Anti-occupation Iraqis to fight elections. posted by lenin

This is excellent news:

Radical Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said Wednesday he would present a joint list of candidates with Sunni Arabs in the Al-Anbar Province to contest the upcoming legislative elections.

His comments come shortly after three Sunni Arab parties set up a coalition to contest the December 15 elections.

Sadr's organization said it decided to ally itself with the Sunnis due to "the difficult situation facing the country, to prevent the occupier and enemies of Iraq from attaining their goals, to consolidate national identity and to reaffirm its unity."

Al-Anbar includes the rebel strongholds of Ramadi and Fallujah, which overwhelmingly rejected the Iraq constitution that was approved by referendum on October 15.

Sadr's office said: "Deputy Fattah al-Sheikh has been designated to form a list in Al-Anbar for the elections." Sheikh told AFP he would "run in Al-Anbar at the head of a list that includes eight Sunni candidates.

"Consultations have taken place in recent days to create a national Islamic force" to run against a secular bloc being mooted by former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, he said. The talks are continuing, he added.

As divisive as the constitution is, this attempt to overcome such divisions and forge Iraqi unity is both welcome and entirely consistent with the unity displayed by Sadr's supporters with anti-occupation Sunnis in the past, both over the constitution and the occupation. Perhaps this will put an end to the false dichotomy between Sunnis and Shiites, and give serious political expression to the real division, that between the majority who oppose the occupation and those who want it to continue. Incidentally, Sadr and Sunni leaders have both declared the constitution results to be faked.

Meanwhile, Meaders draws attention to an interesting interview with Iraqi resistance fighters, particularly a guy named Abu Theeb, an opponent of Saddam ever since the invasion of Kuwait. As frequently happened in Iraq, rejection of Saddam's dictatorship drove him toward political Islam. He now fights the Americans, planting those dreaded IEDs on the roadside for the tanks and military convoys to cop. He describes how initially Zarqawi's so-called 'Al Qaeda' group was welcomed by Sunni fighters because of its military adeptness: "They attacked all the centres of the Iraqi state and prevented the Americans from creating a puppet state that they could hand everything to." However, the willingness of that group to target Iraqi civilians, their sectarianism towards Shiites, and the demand for a "Caliphate" has alienated Iraqi nationalists. Consequently, he and his men defended Sunnis as they went to try and vote down the constitution, while Iraqi fighters have clashed with 'Al Qaeda' repeatedly.

This is an American nightmare: a national political bloc expressing occupation to the occupation contiguous with an armed resistance that both seeks to drive out the occupiers and unite and protect Iraqis (rather than divide and attack them).