Iraq’s Poorest Finding it Harder to Survive

Huda, in the cast, will lose her arm if she cannot get treatment soon. (Photo: N. Latif)


By Sarah Price and Nizar Latif

IRAQ, July 15, (Pal Telegraph) - Asime is 13 and lives in east Baghdad. He has lost both his parents in the last two years, and is now taking care of a sick uncle. With no job opportunities and insufficient help from the Iraqi government, he has had to turn to crime to survive. He hates to steal, but knows that without this, he and his uncle will starve.

"My father died two years ago and then my mother died six months later, so my uncle took me in," he says. "He is poor, but said he wanted me with him because he doesn't have any children, and he knew the orphanage couldn't care for me well. But now, my uncle is seriously ill and cannot work. So, now I have to steal - from shops, or from older people. I steal valuable things, because they can be sold for money.

"I hate to steal. It's bad and I don't have the right to do it. But I have the right to life, and the government doesn't provide enough for me and my sick uncle, so I am compelled to steal, for money and food. My uncle doesn't know what I do. I told him I clean up some of the shops in the market for the money."

But he has been offered work - as part of a gang, which is very active in eastern Baghdad and is known for abducting children of the rich.

"I felt very scared, because this work is very dangerous," he says. "It is reasonable to steal and get the money, but it is not reasonable to engage in terrorist acts for it."

But while he will not turn to kidnapping, he cannot stop stealing. He says he will stop when he can earn enough from a job, or when the Iraqi government will provide enough money to allow him to. But he knows his days are numbered. The Iraqi police will catch him eventually.

Asime is one of approximately 2.5 million children in Iraq who have lost one or both parents due to the war, or sectarian or militia violence. The lack of available work and support from the government or humanitarian organizations has led many children to theft, and some of their mothers to prostitution, just to have food. Those who cannot buy food sift through garbage to find something to feed their families, leading also to health problems that they cannot afford to treat.

Umm Ali lost her husband three years ago. She lives in a very old building in a poor and dirty district in the city of Kut, in southern Iraq. Her apartment has no furniture, does not contain electrical appliances, or cold water to drink to endure the deadly heat of the Iraqi summer.

"My husband was working in the men's clothing store in downtown Kut, when a clash between the Mahdi Army and the U.S. military broke out in the market center of the city," she says. "He was killed in the crossfire. Since then, I have tried to make a better life for my children, but life is very difficult and I cannot provide them with the most basic requirements of life. Sometimes we do not have food for days, and the children have to search for food from the garbage."

Umm Ali talks about the death of her son, Ali, in the photo behind her (Photo: N. Latif)

Sometimes she gets temporary work, which helps feed her six kids, but when she can't work, they find themselves begging for money and help. What money she does get from work lasts only long enough to feed the family for a few days.

In addition to the daily struggles of raising her children alone, she is dealing with a new family tragedy: her son, Ali, 13, was killed by a guided missile that fell near their house, and her daughter Huda, 7, injured by the shrapnel in it, while they were playing outside one day. She could not afford to bury Ali, and had to rely on the help of neighbors and friends. And she has not been able to get medical care for Huda. As a result, Huda's arm is infected, and without prompt medical attention, she could lose it altogether. She says that due to the lack of adequate medical treatment in Iraq, the care Huda has been able to get has not helped her. Her flesh is rotting, and every day that passes without medical attention makes her prognosis worse.

"Our lives were much better when my husband was alive," says Umm Ali. "He was very involved. He provided food and clothing for the family, and solved the problems of my sons, and he was interested in all the details, large and small. But since his death, I think I've lost control of my family, and I worry that they could become criminals and dangerous when they grow up, because I couldn't give them a decent life."

She does get help from some humanitarian organizations, she says, but it's not enough.

"My wish was to see my children get a good education and study in universities and become important people in their community," she says. "But instead they are beggars on the street, and they hardly have any food to eat. They could lose their future and become dangerous to people in their community."

Nisreen al-Musawi, director of the Anwarul organization, which takes care of widows and orphans in Wasit Province in southern Iraq, says, "Widows and orphans suffer total neglect by the Iraqi officials, and the problem has increased significantly over the past three years, especially after the events of community violence, which affected all segments of Iraqi society and the increased numbers of widows and orphans across Iraq."

