A powerful Shi'a militia whose militants were involved in some of the worst sectarian violence of the last few years has launched an unexpected initiative in repatriating displaced Sunni families to southwestern Baghdad.
Local sources in the al-Risala district of the capital tell IraqSlogger that Mahdi Army militiamen are involved in what appears to be a systematic effort to facilitate the return of Sunni families to homes they owned in the formerly mixed area.
The Mahdi Army is a powerful militia nominally aligned with the young Shi'a cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, the current leader of the main faction of the Sadrist current, named for Sadr's late father and father in law, both venerated Shi'a clerics. However, the degree of control enjoyed by the Sadrist leadership over the notoriously decentralized militia has always been in question.
The southwestern quadrant of Baghdad near the Baghdad International Airport was the site of a smoldering turf war between rival Sunni and Shi'a militias for much of the last two years, leading to widespread displacement and high rates of violent death among the civilian population.
Now, however, Mahdi Army members in the Risala area are apparently brokering the repatriation of displaced Sunni residents to the homes in the area from which they fled during the spiraling sectarian violence of the last few years.
Some displaced Shi'a Iraqis living in homes in the Risala area vacated by fleeing Sunnis tell Slogger that in the last two weeks, Mahdi Army members have asked them to abandon the residences to make way for the original Sunni owners of the residence as they return to the area.
One internally displaced Iraqi Shi'a family living as a rent-paying tenants of a home owned by a displaced Iraqi Sunni family in Risala told Slogger that Mahdi Army members knocked on the door of the house and inquired about the original owners.
The militiamen were keen to learn if the Shi'a family were occupying the home without the consent of the original owners, or on a contractual and consensual basis, a family member told IraqSlogger.
The militiamen were also interested in knowing if the displaced Sunni owner was affiliated with extremist ("Wahhabi," in their terms) religious trends, he said, as well as in obtaining the owner's mobile phone number, which they then called to confirm the Shi'a family's account of the arrangement.
It appears that the militiamen could be vetting the displaced Sunni families to screen out "extremists," although Slogger sources cannot confirm this at this time. If this is the case, the hazards of relying on the judgement of displaced families, who may be not be interested or able to relocate from the home they currently occupy, to determine the fitness to return of a home's original owner, bear noting, along with the completely extrajudicial nature of the Mahdi Army's reported repatriation efforts.
Meanwhile, Sunni families displaced from the area report receiving unsolicited telephone calls from self-identified militiamen inviting them to return to their homes in the area.
Locals are puzzled as to the motives of the Mahdi Army in apparently facilitating the restoration of property to its displaced Sunni owners, especially since self-styled Mahdi Army militiamen were involved in some of the worst crimes of displacement, murder, and property theft in Baghdad.
Moreover, the relationship, if any, between leadership of the Sadrist organization and the new Mahdi Army initiative in Risala, is also unclear.
Members of IraqSlogger's network of Iraqi staff contributed to this report but choose to remain anonymous for security reasons.
