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    Iraq Power Struggle Intensifies as Protesters Block Parliament

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    BAGHDAD — Iraqi political leaders spent the last 10 months struggling unsuccessfully to form a government, their country sinking deeper and deeper into political paralysis in the face of growing drought, crippling corruption and crumbling infrastructure.Then in June, those talks imploded. And now, there is a scramble for power as Iraq’s main political factions vie for the upper hand.The powerful Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who leads the largest bloc in Parliament, quit the negotiations in frustration, then urged his followers to take to the streets to get what they wanted. Heeding his call, they set up a tent encampment that has blocked access to Parliament for more than two weeks to prevent any government from being voted in.It is not the first time that Mr. al-Sadr has resorted to the threat of violence to get what he wants politically. He led the armed Shiite revolt against the American occupation of Iraq from 2003-2009, and U.S. officials say they now worry that Iraq could plunge again into violence and instability.Equally alarming, despite years of American efforts to shape Iraq into an alternative Shiite power center that would be more Western-oriented than Iran, ‌Mr. Sadr and his Shiite political rivals favor a political system that would confer more power on religious clerics along the lines of an Iranian-style theocracy.“We’re looking at the beginning of the end of the American-backed political order in Iraq,” said Robert Ford, a former American diplomat in Iraq and now a fellow at Yale University and the Middle East Institute.For decades, Iraq has reeled from crisis to crisis — a cycle that shows no signs of abating. Following the 2003 U.S. invasion to oust Saddam Hussein, there was a civil war, and then the takeover of large parts of the country by the Islamic State.As a result, Iraq, despite vast oil reserves, has remain remained mired in political chaos with a stagnant economy that has left its unemployed youth vulnerable to recruiters for extremist movements and made investors leery. At the same time, Gulf States led by the United Arab Emirates normalized relations with Israel and forged ahead politically and economically to become the new center of gravity of the Middle East.Supporters of the powerful Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr gathered for Friday prayers outside the Parliament in Baghdad on Friday. Saba Kareem/ReutersAnd the U.S. vision for Iraq’s future has seemed to slip further and further away.When President George W. Bush invaded in 2003, his government tried to encourage Iraqi political leaders to set up a representative system that would share power more equitably among the country’s three main groups — the Shiite majority, and the Sunni Muslim and Kurdish minorities.“The Americans were kind of hoping that there would be these cross-sectarian and more policy-centered alliances between the political factions, but the sectarian and ethnic divisions won out,” Mr. Ford said. “Instead, we have this squabbling between and within sectarian and ethnic communities about how to divide Iraq’s oil money.”About 85 percent of the Iraqi government is funded by oil income, according to the World Bank. And under the current political system, each major political faction in Parliament gets control over at least one government ministry, and with it, patronage jobs and the opportunity to skim money and pocket kickbacks.As politicians have focused more on their own power than national interests, Iran has found it easier to persuade a number of Sunni, Kurd, and Shiite leaders to support the policies it cares most about; the cross-border movement of Iranian arms, people, and goods.The crisis now enveloping Iraq pits Mr. Sadr, and his mostly Shiite supporters against a coalition of Shiite parties with militias linked to Iran in a bitter power struggle. The caretaker government, fearing violence, has been reluctant to disrupt Mr. Sadr’s blockade, allowing him to hold the country hostage to a sweeping list of demands:the dissolution of Parliament, new elections, and changes in election law and possibly the Constitution.