She points out that while some organizations are trying to help, it is not nearly enough to curb the problems caused by this epidemic:

"We're getting support from some international organizations such as the United Nations and other groups that attempt to provide assistance to widows and orphans," she says, "as well as some support from the Iraqi government, some Iraqi officials, the American forces, and some support from the rich, but the Iraqi support is not sufficient for the needs of this large army of widows and orphans."

She feels that there could have been preventative measures taken to stop this situation from occurring, but that the government did not take care of it when it should have. She fears for the future of these families, as well as the impact it could have on the country.

"Terrorist organizations, militias and al-Qaeda are trying to recruit the largest possible number of widows and orphans to their side in the fight against the U.S. military or Iraqi security forces, and they have succeeded in that because widows and orphans are suffering from neglect in Iraq and suffering from hunger and difficult living conditions," she says. "This is what makes them easy targets for al-Qaeda and militias. There is a huge number of widows and orphans at their disposal."

Umm Mohammed is a widow who lives next door to Umm Ali. The fatigue her life causes her shows on her face and can be heard in her voice. She is the mother of four young boys - Mohammed, 12, Ahmed, 10, Mazin, 8, and Moualk, 3. She has a job cleaning a school nearby so she can provide for them, but comes home so tired she finds it hard to do much more. She is considering taking them out of school so they can work and help her, as school and living costs have risen steeply, and state funds don't cover enough of the expenses.

"The state provides less than $100 per month, which is not enough to take care of the family for three days," she says. "Iraq is a country very rich in resources, sufficient to provide a decent life for all Iraqis. The Iraqi officials should stop the theft of Iraqi funds and channel these funds for the widows and orphans, because we are ready to do anything to get food and clothing."

But she is concerned that her children will also be willing to do anything for money, including turning to crime, and she is very concerned about their future.

"I have many friends who are widows, and they are all suffering from ill-treatment by the Iraqi government," she says. "There are no jobs for them or their children, and they are living in very difficult circumstances. Some of them have to work as prostitutes.

"We do not have the simple necessities of life. We live in apartments built in the sixties, and these apartments may collapse at any moment. We do not have any furniture in my house, and we eat very bad food. Perhaps some animals eat better meals."

With tens of thousands of families living below the poverty level in Wasit Province alone, and no government solution on the horizon, al-Musawi fears the humanitarian crisis will only worsen.

Iraqis Fear an Uncertain Future

Mohsen Ali sleeps on a Baghdad street corner (Photo: Nizar Latif)

By Sarah Price and Nizar Latif
July 2009 (The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs)

As June 30 nears, Iraqis are waiting to see whether Washington will observe the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. soldiers from Iraqi cities. According to the agreement, all U.S. troops (except for an estimated 70,000 who will remain in Iraq as trainers and advisers) are to be withdrawn from the country by December 2011.

Under Sunni President Saddam Hussain, Iraq’s minority Sunnis were favored over the majority Shi’i. Even though Shi’i Iraqis are now more proportionately represented in government and other sectors, however, Sunni and Shi’i Iraqis alike expressed mistrust of U.S. intentions. None of the Iraqis interviewed for this article seemed to feel that their lives had improved since the U.S. invaded in 2003.

“U.S. forces entered Iraq six years ago and have not improved my life—ever.”

Mohsen Ali, 50, is a former teacher in Baghdad who now calls the city’s streets home.

“Saddam Hussain executed my two sons in 2000 after they refused to join the Ba’ath party. They cursed the party and said bad things about it in public, so Saddam executed them,” he explains. “After their death, my wife left me. Now I’m homeless. I sleep in the streets and public squares every day and ask people to help me, so I can live a normal life. This was my life prior to—and since—the arrival of U.S. forces.”

Ali, a Shi’i Iraqi, believed his life would improve greatly after the fall of Hussain’s regime. “I thought it would be possible to live in a house, even get a small stipend of aid from the new Iraqi government or from the Americans,” he says, “but the truth is that my life has not changed. President Bush, before he entered Baghdad in 2003, promised the Iraqi people a better life and a better future.”

That future now seems uncertain.

“I do not believe the U.S. troops will get out of Iraq at all,” says Mazen Shojaa, 33, “because the goal of America is to control the wealth of Iraq. The U.S. claims that it will leave in 2011, but this is merely an anesthetic for the Iraqi people. They are lying to themselves and the world.”

