Iraq's simmering south

"The US should hand Iraq over to the Hawza and leave peacefully," said Hussein al-Sabaly, holding Sadr's photograph over his chest. Like Sadr, he rejects the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council as illegitimate.

Ignoring such demands, US commanders have moved to marginalize Sadr and limit the extrajudicial power of religious militia to impose conservative Shiite dictates. Meanwhile, they have worked to shore up local civilian governments and reach out to more moderate Shiites who reject Sadr's extremist tactics and accept the US presence.

This summer, for example, marines in Karbala officially disbanded the Hawza's 200-strong Karbala Protective Force (KPF) after it began beating and arresting people - including couples caught holding hands outside the mosque - without turning them over to the city police. Some of the mosque militia resisted and remains active.

"The Hawza beat me with a wooden stick," says Nidhal Bader, a tear running down her sallow cheek onto her black robe. "They called me a pimp bringing prostitutes to the Americans," says Ms. Bader, who works at the Karbala police station searching detained females.

Yet even moderate Shiites disagreed with US efforts to ban forces such as the KPF. "The KPF was keeping security but the Americans didn't allow it, so the lack of control started," says Mr. Azzez, complaining that drugs, arms dealing, and pornography are infesting Karbala.

The upsurge of crime around mosques revealed a clear security gap, posing a dilemma for Shiite clerics, US forces, and local police. In a breakthrough in Karbala in early August, all three groups agreed on a joint operation to sweep out criminals. Hundreds of city police armed with AK-47s and mosque enforcers carrying sticks flooded the plaza around the Imam Abbas Mosque before the market opened, tearing down illegal stalls. US troops stayed at the perimeter, searching incoming vehicles for guns and other contraband.

The Karbala operation was at least a temporary success, but the vulnerabilities at other mosques persisted - culminating in the massive car bombing that rocked the Imam Ali Mosque in Najaf on August 29. The Najaf attack came despite US intelligence warnings that Hussein loyalists or Sunni extremists were planning a terrorist strike at a Najaf shrine. For weeks before the blast, Marines searched hundreds of busloads of worshipers heading to Friday prayers at Najaf.

The explosion killed more than 100 people, including a moderate Shiite cleric supporting the coalition, Ayatollah Mohammed Bakr al-Hakim. Immediately, the black-uniformed Badr Brigade militia linked to Hakim started patrolling shrines in Najaf, but again the marines ordered them to disband. Stepping into the dispute, Iraq's interim governing council this month called on local authorities to create regional security forces to protect the mosques.

US commanders say unless Shiite clerics denounce all violence, including any against coalition forces, instability will persist. "This will continue as long as the people of Iraq tolerate it - it will be a long- term problem and will hurt the progress they've made so far," says Lt. Col. Matt Lopez, a marine based in Karbala.

Today, friction remains high. Indeed, the arrival in the south of a 9,000-strong Polish-led multinational division to replace US marines is complicating the security picture by worsening language barriers and chain-of-command problems.

Earlier this month, hundreds of Iraqis, some brandishing swords, surrounded US MPs at the Karbala station after the soldiers disarmed the guards of a local cleric. Iraqi police stood aside. Polish-led Bulgarian troops arrived late. By the end of the seven-hour protest, three Iraqis had been shot to death by the Americans.

"Unfortunately, it turned for the worse," says Lt. Joseph La Jeunesse of the 870th Military Police.

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