When
Will Washington Get It? Iraq
IS a Proxy War with Iran
by
Professor Rabbi Daniel M. Zucker
Final Jihad, July
17, 2007 Omedia, July 18, 2007 Human Affairs, July 25, 2007 (“Iraq IS a Proxy War with Iran”)
On July 9, 2007 it was reported
that the Iraqi government of Dr. Nouri Kamal al-Maliki had failed to meet many
of the benchmarks set for it.[1] Although there are mixed reports
about the success of the “surge”—significant successes in bringing Sunnis to battle
against al-Qaeda[2] versus horrific daily casualty rates from
suicide car-bombings[3]—it should not come as a major surprise that
the current Iraqi government is not fulfilling its duty to produce a greater
success rate and to foster reconciliation among the three major Iraqi
ethnic/religious groups.
Why? Why shouldn’t we be
surprised at al-Maliki’s failure to meet fully even one US benchmark?
First, let’s review a little
bit of background information. Iraq’s multi-party political system seems to be difficult
for many Westerners to understand. It is essential to overcome this failure of
comprehension and come to a realization that within Iraq’s three major
ethnic/religious communities there are many, many different political parties
and groups. [4] However, one major dividing line within Iraqi
society is not that between ethnic/religious communities (Shi‘ite, Sunni, and
Kurd) but rather between fundamentalist and non-fundamentalist interpretations
of the Islam that is the common religion of the bulk of Iraqis.
Although the political
groupings and coalitions remain complicated, one basically may say that the
non-fundamentalists are willing to build a united independent Iraq; the radical
fundamentalists desire to resurrect the Muslim caliphate. As such, these
fundamentalists[5]—be they Sunnis tied to al-Qaeda, Kurdish
members of Ansar al- Islam/Ansar al-Sunna, or Shi‘ites supporters
of Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim’s SCIRI/SIIC
(Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, aka Supreme Islamic Iraqi
Council) or Moqtada al-Sadr’s Jaish al-Mahdi (the al-Mahdi Army, which
is the militia of the al-Daawa Party, and not coincidently also Nouri
al-Maliki’s political party)—these Iraqi radical fundamentalists are supported
by[6] and beholden to the government of the Islamic Republic of
Iran. Put simply: al-Maliki is not independent; he receives support and is
subservient to the mullahs of Tehran. As long as al-Maliki and his radical
fundamentalist Shi‘ite coalition lead the Iraqi government, Tehran will be
calling the shots.[7] It doesn’t matter that Dr. al-Maliki and his
colleagues wear ties and western suits—they are still Islamist radicals
nonetheless and allies of the Islamic Republic of Iran.[8]
Given the overwhelming evidence
of Iranian support[9] for both the extremist militias of the Sunni
al-Qaéda and the Shi‘ite Badr and Wolf Brigades and al-Mahdi Army[10]
that have caused so much chaos and destruction to Iraqi society[11],
it should be a clear sign that Iran is in control when both Iraqi President
Jalal Talabani[12] and Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki[13]
make frequent visits to Tehran to consult with Iranian President Ahmadinejad
and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It should not come as a great
surprise that the al-Maliki government is not meeting its commitments to the
US. Ayatollah Khamenei doesn’t want to see America help create a real democracy
in Iraq,[14] and al-Maliki is following Khamenei’s orders to prevent
the rise of an independent, secular Iraq.[15] Although subservient
to Iran, al-Maliki’s radical Shi‘ite government currently holds the reins of
power and is content with such an arrangement in which the Sunnis remain
odd-man out. No wonder that there has not yet been any success in enacting a
law for equitable distribution of the oil wealth among the three
ethnic/religious communities.
So what is to be done? What the
American and Western press has failed to report is the fact that nearly half of
the Iraqi electorate has gone on record to indicate opposition to the Islamic
Republic of Iran’s interference in Iraqi national affairs. Out of an electorate
of 11 million potential voters, over 5.2 million have pledged their support to
the Solidarity Congress, an Iraqi coalition of anti-fundamentalist Shi‘ites,
Sunnis, Kurds, and Christians that is led by Dr. Abdullah Hassan al-Jabouri,
former governor of Diyala Province.[16] The Solidarity Congress is
the voice of the silent anti-fundamentalist majority, the good people of Iraq[17]
who oppose fundamentalism, violence, extremism and sectarian prejudice.[18]
If the Solidarity Congress is
able to stand in a new national election—an event that may occur within the
next half year should the al-Maliki government suffer further political erosion
and a non-confidence vote--Iraq could find itself with a government that
believes in a united, secular, democratic Iraq, an Iraq that is neither a
satellite of Iran, nor a candidate for the 51st state. Such an Iraq is just
what is needed for the land of the two rivers.
