Is Muqtada al-Sadr Good for Iraq?

Renad Mansour and Michael David Clark write for War on the Rocks:

The latest storming of the Iraqi parliament is one of the most significant political events in Iraq since Saddam Hussein’s regime was overthrown in 2003. This process, which culminated in the weekend’s dramatic events, began in March of this year when the Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr turned a flagging protest movement into a major national force, by virtue of his personal intervention. By the end of March, at the head of this movement, Sadr himself successfully walked into the Green Zone, where security forces welcomed him with open arms. Rather than reprimanding him for what would otherwise be considered trespassing, the Iraqi general in charge of security kissed his hand — a symbolic gesture of submission. Sitting in the Green Zone, he pushed Abadi to pursue a cabinet re-shuffle and set a 10-day ultimatum.

In April, the prime minister failed three times to pass a technocratic cabinet in parliament. With each failure, the protest movement grew increasingly impatient. Following Abadi’s second failed attempt, which was heavily influenced by former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, Sadr ordered his MPs, who make up the Ahrar bloc, to stage a sit-in inside parliament. This sit-in, which Shia, Sunni, and Kurdish MPs later joined, administered an extra-ordinary parliamentary session and obtained enough votes to sack speaker Salim al-Jabouri. However, Jabouri returned to his seat to administer a third attempt for cabinet reshuffle on April 30. Still, the parliament again failed to pass Abadi’s list of names for a technocratic cabinet and instead adjourned for a 10-day recess. At this point, an impatient Sadr determined it was time for a drastic show of force, resulting in the weekend’s storming of the parliament, where protestors, carrying Iraqi flags rather than guns, were welcomed and kissed by Green Zone security.