Here Dave Packer looks at some recent developments After much horse-trading and delay a new government is about to be formed. Meanwhile Moqtada al-Sadr with the tacit support of al- Sistani, called the biggest demonstration since the invasion, on April 9, when 300,000 Iraqis rallied in Baghdad against the occupation, calling for the immediate departure of foreign troops. The militant rally did not celebrate the 'liberation', but threw down the effigies of Bush and Blair as well as Saddam. It was mainly composed of poor Shi'a from Sadr City, a large suburb in the east of Baghdad. Significantly, the Association of Muslim Scholars called for demonstrations on the same day in the so-called Sunni triangle. Last year, on the eve of the first anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, March 19, thousands of Shi'a marched down from the Khadamiya district in Baghdad and crossed the Tigris, meeting thousands of Sunni Iraqis who had marched from their own mosque to join them. This expression of unity was organized by groups that later supported the Iraqi National Foundation Congress. The INFC, set up in May 2004, is a broad coalition of Iraqi political forces, 4 9400L a possible nucleus for the emergence of a united front against the occupation (see below). These events expose the lies of Bush and Blair that opposition to their occupation is confined to Sunnis, who, they claim, are either supporters of the former Saddam regime or fundamentalists linked to al-Qaeda. Since the election the resistance continues, but with some sections adopting new tactics. Election results Socialist Outlook supported participation in the elections on balance, despite their flawed character and the controversy that surrounded them, and despite the refusal of the leading Sunni parties to participate. The US conceded to the pressure of the long campaign for elections by the Shi'a majority, under the leadership of al-Sistani, and the Kurds, who together make a majority of the population of Iraq. The American administration and its Iraqi puppets made a virtue out of necessity. Of course, the election was an American-brokered event, carried out under the Transitional IRAQ After the Elections The last issue of Socialist Outlook went to press just before the Iraqi elections on January 30. Administrative Law (TAL), and approved by the unelected Interim Iraqi Governing Council. Not only were the elections manipulated, the formation of the new government remains open to further US manipulation. The Iraqi people still do not run their own country, but this does not mean that nothing has changed. The main purpose of the national assembly is to draft a new constitution by August, which is to be finalised and voted in October. If the constitution is adopted, new parliamentary elections will be held in December. However, the Bush administration and their stooge interim Prime Minister Allawi, have made it clear that they want the new National Assembly to rubber stamp the interim constitution already in place, rather than draw up a new one. This had already been rejected by the Shi a majority leaders before the election, because it precludes Iraq from becoming an Islamic Republic like Iran. According to Scott Ritter, the ex-UN Weapons Inspector, the official election results were probably doctored behind closed doors,
so that the country's large Shi'a majority gained only 48 per cent of the vote, while the Kurdish Alliance obtained 26 per cent, and the American puppet Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's coalition party managed 13 per cent. The Iraqi List and others also gained 13 per cent. Ritter argues that the interim constitution. ...had no chance of survival had the Shi a won an outright majority of the vote in the Iraqi election. 'If it [the percentage of Shi a votes] had been higher, the [Shi'a] slate would be seen with a lot more trepidation. a senior U.S. State Department official said The problem is, there is good reason to believe that the percentage of votes for the Shi'a was higher - much higher. Well-placed sources in Iraq who were in a position to know have told me that the actual Shi'a vote was 56 per cent. American intervention, in the form of a 'secret vote count', conducted behind closed doors and away from public scrutiny; produced the February 14 result. The lowering of the Shi'a vote re-engineered the post-election political landscape in Iraq dramatically! Be that as it may, the Shi'a dominated United Iraq Alliance has a slim majority of 140 seats out of 275 in the new Assembly. Despite this, political infighting has raged behind the scenes as the major political alliances vie to get their candidates positioned in the new government. Institutionalised communalist blocs would be an ideal outcome for Imperialist 'divide and rule' tactics. Already the US has managed to lever their ex CIA puppet Ayad Allawi into the government - four cabinet posts have been allocated to his bloc. The government is to be called the National Unity Government. threatened that his bloc, holding 40 out of 275 seats, would go into opposition against a ruling coalition if it were dominated by a Shi'a alliance. If the US manages to stop the Shi'a majority from achieving its objectives it may ignite a violent insurrectionary movement, which so far they have managed to avoid. However, the American forces and their 'allies' in the leadership of the Kurdish alliance, who have their own national objectives - a fully fledged, autonomous Kurdistan province - have expressed fears that the new prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, leader of the Shi'a Da'wa Party and supported by al-Sistani, will pursue an Islamist agenda and build an Islamic state allied to Iran. But, they also fear that Al-Jaafrari will bow to mass pressure and demand the expulsion of the occupation forces as he had promised. 