Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
August 8, 2004
NAJAF, Iraq — Iraqi security forces mounted an unsuccessful raid Saturday
to seize rebel cleric Muqtada Sadr, the Shiite Muslim leader blamed by the
United States for a surge in violence in this holy city that has claimed scores,
perhaps hundreds, of lives.
In their first such move against Sadr,
members of the Iraqi National Guard and police tried to arrest him at his home
in Najaf near the Imam Ali shrine, the base from which he had urged followers to
rise up and eject U.S. forces. But the militant leader was not at home.
Fighting eased Saturday after two days of battles between his supporters
and U.S. troops.
Even as Iraqi forces made their move against Sadr,
interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said at a news conference in Baghdad that the
government had received "positive messages" from the cleric and concluded that,
in effect, he was not to blame for the violence.
"These are bandits and
gangs trying to hide behind Muqtada Sadr," Allawi said of the insurgents. "We
don't think those are his people. There is no statement from him committing
himself to them…. That's why I say it's not him."
Allawi also
unveiled a long-awaited amnesty program — albeit much more limited in
scope than expected — for those linked to Iraq's bloody 15-month-old
insurgency.
And in a move that some called an attack on press freedom,
Allawi announced a monthlong shutdown of Al Jazeera news channel's operations in
Iraq, alleging that it fomented hatred and glorified insurgents.
In
Najaf, which has seen the fiercest fighting in Iraq since May, only sporadic
conflict was reported Saturday.
U.S. helicopters and warplanes droned
overhead, and occasional mortar rounds whistled and exploded in the abandoned
streets.
U.S. and Iraqi officials said they had made progress in
retaking control of a cemetery close to the Imam Ali shrine that was being used
as a base and weapons storehouse for members of Sadr's Al Mahdi militia.
The sprawling graveyard, pocked with caves and mausoleums, was the scene of
running battles between militants and U.S. Marines, sometimes leading to
hand-to-hand fighting so close that "you can smell a man," said Lt. Col. John
Mayer, commander of the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit.
"This is the
most intense combat I've seen," said Capt. Coby Moran, operations officer for
the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit, 1st Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment.
U.S. officials Friday put the number of militants killed at 300 but
acknowledged that such battlefield estimates were "always iffy." Sadr's aides
said the figure was closer to three dozen.
Saturday's action culminated
in the surprise move by Iraqi police and the Iraqi national guard to swarm
Sadr's home in an attempt to arrest him.
"We surrounded the house, but
he was not at home," said Gen. Ghalib Hadi Jazaery, Najaf's chief of
police.
Jazaery said his officers were serving an arrest warrant issued
last year against Sadr in the killing of a rival cleric. U.S. troops tried to
serve the warrant in April, igniting an uprising among his followers that lasted
two months and left hundreds of Iraqis dead before ending in an uneasy
cease-fire.
"We want to clean up this city from this devil," Jazaery
said.
There was confusion over who ordered Saturday's arrest attempt.
U.S. officials said they were not involved in the raid. One Iraqi national
guard commander, Lt. Col. Aqeel Khalil, accused Jazaery of grabbing 130 of his
men for the raid without authorization. He said a guardsman was killed and nine
were injured in the raid, and 17 were missing.
"They've become shaken
and scared," Khalil said. "They're in low spirits."
The move against
Sadr came two hours before the expiration of a 6 p.m. deadline set by Najaf
Gov. Adnan Zurfi for all militants hailing from outside Najaf to quit the
city.
Prime Minister Allawi, at his Baghdad news conference, said that
of the 1,000 militants U.S. and Iraqi forces say they have captured, many have
dissociated themselves from Sadr during questioning. He reiterated allegations
by Iraqi officials that most of the fighters had come to Najaf from other cities
or countries, particularly Iran, or were criminals out to wreak havoc.
The seeming contradiction between the attempt to seize Sadr and Allawi's
conciliatory statements may be part of a delicate political balancing act.
The transitional government is keen to stamp out the lawlessness and
violence that have angered Iraqis since the U.S.-led invasion last year, but
officials also desperately want to avoid setting off a rebellion among Iraq's
long-suppressed majority Shiites. The prime minister is a Shiite.
"I
think he tried to play it smart," said Hassan Bazaz, a Baghdad political
analyst. "Let the Americans do and say what they want" — blaming Sadr and
cracking down in Najaf — "while he played it cool."
Pressure from
U.S. and Iraqi forces could therefore help squeeze Sadr into accepting the
government's olive branch. "Put him in the corner and give him just one
alternative," Bazaz said. "It could work."
Associated Press reported
that other Shiite leaders and a U.N. envoy met with Sadr's deputies Saturday to
mediate an end to the conflict.
To persuade others to give up violence,
Allawi announced the limited amnesty program, good for the next 30 days, for
Iraqis guilty of "minor crimes," such as owning weapons or explosives, failing
to pass along knowledge of militant plots or sheltering those involved in
insurgent attacks.
Officials ruled out pardons for anyone directly
involved in fatal assaults such as the suicide bombings that Sunni Muslim-backed
insurgents have used to deadly effect.
The plan fell far short of
expectations, casting doubt on whether it could win over active sympathizers of
the insurgency, which supporters regard as patriotic resistance to the U.S.
military presence in Iraq.
"This has been established to allow our
citizens to rejoin civil society … instead of wasting their lives on a lost
cause," Allawi said.
The tough-talking prime minister reserved some of
his harshest words at Saturday's news conference for the satellite channel Al
Jazeera, possibly the most popular source of news for the Arab world.
Allawi accused Al Jazeera of inciting hatred and violence by airing grisly
footage of hostage executions, siding with the insurgents and putting out a "bad
image" of Iraq.
"I am not worried whether Al Jazeera likes it or not,"
he said of the decision to shut down its Iraq operations for a month.
Journalists called it an ominous sign of the interim government's views on press
freedom.
"We're pretty shocked at the decision," said Al Jazeera
spokesman Jihad Ballout at the channel's headquarters in Doha, Qatar.
The media have "been promised, for months now, freedom of the press and freedom
of expression…. This particular move has changed the scene completely in
Iraq."
Iraqi police descended on Al Jazeera's Baghdad bureau Saturday
night, demanding keys from employees, locking rooms and ordering everyone
out.
"This is not a shop. You can't just tell us to stop selling goods
and close the shop," Haider Mullah, the bureau's legal counsel, insisted to
police.
"This is a media network. We have to know what our legal
rights are."
Last month, Allawi sanctioned the reopening of Sadr's
newspaper, which had been closed by American officials in March because they
said it was inciting attacks on U.S.-led forces and their Iraqi allies.