Iraqi Shi'ite Infighting

According to Juan Cole, militias loyal to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani and Muqtada Sadr have clashed in Karbala, with at least five reported killed. Bulgarian troops succeeded in blocking off the city so that the Sadrists didn't get reinforcements from Sadr City, where they are strongest. The Sadrists want control of the holy shrines in Karbala which the people of the city have been keeping them out of for the past month. My analysis of this will probably get better once I finish reading Yitzhak Nakash's The Shi'is of Iraq, but I'd already note this seems to continue the pattern where Sadr's first goal is to become the pre-eminent leader among Shi'ites, and he only goes after the CPA either for tactical reasons in intra-Shi'ite battles or in self-defense.

Sadr's rise is currently the worst threat to the U.S. occupation, and it looks like his biggest strength is in the Sadr City neighborhood of Baghdad, a base of manpower more than resources. I repeat, however, that Sadr is aiming for political power in ways which render is lack of traditional religious prestige almost irrelevant. In this light, his focus on the Sistani faction as his main foil is interesting: Certainly Sadr's political agenda has a religious base, and religious authority can thus undercut it, but I also wonder if his probable deal with Iran involved removing rival schools of thought within Shi'ism, leaving Khomeinism as the dominant ideology throughout the region.