Can't tell the players without a program. Here are some of the main leaders in the United Iraqi Alliance:
ABDEL-AZIZ AL-HAKIM
Top billing on the list goes to this black-turbaned, pro-Iranian cleric who heads the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq and opposed Saddam Hussein from exile in Iran before returning after last year's U.S.-led invasion. Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim was a member of the dissolved Iraq Governing Council and is allied to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Hussein al-Sistani, the country's top Shiite cleric, who was instrumental in setting up the coalition. | Read the Rantburg archives on the family al-Hakim. Very enlightening. |
Al-Hakim headed his organization's armed wing, the Badr Brigade, which oversees security in several southern cities. His older brother, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim, was assassinated in a car bombing in Najaf last year.
IBRAHIM AL-JAAFARI
A Shiite and the main spokesman for the Islamic Dawa Party, Ibrahim al-Jaafari was born in Karbala and educated at Mosul University as a medical doctor. The Dawa Party was previously based in Iran and launched a bloody campaign against Saddam's regime in the late 1970's. Saddam crushed the campaign in 1982. The group said it lost 77,000 members in its war against the toppled Iraqi dictator.
AHMAD CHALABI
A secular Shiite and one-time Pentagon confidant who led the Iraqi National Congress, a major umbrella group of numerous disparate groups, including Iraqi exiles, Kurds and Shiites. A 58-year-old former banker who left Iraq as a teenager, Ahmad Chalabi fell out with Washington this year after claims he had passed on intelligence information to Iran. He also has many critics who are opposed to anyone ruling Iraq after spending so many years abroad. al-Hakim also spent many years abroad in Iran. |
Chalabi was convicted in absentia of fraud in a banking scandal in Jordan in 1989 and sentenced to 20 years in prison. Had been touted as a possible Iraqi leader, but lacks support from other opposition groups.
HUSSAIN AL-SHAHRISTANI
One of six figures chosen by al-Sistani to draw up the coalition list of candidates, Hussain al-Shahristani is a nuclear scientist whose refusal to work in Saddam's nuclear program led to his 1979 jailing. He escaped in 1991 after the U.S. military bombed the Abu Ghraib prison during the first Gulf War, enabling him to head for Jordan. Educated and married in Canada, al-Shahristani worked for human rights organizations in Iran and London. After Saddam was toppled, al-Shahristani's reputation for being nonpolitical saw his name floated as a possible interim prime minister, but the job went to Ayad Allawi.
SHEIK FAWAZ AL-JARBA
Head of the powerful Mosul-centered Sunni Shemar tribes, Sheik Fawaz al-Jarba is a cousin of interim Iraqi President Ghazi al-Yawer, and has close ties with both Shiite and Kurdish groups. The Shemar tribe is one of Iraq's most prominent Sunni clans, crossing into Iraq from Saudi Arabia in the 17th century and scattering across the country. Sheik Fawaz refused Saddam's plan to "Arabize" the Kurdish north, and the participation of his predominantly Sunni tribe makes him a valuable partner in the Shiite-dominated coalition. |