Word: dawa
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...power and a deep-seated distrust of U.S. motives. Backed by Grand Ayatullah Ali Husaini Sistani, the supreme religious leader of Iraq's Shi'ite majority, the U.I.A. includes the country's strongest Shi'ite parties, among them the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (S.C.I.R.I.) and the Dawa Party, which have close links to Iran. It also includes such wild cards as former Pentagon favorite Ahmad Chalabi as well as representatives of Muqtada al-Sadr, the radical Shi'ite leader whose militias were fighting pitched battles with U.S. troops less than a year...
Speculation in the Iraqi media centers on three candidates, all considered religious moderates: the Dawa Party's Ibrahim al-Jaffari, S.C.I.R.I.'s Adil Abd al-Mahdi and Sistani prot??g?? Hussein Shahristani. Whoever gets the nod, Washington will find itself having to deal with a group that has no natural affinity with the U.S. "These are all people who have one reason or another to dislike America," says pollster Sadoun al-Dulame, executive director of the Iraq Center for Research and Strategic Studies. "If George Bush has to do business with these people, well, good luck...
...Iraq's Shiite majority, who has declared it a religious duty to go to the polls (an act that for many Iraqis will require considerable physical courage). The list's grounding in the most popular Shiite parties (the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, and the Dawa Party) and its blessing by Sistani, make it the favorite to emerge with the largest share of seats in the National Assembly, and its leading candidates are likely to be top contenders for the jobs of Allawi and others in the current interim government. The new assembly must elect...
...national character and its backing by the clerical leadership and the two most popular parties in Iraq (SCIRI and the Dawa) make the Iraqi United Alliance favorites to emerge as the largest bloc in the National Assembly - particularly given the fact that substantial numbers of Sunnis are expected to stay away from the polls, thereby amplifying the power of the Shiite vote. Not all Shiites will vote for the UIA list, of course, but it is well-placed to carry a majority of them. Allawi has the advantage of greater access to the government-controlled media, but the Shiite list...
...while Shaalan's suggestion that the IUA is an "Iranian list" smacks of partisan mudslinging - the SCIRI and Dawa, after all, participate at cabinet level in Allawi's government, and served in the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council before that - both groups are certainly closer to Tehran, where they were based during their years in exile, than they are to Washington. U.S. officials have drawn comfort from the fact that Sistani, and much of the Iraqi Shiite clerical establishment, opposes the Iranian view that clerics ought to hold political power. Leaders of both SCIRI and Dawa have been somewhat ambiguous...