Sistani inching towards declaring jihad against U.S.?
posted at 5:48 pm on May 22, 2008 by Allahpundit
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Here’s a nice turd in the progress punchbowl.
Iraq’s most influential Shiite cleric has been quietly issuing religious edicts declaring that armed resistance against U.S.-led foreign troops is permissible — a potentially significant shift by a key supporter of the Washington-backed government in Baghdad…
So far, al-Sistani’s fatwas have been limited to a handful of people. They also were issued verbally and in private — rather than a blanket proclamation to the general Shiite population — according to three prominent Shiite officials in regular contact with al-Sistani as well as two followers who received the edicts in Najaf…
A longtime official at al-Sistani’s office in Najaf would not deny or confirm the edicts issued in private, but hinted that a publicized call for jihad may come later.
“(Al-Sistani) rejects the American presence,” he told the AP, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment to media. “He believes they (the Americans) will at the end pay a heavy price for the damage they inflicted on Iraq.”
It’s always hard to know how seriously to take these stories given the anonymous sourcing and sectarian agendas at work. If the “Shiite officials” quoted here are Sadrists, or even Badrists (i.e. SCIRI), then no wonder they want to maintain a public perception that Sistani approves of irregular militia forces. On the other hand, five sources is a lot of corroboration. The rose-colored spin on this would be that it’s only because Maliki has succeeded in Basra and now in Sadr City that Sistani feels he can triangulate by getting a little more aggressive with U.S. forces; until recently, they were the only thing keeping Sadr and the Mahdi Army from trying to impose a thugocracy and clerical rule, which Sistani has always supposedly opposed. Now that the government has a firmer hand, he can be the good Shiite populist resisting foreign occupation.
The not-so-rose-colored view? He thinks it’s time for us to go and this is his way of nudging us towards the exit. Exit question: Think Barack Obama can get a meeting with him?
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Now there’s a Satanic looking sumbitch for ya…
pseudonominus on May 22, 2008 at 5:51 PM
Lets hope not. This would make things very messy, very fast.
firepilot on May 22, 2008 at 5:54 PM
Death to America.
wise_man on May 22, 2008 at 5:56 PM
Has Sadr not, from day one, always wanted US Military out of Iraq?
Now, 5 years later, he is ready to declare open war on US forces?
rockhauler on May 22, 2008 at 5:57 PM
If democracy was more ingrained in this culture, then maybe he would lobby the Iraqi government to ask us to leave…you know…instead of merely telling his religious followers that it’s ok to kill Americans.
Could you see what the MSM would do if a Christian leader told his followers that it’s now ok to kill illegal immigrants????
blink on May 22, 2008 at 5:58 PM
Oh crap…
Sistani, Sadr, they all look and sound alike to me…
My Bad…
Whatever.
rockhauler on May 22, 2008 at 5:59 PM
It’s getting time for us to move out. Sadr City is pacified. We need to give the troops a break.
We can send them to Afghanistan for some R & R..
originalpechanga on May 22, 2008 at 5:59 PM
Oh, Allah! You make me smile daily! : )
kcd on May 22, 2008 at 5:59 PM
Hmm, that’s an interesting choice of words.
Sistani reportedly said something similar - or was going to - about two/three years ago. And nothing came of it.
One hopes that it’s a posturing measure to gain leverage either in the Parliament or with the Maliki government.
And why now?
SteveMG on May 22, 2008 at 6:06 PM
It doesn’t take much to get us to leave. Just ask.
Example: Subic Bay.
silverfox on May 22, 2008 at 6:07 PM
The BILLIONS of dollars spent and 5 soldiers I lost from my unit while there are a heavy enough price, but I will continue to pay more so that we don’t have to come back again in a few years.
thomashton on May 22, 2008 at 6:10 PM
Well, maybe , maybe not.
If he does, and we do leave, he must have a very deep bunker. Once the Sunni-Shia bloodbath gets in full swing, he’s a dead man walking.
patrick neid on May 22, 2008 at 6:13 PM
On another note McCain just bitch slapped Obama over the Veteran’s bill.
patrick neid on May 22, 2008 at 6:17 PM
Hmmm, I wonder when the opportunity will come that the Iraqi government can forbid Clerics the authority to issue fatwas or jihads?