Shojaa, a Sunni from the area of Ghazaliya, west of Baghdad, was unhappy with the entry of U.S. troops into Iraq, because he opposed the country’s rule by a foreign force that cared nothing about his people.

“Prior to the occupation,” he recalls, “we had a good and normal life, despite some difficulties brought on by the economic blockade imposed by America, and we had freedom, safety and stability.”

Shojaa says he now fears for his life every day. While he once hoped that U.S. troops would leave soon, with the emergence of Iranian intervention in Iraq and what he sees as the hegemony of some of Iraq’s ruling parties, Shojaa has changed his mind. He now hopes U.S. troops will stay to help Iraqis ward off Iranian influence and interference.

Jamal al-Din Yassin, 56, a grocer from the Karrada district in east Baghdad, disagrees that the U.S. will remain in Iraq past the SOFA deadline, and feels more hopeful about Iraq’s future.

“[They will leave] because the U.S. has suffered much from the occupation of Iraq and has had many of its soldiers killed and wounded,” he argues.

Like his fellow Shi’i Mohsen Ali, Yassin’s life before the occupation was difficult.

“I was bitter and there was a lot of poverty,” he says. “We thought the arrival of U.S. troops could change the reality of the situation, but now I’m afraid for myself and my family because of the loss of security and stability in Iraq.”

Unlike Shojaa, however, Yassin believes Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has made great strides in rebuilding and strengthening Iraq’s security forces, enabling them to take a leadership role in establishing stability in their country.

“I feel that the exit of U.S. troops will not affect the security on the ground much,” he explains, “because Iraq in two years will be far more powerful than it is now.”

Muhammad Ali Ghani, 36, a Shi’i schoolteacher from Sadr City, also had high hopes for what the U.S. troops could do for Iraq, but disagrees that al-Maliki’s government is ready to take over.

“We were pleased with the entry of U.S. troops in Iraq, because we thought America would save Iraq from the dictatorship and abuses of Saddam,” says Ghani. “I was one of the first ones running to welcome the U.S. forces.”

But it soon became apparent that the U.S. didn’t know much about occupying a country, he continues, and the mistakes made in disbanding the Iraqi security forces opened the door to lawlessness, benefitting al-Qaeda and other militia groups.

“The loss of security in Iraq and the spread of corruption in the country and the decline of industry and agriculture all made me feel scared in Iraq,” Ghani says. “I don’t know where to go or what to expect in the future. The Iraqi government’s performance so far is weak. If Iraq doesn’t help itself with national political reconciliation, and by building strong army intelligence and security forces that can function on their own when the U.S. leaves, it could lead to renewed instability. Iraq may disintegrate and become subject to the small neighboring countries.”

Samah Moueen, 48, a Shi’i widow from the new Baghdad district, lost her husband in the Iraq/Iran war. She supports her two daughters by working as a cleaner in a small school in east Baghdad.

In Moueen’s opinion, “It would be very difficult for the U.S. troops to leave Iraq; I think they will stay more than a hundred years. American policy will not change with the Democrats in power. It won’t change no matter what the circumstances. The Americans have been planning to occupy Iraq for more than 40 years. They waited patiently for Iraq to be weak so they could have control over oil resources. America obtained the Iraqi cake and the victim is the Iraqi people, who have suffered the terrorism of al-Qaeda and the militias because of the U.S. occupation.

“I imagine that Iraq will be a real battlefield when the U.S. troops leave, because it doesn’t currently have security forces that can take control,” she worries. “And we also have Iran, which carries a significant weight. Its influence is strong and plays a very negative role in Iraq. So, I hope that the U.S. troops do not leave in 2011. The worst thing for women in Iraq would be if the party that took control was from Iran, or the Islamic government in Iraq.”

As for Mohsen Ali, he says he will continue to hope for the best.

“When the U.S. troops leave Iraq, I hope to find a safe place to live away from the fighting, because I expect that there will be a very bloody sectarian war,” he says. “I will stay sleeping on the streets for the rest of my life, and I have to find a street where I can sleep better. I dream for a good future, either by the Americans or the Iraqi government.”

