Thursday, August 26, 2004

I was reading the details of the new As-Sadr-Sistani agreement. I think that As-Sadr may wind up gaining, yet again. Contrary to widespread press and government speculation in the US, Sistani seems to often come to the rescue of As-Sadr, perhaps because he is sensitive to his popular base. In the last speech on Iraq by Hasan Nasrallah last week, I also noticed that he defended "those Shi`ite authorities" that are being criticized--in clear reference to Sistani who has been coming under criticisms in the Arab world. Nasrallah asserted that those "authorities" are not far from the position of As-Sadr. It seems that he was right. Based on what I have read so far from tomorrow's Arabic papers and sites, all in all, As-Sadr is still ahead of the puppet government--in political calculations. I also believe that the Iraqi puppet government and US forces did not think that the Najaf battle would drag that long, and they also miscalculated in trusting that the Iraqi puppet forces would be willing to do the killing job. And "Bush" was not going to allow the matter to overshadow his crowning convention...In other news, the New York Times is still busy celebrating the Israeli win in the Olympics, and they will have a special pull-out section tomorrow in celebration.