19 - 25 April 2007 Issue No. 841 Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/841/op122.htm Questioning the Shia crescent In the first of two pieces examining Iran's rising regional role, Amal Saad-Ghorayeb* argues that rather than building a sectarian alliance, Iran in Iraq aims to confront US-led imperialism The notion of an Iraq-inspired model of Shia empowerment, which an emboldened Iran has exploited for the purpose of creating a "Shia Crescent", grouping itself with Iraq, Lebanon and Syria, has gained much currency in academic, media and political circles in the West and the Arab world. Yet the theory is seriously flawed, underpinned by faulty premises, not the least of which is the assumption that the Shia experience in Iraq has raised the political consciousness of Shias elsewhere on account of sectarian identity. Such a view oversimplifies Shia identity politics by overlooking competing interpretations of what it means to be Shia, and ignoring alternative notions of Shia empowerment. The accommodation of a significant segment of Shia political forces in Iraq to the US occupation has been due in part -- or at least legitimised by -- the politically quietist trend of Shia jurisprudence typified by Ayatollah Abul-Qassim Khoei and his successor Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani who placed primacy on religious and scholarly matters over political ones. Opposing this persuasion is the more widely observed politically activist school of thought developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s by clerics such as Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Sayed Mohamed Baqir Al-Sadr, Imam Moussa Al-Sadr and Sayed Mohamed Hussein Fadallah. As redefined by these jurists, Shiism is not merely an ascribed cultural identity but a political one shaped by a historical sense of injustice and rejection of oppression and humiliation, as epitomised by Imam Hussein whose martyrdom served as a revolutionary paradigm for Shia believers. In this understanding, the concept of power is synonymous with resistance to oppression and subordination, and the restitution of justice, freedom, dignity and honour. The "Husseini" political culture has been translated into a staunchly anti-Israel, anti-imperialist, pro-resistance Shia political identity, which finds its embodiment today in Hizbullah and Iran -- the true models of political empowerment for Shias -- rather than the Shia dominated Iraqi government. Both share a conceptualisation of political power distinct from the Iraqi Shia conception. Thus, contrary to popular wisdom, the protest campaign launched by Hizbullah and its local allies does not aim at securing a greater share of political power for the Shia community. The party's fundamental objectives relate to protecting what it refers to as its "resistance priority" in safeguarding Lebanon's sovereignty from US and Western diktat. In fact, neither after Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, nor after its defeat in the July war of 2006, did Hizbullah seek to make any meaningful political capital out of its military successes. Hizbullah's Shia supporters give precedence to its resistance over any political gains the party, or the community as a whole, could potentially make in a more representative political system. According to the findings of a poll conducted in March by the reputed Beirut Centre for Research and Information (BCRI), 98 per cent of Shia respondents claimed they would refuse to disarm the resistance in exchange for more political power for the Shia community should such a trade-off ever be proposed. As perceived by Lebanon's Shias and Hizbullah itself, the continued Israeli occupation of Lebanese land and the perceived threat which Israel poses to Lebanon, coupled with flagrant US and French intervention in Lebanese affairs, has seriously compromised Lebanon's sovereignty and independence. A larger stake in the political system, commensurate with the community's size, would actually amount to disempowerment if it was won by acquiescing to the US- Israeli demand for Hizbullah's disarmament and submitting to US and French tutelage over Lebanon. A similar logic governs Lebanese Shias' attitudes towards the Shia dominated Iraqi government: 75 per cent of Shia respondents in the BCRI poll claimed they did not view the Shia- dominated government as a legitimate national entity, while 60 per cent could not find a justification for the alliance of Iraqi Shia officials with the US. For Hizbullah and the Lebanese Shia community, as well as others who share this political identity, political power is not to be confused with public office in a context of military occupation and/or political domination. Real empowerment lies in resistance. It is precisely this tendency to conflate being in power with empowerment that has given rise to the misconception of an Iraqi Shia model of communal empowerment. Viewed from the Shia activist lens, the domination of Iraqi Shias in the Iraqi political system today has merely substituted oppression under Saddam Hussein's dictatorship for subservience to the US-led occupation. The notion of a Shia-dominated state installed by occupation forces --none less than those of the "Great Satan" -- does not constitute empowerment, and would in fact be deemed oxymoronic if the state in question were a US-supported Shia theocracy. While Hizbullah's stand towards the Iraqi government has been shrouded in ambiguity, one can detect a considerable degree of political distance from Iraq's Shia dominated authority, which in several instances earned Hizbullah the reproach of Iraqi Shias. As such, Hizbullah has adopted a policy