Al-Qaeda Preys on Iraqi Widows and Orphans for Suicide Missions

By Sarah Price and Nizar Latif
Tuesday, 05 May 2009 (The Palestine Telegraph)

WASIT, IRAQ - The number of widows in Iraq due to the war has now topped 2,100,000, according to Iraq's Women's Rights Organization. The Ministry of the Interior estimates that approximately 100 of those recruited by al-Qaeda have carried out suicide bomb missions."

Al-Qaeda uses them for military operations because it's a weak point in Iraqi society; women can pass through without inspection checks at military checkpoints due to Islamic rules, which forbid men to touch women. If they do, they'll be punished," says Samira Mohammed Al Shammari, director of the Office of Women's Rights in Wasit Province in southern Iraq. "Therefore, al-Qaeda personnel, taking advantage of this point, have been successful in the recruitment of dozens of these women to carry out suicide attacks against the Iraqi army and the U.S. military, especially women who have lost their husbands during the fighting, because these women are very sad and hopeless, and they are easier to influence."

According to Al Shammari, widows who have lost their husbands due to violence account for an estimated 40% of the women of Iraq.

Umm Nahla's husband joined al-Qaeda in 2004, under the threat of death. They lived with their daughter in Diyala, in northern Baghdad, and the organization had a stronghold in the region then, making resistance very difficult.

"Al-Qaeda was supported by Arab tribes in Diyala to fight the Americans out of Iraq. They organized several attacks each day in Baghdad, Diyala, Mosul, Tikrit and other cities," she says. "Al-Qaeda threatened to kill him if he didn't join, and said they would kill me and our daughter. So my husband joined them, fearing for his family. He became involved in many attacks on the U.S. military and Iraqi army, and he was absent sometimes for days."

In 2007, he was among a group of 100 fighters in an attack against the U.S. military in northern Baghdad, and was killed in the battle. The group was led by Prince Ameer, a military leader who trained with the Republican Guard under Saddam Hussein.

"The prince told me that he wanted to take care of me and my daughter, and that his wife would provide us with money and food and everything we needed," she said. "I began to fear for the future, and the future of my daughter. Not only did I not know how to find a way after the death of my husband, I did not have any idea how I would continue life and get back any pleasure and happiness. It had been hell since the arrival of the base to our city, especially when my husband joined al-Qaeda."

But the support of Prince Ameer and his wife was not to come without a great cost.

"One day, the prince's wife came to my house and she told me that she would take care of me and my daughter and we started to talk, and I started to complain to her about our future, and she told me to not be worried, and that she and her husband would support us," she says. "We became friends, and she talked about my husband and how he had fought bravely, and that it was now in the hands of God, and how he is in the right place now, because he fought and died for Islam, religion and principle.

"Then she invited me to her house to visit her, and she had invited all the wives, mothers or sisters who lost their husbands, sons or brothers, fighting the U.S. military or the Iraqi army. She said that your husbands have their rightful place with God, and you should get the right place for you, and she started to recruit us to be suicide bombers."

She asked what would happen to their children, should they die as suicide bombers, and was told that they would be taken in by the prince and his family, and cared for as if they were their own children.

"Most of the wives who lost their husbands are unhappy in their lives and have lost hope in life, and you see the misery and unhappiness in their eyes as well," she says. "One of the widows, Umm Mohammed, was always telling me that she wants to die and get rid of this miserable life. She says she has always been eager to bomb herself, as revenge for the death of her husband."

But Umm Nahla was not satisfied with this option. She felt that al-Qaeda had destroyed Iraq and taken it backwards. "I was more concerned about the future of my daughter. I wanted her to get a good education and a great future and a happier life than mine. So I waited for the opportunity to run with my daughter to the south, in order to be safely out of the hands of al-Qaeda, and when I had the chance, we fled to Wasit, for a better life and a happier future."

Al Shammari says, "The Iraqi government should be very serious about the development of the lives of these widows, and provide them with protection and the amount of money they need to live, and provide them with programs to develop skills and find employment for them, because these widows may constitute a significant risk to the Iraqi people, if they are being used by militias or al-Qaeda."

Wasit Province is currently the home of an estimated 1500 Iraqi widows.

However, widows are not the only group still targeted by al-Qaeda for suicide missions; orphans are not immune, either.

