Iraqi Cleric Threatens Action if U.S. Forces Remain

Iraqi crowd chants ‘No, no America’

Followers of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr wave Iraqi flags as they burn an effigy of former U.S. President George W. Bush and U.S. flags on Saturday, April 9, 2011 during a rally marking the eighth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad to American troops. Al-Sadr has threatened to reactivate his feared militia in Iraq if U.S. soldiers extend their stay. (Photo: Karim Kadim / AP)

By Bushra Juhi

April 9, 2011

BAGHDAD — A powerful anti-American Shiite cleric threatened Saturday to reactivate his feared militia if American soldiers remain in Iraq beyond this year, after a U.S. offer to keep troops on if they are needed.

Muqtada al-Sadr issued a statement to his followers on the eighth anniversary of Saddam Hussein’s ouster that stopped just short of calling for violent action against U.S. forces. He accused “the occupation” of inciting panic, corruption and unrest among Iraqis.

His statement was read aloud at a huge protest of tens of thousands in Baghdad’s Mawal Square, near al-Sadr’s stronghold in an eastern Baghdad slum. The cleric is in Iran, where he has been studying religion for the last several years.

“What if the invasion forces will not leave our lands?” al-Sadr asked in the statement, which was read at the protest by his aide Salah al-Obeidi. “What if the U.S. forces and others stay in our beloved lands? What if their companies and embassy headquarters will continue to exist with the American flags hoisted on them? Will you be silent? Will you overlook this?”

“No, no America. No, no America,” the crowd shouted in reply. …

Under a security agreement between Washington and Baghdad, U.S. troops are scheduled to leave Iraq at the end of 2011. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who needed al-Sadr’s support to keep his job after his party failed to win a majority in national elections last year, has said repeatedly he believes the American forces will no longer be needed in Iraq by next year.

But many Sunni and Kurdish lawmakers want U.S. troops to stay, fearing Iraq is still too unstable to be able to protect itself should Iran begin to play a more active role in the country after American forces leave. …

Full story

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Down the Memory Hole

Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, U.S. Army:  “The target is Muqtada al-Sadr and his militia. We will hunt them down and we will destroy them” (2004).

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Al-Qaida Nuclear Terror Threat

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