Fundamentalists of the World Unite?

Shahram Rafizadeh, Rooz Online:

Moghtada Sadr, the young fundamentalist cleric who set Iraq on fire in April 2004 is now in Tehran. After his meetings with senior Iranian officials, Sadr told reporters that his Al-Mahdi army, an ultra-radical movement of Lebanese militia, would come to the support of neighboring Muslim countries if they were attacked. Young Sadr's comments were a reference to possible attacks against Iran in its dispute over its nuclear policies.

In his trip to Syria last week, president Ahmadinejad renewed the support and friendship of the Islamic Republic to President Bashar Assad who like Iran is currently under heavy international pressure over the death of Lebanon’s former Prime Minister Hariri.

Last month Tehran witnessed another visitor of the same caliber. Khaled Mashaal, chairman of the political wing of fundamentalist Hamas organization officially traveled to Tehran to thank Ahmadinejad for his anti-Israeli comments that called for wiping the country off the map of the world. Mashaal announced in Tehran that Hamas would expand and increase its attacks on Israel if the latter attacked Iran.

Then last summer, well before Ahmadinejad resumed his official duties as president, the leader of Lebanon’s military group Hezbollah Seyed Hassan Nasrollah was in Tehran to learn of the future policies of new hardline government in Tehran. In similar light, just a few days ago Mehdi Chamran whose brother was the key player in organizing the Islamic Amal group in Lebanon some decades earlier, announced that the new movement launched by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had created a powerful wave that could overtake politicians, intellectuals and even senior government officials.

Political observers believe that the increasing international pressures on Iran over its nuclear program has motivated Iranian leaders to search for younger neighboring allies, instead of depending on traditional diplomacy, hoping that this would protect the country from international isolation and meet its interests. READ MORE

Sadr is a known warrior who engaged the coalition forces in Iraq led by the US in several cities last year inflicting serious damage. And while promising to fight till the end, he eventually took refuge in a mosque and retreated after a negotiated settlement and the intervention other senior Iraqi clerics and politicians. And even though an arrest warrant had been issued for him by the coalition forces, no serious steps were taken for fear of antagonizing the Shiites and his supporters in an-already fragile and precarious situation.

Sadr is a relatively young cleric who has inherited his father’s brand of radicalism in which he generally opposes the traditional and conservative clerics of Iraq. His father who used to be a very prominent and popular cleric in Iraq during Saddam Hussein’s days lost his life in that position, along with his two other brothers. It is because of his radicalism and views that other senior Iraqi clerics such as ayatollah Sistani do not recognize him as a religious authority, and Sadr’s initiatives to win such support have not been successful. His strategy has been to incite the discontented Shiites and this may explain why he chose to create his Jeysh al Mehdi armed militia.

In Tehran, Rafsanjani, Larijani and Mottaki all warmly shook Sadr’s hands while in Tehran. Hamid Reza Taraghi, a senior leader in Iran’s right wing Jamiate Motalefe group said that talks with Sadr are useful for the future of Iraq. So while there seems plenty of similar talk between these visitors and groups, is there any real common interest and basis to suspect yet another hardline front?