Speakup on May 22, 2008 at 6:20 PM
Take him out, he gets his virgins, we get peace…it’s a win-win.
right2bright on May 22, 2008 at 6:23 PM
my fear was always that the Iranians would kill this guy.
this is someone whom we airlifted out when he needed medical assistance. so much for muslim gratitude huh?
as i told my cousin who is over there right now… “pull back and nuke em from orbit to make sure. its the only way to be sure”
elduende on May 22, 2008 at 6:25 PM
Far too much opportunity for creative translation and re-translation, not to mention garden variety misinterpretation and alarmism. We’ll see, when we see, if it means anything at all. Until then, it’s noise.
CK MacLeod on May 22, 2008 at 6:29 PM
Now I know what Nasty Pelooser was doin over there.
Commie leader of the House giving orders to oppositon in Iraq.
“Honorable al-Sistani your Holiness!”
“Cause trouble for a few more months and we will pull our troops out in disgrace and turn Iraq and all its’ riches over to you. George Bush will get the blame and we dimwits will have power forever” Your comrade in arms Nasty!
dhunter on May 22, 2008 at 6:31 PM
How can that be?
I thought that Sistani was suppose to be one of them thar moderate Muslims that we hear so much talk about.
Silly me.
MB4 on May 22, 2008 at 6:37 PM
Don’t believe everything you read on the Internet or in the press, especially when anonymous soucres are involved, no matter how many they have.
bnelson44 on May 22, 2008 at 6:41 PM
I agree. Remember all the support the politicians supposedly had for amnesty? This was the story throughout the MSM: turned out to be totally wrong!
landlines on May 22, 2008 at 6:48 PM
Somehow, this sounds very fishy.
Doesn’t Sistani realize that the best thing that the U.S. ever did for Iraqi Shiites was taking out Saddam Hussein and his sons, who were butchering Shiites for decades?
Sistani was a leading voice of restraint on Shiites when the Sunni insurgents (former Baathists and al Qaeda) were stirring up trouble, and Sistani tried to avoid revenge killings.
With Al Qaeda chased out of Baghdad and the provinces around it, and holed up in Mosul, and Maliki kicking Sadr and his followers out of Basra and Sadr City, the enemies of a peaceful, secular Iraq are becoming fewer and weaker. Sistani has always been opposed to Sadr and supported the Maliki government–why would he suddenly turn on the Americans, who have helped Maliki drive out the enemies of Iraqi Shiites? With unnamed sources, this might be some closet Sadr’ites pretending to speak in Sistani’s name.
About the only explanation might be that Sistani has grown jealous that Maliki has started to assert some real power, and has a growing following and legitimacy as the elected leader of Iraq. But now that the Sadr’ites have surrendered, who would do battle for Sistani? Would the Iraqi Shiites, who are mostly loyal to Maliki, turn on him now for Sistani? This doesn’t make much sense…
Time for a little separation of mosque and state, Iraqi style. Let Sistani run the mosque, and Maliki run the state, and our troops will protect the government that the Iraqis elected, and leave when Maliki asks us to.
Steve Z on May 22, 2008 at 6:50 PM
I’m guessing the names ending in “i” are of Iranian derivation, and the “r” ones Arabic.
JiangxiDad on May 22, 2008 at 6:50 PM
Muqtada al-Sadr is Lebanese
bnelson44 on May 22, 2008 at 6:56 PM
This is one of those days when I think we’d be best to just let these people rot in their own juices. Their “religion” and indeed their entire lives are stuck in the 7th Century and attempts to bring civilization to them is wasted effort.
johnsteele on May 22, 2008 at 6:58 PM
Better start kissing lots of Korans.
BL@KBIRD on May 22, 2008 at 7:02 PM
From the article:
I call BS on this article and question the motivation behind the two authors.
Sistani did not oppose disarming Sadr’s militia, he told Sadr it was not his decision to make, it was Sadr’s responsibility. Sadr was looking for a way to save face and Sistani would not give it to him. Result … Sadr is in Iran humiliated and Basrah is liberated and Sadr City is in the hands of the Iraqi Army.
Sistani has repeated said that Clerics need to stay out of the government. This is why he would not meet with Bush and he surely won’t be meeting with Obama either.