of constructive ambiguity, by confining its vitriol to US occupation forces and supporting the Iraqi resistance, while expressing only veiled criticisms of the government so as to avoid alienating Iraqi Shias or creating an internal Shia rift. Casting aside the as yet unsubstantiated reports of Hizbullah's alleged involvement in resistance activities in Iraq, the party has consistently and strongly denounced the US-led occupation which brought the government to power and with which it is allied. In a May 2004 speech, the Hizbullah secretary-general, Sayed Hassan Nasrallah, imputed the occupation of Iraq with the same degree of illegitimacy and iniquity as Israel's occupation of Palestinian land: "this occupation [of Iraq] is a replica of the same quality and identity [as the Israeli occupation] in its hegemony, monstrosity, devastation, perpetration and committing massacres under the same slogans of civilisation, democracy and human rights." It necessarily follows that armed resistance to this occupation becomes as religious and moral a duty as is the resistance to Israeli occupation. This is signified by Nasrallah's reference to the armed struggle against the occupation of Iraq as a "jihad" and as Iraq's "salvation", in a January speech. Though Hizbullah has not admitted as much, the fact that the government -- with the exception of Muqtada Al-Sadr's Mahdi Army -- has not only failed to partake in the resistance to occupation, but has capitulated to it, has most likely served to call its legitimacy into question and set it apart from the Shia political identity which characterises Hizbullah and its supporters. Nasrallah's call, on the eve of the US-led invasion in March 2003, for reconciliation between the Iraqi Shia opposition and the Saddam regime, along the lines of the Lebanese Taif Accord, was a clear attempt to dissuade the Shias from collaborating with the would-be occupiers and from making any political gains out of the impending occupation. The implication of Hizbullah's preference for a compromise with the former oppressor of Shias, Saddam, over cooperation with the occupation forces, is that the latter is more oppressive than the former and hence any political authority associated with it, is devoid of legitimacy. That Nasrallah only professes solidarity with the Iraqi "people" and "resistance", at the exclusion of the Iraqi state or government, lends further credence to this inference, as does his assertion in January of this year: "they [the Iraqis] find their rectitude in the political process. Should they ask me and according to my Lebanese experience... I would say the Americans did not come to establish democratic institutions in Iraq nor even a centralised democratic Iraq. The Americans came to divide Iraq and the entire region." Despite its circuitousness, the statement signifies Hizbullah's reluctance to endorse the political process which swept Shia political forces, close to the party's main ally, Iran, to power. Moreover, while members of the United Iraqi Alliance, with the exception of Al-Sadr's movement, have lobbied hard for a federal state, Hizbullah has repeatedly voiced its rejection of an alleged American plot to partition Iraq, as the above statement demonstrates. If Hizbullah truly did harbour ambitions to join a Shia crescent, then it would have surely warmed to the idea of an oil-rich Shia region, contiguous to Iran. In effect, Hizbullah does not identify with Iraqi Shia authorities, let alone aspire to join forces with them as part of a Shia strategic alliance. Although Iran shares Hizbullah's interpretation of empowerment, in so far as its foreign policy is characterised by political resistance to "imperialist" powers and Zionism, its approach to Iraq is more nuanced than Hizbullah's and fulfils wider strategic aims. As a state actor, and a regional powerhouse, Iran has a definition of political power that is identical with "soft power" -- the power to affect behaviour by means of ideological or cultural influence. The endeavour to exert soft power is essentially a political, not a cultural, exercise in ideological infiltration; exporting political Shiism -- that is, Shiism as a political identity -- rather than cultural proselytisation. In turn, this type of influence ultimately serves both Iran's ideological and strategic regional interests. Iran, therefore, is projecting its power in Iraq as a state pursuing national and ideological interests rather than as a Shia power bent on creating a cultural or sectarian axis. While there can be no denying that Iran has forged close cultural ties with various Shia groups and individuals who make up the Iraqi government and religious establishment, this political and cultural proximity is not an end in itself. The ideological and strategic alliance between Iran and Sunni Hamas, as well as secular and predominantly Sunni Syria, illustrates the non-sectarian objectives that inform Iran's foreign policy. Having said that, one cannot ignore the extent to which Iran's support for the Iraqi government has become a liability for it in the short term, in that its perceived Shia bias and alleged tacit collusion with the US has undermined Iran's influence among Sunnis. However, Iran's Iraq policy is in fact two-pronged in that backs the Iraqi government on the one hand while providing some support to resistance groups on the other. Branded a "schizophrenic policy" by Zalmay Khalilzad, outgoing US ambassador to Iraq, this duality could be more accurately labelled "calculated ambivalence", designed to secure Iran's interests in Iraq and the region as a whole. As many observers have noted, Iran has greatly benefited from the ouster