'Troops out, is what the overwhelming majority of Iraqis want and voted for, however, no Shi'ite or Kurdish party leader, nor al-Sistani himself is contemplating this at this stage. Predictably, al-Jafaari has said repeatedly that immediate withdrawal outcome of the elections confirms that it was not a genuinely free expression of the views of the Iraqi people. Recent developments only undermine the legitimacy of the elections and the new government in the eyes of the masses. As a response to the paralysis of the new government we may see a greater political unity within the mass anti- occupation resistance between the Sunni and Shi a communities. Big demonstrations According to Jonathan Steele, of The Guardian, some Sunnis were also on the big April 9 demonstration, urged to participate by the Association of Muslim Scholars, which has contacts with the Sunni armed resistance. He suggested that it was also significant, that Moqtada al-Sadr, had developed links with the Iraqi National Foundation Congress. The INFC is an umbrella group that includes left forces, nationalists, various tendencies, both Shi'a and Sunni, who opposed Saddam's regime and who refused to be part of any US-installed political body? unequivocally for the immediate opposition to any possible division of Iraq's territory and people on religious or sectarian basis. The alliance condemned the US-led offensives against both the mainly Shi'ite city of Najaf and the mainly Sunni city of Fallujah, and, according to its spokesperson, has been instrumental in defusing sectarian tension in Kirkuk and Mosul. A number of reports suggest the INFC alliance is conscious of the occupiers' strategy of fomenting sectarian strife, and strives to bring together in a united front, Sunni and Shi'a Muslims, Arabs, Kurds, Turcomen, Assyrians and other minorities. They have no armed wing, but explicitly support the Iraqis' right to resist 'by all means necessary'. However, it condemns beheadings, hostage-taking, and the killing of non-combatants. They affirm, 'the legitimate right of the Iraqi resistance to defend their country and its destiny', while 'rejecting terrorism aimed at innocent Iraqis, institutions, public buildings and places of worship'. joint INFC statement also says the government, 'will have no right to ratify any agreement or treaty that might affect Iraq's sovereignty, the unity of its territory and the preservation of its resources. If such a policy statement were to be adopted by the Iraqi Government, then the US aim to establish permanent bases in the country would be blocked, representing a major blow to American strategic objectives in the region. Continuing Resistance Imperialism called the elections a great success and an endorsement of its policy, claiming as proof that the number of insurgent attacks has been reduced. In fact the war against the continues: reports suggest that most of western Iraq is beyond US control, while the city of Mosul could explode at any moment and Ramadi is practically a no-go area. Many in the resistance are now differentiating themselves from the mostly fundamentalist, jihadist forces, mainly from outside the country and a few ex-Baathists (together constituting between 5 - 10 per cent of the resistance), who tragically continue their indiscriminate bombings which have caused the death and suffering of many Shi'a Iraqi civilians, often outside Shi'a Mosques. Recently it was widely reported that masked Sunni jihadists had taken 60 Shi'a hostages in the town of Madain, south of Baghdad and threatening them with death unless the Shi'a section of the population left the town. This may be true, but we should remain cautious, not only about misinformation in the media, but of the possible activities of agent provocateurs. At the time of writing, it has been reported that more than 50 bodies have been found in the Tigris river. However, residents in Madain have dismissed the hostage-taking reports. A senior member of the Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars, Abd al-Salam al-Kubaisi. said that the reports were fabricated by the Iraqi government and were an excuse io raid the town and crack down on the tow:: Sunnis. Today, many Sunnis and Shiites c: all political opinions are convinced that a.- Zarqawi is being exploited in a CIA black- ops' designed to exacerbate ethnic tensions. I: certainly fits in with the US agenda. In the present context, and despite the disagreements socialists would have with the Islamist objectives of al-Sadr's programme. new developments such as the INFC alliance. which attempts to cut across communalis: divisions, are positive. The military occupatior. continues to poison and corrupt politica processes in Iraq and foment division. The rebuilding of the infrastructure of country has faltered - electricity is still either nonexistent or unreliable and reports suggest that infant mortality may have doubled since the invasion The Bush administration script is well known: Iraq was 'liberated' from 'tyranny' and the "insurgents' are fighting democracy - of which the elections were the first manifestation. On the contrary: Iraq was conquered, not liberated: the new government will not have any say in economic and oil issues; the resistance fights the occupying power, not democracy.4 In Britain the task for the left is to redouble our demand for the immediate withdrawal of the occupation forces. 1. Scott Ritter, 'Hijacking Democracy in Iraq' Al- terNet, 23 March 2005, www.globalresearch.ca 28 March 2005. Scott Ritter was UN chief weap ons inspector in Iraq from 1991-1998. His book. Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of America's Intelligence Conspiracy, I.B. Tauris (London). is to be published in the summer of 2005 2. The al-Sadr movement, has a representative in the general secretariat. See interview with Sheik Jawad al-Khalisi of the Iraqi National Four- dation Congress. 3. Quotes from Jonathan Steele, 'Don't se fooled by the spin on Iraq. The US is failing •a= hatred of the occupation greater than ever. ThE Guardian, April 13, 2005 4. 'The Shi'ites' Faustian Pact', by Pepe Escoca- ttp://globalresearch.ca/articles/ESC50ZA.~:- 5
ESSO e hidden hand ef Select 66,
requires the (not so well) hidden fist. corporations. As the articles by Jane Kelly and Eric Toussaint show, opinion that, despite his neo-liberal politics and his willingness to wage war in the interests of US and British capital, he is really one of them. The Public Face of