Jaffari, S.C.I.R.I.'s Adil Abd al-Mahdi and Sistani prot??g?? Hussein Shahristani. Whoever gets the nod, Washington will find itself having to deal with a group that has no natural affinity with the U.S. "These are all people who have one reason or another to dislike America," says pollster Sadoun al-Dulame, executive director of the Iraq Center for Research and Strategic Studies. "If George Bush has to do business with these people, well, good luck...
...produce fears of an Iranian-style Shi'ite theocracy taking root in Baghdad. But Iraqi Shi'ite leaders have sought to allay those concerns by emphasizing that they will not press for velayat-e-faqih, or rule by the clergy, which is dreaded by Sunnis and secular Shi'ites. Sistani's group is mindful that the constitution can be scuttled if any three of Iraq's 18 provinces vote against it. Sunnis dominate four. One solution favored by Shi'ite leaders is to include prominent Sunni legal experts on the committee that will write the draft constitution. "The important thing...