Ali as-Sistani

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Ali as-Sistani

Grand Ayatollah Ali as-Sistani ( Persian سیدعلی حسینی سیستانی, DMG Seyyed-ʿAlī Ḥosainī Sīstānī ; Arabic علي الحسيني السيستاني, DMG ʿAlī al-Ḥusainī as-Sīsitānī ; * around August 4, 1930 in Mashhad , Iran ) is the most important Shiite cleric in present-day Iraq .

Life

Although as-Sistani was already considered the leader of the Shiites during the reign of Saddam Hussein , he was mostly under house arrest until 2003. As head of the Hawza , the theological college of Najaf , he is the successor of Grand Ayatollah Abu l-Qasim al-Choei . He had been the highest Shiite dignitary in Iraq since 1970.

Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani and the traditional Islamic school of Najaf reject a purely religious government and advocate free elections . Najaf, which before Khomeini was the religious center for Iranians as well, stands in contrast to the Iranian school of Qom . As-Sistani regards the Iranian model as a failure and refused several times to take over the leadership of Islamic parties, which had to expect a large share of the vote.

Political position in Iraq today

On June 2, 2004, Grand Ayatollah as-Sistani gave his blessing to the new transitional government after he had previously called for elections. The appointment of the transitional government is "an important step to pave the way for free and fair elections that should lead the country out of the crisis and restore full sovereignty."

In August 2004, Sistani reached a pacification of the situation in Najaf, when the Mahdi Army of Moqtada Sadr and US troops fought. On August 19, the Iraqi government threatened to storm the Imam Ali mosque within hours if the Mahdi army did not leave the mosque. Sadr is said to have given his supporters the instruction to hand over the keys of the mosque to Sistani: On August 25, as-Sistani called immediately after a heart operation in London to march into Najaf, which was besieged by US and Iraqi troops which tens of thousands of his followers attended. His resolute intervention caused the besiegers to retreat. The next morning, Sadr's supporters, who were holed up in the Imam Ali mosque, gave Sistani the keys to the mosque.

In the first free Iraqi elections since Saddam Hussein, which took place on January 30, 2005, as-Sistani did not support the predominantly Shiite party alliance United Iraqi Alliance , which was to emerge as the winner with 48.2% of the votes express position for a particular party.

Influence through fatwas

In a fatwa , as-Sistani (as well as the Najaf Grand Ayatollahs Muhammad Said al-Hakim and Muhammad Ishaq Fayadh ) instructed the 15 million Iraqi Shiites to avoid clashes with American soldiers and the civil administration, because cooperation is permitted. He declared attacks against foreign armed forces to be acts of terrorism, while she describes the school of Qom as desirable Muslim resistance against the non-Muslim occupiers. Because of his moderating influence, he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by the New York Times in 2005 and by the Sunday Telegraph in 2014.

Opinions on homosexuality

In October 2005, as-Sistani issued a fatwa calling for the death penalty for homosexuals . This fatwa is seen as a founding appeal for death squads from the ranks of the Badr Corps . The Badr Corps are the military arm of the Supreme Islamic Council in Iraq , which is involved in the current Iraqi government , and was subordinate to the Iraqi Interior Minister in autumn 2006 and integrated into the Iraqi police. After attacks and murders of homosexuals and conversations with an Iraqi gay and lesbian association, as-Sistani withdrew the fatwa in 2006, which led to a decline in attacks.

As a result of this fatwa, as-Sistani is accused of being partially responsible for the deaths of homosexual Iraqis. The London gay group Iraqi LGBT , which has ties to people in Iraq, reported several murders in early April 2007, which led to a significant increase in asylum applications in England in early 2007.

ISIL

In view of the advance of the terrorist organization “ Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant ” (ISIL) in Iraq in 2014, al-Sistani called on all political groups to unite against the terrorists. As-Sistani also expressed solidarity with the Iraqi security forces. This declaration by Sistani, which was read out by one of his deputies in Kerbala on June 13, 2014 , and which called for the exercise of a "defensive" jihad , was used by the Iraqi government as well as numerous political groups and mostly Shiite volunteer organizations as an opportunity to found the paramilitary Al-Hashd ash-Sha'bī .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Imam Ali Mosque: House of God priceless . In: Spiegel Online . August 20, 2004 ( spiegel.de [accessed July 25, 2018]).
  2. ↑ [1]
  3. ↑ Ayatollah Ali Sistani deserves Nobel Peace Prize according to UK Sunday Telegraph Chief Foreign Correspondent . In: Iraq news, the latest Iraq news by Iraqi News . March 27, 2014 ( iraqinews.com [accessed July 25, 2018]).
  4. ↑ a b c Cara Buckley, nytimes.com Gays Living in Shadows of New Iraq , New York Times , December 18, 2007 (accessed June 26, 2013)
  5. ↑ Navid Kermani, " In the Heart of the Schia ", Der Spiegel No. 39, September 22, 2014 (112-117), p. 116.
  6. ^ Daniel Howden, " Sistani renounces fatwa on gays, " The Independent , May 15, 2006.
  7. ↑ Sistani renounces fatwa on gays . In: The Independent . ( independent.co.uk [accessed July 25, 2018]).
  8. ↑ IRAQI LGBT. Retrieved July 25, 2018 .
  9. ^ Inna Rudolf: Holy Mobilization: The Religious Legitimation behind Iraq's Counter-ISIS Campaign. ICSR King's College, accessed October 3, 2019 .
  10. ↑ Will the militias take power? May 9, 2018, accessed October 4, 2019 .
personal data
SURNAME as-Sistani, Ali
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Iraqi Shiite clergyman
DATE OF BIRTH around August 4, 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH Mashhad , Iran