Shi'ite unity deal explodes US myth

[FarCenter]

By Gareth Porter http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/KH11Ak06.html

WASHINGTON - The agreement announced last week between Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and a Shi'ite resistance group called the League of the Righteous (As'ib al Haq) formally ended the group's armed opposition to the regime in return for the release of its leader and eight other Shi'ite detainees. This deals a final blow to the US military's narrative of an Iranian "proxy war" in Iraq.

The US command in Iraq has long argued that Iran was using "special groups" of Shi'ite insurgents who had broken away from cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army to destabilize the US-supported Iraqi regime - but pro-Iranian groups were weakened by US military pressures throughout 2007 and defeated by the Maliki regime in 2008.

The history of the new agreement confirms what was evident from existing information: the League of the Righteous was actually the underground wing of the Mahdi Army all along, and the Sadrist insurgents were secretly working closely with the Maliki regime against the Americans and the British - even as it was at war with armed elements within the regime.

The contradictory nature of the relationship between Maliki and the Sadrists reflects the tensions between pro-Sadrist elements within the regime - including Maliki's Da'wa Party - and the anti-Sadrist elements led by the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq.

The relationship between Maliki and the US was also marked by contradictions. Even though he was ostensibly cooperating with the US against the Sadrists in 2007 and 2008, the Maliki regime was also cooperating secretly with the Sadrist forces against the Americans. And Maliki - with the encouragement of Iran - was working on a strategy for achieving the complete withdrawal of US forces from Iraq through diplomatic means, which he did not reveal to the Americans until summer 2008.

Meanwhile, the Iranian Qods Force commander was playing the role of mediator between Maliki and the Sadrists, encouraging the latter to reach ceasefires with the government on the promise that he would get American troops out of the country.

Representatives of the League of the Righteous have said their reconciliation with Maliki is based on a common aim of expelling the US military influence from Iraq.

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[jody]

1. Iranian group brokered an agreement between rival Iraqi Shi'ite groups against the US. The enemy of

my enemy is my friend and the U.S. is the enemy of way too many foreign countries.

[stray cat]

2. Myth? The dead Shia and Sunni that died in ethnic killings are not a myth

[FarCenter]

3. The myth was that the Shiite's in the Sadrist and SCRI factions were enemies

Now that the US is leaving, the Shiite will unite and resume the civil war with the Sunnis and the Kurds.

[snagglepuss]

4. i understand why Kurds and Sunnis don't get along. But why don't the

Shiite get along with the Kurds? Were't they both oppresed by the Sunnis.