“It looks like a peaceful coup d’état, a peaceful revolution,” Mahmoud Othman, a former Parliament member who was not affiliated with any political party, said of the Sadrists’ blockade of Parliament. “I say peaceful because his followers are not carrying guns. Sadr is stronger than guns. He is now the strongman on the street and he is imposing his will on others.”So far the blockade has not been violent.Several thousand Sadrists occupy the tent encampment, working in shifts. They wander about, listening to clerics denounce government corruption and eating shawarma, grapes and watermelon donated by sympathizers. They rest in tents in the heat of the day, waiting for Mr. Sadr’s next instructions via tweet — his favored means of communication.Inside Baghdad’s Green Zone, supporters of the Iraqi Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr told The New York Times that they would remain there as long as he tells them to.Sunnis and Kurds have remained on the sidelines.Many Sunnis say they feel disenfranchised and see no role for themselves in the future Iraq, and many wonder whether it would be better to divide the country and have a separate Sunni enclave, said Moayed Jubeir Al-Mahmoud, a political scientist at the University of Anbar in the city of Ramadi, a Sunni stronghold.“Unfortunately I do not see a secure and prosperous future for my country,” he said, describing Iraq as a failed state controlled by Iran-linked militias. “We are concerned that the state will just go from being dominated by militias to being dominated by al-Sadr.”For now, the tent city blockading Iraq’s Parliament seems a relaxed place. Thousands of Sadrists maintain it at any given time, working in shifts.Ahmed Jalil/EPA, via ShutterstockThe United States and most neighboring countries have stayed largely silent about the chaos in Iraq. Only Iran has tried to intervene, meeting with Mr. Sadr’s Shiite opponents and encouraging negotiations even though Mr. Sadr, a nationalist, has taken a strongly anti-Iranian stance in recent years.The last thing Iran wants is for Shiites to fight one another and risk weakening their grip on power, which could end up undercutting Tehran’s influence in Iraq.A number of Mr. Sadr’s positions align with Tehran. Both want to force the remaining 2,500 U.S. troops to leave Iraq, oppose any interactions with Israel and favor criminalizing homosexuality.This is not the first time Mr. Sadr has resorted to mass demonstrations. But this time, he is using street protests to force the country to ignore last October’s election results and to hold a new vote that could return his legislators to power.The parliamentary election 10 months ago went well for Mr. Sadr. Legislators who supported him won the most seats of any faction and had almost forged a governing coalition supported by Kurdish and Sunni partners. The next step would have been to bring it to a vote for approval.Mr. Sadr’s Shiite rivals, however, refused to attend the Parliament session, denying him the quorum needed for a vote. Frustrated, Mr. Sadr asked his legislators to resign in protest.Portraits of Muqtada al-Sadr and his father, Ayatollah Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr, outside the Parliament building.Ahmad Al-Rubaye/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe parties who had gotten fewer votes, primarily his Shiite rivals, then filled the seats that Mr. Sadr’s followers had vacated potentially giving them control over ministries and government offices and leaving Mr. Sadr out.He responded by calling for the blockade of Parliament to prevent a vote on a new government.“So this is when Muqtada al-Sadr decided that if the democratic procedures are not allowed to play themselves out, then the response is revolution,” said Rend Al-Rahim, a former Iraqi ambassador to the United States and the president of the Iraq Foundation, a nonprofit organization that promotes democracy.At the tent encampment, the atmosphere is decidedly Shiite. Last week, Mr. Sadr’s followers marked Ashura, which commemorates the death of Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad. His death is often depicted as the start of the division between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.Everywhere there were signs of support for Mr. Sadr’s cause: Even some of the poorest chipped in to pay for a tent or meals. A water company donated enough every day to fill the large tanks that supply the tent dwellers. The markets in Sadr City — a poorer area of Baghdad filled with Sadr loyalists — sent crates of tomatoes, onions, dates, grapes and apples.To cope with the 115 degree heat in daytime, some protesters installed large fans or air coolers hooked up to Parliament’s 24-hour electricity supply.Protesters cooled down in a fountain outside the Iraqi Parliament in Baghdad. Ahmad Al-Rubaye/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“It’s the first time we have had electricity 24 hours a day,” said Faiz Qasim, an enthusiastic Sadr organizer who usually works as a day laborer. Much of Baghdad suffers from daily electricity cuts.Sadr supporters from the south of Iraq prepared large caldrons of stews daily. One day it was a rich curried chicken, while nearby, the next day’s meal — a black-and-white cow tethered to a cellphone tower — placidly masticated some watermelon. A little further down the same street, another cow was being slaughtered for dinner that night.Clerics periodically rallied groups of men — there are almost no women in the tents — with chants against the current political leaders:“Many people suffered from those who were here in this swamp.They climbed to power on the backs of the innocent and Iraq suffered because of them.There are many people holding out their hands, begging in the streets and going through the garbage.Al-Sadr says America and Israel have the money and the weapons. But what do we have?Allah almighty.”Falah Hassan contributed reporting. More

