August 19, 2004
Imagine if Najaf was Vatican City
This is not the Imam Ali mosque. It is another building in the holy city of Najaf, where American troops were seldom allowed to go and have not bombed, until now.
Pretend the Pope is out of town for surgery in London, and the Americans are assauting Saint Peter's Cathedral while he is gone, to attack IRA radicals holed up there. If you were a Catholic, you might understand how the Shia feel today.
Needless to say, this will not help Allawi gain legitimacy among Iraqis.
The Ultimate Stupidity, The Attack on Najaf
By GARY LEUPP"Oppose the oppressor and support the oppressed."
-Imam Ali, Last Will and Testament (39 AH; 661 CE)
I have been thinking for months that if those commanding U.S. forces in Iraq really wanted to perform the ultimate stupidity, and ratchet up exponentially the degree of hatred they face in Iraq and throughout the Muslim world---then they’d surely attack the Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf, or be drawn into a situation where they’d damage it. This is the most important Shiite site in the world, and is holy not only to Shiites (about 120 million people) but also to all the billion-plus Muslims on the planet. It sits atop the tomb of Ali, cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet, fourth caliph ("successor" of Muhammed and political and religious leader of the expanding Muslim world), assassinated by opponents in 661. Ali’s partisans supported his son Hussein as next caliph, but Umayyad foes defeated Hussein and 72 followers in battle at Karbala in 680, their martyrdoms producing the enduring division between Sunni and Shia Islam.
Hussein is entombed, not with his father, but in Karbala. But according to Shiite tradition, an even more remarkable figure rests under the golden dome of the Ali Shrine: Adam, the first man. A son of Noah, who refused to enter the ark, died in Najaf, and here the patriarch Abraham and his son Isaac once bought a parcel of land now called the Valley of Peace. This is the sprawling Wadi al-Salaam cemetery (the world’s largest) that adjoins the shrine. Pilgrimage to Najaf will supposedly bring 70,000 Muslims immediate entry into Paradise. Najaf was home to Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini for twelve years. It was a target of Saddam Hussein during the Shiite rebellion after the 1991 Gulf War, in which the first President Bush encouraged the Shiites to rise up, only to abandon them ignominiously. (In that episode the shrine was looted and bombed, although soon repaired by the Baathist regime.) Ayatollah Mohammad Sadiq al-Sadr, Muqtada al-Sadr’s father, was assassinated here in 1999. In short, Najaf is a hub of mythology, tradition, and historical memories of injustice, resistance and martyrdom that inevitably affect its significance as a military target. Especially when Shiite resistance fighters take refuge there, and use it as a base of operations against unwelcome infidel troops.
Shiites constitute about 10% of the world’s Muslims, and are the majority population in Iran (93%) and Azerbaijan (61%). They comprise large communities in India and Pakistan (over 50 million total), but are the majority in only two Arab nations, tiny Bahrain (65%) and Iraq (60%). In Iraqi Shiism, the Arab and Indo-Iranian worlds intersect, and by chance the holiest site of Shiism is located in a proud Arab country, next door to the Shiite powerhouse of Iran, and now surrounded by foreign invaders. The latter, under fire from the general population, come to hate, fear and disparage the Iraqis and, regardless of the orders they receive from their officers, cannot be expected to treat Muslim sites with sensitivity and deference.
'Final call' issued for militia to leave mosque
Meanwhile, sounds of intense fighting erupted Thursday outside the mosque.CNN's Kianne Sadeq, who is inside the compound with other journalists at the invitation of al-Sadr's Mehdi militia, reported persistent sounds of mortars, gunfire and many explosions, and devastation to the streets, homes and businesses around the mosque compound.
Two of the mosque's minarets have been damaged in recent fighting, and al-Sadr loyalists said a clock in one of the towers caught fire, Sadeq reported. The mosque is one of the holiest shrines in Shiite Islam.
"Everything outside of the mosque seems to be totaled," Sadeq said.
Ailing Sistani plans quick return from UK
LONDON: Iraq's most influential Shi'ite cleric, Ayatollah Ali Al Sistani, who is undergoing medical treatment in London, is worried about violence in Najaf and wants to return as soon as he can, his spokesman said yesterday.Sistani's health could prove crucial to Iraq's stability. He stands against the resistance espoused by the young Shi'ite cleric Moqtada Al Sadr, whose militia has fought US and Iraqi government forces for more than a week in the latest flare-up....
Many of Iraq's Shi'ite majority view the reclusive Iranian-born Al Sistani as their highest religious authority and are anxiously waiting for his recovery and return to Iraq.
Kashmiri said exactly when the Muslim cleric returned would depend on doctors' advice. He came to London on August 6.
Al Sistani had an operation to unblock a coronary artery in a London hospital last week and was due to undergo eye surgery later yesterday.
Najaf assault turns allies against US
When the US wanted a Shia cleric to strengthen the credibility of the IGC, it turned to Bahr al-Ulum, whose family had lost many members for opposing Saddam Hussein.But watching his hometown of Najaf come under US bombardment to crush Muqtada al-Sadr and his supporters, Bahr al-Ulum has lost faith in US intentions towards Iraq, and says millions of moderates like him, who welcomed last year's invasion, now regard Washington as an enemy.
"The Americans have turned the holy city into a ghost town. They are now seen as full of hatred against Najaf and the Shia. Nothing I know of will change this," the former president of the now defunct council said on Friday.
"I do not understand why America craves crisis. A peaceful solution to the confrontation with Muqtada could have been reached. We were hoping that Prime Minister Iyad Allawi would lead the way, but he sided with oppression."
Bahr al-Ulum has been one of the most outspoken critics of violence fuelled by al-Sadr and his supporters, who have challenged the authority of elder clerics such as Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and Bahr al-Ulum himself.
Does Iraq violence threaten democracy?
Posted by Mike at August 19, 2004 04:57 PM | TrackBack
From BBCArabic.com: "In my opinion, Moqtada has greatly contributed in the weakening of the Shias and has desecrated the holy shrines that he claims to defend. He claims to be a devout Shia while turning the Holy Mausoleum of Imam Ali into a weapon cache and a potential battleground. He placed pieces of artillery and machineguns on top of its minarets and when Americans returned his fire, he claimed that infidel Americans were destroying the shrines. Moqtada, you are very much aware of the holiness of these sites and should spare them any harm. If you want martyrdom, get out there and leave them as places of prayer like they have always been. Americans didn't come near them for a whole year until your army occupied it." -Haydar Al Karabala'i, Karbala, Iraq