Final Results Confirm Sadr's Victory In Iraq's Parliamentary Election
Sadr's supporters celebrating victory after preliminary election results on October 22, 2021
Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr's party is the biggest bloc in Iraq's parliament with 73 seats in the 329-seat house, final results announced Tuesday show.
The Taqaddum Party, which draws support from minority Sunni Muslims, won 37 seats. Former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's State of Law group won 33 seats, and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) secured 31, according to the results cited by state media.
The results were broadly in line with preliminary figures released in the days after the October 10 election, and unlikely to alter calculations much as politicians negotiate on the makeup of a new government.
Pro-Iran groups who performed poorly have refused to accept the results. They tried to change the outcome by protests, which the government ignored and the United Nations confirmed the general accuracy of the results.
Turnout reached 44%, the commission said, revised up from the 43% preliminary figure but still lower than in the last election in 2018.
More than 9.6 million people cast their ballots in the Oct. 10 vote, where at least 167 parties and more than 3,200 candidates competed for the parliament's 329 seats, the commission said.
The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen said on Tuesday it launched air raids on "legitimate" Houthi military targets including a "secret" site belonging to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.
The coalition asked civilians not to gather around or approach potential targets, Saudi state TV reported.
The Iran-aligned Houthis' main broadcaster, Al Masirah TV, said three air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition had hit Sanaa airport, while a fourth raid targeted a park.
The raid is one of several the coalition has carried out this month over the densely populated capital city of Sanaa.
Houthis have repeatedly launched cross-border attacks on the kingdom using drones and missiles since the coalition intervened in Yemen in March 2015 after the movement ousted the Saudi-backed government from the capital.
The conflict is widely seen as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran. Iran has been supplying th Houthis with weapons and military technology. The Houthis are pressing an offensive in Marib, the internationally recognized government's last northern stronghold, as well as in other areas in Yemen.
State-controlled media in Iran have tried to explain why IRGC General Seyyed Javad Ghaffari, top commander in Syria had to leave that country in early November.
Etemad Online quoted the IRGC-linked news agency Tasnim as having reported that Ghaffari was seen off in Damascus after leading those forces for six years "following some developments in Syria," but did not elaborate on those developments. However, Tasnim acknowledged that according to "foreign news sources," Ghaffari was forced by the Syrian government to leave Syria after a visit to Damascus by the Foreign Minister of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan's on November 9.
While Tehran has been portraying the development as an ordinary event, The Times of Israel on November 11 quoted Saudi sources as saying that Ghaffari was expelled from Syria as he was "accused of ‘major breach of Syrian sovereignty’ after attacking US forces, and deploying Iranian weapons to unapproved places."
According to the Times, It was reportedly Syria that shunned Iran's Qods Force Commander Javad Ghaffari for "nearly starting a war with Israel," and "almost causing an unwanted regional war."
The report published by the Times of Israel said that acting “contrary to instructions,” Ghafari led “a number of activities against the United States and Israel that almost led to the entry of Syria into an unwanted regional war, including the attack on American targets in Syria on October 20 by Iranian-backed militias.” The report said the move against Ghafari was taken by high-ranking officials in the Assad regime, after “months of disputes.”
Meanwhile, the Jerusalem Post reported that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was behind the ousting of the top commander of the Iranian forces in Syria. The Post named Al-Arabiya news agency as its source for the report. The Jerusalem Post added that sources at the Syrian Presidential Palace had said that the palace deemed Ghaffari's behavior as a "violation of Syrian sovereignty."
Ghaffari was the third commander of the Iranian forces in Syria since 2011 when Iran began to intervene in Syria's civil war. He started his career in Syria as one of the commanders at the Iranian forces' headquarters in Damascus and later became the commander of the forces in Aleppo where he recently led Iranian forces as well as their Lebanese Hezbollah and Afghan mercenaries, the Fatemiyoun, Etemad Online reported in Tehran.