19-year-old Zahra's parents were killed in an air strike during an army attack. She lived with her family in Diyala City. Soon after her parents' death, she was taken in by women with connections to al-Qaeda, who later recruited her for a suicide mission.

Wearing a bomb belt and approaching an Iraqi checkpoint in Baquba City, she panicked and wanted out of the mission. Crying, she called over an Iraqi soldier, and told him she was wearing a bomb belt. He calmed her down, telling her everything would be OK, as other soldiers removed the belt from her. She is currently being detained in a women's prison in Baghdad. Women's Rights Organization is arguing on her behalf, that since she was forced into the mission by al-Qaeda, she should not be imprisoned. But the government wants to keep her in the facility until they feel it is safe for her to be out.

According to Ali al-Dabbagh, an official spokesman for the Iraqi government, there are an estimated 2.5 million orphans in Iraq, and, he says, it's more than the Iraqi government can handle. There has been great interest internationally in adopting the orphans, but for many reasons, it is not allowed.

So, with few options for these children, and a government that can't provide for them, they are prey to al-Qaeda and other militia groups who have a use for them. And those who have already lost the most - the widows, the orphans, and the mothers who no longer have children - are still those who have the most to lose.

As U.S. Troops Prepare to Leave Iraq, Who Will Take Control?

By Sarah Price and Nizar Latif
April 22, 2009 (The Palestine Telegraph)



BAGHDAD - The current U.S.-Iraq Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) dictates that U.S. troops must vacate Iraq by December 31, 2011, although it is understood that there may be as many as 70,000 troops left behind as "advisers and trainers;" and a referendum is expected in Iraq in mid-2009 that may require U.S. troops to leave 18 months earlier. Nevertheless, however the U.S. occupation ends, it is expected that this is when the next battle for control of Iraq will begin.

Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army (Jaish al Mahdi) was formed in Iraq in June 2003, but came to prominence the following year, after a major military conflict with U.S. troops in the Battle of Najaf.

The Sunni paramilitary force has maintained its influence in Iraq, and has been a factor in ameliorating the level of violence through al-Sadr's cease-fire declarations.

Last November, he demanded that all U.S. troops leave Iraq unconditionally, or he would lift the cease-fire and "support the resistance against the occupier." However, last summer al-Sadr announced plans to expand the army into a social, political, and religious organization, while still maintaining the militia.

He has left Iraq to study in Iran, raising questions about his continued authority, and whether Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is seeking to bring his own influence to the new Iraq. Who has the power now, and who will have it later, is debatable.

Abu Raed, 44, is a former commander in the Mahdi Army, in the al-Ameen district in east Baghdad. He recently left the militia and is now a member of the Sadrist Independent Liberals political bloc.

He believes the U.S. made its first mistake in Iraq when it invaded and occupied a country it didn't understand.

"Their worst failure was when they tried to divide Iraq into three states: northern, southern and middle, in order to weaken and control Iraq," he says, adding that Bush wasn't expecting the level of resistance that came from the various militias that rose up in Iraq, following the invasion.

"We have not benefited from the occupation - we only got killing, displacement, and robbing Iraqi money and oil," he says. "I believe life will improve greatly with the exit of the American occupation."

He also believes the Mahdi Army is the solution for improving Iraqi lives: "The Iraqi people are currently waiting for relief, and we find the Al-Sadrist line is the salvation and sanctuary to the Iraqi people because it is a line of Arabic people. Many of [al-Sadr's] followers have been thrown into prison, but we won in the last election in many Iraqi provinces, and we have the ability to return to the political arena in the next elections."

28-year-old Malik al-Mohammadawi is a former Mahdi Army fighter who now works in a milk factory in east Baghdad, and is married with children, but still holds the beliefs of a Sadrist follower.

"When the Americans leave, life will become normal, business will return, and Iraq will become more secure than ever before, because the cause of evil and chaos is the U.S. occupation, which wanted to make Iraq a client state. The Americans tried in various ways to eliminate the Mahdi Army, but they failed in their efforts, despite the support of police forces and the Iraqi army. To the U.S. forces, we were still strong."

But, he says, when al-Sadr called for a cease-fire and asked his militia to stop all military operations against U.S. troops, it opened the door wide for the U.S. forces to hunt down the Sadrists, but says they did what they could to ensure that not all of them would be caught, and he still believes in al-Sadr's influence over the Iraqi people.

