In the early hours of Friday, January 24, "a human tide" has already invaded Baghdad, reports Cyril Payen, France 24's special envoy to Iraq. Between the checkpoints erected to provide security, supporters of Moqtada al-Sadr converge by the hundreds in front of the Green Zone, where the American army is located. "Outside the Americans," can we read on the signs.
"It is expected that the call of Moqtada al-Sadr will be widely followed in the country," said Lucile Wassermann, Baghdad correspondent for France 24. In Kerbala, further south, his followers took buses to reach Baghdad.
"We must not underestimate the anger provoked by the American strike against General Qassem Soleimani, Tehran's emissary in Iraq, and by Abu Mehdi al-Mouhandis, his Iraqi lieutenant and number two in Hachd al-Chaabi" , she adds.
"Occupation forces"
This strike rekindled an American sentiment in the country. On January 5, the Iraqi parliament called on the government, through a resolution, to "end the presence of foreign troops" in Iraq.
In the Sadrist ranks, the will is even more marked because of the past of Moqtada Sadr, who long fought the American forces in the 2000s. "He considered them at the time as occupying forces, specifies- It is the same speech that we find today in the camp of his supporters. "
Some have told Lucile Wasserman that they would mobilize until the departure of the American army, and even say they are ready to take up arms if Moqtada Sadr asks them. But for now, the latter recalled that the movement was peaceful, and that the political and diplomatic way should be favored.
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