In an apparent attempt to undermine the news about Ghaffari’s expulsion, political commentator Massoud Assadollahi claimed in an interview with Etemad Online that Iran's presence in Syria has been more political than military in recent months. He also claimed that Ghaffari's mission to Syria had ended in 2020 but the killing of Qods Force Commander Qasem Soleimani delayed his return to Iran.
Meanwhile, Assadollahi characterized Ghaffari as a military adviser. This comes while during his mission to Aleppo, Ghaffari was nicknamed "the butcher of Aleppo," a title utterly far from being advisory. The commentator claimed that Ghaffari's role in Syria was one of "solving the Syrian people's problems," and that he was "a popular figure" in Aleppo.
Assadollahi further denied that Ghaffari was expelled from Syria, adding that according to diplomatic protocols he would have been given 48 hours to leave Syria if he was expelled, but he stayed in Syria for a month after the end of his mission. Some reports said that Ghaffari had his own private business in Syria.
According to the Jerusalem Post, the Saudi news channel Al-Hadath reported that the Syrians blamed the Iranians for taking advantage of Syria's natural and economic resources for their own gain and for evading tax payments to the Syrian regime.
Furthermore, Al-Hadath also revealed that Ghaffari admitted that he had stationed Iranian forces in places that were not approved by Syria.
Saudi Arabia said on Tuesday it had destroyed a ballistic missile launch site in overnight air strikes in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa, where residents reported big explosions.
A broadcaster run by the Iran-aligned Houthi movement, Al Masirah TV, said three air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition had hit a residential district of the capital.
There were no immediate reports of casualties.
In a statement reported by the Saudi state news agency (SPA) on Twitter, the coalition said air strikes had been conducted against "legitimate military targets" in Sanaa.
It described the ballistic missile sites as "secret" and said one of "high-value" had been destroyed.
The coalition said that "the secret positions" had used hospitals, organizations and civilians as human shields.
Residents told Reuters the explosions had rocked the northern neighborhoods of the city, and said two military sites had been attacked.
The Houthis have repeatedly launched cross-border attacks on Saudi Arabia using drones and missiles since the Saudi-led coalition intervened in Yemen in March 2015 after the movement ousted the Saudi-backed government from the capital.
The Houthi movement said on Saturday it had fired 14 drones at several Saudi cities, including at Saudi Aramco facilities in Jeddah.
The conflict is widely seen as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Bahrain arrested several suspected militants ahead of an attack and seized weapons and explosives that had come from Iran, the interior ministry said on Monday.
The ministry, tweeting the news, did not say how many people were arrested or specify their nationalities. It described them as "linked with terrorist groups in Iran" and said they were "plotting terrorist operations against security and civil peace".
Bahrain, host to the US Navy's Fifth Fleet and other international naval operations, has often accused Shiite Muslim Iran of seeking to subvert the Sunni-ruled kingdom, which has a Shiite majority. Iran has denied such charges.
The island state was the only Gulf Arab state to witness a sizeable pro-democracy uprising in the 2011 "Arab Spring", from a largely Shi'ite opposition movement, which it quashed with help from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Last year, Bahrain said it had foiled a "terrorist attack" backed by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Iranian officials and government-controlled media routinely attack Bahrain’s royal family and its close ties with Saudi Arabia.
US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin ended his Middle East trip on Monday emphasizing the importance of reassuring regional allies about America's commitments.
Austin’s last meeting was with Abu Dhab’s Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan during which the Defense Secretary reaffirmed “the importance of the US-UAE strategic partnership.” He also thanked the United Arab Emirates for hosting US troops.
The Secretary who attended the Manama Dialogue conference in Bahrain had a series of meetings with regional partners. During the conference he talked about Iran and tried to reassure regional alliesabout the Biden Administration’s determination not to allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons.
Israel and America’s Arab allies are concerned about Iran’s growing nuclear program and its belligerent regional policies, while the United States continues to rely on diplomacy to reach a nuclear agreement with Tehran.
In a tweet at the end of his visit Austin said, “One of my core missions as SecDef is to deepen our partnerships. I want our partners to know they are important to us and that they will see a commitment from us for years to come.”