"I have a great belief that al-Sadr can keep the unity of Iraq and its people, and he can stop the calls for dividing Iraq, and stop the spirit of sectarian division."

But Dr. Malik al-Noimee, a specialist in the study of the militias in Iraq, disagrees about al-Sadr's power in the communities. He believes that with al-Sadr's decision to expand the Mahdi Army from a militia into an organization that also has social, religious and political sects, he is trying to imitate Hassan Nasrallah, commander of Hezbollah in Lebanon.

"The power of the Mahdi Army in the community is close to zero," he says. "There is no effect and a lot of militia members in the past are now wearing uniforms and they were forbidden to, before. I am afraid that leaving the Mahdi Army without observing and without control measures by the government will not lead to canceling this phenomenon, and we must exploit this situation. The Iraqi government has to establish new values to replace the sense and ideas belonging to the militia in the Iraqi community, because now militias are closer to death than life."

He also doubts al-Sadr's influence at election polls. "The election results gave a clear size of the popularity of Moqtada al-Sadr in Iraq, although there is a part of those who elected [The Independent Liberals] who are not necessarily in favor of Moqtada al-Sadr; in their eyes, they made the situation worse and there were a lot of missed opportunities for the people of the southern region, in the field of construction and progress."

A U.S. study in 2007 estimated the Mahdi Army force was about 60,000 strong. But al-Noimee believes if al-Sadr called his militia to action today, only about a quarter of that number would show up.

"If Moqtada al-Sadr ordered them to fight, not more than 15,000 fighters would show on the scene." He also notes that the leaders of the Mahdi Army are driven much more by money than by religious ideology, and that an improvement in Iraq's economy could actually hurt the Mahdi Army's popularity and influence.

"The first factor is the strength of the central government, and the prestige of the government in a citizen militia, and then across the country in general; the second is the economic factor: if the government immediately improves the economy of the individual and the national economy, then Moqtada al-Sadr will never get people who listen to him from the communities that are considered the source of militias, such as the poor communities." He claims that many of the Mahdi Army leaders have links to Iran, and that it is having a source of money that really keeps them invested in the cause. "[There are] a very few who are driven by religious passion."

With al-Sadr now living in Iran, there are questions as to his continued influence - but also to Ahmadinejad's increasing persuasion - in Iraq, as Ahmadinejad tries to widen his power across the region.

Abu Raed thinks this is a temporary situation, and one that will be alleviated once the U.S. troops leave: "Iran has very clear power on the Iraqi arena by virtue of its relationship with some Islamic parties, which found Iran to be a safe haven, when they were being pursued by Saddam Hussein. Therefore, those parties have roots and links with Iran one way or another.

I think that after the departure of U.S. troops, Iran would be a stronger influence on the Iraqi arena, by virtue of being a neighbor, an Islamic state, and as a Shiite sectarian. But, Iraq remains an independent, free country.

"There is a difference between Ahmadinejad, who is the leader of a political and military fields and al-Sadr, the religious and spiritual leader for most of the Shiites in the region. I do not think there will be conflict between them."

Al-Mohammedawi agrees: "I imagine that Iran has a major intervention in Iraq by virtue of their many parties on the Iraqi arena, as well as their relationship to those who are of Iranian origin in Iraq, and who are not ashamed, and they do not hide their links to Iran," he says. "But after the departure of the Americans, I believe that the Iranian influence will be less than ever before, because Iran now interferes because of their fearing that U.S. troops should stay close to its borders.

If the U.S. troops are gone, Iran will pull its hands out of Iraq, and its relations will remain good, based on good-neighborliness."

But independent Iraqi Parliament member Dr. Haider Al-Sewedi is not so sure.

"The Iranian influence is very significant," he says. "There is a hidden conflict between al-Sadr and Ahmadinejad, because Ahmadinejad is trying to strengthen Iran's influence in the region, but al-Sadr doesn't accept any external interference in the Iraqi affairs, even if it is a Shiite state like Iran. Al-Sadr sought asylum in Iran in terms of security, only to save his life from the U.S. military. Now al-Sadr has little effect in the Iraqi arena."

With so many disparate opinions about who holds the power now in Iraq, only time will tell who will step forward as a leader after the pullout of U.S. troops in 2011 - or whether anyone will have enough power to step forward at all.