The return of the Iraqi street

Ali Mamouri writes this week, “The July 16 killing of Muntazar al-Hilfi by police in al-Madina, north of Basra, during a protest for improved services was redolent of the death of Tunisian Mohamed Bouazizi on Jan. 4, 2011.” Al-Hilfi’s killing energized anti-corruption protests in central and southern Iraq, which have continued in some form until now.

While religious authorities in Najaf, including Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, have backed the demonstrations, Mamouri observes, “It was striking that Iranian official authorities and Iraqi parties known for their loyalty to Iran strongly opposed the popular protests, leveling numerous accusations against them and trying to stop them. It is noteworthy that pro-Iran Islamic parties dominating government were targeted by protesters because of their poor governing performance.”

Mamouri adds, “The ongoing protests in Iraq have brought together religious, civilian, secularist, communist and other communities. They all seek to reform the system and eradicate corruption within the Iraqi government. It seems that religious slogans and figures, especially Sistani, are exploited to attack the protests in order to create a rift between the protesters. … The situation on the ground indicates that the Iranian or pro-Iran movements’ attacks and assaults on protesters by accusing them of being anti-religion, breaching religion or being affiliated to IS [Islamic State] aim to defend specific Islamist parties with regional alliances with Iran. In light of the Iranian authorities’ explicit attack on the protests and Sistani’s support for them, conflict between the two camps on the way to deal with Iraqi affairs seems to loom in the horizon. While Iran wants Iraq to be a key element in its regional camp against Saudi Arabia, Sistani wants to distance Iraq from the ongoing regional conflicts, as much as possible, to allow it to make independent decisions within the framework of an efficient and stable civil state.”

Mustafa al-Kadhimi writes that despite the Iraqi parliament’s endorsement of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s reform package, “The difficulty of this task lies not only in the lack of required professional and scientific experts to deal with the situation — especially in light of the major brain drain in all domains during the past decade — but also in the will of Iraqi politicians to adopt the philosophy of reform in the interest of unity and society.”