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      Iraq Confirms Election Gains for Muqtada al-Sadr

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      A court certified October’s parliamentary vote that gave Muqtada al-Sadr’s party a plurality of seats, clearing a path for a government to be formed.Iraq’s Federal Supreme Court on Monday upheld the results of the country’s October parliamentary elections, resolving a dispute that had stalled the formation of a new government as Iran-backed Shiite Muslim militias contested gains by a rival Shiite political bloc.The court certified the victory of Muqtada al-Sadr, the influential Shiite cleric who is regarded as a possible ally, if a wary one, for the United States in Iraq. His party won 73 of the 329 seats in Parliament, more than any other and up from 54 in 2018. It handily beat an alliance of Iran-aligned militias led by the Fatah coalition.For Fatah and its allies, Mr. al-Sadr’s victory upset the traditional balance of the Shiite powers that have dominated Iraqi politics since the fall of Saddam Hussein almost 20 years ago and threatened to dent Iranian influence in Parliament. Mr. al-Sadr — an Iraqi nationalist whose forces once battled the Americans but who is now viewed as more hostile to Iran — is poised to play a strong role not only in Parliament but also in choosing the next prime minister.Mr. al-Sadr thanked the court, the election commission and the Iraqi people in a Twitter post on Monday and called for “the formation of a government of national majority that is neither Eastern nor Western.” Earlier he visited the shrine of Imam Ali in the city of Najaf, one of the holiest sites in Shiite Islam, to offer thanks.Fatah filed the lawsuit challenging the results and alleging election fraud after it won 17 seats, little more than a third of its previous total. But on Monday, it accepted the court’s ruling.“We abide by the decision of the Federal Court despite our deep and firm belief that the electoral process was marred by a lot of fraud and manipulation,” said Hadi al-Amiri, the leader of Fatah, citing “concern for Iraq’s security and political stability and our belief in the political process and its democratic path.”Tension had clouded the legal process, delaying the announcement of the ruling, which was originally set for earlier this month. The dispute had raised the possibility that Fatah and its allies would unleash violence to force a result they wanted, and militia members gathered outside the court on Monday morning ahead of the ruling, chanting against the current prime minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi.But they withdrew by early afternoon, and there were no reports of violence.Supporters of Iraqi Shiite parties that disputed the election results gathered outside Iraq’s Supreme Court on Monday in Baghdad before it ratified the results.Ahmed Saad/ReutersMr. al-Kadhimi survived a drone strike on his home early last month after Iraqi security forces clashed with militia members who were protesting the election results outside the Green Zone, where the American embassy is. A deputy commander of one Iran-backed militia was killed.In a speech addressed to the losing political parties on Nov. 18, Mr. al-Sadr warned them against the “ruin of the democratic process in Iraq” and called on them to dissolve their militias and hand over their weapons to the Iraqi national army.With his huge popular following and powerful militia, which he deployed to entrap American forces in brutal street fighting in the mid-2000s, Mr. al-Sadr was once such an opponent of the Americans in Iraq that the United States ordered him killed. It later decided not to do so.But Mr. al-Sadr has come to oppose Iranian meddling in Iraq, and he signaled in a speech after the election that foreign embassies were welcome so long as they did not interfere in Iraq’s affairs.Now that the election results have been certified, factions representing Iraq’s Kurdish and Sunni Muslim minorities, which have been waiting for the outcome to negotiate or form alliances that could be part of the new government, can plunge into the fray. A majority of Iraqis are Shiite.Iraqi military forces were deployed following a drone attack on Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi’s residence in Baghdad on Nov. 7.Thaier Al-Sudani/ReutersPolitical analysts said they believe the Sadrists won big partly by taking advantage of a new electoral law that limited the traditional power of larger parties and made room for new faces by increasing the number of electoral districts. The Sadrist organization studied the electoral map closely, making sure to field candidates that would not end up running against each other.But they were not the only beneficiaries: Independent candidates coming out of Iraq’s anti-government protest movement, which flooded the streets in late 2019 as Iraqis mobilized against their deeply corrupt and sectarian political system, also won a handful of seats.Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, the United Nations envoy to Iraq, praised the parliamentary elections as “generally peaceful” and well-run.“Elections and their outcomes can provoke strong feelings,” she said. “If such feelings and debates give way to undemocratic impulses — such as disinformation, baseless accusations, intimidation, threats of violence or worse — then sooner or later, the door is opened to acts that are simply intolerable.”Despite the affirmation, the elections, the fifth since Saddam Hussein’s fall in 2003, saw a record-low turnout of 41 percent that reflected Iraqis’ intense frustration with their leaders. 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      After Iraqi Election, a Shiite Leader Emerges as an Unlikely U.S. Ally

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      The U.S. once threatened to kill Muqtada al-Sadr as his militia battled occupying forces. Now, the powerful cleric is helping Washington by keeping Iran at bay.BAGHDAD — Standing at a podium with an Iraqi flag by his side, the cleric Muqtada al-Sadr looked the part of a statesman as he read a postelection address.In the 18 years since he formed the Mahdi Army militia to battle occupying U.S. forces, the onetime firebrand has refined his delivery. His formal Arabic is more proficient, and his voice more assured. Looking up to address the camera, he raised a finger in emphasis in remarks carefully crafted to send messages to both the United States and Iran after his party picked up seats in last week’s parliamentary election.In 2004, as Mr. al-Sadr’s fighters took on U.S. forces with rifles and rocket-propelled grenades in Baghdad and across the southern provinces, the United States pledged to kill or capture the Shiite cleric.Next to Al Qaeda, he posed the biggest threat to the American occupation in Iraq, miring U.S. troops in fighting in the streets and alleys of Iraqi cities as the military fought both Sunni and Shiite-based insurgencies.A member of Mr. al-Sadr’s militia, the Mahdi Army,  firing a rocket-propelled grenade toward American tanks in Sadr City in 2004.Joao Silva for The New York TimesAlthough still unpredictable, the cleric is consistently an Iraqi nationalist and now seems to be emerging as an arm’s-length American ally, helping the United States by preventing Iraq from tilting further into Iran’s axis.“All embassies are welcome, as long as they do not interfere in Iraqi affairs and government formation,” Mr. al-Sadr said in a reference aimed at the United States, whose embassy was stormed two years ago by what were believed to be members of Kitaib Hezbollah, one of the biggest Iranian-backed Iraqi militias. “Iraq is for Iraqis only.”In preliminary results from last Sunday’s elections, the Sadrist Movement gained roughly 20 seats, giving it up to 73 seats in the 329-member parliament. That leaves Mr. al-Sadr with the biggest single bloc in Parliament and a decisive voice in choosing the next Iraqi prime minister.In his remarks, the cleric made a pointed reference to Iranian-backed militias, some of which have grown more powerful than Iraq’s official security forces and pose a threat to the United States in Iraq.“From now on, arms must be restricted in the hands of the state,” he said in the address, broadcast on Iraqi state television. “The use of weapons shall be prevented outside of the state’s framework.” Even for those claiming to be the “resistance” to the U.S. presence, he said, “it is time for the people to live in peace, without occupation, terrorism, militias, kidnapping and fear.”The self-styled resistance groups are the same Iranian-backed militias that launched drone and rocket attacks on the American Embassy and U.S. military bases after the U.S. killing of a leading Iranian commander, Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, and a senior Iraqi security official in Baghdad last year.An aide to the Shiite cleric said disarming groups that are not under government control would also apply to Mr. al-Sadr’s own militia forces.