Pivotal Player: The Iraq Effect And Ali al-Sistani

June 23, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Iran, Iraq War 

It is being reported by the EurasiaNet civil society that as Ali Akbar Hashemi Rasfanjani plots against his nemesis Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in the Holy City of Qom, he is also ganering the support of Iraq’s most senior cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani:

Now that Ayatollah Khamenei has become inexorably connected to Ahmadinejad’s power grab, many clerics are coming around to the idea that the current system needs to be changed. Among those who are now believed to be arrayed against Ayatollah Khamenei is Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the top Shi’a cleric in neighboring Iraq. Rafsanjani is known to have met with Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani’s representative in Iran, Javad Shahrestani.

Now since al-Sistani was a key ally of the United States in Iraq, would his emergence have been possible if it weren’t for the fall of Saddam Hussein?

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