Adam Taylor
BY ADAM TAYLOR
When it comes time for history to be written, one of the most important turning points in Iraq’s current crisis may not have been created by guns or bombs. It may have been spurred by a handwritten letter.
The Washington Post’s Loveday Morris reported that a message from Grand Ayatollah Ali Al Husseini Al Sistani was key in convincing Iraq’s political elite that embattled Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki needed to go. The letter from Al Sistani, sent to leaders of Al Maliki’s Dawa party on July 9, spoke of the “need to speed up the selection of a new prime minister who has wide national acceptance.” Not long after the letter was received, Haider Al Abadi, a deputy speaker for Iraq’s parliament and also a member of Dawa, was called upon to lead the country. On Thursday, Al Maliki finally admitted defeat.
It was a bold move. While few people had doubts about Al Sistani’s theological power, he has rarely acted so directly to influence politics. The 84-year-old Islamic cleric, infrequently seen in public and generally circumspect when making announcements, is a member of the “quietest” Shia tradition that is suspicious of religion and politics mixing. However, Iraq’s crisis may now be so bad that Al Sistani is taking action — and we may just be seeing the start of it.
Born to a family of religious scholars in Mashhad, Iran, Al Sistani only moved to his current home, the Iraqi holy city of Najaf, later in life. He was prodigious in his scholarship of the Muslim faith, and soon an important religious leader. In 1992, his religious authority was recognised when, after the death of Grand Ayatollah Imam Abul Qassim Al Khoei, he was selected to lead the most important hawza in Najaf.
During Saddam’s dictatorship, Shia Muslims faced suppression by the ruling Ba’ath Party, and both Sunni and Shia clerics were forced to either keep quiet, flee the country or face serious persecution and even death. Al Sistani kept a low profile. After the the 2003 invasion of Iraq, however, Al Sistani gradually took a far more prominent role in leading Iraq’s Shia majority, surprising many outside observers.
They were tentative but important steps. In June 2003, for example, he released a fatwa that called for an elected assembly to draft a constitution. Then, in August of the next year, he helped broker a peace deal between Muqtada Al Sadr’s Shia militia and US and Iraqi forces. He urged restraint from Iraqi Shias in the face of attacks from Sunni extremists.
For these things and more, Al Sistani earned plaudits for his actions from many observers: In 2005, The New York Times’ Thomas Friedman suggested that he should be given the Nobel Peace Prize, for instance. You can get a sense of Friedman’s argument here:
In many ways, Sistani has played the role for president George W Bush that Nelson Mandela and Mikhail Gorbachev played for his father, president George H W Bush. It was Mandela’s instincts and leadership — in keeping the transition to black rule in South Africa nonviolent — that helped the Bush I administration and its allies bring that process in for a soft landing. And it was Gorbachev’s insistence that the dismantling of the Soviet Empire, and particularly East Germany, be nonviolent that brought the Soviet Union in for a soft landing. In international relations, as in sports, it is often better to be lucky than good. And having the luck to have history deal you a Mandela, a Gorbachev or a Sistani as your partner at a key historical juncture — as opposed to a Yasser Arafat or a Robert Mugabe — can make all the difference between US policy looking brilliant and US policy looking futile.
Of course, that passage looks a little foolhardy given Iraq’s current situation. The chaotic and disastrous events in Iraq over the past few months appear to have led to a shift in Al Sistani’s thinking. Notably, there was a clear break with Al Maliki, who had filled the government with Shia allies and had previously enjoyed Al Sistani’s approval. As the Sunni extremist group the Islamic State began to capture huge parts of Iraq and Al Maliki’s government began to look less and less capable, Al Sistani lost patience with Iraq’s prime minister and stepped in himself. In June, he called for Shia Muslims to take up arms to fight the advancing Sunni Islamist threat (a call many answered by forming militias). Last month, he issued a thinly veiled warning to Al Maliki to not stay in power. July’s letter now shows he was actively working against the prime minister.
Given the widespread belief that Al Maliki was a disastrous leader, should we dust off Al Sistani’s Nobel Peace Prize application? Some already have. However, there is certainly more to Al Sistani’s move against Al Maliki than a desire for international plaudits. In a long and fascinating profile of Al Sistani for the Boston Review, Mohamad Bazzi argues that the creeping Iranian influence over Iraq’s political elite may have led Al Sistani to get more politically involved. Bazzi makes a compelling argument that a struggle, both geopolitical and theological, between Al Sistani and Iranian clerics may shape the future of Iran.
If nothing else, Al Maliki’s ouster is a reminder of the power Al Sistani welds, should he choose to use it. “Before this, no one in the leadership had openly expressed an opinion about a change,” Ali Al Alaq, a Dawa party parliamentarian, told The Washington Post. “But after, we were unanimous, or actually 10 to 1.” The one member of the Dawa party’s 11-person leadership committee to disagree was apparently Al Maliki himself.