“No country wants forces that are stronger than its army,” said Dhia al-Assadi, a former top official in the cleric’s political movement. He said Mr. al-Sadr would leave it to the incoming government to decide whether U.S. forces should remain in Iraq.The United States has agreed to withdraw all combat troops from the country by Dec. 31, although Washington does not consider its troops there currently to be on a combat mission. Under that agreement, the number of U.S. forces — about 2,000 in Iraq at Baghdad’s invitation — is expected to remain the same.American troops fought the Mahdi Army in Najaf in 2004 on a mission to capture or kill the cleric. Then U.S. officials changed their minds. Tyler Hicks/The New York Times“That is labeling or classifying the troops as trainers and not fighters,” said Mr. al-Assadi, who served as the head of Mr. al-Sadr’s former Ahrar political bloc. “The decision should be revisited again and decided by Parliament and the government.”Mr. al-Assadi said he does not foresee any change in an existing ban on senior officials of the Sadrist Movement from meeting with U.S. or British officials.Once a fierce sectarian defender of Iraq’s Shiite majority, Mr. al-Sadr has expanded his reach in recent years, reaching out to Sunnis, Christians and other minorities. After telling his followers to protect Christians, young men from Mr. Sadr’s stronghold in the mostly Shiite neighborhood of Baghdad’s Sadr City began wearing large crosses around their necks in a sign of solidarity. In a previous election, the Sadrists formed an alliance with the Communist Party, which is officially atheist.Externally, he has fostered relations with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates at a time when those countries’ Sunni Arab rulers were hostile to Iraq’s Shiite-led government. Domestically, one of his main demands is to clean up Iraq’s dysfunctional and deeply corrupt political system, which appoints people to senior government posts on the basis of party loyalty rather than competence.“He has grown and evolved,” said Nabeel Khoury, a former U.S. State Department official who served in Iraq in 2003. “But I think to some extent we underestimated him in the very beginning.”Mr. Khoury said that he was approached in 2003 by Mr. al-Sadr’s aides as Iraq’s first governing council was being decided.“We had coffee, we talked and they said Sadr was interested in playing a political role,” said Mr. Khoury, a fellow at the Atlantic Council. But Iraqi political figures who had returned from exile did not want Mr. al-Sadr involved, Mr. Khoury said, and the United States followed their counsel.A few months later, the cleric formed his Mahdi Army militia to fight occupying troops.When U.S. forces had an opportunity to kill Mr. al-Sadr during a battle in Najaf, Washington told them to stand down, also on the advice of the Iraqi expatriate politicians, said Mr. Khoury, adding: “They knew if Sadr was killed it would become a big problem for them.”Mr. al-Sadr, 47, is the youngest son of a revered cleric, Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr, who was assassinated by Saddam Hussein in 1999 after demanding religious freedom for Iraq’s Shiites. The Sadr family commands the loyalty of millions, many of them poor and disposed, most of whom believe his election win was ordained by God.Mr. al-Sadr at the podium. Once a firebrand enemy of the U.S., he has adopted a more conciliatory stance, emerging as an arm’s-length ally of Washington and one of the country’s major political players.Alaa Al-Marjani/ReutersIn Sadr City, the Sadrist organization provides food, support for orphans and widows and many other services the Iraqi government fails to deliver.“He would like to achieve certain objectives, and the main objective is social justice,” said Mr. al-Assadi of the cleric’s aims. He likened Mr. al-Sadr’s goals to those of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. or Mahatma Ghandi.But unlike the Black civil rights leader or India’s pacifist icon, Mr. al-Sadr has overseen an armed militia that has waxed and waned but never entirely gone away.The Mahdi Army has been blamed for fueling Iraq’s past sectarian violence. As it battled with Sunni fighters of Al Qaeda for supremacy in Iraq between 2006 and 2008, Mr. al-Sadr’s fighters were accused of running death squads and conducting sectarian cleansings of Baghdad neighborhoods.Mr. al-Sadr has said that not all the fighters were under his control.In 2008, after losing a fight with Iraqi government forces for control of Basra, Mr. al-Sadr — who lacks the religious credentials of his father — abruptly left for Iran to pursue his theological studies.Yet he has long had an uneasy relationship with Tehran, and while he cannot afford to antagonize its leaders, he advocates an Iraq free of both Iranian and American influence.“I think he has his own space in which he walks, and his base is not dictated by any country, especially not the Iranians,” said Elie Abouaoun, a director at the United States Institute of Peace, a U.S. government-funded think tank. “I think that he is much less sectarian than many, many others because he has a nationalist vision of Iraq.” More