On the other hand, if the
United States and its allies leave Iraq too precipitously, all the current
successes in opposing al-Qaeda will be reversed, and the Solidarity
Congress will never be given a chance to run for elections—Iran’s radical Iraqi
allies and the Sepah-e Qods agents of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary
Guards Corps/Pasdaran will carry out an horrific assassination campaign
that will smother Iraqi democrats just as done to Iranian democracy advocates
in Iran for the last 28 years.
Without a doubt, the American
initiation of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003 was carried out without
sufficient thought to the consequences of shifting the delicate balance of
power that existed between Iraq and Iran. Nevertheless, having ended the
tyrannical reign of Saddam Hussein, an action that few regret, given his
penchant for cruelty and mass murder in the extreme, it behooves the United
States to assure the Iraqi people that it did not simply exchange a secular
tyrant with its radical religious replacement. Not only would that be an act of
supreme cruelty to the Iraqi people, but, given the stated intentions of Iran’s
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his vocal puppet, President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad, it would guarantee a major victory for the forces of Islamist
radicalism and constitute a major defeat for the West and its way of life.
Although the war in Iraq is messy, as Natan Sharansky recently pointed out,[19]
now is not the time to cut and run—the consequences are too dire to allow for
such a short-sighted policy.
There remains one additional
point that needs to be emphasized. As former US Deputy Undersecretary of
Defense (for President G.H.W. Bush) Jed Babbin wrote in his essay “Let’s undo the concessions to Iran”, www.HumanEvents.com,
July 9, 2007,[20] the Iranian opposition group, the Mojahedin-e Khalq,
currently proscribed for illegitimate political reasons on the American and EU
terrorist lists, as the oldest, best-organized, and most popular Iranian
opposition movement—and the one which Tehran genuinely fears—is capable of changing the regime in Tehran to one that is
at peace with the world. The Iraqi Solidarity Congress and its allies[21]
firmly support the MEK,[22] as they share a genuine
abhorrence of the Islamist fundamentalist radicalism that Iran [23]
and its extremist Shi‘ite allies[24] in the Al-Maliki government
profess. Removing the MEK and the National Council of Resistance of Iran
from the US and EU FTO lists is the first step to winning the war in Iraq and
defeating and removing the mullah regime from power in Iran.[25] The
quicker that is done, the sooner the Middle East will return to a sense of
normalcy and serenity.
Professor
Rabbi Daniel M. Zucker is founder and Chairman of the Board of Americans
for Democracy in the Middle-East, a grassroots organization dedicated to
teaching our elected officials and the public of the dangers posed by Islamic
fundamentalism and the need to establish genuine democratic institutions in the
Middle-East as an antidote to the venom of such fundamentalism.
Notes:
[1] http://apnews.myway.com/article/20070710/D8Q9EA400.html
, http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/3527/Official_US_Finds_Iraq_Failed_All_Benchmarks
, and http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/3523/McCain_Slams_Iraqi_Progress_on_Benchmarks
.
[2]http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0503/p01s04-wome.html
, and http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-op-kagan10jun10,0,1196899.story?coll=la-opinion-center.
[6]http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070711/FOREIGN/107110068/1001,
and http://www.ncr-iran.org/content/view/3825/152/
.
[7] http://www.ncr-iran.org/content/view/3846/152/,
and http://www.iranfocus.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=11686
.
[9] http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110010302
, http://www.ncr-iran.org/content/view/3843/152/
, http://www.ncr-iran.org/content/view/3827/152/
, and http://www.ncr-iran.org/content/view/3836/152/.
[16] http://www.ncr-iran.org/content/view/1791/70/, and http://www.globalpolitician.com/articledes.asp?ID=2635&cid=2&sid=38
.
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