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 References
1. Islamic Da’wa party,
Istishhad al-Imam Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr min Mandhur Hadhari, (n.p,
1981), pp. 36-37.
2. These groups included Fedaian Islam founded by Nawab Safavi in
the late 1940s and later headed by Sadiq Khilkhili, the head of the
revolutionary courts in 1979-80; Mujahidiyn Khalq, a Socialist
Islamic organization supported by the late Ayatullah Talaqani; and
Nahzat Azadi, a liberal-Islamic group, founded by Mahdi Bazargan,
the first prime minister of the revolution appointed by Ayatullah
Khomeini.
3. For a full account of Qasim’s regime, see Uriel Dann, Iraq
under Qassem (New York: Praeger, 1969).
4. On the influence and the atrocities of the Iraqi Communist Party
(ICP), see U. Zaher, "The Oppression," in CARDRI
(Committee Against Repression and for Democratic Rights in Iraq),
ed., Saddam’s Iraq, Revolution or Reaction?, (London: Zed, 1986),
pp. 148-50.
5. Hassan Shubar, "Dawr Hizb al-Da’wa al-Islamiyya fi al-Taghyir
wa-Halat al-Istirkha’ al-Sabiqa," al-Jihad, 363 (October 24,
1988), 8.
6. According to Talib al-Rifa’i, a colleague of Sadr and a
well-known jurist activist in the 1950s and 1960s, Jamat al-Ulama’
consisted of ten mujtahids: Murtada Al Yasiyyn, Abbas al-Rumaythi,
Isma’il al-Sadr, Muhammad Tahir Shaykh Radi, Muhammad Jawad Shaykh
Radi, Muhammad Taqi Bahr al-Ulum, Musa Bahr al-Ulum, Muhammad Reda
al-Mudhaffar, Husayn al-Hamadani, and Muhammad Baqir Shakhs.
7. Interview with Mohammad Baqir al-Hakam, al-Jihad 5 (Summer,
1980), 7-9.
8. Muhammad Husayn Fadlullah, "Taqdim, preface to Muhammad
Baqir al-Sadr, Resalatuna (Beirut: al-Dar al-Islamiyya, 1981), p.
16.
9. An interview with one of the leading figures in the Jamacat al-Ulama’
and the Da’wa party, in January 1, 1990; he requested anonymity
and will be referred to here as A.H.F.
10. Interview with Talib al-Rifa’i.
11. However, al-Awa’, according to Talib al-Rifa’i, was later to
become the voice of the Islamic Da’wa party; it published party
doctrine in editorials and articles.
12. Fadlullah, "Taqdim," p.17.
13. Talib al-Rifa’i told me that Sadr did not have the money to
buy books on Western philosophy, but a friend, an Arab nationalist
and an owner of a bookstore, generously let him borrow them.
14. However, according to A.H.F, the al-Siwaki brothers, Hadi and
Mahdi, who were members of the Tahrir party, proposed forming a
political party to Murtada al-Askari, who in turn contacted Sadr to
set up the party’s structure and write its doctrine. According to
A.H.F, Mahdi al-Hakim and Talib al-Rifaci were among the first to be
contacted and to join.
15. Al-Asadi, "izb al-Da’wa al-Islamiyya," ariq al-aq,
August, 1980, p. 46.
16. Sadr, according to the Da’wa party, wrote four articles in the
official journal of the party, awt al-Da’wa, explaining the name,
the structure, the goals, and the nature of the political struggle
to build up the party. The articles published in Da’wa party
publication no. 13, Min Fikr al-Da’wa al-Islamiyya: al-Shahid al
Rabi’, al-Imam al-Sadr (n.d, n.p.)
17. Al-Asadi, "izb al-Da’wa al-Islamiyya," p. 48.
18. According to al-Rifa’i, Sadr decided to resign from the party
at Samarra, where the shrines of Imams al-cAskariyyn are located,
after randomly selecting a verse from the Qur’an and using it as a
basis for his decision.
19. Hussein al-Safi was the head of the Ba’th party in Najaf,
which cooperated with the Islamic forces to counter the communist
surge. Jamacat al-cUlama’ used Muhammad Reda Sheikh Radi as a link
between them and al-Safi’s nationalist and Ba’thist forces, and
was well aware of Sadr’s activities. When the Bacthists came to
power in 1963, al-Safi was appointed governor of Diwaniyya, a
principality near Najaf. He later retired from politics, and
emigrated to Morocco in the 1970s to become a businessmen. Saddam
invited him to Iraq in 1985, and later executed him.
