BAGHDAD (AP) — The most respected voice for Iraq’s Shiite
majority on Friday joined calls for the country’s prime minister to
form an inclusive government or step aside, a day after President Barack
Obama challenged Nouri al-Maliki to create a leadership representative
of all Iraqis.
Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani’s thinly veiled
reproach was the most influential to place blame on the Shiite prime
minister for the nation’s spiraling crisis.
The focus on the need
to replace al-Maliki comes as Iraq faces its worst crisis since the
withdrawal of U.S. troops in 2011. Over the past two weeks, Iraq has
lost a big chunk of the north to the al-Qaida-inspired Sunni militants
of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, whose lightning offensive
led to the capture of Mosul, the nation’s second-largest city.
The
gravity of the crisis has forced the usually reclusive al-Sistani, who
normally stays above the political fray, to wade into politics, and his
comments, delivered through a representative, could ultimately seal
al-Maliki’s fate.
Calling for a dialogue between the political
coalitions that won seats in the April 30 parliamentary election,
al-Sistani said it was imperative that they form "an effective
government that enjoys broad national support, avoids past mistakes and
opens new horizons toward a better future for all Iraqis."
Deeply
revered by Iraq’s majority Shiites, al-Sistani’s critical words could
force al-Maliki, who emerged from relative obscurity in 2006 to lead the
country, to step down.
On Thursday, Obama stopped short of
calling for al-Maliki to resign, but his carefully worded comments did
all but that. "Only leaders that can govern with an inclusive agenda are
going to be able to truly bring the Iraqi people together and help them
through this crisis," Obama declared at the White House.
The
Iranian-born al-Sistani, believed to be 86, lives in the Shiite holy
city of Najaf, south of Baghdad, where he rarely ventures out of his
modest house on a narrow alley near the city’s Imam Ali shrine and does
not give media interviews. His call to arms last week prompted thousands
of Shiites to volunteer to fight against the Sunni militants who now
control a large swath of territory astride both sides of the Iraq-Syria
border.
The extent of al-Sistani’s influence was manifested in the
years following the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq when he forced
Washington to modify its blueprint for the country and agree to the
election of a constituent assembly that drafted the nation’s
constitution.
For the past two years, he has shunned politicians
of all sects, refusing to receive any of them to show his
disillusionment with the way they run the country.
However, the danger
posed by the Islamic State militants appears to have forced him to say
more.
His call to arms has given the fight against the Sunni
insurgents the feel of a religious war between Shiites and Sunnis. His
office in Najaf dismissed that charge, with his representative, Ahmed
al-Safi, saying Friday: "The call for volunteers targeted Iraqis from
all groups and sects. … It did not have a sectarian basis and cannot
be."
Al-Maliki’s State of Law bloc won the most seats in the April
vote, but his hopes to retain his job are in doubt with rivals
challenging him from within the broader Shiite alliance. In order to
govern, his bloc must first form a majority coalition in the new
328-seat legislature, which must meet by June 30.
If al-Maliki
were to relinquish his post now, according to the constitution the
president, Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, would assume the job until a new
prime minister is elected. But the ailing Talabani has been in Germany
for treatment since 2012, so his deputy, Khudeir al-Khuzaie, a Shiite,
would step in for him.
Al-Maliki’s Shiite-led government long has
faced criticism of discriminating against Iraq’s Sunni and Kurdish
populations. But it is his perceived marginalization of the
once-dominant Sunnis that sparked violence reminiscent of Iraq’s darkest
years of sectarian warfare in 2006 and 2007.
Shiite politicians
familiar with the secretive efforts to remove al-Maliki said two names
mentioned as replacements are former vice president Adel Abdul-Mahdi, a
Shiite and French-educated economist, and Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite
who served as Iraq’s first prime minister after Saddam Hussein’s ouster.
Others include Ahmad Chalabi, a one-time Washington favorite to lead
Iraq, and Bayan Jabr, another Shiite who served as finance and interior
minister under al-Maliki.
Nearly three years after he heralded the
end of America’s war in Iraq, Obama announced Thursday he was deploying
up to 300 military advisers to help quell the insurgency. They join
some 275 troops in and around Iraq to provide security and support for
the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad and other American interests.
But the U.S. leader was adamant that U.S. troops would not be returning to combat.
Obama
has held off approving the airstrikes sought by the Iraqi government,
though he says he could still approve "targeted and precise" strikes if
the situation required it and if U.S. intelligence gathering identified
potential targets.
Manned and unmanned U.S. aircraft are now flying over Iraq 24 hours a day on intelligence missions, U.S.
officials say.
A Shiite politician close to al-Maliki said Obama did not offer enough to help Iraq at its hour of need.

"His
plan does not rise up to the level of Iraqi-U.S. relations. His message
is clear: America is not ready to fight terrorism," said the official,
speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of
the sensitivity of the subject.
Another Shiite, cleric Nassir
al-Saedi, warned that the 300 advisers would be attacked. Al-Saedi is
loyal to anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose Mahdi Army militia
fought the Americans during their eight-year presence in Iraq.
"Our
message to the occupier: We will be ready for you if you are back," he
said during Friday prayers attended by al-Sadr supporters in Baghdad’s
Sadr City district.
Sunnis, predictably, had a different take.
Mohammed
al-Khalidi, a Sunni lawmaker who favors replacing al-Maliki’s
government, said he thought "Obama’s statement was balanced and
reasonable."
"But," he added, "U.S. officials should be aware that
the situation in Iraq needs an immediate remedy because Iraq is heading
to the unknown."
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Associated Press writers Qassim Abdul-Zahra and Sameer N. Yacoub contributed to this report.