WP-BLOOMBERG
BY ADAM TAYLOR
When it comes time for history to be written, one of the most important turning points in Iraq’s current crisis may not have been created by guns or bombs. It may have been spurred by a handwritten letter.
The Washington Post’s Loveday Morris reported that a message from Grand Ayatollah Ali Al Husseini Al Sistani was key in convincing Iraq’s political elite that embattled Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki needed to go. The letter from Al Sistani, sent to leaders of Al Maliki’s Dawa party on July 9, spoke of the “need to speed up the selection of a new prime minister who has wide national acceptance.” Not long after the letter was received, Haider Al Abadi, a deputy speaker for Iraq’s parliament and also a member of Dawa, was called upon to lead the country. On Thursday, Al Maliki finally admitted defeat.
It was a bold move. While few people had doubts about Al Sistani’s theological power, he has rarely acted so directly to influence politics. The 84-year-old Islamic cleric, infrequently seen in public and generally circumspect when making announcements, is a member of the “quietest” Shia tradition that is suspicious of religion and politics mixing. However, Iraq’s crisis may now be so bad that Al Sistani is taking action — and we may just be seeing the start of it.
Born to a family of religious scholars in Mashhad, Iran, Al Sistani only moved to his current home, the Iraqi holy city of Najaf, later in life. He was prodigious in his scholarship of the Muslim faith, and soon an important religious leader. In 1992, his religious authority was recognised when, after the death of Grand Ayatollah Imam Abul Qassim Al Khoei, he was selected to lead the most important hawza in Najaf.
During Saddam’s dictatorship, Shia Muslims faced suppression by the ruling Ba’ath Party, and both Sunni and Shia clerics were forced to either keep quiet, flee the country or face serious persecution and even death. Al Sistani kept a low profile. After the the 2003 invasion of Iraq, however, Al Sistani gradually took a far more prominent role in leading Iraq’s Shia majority, surprising many outside observers.
They were tentative but important steps. In June 2003, for example, he released a fatwa that called for an elected assembly to draft a constitution. Then, in August of the next year, he helped broker a peace deal between Muqtada Al Sadr’s Shia militia and US and Iraqi forces. He urged restraint from Iraqi Shias in the face of attacks from Sunni extremists.
For these things and more, Al Sistani earned plaudits for his actions from many observers: In 2005, The New York Times’ Thomas Friedman suggested that he should be given the Nobel Peace Prize, for instance. You can get a sense of Friedman’s argument here:
In many ways, Sistani has played the role for president George W Bush that Nelson Mandela and Mikhail Gorbachev played for his father, president George H W Bush. It was Mandela’s instincts and leadership — in keeping the transition to black rule in South Africa nonviolent — that helped the Bush I administration and its allies bring that process in for a soft landing. And it was Gorbachev’s insistence that the dismantling of the Soviet Empire, and particularly East Germany, be nonviolent that brought the Soviet Union in for a soft landing. In international relations, as in sports, it is often better to be lucky than good. And having the luck to have history deal you a Mandela, a Gorbachev or a Sistani as your partner at a key historical juncture — as opposed to a Yasser Arafat or a Robert Mugabe — can make all the difference between US policy looking brilliant and US policy looking futile.
Of course, that passage looks a little foolhardy given Iraq’s current situation. The chaotic and disastrous events in Iraq over the past few months appear to have led to a shift in Al Sistani’s thinking. Notably, there was a clear break with Al Maliki, who had filled the government with Shia allies and had previously enjoyed Al Sistani’s approval. As the Sunni extremist group the Islamic State began to capture huge parts of Iraq and Al Maliki’s government began to look less and less capable, Al Sistani lost patience with Iraq’s prime minister and stepped in himself. In June, he called for Shia Muslims to take up arms to fight the advancing Sunni Islamist threat (a call many answered by forming militias). Last month, he issued a thinly veiled warning to Al Maliki to not stay in power. July’s letter now shows he was actively working against the prime minister.
Given the widespread belief that Al Maliki was a disastrous leader, should we dust off Al Sistani’s Nobel Peace Prize application? Some already have. However, there is certainly more to Al Sistani’s move against Al Maliki than a desire for international plaudits. In a long and fascinating profile of Al Sistani for the Boston Review, Mohamad Bazzi argues that the creeping Iranian influence over Iraq’s political elite may have led Al Sistani to get more politically involved. Bazzi makes a compelling argument that a struggle, both geopolitical and theological, between Al Sistani and Iranian clerics may shape the future of Iran.
If nothing else, Al Maliki’s ouster is a reminder of the power Al Sistani welds, should he choose to use it. “Before this, no one in the leadership had openly expressed an opinion about a change,” Ali Al Alaq, a Dawa party parliamentarian, told The Washington Post. “But after, we were unanimous, or actually 10 to 1.” The one member of the Dawa party’s 11-person leadership committee to disagree was apparently Al Maliki himself.
WP-BLOOMBERG