20. For a full account of the situation, see Muhammad Baqir
al-Hakim’s interview in al-Jihad 14 (Jamadi al-Thani 1401).
Al-Hakim referred to a letter explaining the whole episode that Sadr
sent to him when the latter was in Lebanon.
21. Ibid.
22. Fadlullah, "Taqdim," p. 17.
23. A famous saying of Sadr, "Mujtamacuna la yatahaml
Mujtamacuna" (Our society cannot bear Our Society).
24. Interview with A.H.F., Jan 1, 1990.
25. Conversation with Muhammad H. Fadlullah in St. Louis, December,
1982; also see his "Taqdim," p. 17.
26. Fadil al-Nuri, al-Shahid al-Sadr Fada’iluhu wa-Shama’iluhu,
(Qum: Mahmuwwd al-Hashimi Office, 1984), p. 93.
27. The Sadr book in Usul is al-Macalim al-Jadida fi Usul al-Fiqh
See Fadil al-Nuri, al-Shahid al-Sadr, p. 64; and S. D. al-Qubanchi,
al-Jihad al-Siyasi, p. 79.
28. Ibid.
29. The association headed by Hadi al-Hakim and Murtada al-Askari.
In the late 1960s, Mahdi al-Hakim, became the best and most
outspoken member of the association. See "Interview with al-Askari,"
Liwa’ al-Sadr, Jamadi al-Thani 7, 1409, p. 6.
30. The meeting was held in al-Karada al-Sharqiyya, a suburb of
Baghdad, attended by sixty religious scholars from Baghdad and
Kadhimiyah; see al-Shahada, Jamadi al-Thani 2, 1409.
31. Liwa’ al-Sadr, Shaban 29, 1409.
32. Murtada al-Askari, "Jidhuwwr wa-Khalfiyat al-Taharuk al-Islami
fi Muwajahat al-Ba’th al-cAflaqi," Liwa’ al-Sadr, Muharam
22, 1409, p. 10.
33. Ibid.
34. The Ba’thist government tried to influence the selection of
the Supreme Mujtahid of the Shia through a campaign on behalf of
Shaykh Ali Kashif al-Ghita’ who publicly endorsed the regime.
However, Sadr and Muhsin al-Hakim’s eldest son Yusuf put their
weight behind Khoei. On the selection of Ayatullah Khoei, see also
Fouad Ajami, The Vanished Imam, Musa al-Sadr and the Shia of Lebanon
(Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1986), p. 194.
35. Qubanchi, al-Jihad al-Siyasi, p. 74.
36. Da’wa Party, Lamaat min masirat hizb al-Da’wa al-Islamiyya,
(n.p., n.d.), p. 25.
37. Salih al-Adib, "Mawakb al-Talaba," al-Jihad, Feb 29,
1988, p. 12.
38. Sahib Dakhiyyl, editor of the Da’wa party’s underground
journal, Sawt al-Da’wa, was detained on Sept. 28, 1971, and later
executed; al-Jihad, Jan. 3, 1983.
39. The five sentenced to death were Shaykh Arif al-Basri, Iz
al-Din al-Qubanchi, Imad al-Tabrizi, Hussein Chalukhan, and Nuri
Tucma. See Islamic Da’wa party, Shuhada’ Baghdad (Tehran:
Islamic Da’wa party publication, 1982).
40. On the reaction of Ayatullah Khumeini to the execution of five
"martyrs," see al-Jihad, Rabiy al-Awwal 1404, p. 44.
41. Qubanchi is the only one to mention that Sadr was detained by
the government in 1971, but was not imprisoned because of his poor
health; he was, however, tied to his hospital bed (see al-Jihad al-Siyasi,
p. 53).
42. Another maraji in Najaf was Ruhallah Khumeini; there were
others in Qum such as Gulpaygani, Shariycat-Madari (d. 1985),
Marcashi-Najafi (d. 1989); and in Mashhad Abdullah Shirazi (d.
1986).
43. For detailed accounts of the uprising, see Racad al-Musawi,
Intifaat afr al-Islamiyya fi Iraq, 2nd ed. (Qum: Amiyr al-Mu’miniyyn,
1983) pp. 66-68.
44. Ibid., pp. 71-73.
45. Ibid., pp. 68-69.
46. Ibid., pp. 95-99.
47. Ibid., p. 101
48. Ibid., pp. 102-103.
49. The three members of the court were Izat Mustafa, Minister of
Health, Hasan Ali, and Falayh Jasim, all members of the regional
command of the Ba’th party.
