Sadr Urges Resistance to U.S.

Well, that didn’t take long. Days after returning from almost four years of self-imposed exile in Iran, Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr urged his followers to resist America and all foreign occupiers, leading a chant of “No, no, to America.” But Sadr went on to say that though, “We are still fighters,” arms are for “people of weapons only,” a possible endorsement of Iraq’s official army. Sadr’s militia, the Mehdi Army, fought frequently with U.S. and Iraqi forces and was blamed for the abduction and killing of thousands of Sunnis in 2006 and 2007. A less equivocal statement of support for Iraq’s government, Sadr said, “All of us will be with the Iraqi government if it serves the Iraqi people. If it doesn't, there are political—only political—ways to reform the government.”