MUST READ: IRAQI SHI'ITE FACTIONALISM & IRAN'S ROLE IN THE BASRA FIGHTING

Iraqi Shiite Factionalism and Iran’s Role in the Basra Fighting
By Reidar Visser

One week after the upsurge of violence in Basra, questions about the motives and implications of the fighting still linger. The issue of Iran’s involvement remains especially obscure. A recurrent explanation suggests that the operations were an attempt by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC) leader Abd al-Aziz al-Hakim to weaken the followers of fellow Shiite leader Moqtada al-Sadr ahead of October’s provincial elections, and perhaps to also further Hakim’s scheme of a single Shiite federal entity, which many Sadrists have resisted. On the surface this seems plausible. This has clearly been a political operation and not a purely security-guided one: Many militia forces in Basra unaffiliated with the Sadrists were left untouched. Also, the Maliki-Hakim axis is the sole remnant of the United Iraqi Alliance; to them it would be prudent to stick together and guard against encroachments on their local power bases. As for the United States, as long as its policy remains tied to Hakim’s SIIC it perhaps makes sense to give the green light to operations against the Sadrists, even if the timing and the scale of the latest attacks may not have been of its own choosing.

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Pertinent Links:

1) Iraqi Shiite Factionalism and Iran’s Role in the Basra Fighting