50. In a letter to his former pupils and disciples in Iran, Sadr
expressed his admiration for Khomeini, and demanded they support
him. Sadr said that Khomeini’s marja’ iyya had achieved the
goals of the "objective marja’ iyya," which he has
theorized years ago. For the text of the letter, see al-Ha’iri,
Mabaith ilm al-usul (Qum: n.p., 1988) pp. 145-46.
51. The message was not publicized because Sadr’s disciple living
in Iran thought such a statement would endanger Sadr’s life. For
the full text of the message, see al-Ha’iri, Mabaith, pp. 142-45.
52. Ibid, p. 114.
53. Because of the 1975 agreement between Iraq and Iran, the Ba’th
government supported the Shah. Saddam, then the vice president, had
declared in one of the party meetings in Basra, al-Shah baqi, baqi,
baqi ("The Shah will survive, will survive, will
survive").
54. For the text, see Ha’iri, Mabaith, p. 147.
55. For texts of Khomeini’s message to Sadr, see Ibid., pp.
117-18. Khomeini insulted Sadr by addressing him as ujjat al-Islam
wa-al-Muslimiyn, a title used for a low-ranking alim; Sadr was then
a marja’ of well-known reputation and usually addressed as ayatullah
al-uma (grand Ayatullah). Only after Sadr’s death did Khumeini
start referring to him as Ayatullah Sadr.
56. Conversation with Sayyid M. H. Fadlullah in 1982.
57. For the text of Sadr’s reply to Khomeini, see al-Ha’iri
Mabaith, p. 123.
58. Al-Nu’mani quoted in al-Ha’iri, Mabaith, p. 119.
59. al-Jihad, May 2, 1983.
60. Al-Jihad, May 2, 1983.
61. Al-Nu’mani as quoted in al-Ha’iri, Mabaith, pp. 162-63.
62. Munaamat al-Amal al-Islami (Islamic Task Organization) is a
splinter group of the Da’wa party. Their leader, Muhammad Mahdi
al-Shirazi, was one of the first group, according to Mahdi al-Hakim,
to join the Da’wa party. In the early 1970s he and his brother
Hasan (assassinated in Lebanon in 1980) formed their own
organization, al-’Amal al-Islami as a result of disagreement with
Da’wa over an issue of leadership of the party and political
tactics. When al-Shirazi announced his marja’ iyya in 1970,
Muhammad Taqi al-Mudrisi and Hadi al-Mudrisi headed al-’Amal,
while Shirazi assumed the role of spiritual leader of the
organization.
63. Chibli Mallat, "Religious Militancy in Contemporary Iraq:
Muhammad Baqer as-Sadr and the Sunni-Shia Paradigm," Third
World Quarterly, April, 1988, p. 728.
64. According to Da’wa party members, these recorded messages were
supposed to be published and distributed to people inside and
outside Iraq, but they were censored by his associates fearing the
regime’s reprisal on Sadr’s life and were not made public until
after his death.
65. For the full text of Sadr’s three messages to the Iraqi people
in Arabic; see al-Ha’iri, Mabaith, pp. 147-153; for an English
translation see Abu Ali, A Glimpse of the Life of The Martyred Imam:
Muhammad Baqer al-Sadr and His Last Three Messages (n.d., n.p), pp.
16-19.
66. According to one of Sadr’s cousins, the family of Sadr still
hopes that the regime has spared the life of Amina al-Sadr, but the
Islamic movement always refers to her as a martyr.
67. See an interview with Mahdi al-Hakim on the history of the
Islamic movement in Iraq in Liwa’ al-Sadr, Jan 12, 1990, 12.
68. One of the examples of how Sadr was pushed into unplanned direct
confrontation against the government was when he was hospitalised in
1979, and one of the Iranian ulama asked Talib al-Rifaci to write a
get-well telegram in Arabic to Sadr. However, the draft was rejected
on the basis that its language was too mild and did not include a
harsh statement against Saddam and the Ba’th party. Al-Rifaci
refused to write such a statement because it would endanger Sadr’s
life.
69. An interview with Ahmad Kubba, one of the Da’wa members who
initiated the first demonstration after the Friday sermon of
Ayatullah Khoei in the Masjid al-Khadra in Najaf, in 1978. He said
that he had no orders from the party to start the demonstration.
Rather the party officials discouraged such a move. He then had
supported public protests only after the success of the revolution
in Iran.
70. Ayatullah Khoei advised Sadr, via the latter’s representative
in Kuwait, that he should not involve himself in a political
struggle then because the Ba’thist government would certainly kill
him at a time when the Hawza needed his services.
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