Texas Gal on May 22, 2008 at 7:21 PM
Well, if true, that surely won’t help. Maybe he’s on Iran’s payroll.
CP on May 22, 2008 at 7:26 PM
Hmmm, perhaps it was Barzini all along……
ThePrez on May 22, 2008 at 7:39 PM
” By HAMZA HENDAWI and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA”
Hmmm, I dunno. Go over to google news and do a search on “HAMZA HENDAWI” but select “2006″ and you will see that practically every single article written under that byline (and under HAMZA HENDAWI and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, of which there are several) are anti-American. I am not sure I would believe it. Reading it on the AP wire and that it comes out of the AP’s Baghdad bureau pretty much assures that it is agit-prop.
crosspatch on May 22, 2008 at 7:44 PM
ThePrez
Ding! We have a winner. That gave me a great laugh and I needed one today.
Mormon Doc on May 22, 2008 at 7:44 PM
Just to be clear. Was he saying that killing Americans was forbidden and now he is changing his policy. The only thing that appears to have changed is his underwear.
Mormon Doc on May 22, 2008 at 7:46 PM
I think the AP writers want this more than any old sistani.
And I simply don’t trust a word of the article.
There has been too much good news out of Iraq lately.
bridgetown on May 22, 2008 at 8:34 PM
This story makes no logical sense. I do not think Sistani is looking for power at this stage in his life. He knows he will not live for long. He may feel that we have created a problem with the Sunni awakening movement; but even so, I doubt that after five years of trying to hold down violence he would want to ramp it up.
In truth, we all know, including Sistani, that general peace is the quickest route to American withdrawl of ground forces. (Other than an Obama victory in US elections of course.) Air and armor will be needed for some time to keep other neighboring nations from meddling. Sistani could not be wishing for a Turkish or Iranian invasion so he would surely want an American Air and Armor deterence for now.
KW64 on May 22, 2008 at 9:00 PM
bridgetown on May 22, 2008 at 8:34 PM
Agreed, the timing stinks and there is no reason Sistani would pull this crap for sport. Time will tell….oh and another point..Arabs love to lie!
dmann on May 22, 2008 at 9:07 PM
This comes from the AP. WHO believes those traitorous twits??
Rick554 on May 22, 2008 at 9:21 PM
I think this should be handled much like Israel,
target,done,switch to new target,done!
canopfor on May 22, 2008 at 9:33 PM
Funny, he doesn’t look it….
ScottG on May 22, 2008 at 9:49 PM
Flush him.
Dr.Cwac.Cwac on May 22, 2008 at 9:56 PM
First of all, Juan Cole is an expert on NOTHING! He’s an Anti-Semitic, Anti-American, Pro-Jihadi Leftist Nutbag, a convert to the Cult Religion of the Baha’i, who has sucked up to the Ayatollahs and Mullahs of Iran and Shiite Iraq for years!
Second, on the Bullshit Scale, this is a pure 10 out of 10; Sistani doesn’t not at all believe in playing “politics”; he has issued fatwas in the past saying that his followers must not go against the “government”.
Second of all I’ve never heard of “individual fatwas” of jihad; it makes no sense to declare “jihad” against “occupiers” if you tell one or two people!
Just remember, Sistani may be Iranian by blood, but he definitely belongs to the Iraqi “Najafi” school of Ithna Asheri Usuli Shiites, the so-called “Quietists”, who are really influenced by the old apolitical “Akhbari” school if Shiites.
As Sadr, conversly, is Iraqi by blood, but he is definitely, theologically of the Iranian “Qomi” flavor of Ithna Asheri Usuli Shiites; instead of a “Quiteist”, he’s of the “Khomenist/Activist” stripe, a trouble maker and a pure Jihadist, who believes, unlike Sistani, in an active Political role for the Shiite Religious authorities.
Regardless, this is mostly BS, and political posturing by people close to Sistani, who are most probably worried by Maliki suddenly coming out on top in his battle with As Sadr, and they figure this might be a way to subtlely reign in Maliki, so he doesn’t get too powerful.
Dale in Atlanta on May 22, 2008 at 10:00 PM
I smell BS. FTA:
“All spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.”
It just doesn’t pass the small test.
