Aware of the dangers to the political process, clerics close to Sistani have warned that he and the country’s three other grand ayatollahs could soon intervene. In July, Sistani’s representative Abdul Mehdi Karbalai made clear that the marjaia, the country’s highest-ranking Shiite clergy, were losing patience with the failure to form a government.
“Yes, if things will reach deadlock, which we don’t hope, the higher marjaia will not spare giving advice and help [to] those blocs which will maintain the interests of Iraqis and solving the crisis,” Karbalai said.
This month, at a conference in Najaf, one of Sistani’s peers issued a warning.
“We demand that all the political blocs work hard … to solve the many choking crises that the country is suffering and intensify the efforts to provide the basic services as soon as possible,” Grand Ayatollah Ishaq Fayyad said in a speech read on his behalf. “Otherwise, the people’s patience is almost running out.”
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