of Saddam Hussein who had waged a costly war against it in the 1980s. Accordingly, Iran took a "neutral" position vis-à-vis the "fighting" that followed the invasion, since "both parties to the conflict were oppressors", as articulated by Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Branding the invasion an act of "aggression", Iran hailed democratic elections as the antidote to occupation as early as March 2003 when Khamenei declared that, "the people of Iraq can decide their future and their next government by going to the polls and casting their votes." For Khamenei, elections were an indication that the Iraqis were taking matters into their own hands, thereby expediting an American withdrawal. In contrast to Hizbullah, which tends to identify the political process in Iraq with the US-led occupation, Iran views the elections as not only distinct from but also anathema to US policy. Referring to the US's earlier attempt to confine the scope of elections and to postpone them indefinitely, in an August 2005 speech Khamenei praised the role of Ayatollah Sistani and others in insisting on free and early elections. This positive view of the political process has enabled Iran to confer its legitimacy upon the Iraqi government and wholeheartedly support it as the first truly "popular government" in Iraq, which defied US wishes for a "puppet regime", as described by Khamenei. While government forces have, by and large, chosen not to resist the occupation, Iran sees in the Iraqi government a potentially like-minded regional ally, which, under Iran's influence, could become another anti-imperialist, anti-Zionist, pro-resistance outpost in the region. Instilling such a sense of political identity in Iraq's Shias therefore necessitates that Iran wrest Iraq away from the US, by maintaining close ties with Shia political forces. Viewed from this perspective, Iran's support for the Iraqi government undermines US control over Iraq, just as military resistance does. Not only does this strategy realise Iran's ideological objectives, but it also serves its national interests by strengthening Iran's bargaining position with the US. Though the viability of this strategy has yet to be tested, the recent threat issued by Moqtada Al-Sadr -- whose Shia movement was once one of the most autonomous from Iranian control -- to retaliate against US forces in the event of an attack on Iran, suggests that Iran's policy appears to be reaping some early dividends. Harder to discern is the nature and extent of Iran's support for resistance groups. As rhetorically and ideologically opposed to the occupation of Iraq as Iran is, it has remained tight- lipped about the need and obligation to resist. While Iranian officials express their support for the resistance in Iraq -- though almost always in the same breath as resistance movements in other countries -- this does not translate into an active call to resist as it does in other regional contexts such as Lebanon or Palestine. Unlike non-state actors such as Hizbullah, Iran does not have the luxury of ideological posturing on the merits of resistance, nor the political incentive to encourage it. First, Iran is keen to avoid further blame for US military failure in Iraq in a climate of abundant reports of Iran's increased support for the Mahdi Army and its offshoots, among others, coupled with accusations about Iranian arms shipments to Shia militant groups, the most recent being that of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) used against coalition forces. With US sabre rattling about striking Iranian nuclear sites, Iran does not want to give its long time foe ammunition to use against it. Second, Iran cannot provide full political or military support to resistance groups as this would undermine the Iraqi government and hence split Shias into Arab and Persian camps while spiralling Iraq into unmanageable chaos. Finally, a mass resistance campaign, with or without a US exit from Iraq, would deprive Iran of a valuable bargaining card vis-à-vis the US, hence Iran's preference for the current scope of resistance. Though some have interpreted this preference as "collusion" with the US, it is more akin to entrapment. The presence of American troops in Iraq presents Iran with an ideal battleground in which it could respond to a potential US attack on it. This line of reasoning is reinforced by Sadr's threat to retaliate against US forces both "inside and outside Iraq". It is even more clearly substantiated by Khamenei's recent threat to respond to a US attack on Iran with "a comprehensive reaction to the invaders and their interests all over the world." As cited by an Iranian official in a 2005 International Crisis Group report, the US occupation of Iraq has provided Iran with "140,000 hostages". To keep the US hostage, Iran needs the right dose of resistance activity with which it can slowly bleed US forces inside Iraq, and enough losses with which to threaten the US. This conclusion is bolstered by Al-Sadr's threat to retaliate against US forces both "inside and outside Iraq". It is even more clearly substantiated by Khamenei's recent threat to respond to a US attack on Iran with "a comprehensive reaction to the invaders and their interests all over the world". In the final analysis, Iran's policy in Iraq has much less to do with building Shia regional alliances than with confronting US hegemony in the region. * The writer is a leading Lebanese expert on Hizbullah and a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment Middle East Centre. She is the author of Hizbullah: Politics and Religion, Pluto Press
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