Pythagoras on May 22, 2008 at 10:28 PM
Ah, but he is. Everyone keeps saying he is Iraqi by blood, he isn’t. He is Lebanese by blood.
bnelson44 on May 22, 2008 at 10:34 PM
Well, perhaps he was OK with our presence as long as we and our Iraqi lackeys were attacking the Sunnis. Now that Maliki went off the rails and started taking out Shiites, Sistani is seeing things a little differently.
Kafir on May 22, 2008 at 10:35 PM
I put absolutely zero credibility on Juan Cole and the MSM on any news at all coming out of Iraq. This is a bunch of he said he said anonymous spin — five sources or fifteen. The whole article is directed at “looming” this and “developing” that and “fears of” jargon that the MSM uses when it doesn’t have the goods.
I mean, these are the geniuses that were telling us Malaki was on the rocks after his massive loss in Basra, that the Mitey Mehdi Army was about to spring up and push him out, that the Green Zone was under “constant bombardment” for two months, that Sadr City was an impregnable Sadrist stronghold.
There may be a smoking gun somewhere but this article smells more like the Juan Cole gang desperately seeking to save face from their recent miscalls by using boogie man smoke machines.
DaMav on May 22, 2008 at 11:38 PM
Ayatollah Scarecrow as Iraqi blogger Ladybird calls him.
But if anyone here - including Allah and Morrissey, who should go back to singing about the “boy with the thorn in side”, since correctly analyzing the situation in Iraq is so far out of his league — had bothered to do some scholarship on Iraq, you might have guessed that the Ayatollah had a certain bias against the infidels.
Try reading John Agresto’s book, Mugged By Reality.
Or do a little research on the Ayatollah’s son, Mohammed Redha al-Sistani. Or, visit Sistani’s site and see what
the Ayatollah regards as unclean (Christians,urine, semen…) Or do a search on the Ayatollah and funds sent to Qom. Or try a search at Jihad Watch. Or check out a site like Direland to see what the Ayatollah’s fatwa against gays and lesbians in Iraq did.
Even if the 48 hour rule has to be applied to this story, the Sharia-loving Ayatollah is not America’s friend and never has been. The fact that he has any influence in Iraq,
is a major disaster - we should not be empowering Islamists on the American taxpayer’s dollar.
Mister Ghost on May 22, 2008 at 11:43 PM
AP’s Baghdad bureau changed chiefs this month. It will be interesting to see how the reporting changes. Robert H. Reid is now the bureau chief.
crosspatch on May 23, 2008 at 12:14 AM
Texas Gal:
“I call BS on this article and question the motivation behind the two authors.”
Ditto that!
Aside from the fact that such fatwas would run counter to almost everything we know about al Sistani, the idea of al Sadr as an al Sistani rival is utterly fatuous — and never less so than in the “recent months” which are as close to any edict dating as the authors get. Frankly, the article itself strikes a peculiarly dated note — I suspect it may have been shopped around for quite some time and simply freshened up with the addition of a detail here and there.
In any case, if you’re an armed insurgent, what could be more convenient than a private fatwa from Iraq’s “most influential” cleric? I’d bet such claims are a dime a dozen. Unless the authors are al Sadr shills — or dupes — themselves, however, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to discover the Iranians stirring this pot.
JM Hanes on May 23, 2008 at 2:20 AM
There’s a new article out from Voice of Iraq with a completely different conclusion:
crosspatch on May 23, 2008 at 11:48 AM
From the lay person’s perspective, there is practically no way to discern what is true here.
However, when 2 of 3 potential presidents are calling for the imposition of a
power vacuum in Iraqwithdraw, it might make sense.Obama and Clinton have interjected an unknown variable/risk into the whole political equation in Iraq. In short, it makes sense to hedge one’s bet.
moxie_neanderthal on May 23, 2008 at 3:43 PM
Debunked here:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2008/05/is_sistani_promoting_attacks_o.asp
bnelson44 on May 23, 2008 at 4:33 PM
At the beginning of the Iraq war, if I remember correctly, a lot of people in this coutnry were saying, geez, I sure do like those Shittes. Let’s kill Saddam and give them freedom.
Didn’t seem to be much of a long-term plan…
bayam on May 23, 2008 at 5:45 PM