Muqtada Al Sadr’s plea for help
Will Iran allow the man who’s now become the most important player in Iraq’s political life to experiment with the possibilities of rapprochement between Iraqi blocs and create a moment of national political consensus away from the influence of Iran and other foreign powers?
Muqtada Al Sadr, the popular Shiite leader, is unlike other Iraqi leaders which Iran has gotten used to dealing with, especially after Muqtada’s alliance Sairoon won the largest number of seats in the recent parliamentary elections.
Muqtada, the descendant of the religious and political Sadr family in Iraq and son of the most popular branch of the Sadr family, that of Sayyid Mohammed Sadeq al-Sadr, has inherited the popular base that his father had gained among non-partisan popular categories. This is evident in the capital Baghdad, especially in highly-populated neighborhoods like the Sadr City or Al-Shu'ala.
Iran will use its proxies to intimidate Muqtada Al-Sadr and his bloc in order to keep Iraq under its influence
Mashari AlthaydiSpeaking of Al-Shu'ala, there have recently been terror attacks which I think have been carried out by Muqtada’s foes. It’s expected that Iran will use its allies and proxies, like the Popular Mobilization led by Hadi al-Amiri or Nouri al-Maliki, to intimidate Sadr and his bloc into accepting an Iranian solution in order to keep Iraq under Iran’s influence.
Few days ago while meeting with Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General (SRSG) for Iraq Jan Kubis, Muqtada said: “Our vision for the next phase is for decisions to be purely Iraqi national decisions. This stems from people’s desires and the phase also necessitates this because the Iraqi people have suffered a lot from corruption and poor governance.” He added: “It’s important that the international community and the UN increase their support for Iraq to get out of the tunnel of abominable sectarianism and quotas and stop regional interferences in the election file.”
Will Iraq’s popular leader Muqtada al-Sadr succeed in bringing Iraq out of the tunnel of sectarianism, corruption and quotas? This is the question.
This article is also available in Arabic.
_______________
Saudi journalist Mashari Althaydi presents Al Arabiya News Channel’s “views on the news” daily show “Maraya.” He has previously held the position of a managing senior editor for Saudi Arabia & Gulf region at pan-Arab newspaper Asharq al-Awsat. Althaydi has published several papers on political Islam and social history of Saudi Arabia. He appears as a guest on several radio and television programs to discuss the ideologies of extremist groups and terrorists. He tweets under @MAlthaydy
-
Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr arrives in UAE on official visit
Influential Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has reportedly arrived in the United Arab Emirates on an official visit. During his visit, al-Sadr is ... Gulf -
Muqtada al-Sadr: Riyadh serves as regional ‘father figure’
Muqtada al-Sadr, the leader of The Sadrist Movement in Iraq, stated that visions were aligned during his meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin ... Gulf -
Muqtada al-Sadr in Riyadh
Iran’s domination over everything in Iraq from controlling commerce, construction and supply of bad products to controlling banks, the ... Middle East -
Muqtada al-Sadr visits Saudi Arabia for the first time in 11 years
Influential Iraqi cleri Muqtada al-Sadr has arrived in Saudi Arabia on Sunday and met with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, in what is hist first ... Middle East