Oh yeh, I forgot to mention; "Beyond Chutzpah" is still available on amazon.co.uk as far as I can see - dunno what this means.
In re: Iran, though
>
> With the reformist faction and/or the Rafsanjani faction back in power
> at the national level, Iran's foreign policy will be different. If
> the price of American friendship were ditching Hamas, Hizballah, etc.,
> they would be happy to, whereas Ahmadinejad's faction wouldn't be.
I don't believe this. They will still want nukes; everyone does. Hamas ought to be ditched by everyone anyway - they are an entirely useless resistance organisation who are vastly more dangerous and harmful to their own population than to their enemies. And ditching Hezbollah is not even slightly on the cards given the importance of Lebanon to Iran. A diminution in Iranian support for Hezbollah (and consequent increase in Syrian influence) would be no bad thing either, as it would strengthen the nationalist elements in Hezb relative to the fundamentalists; I don't see how it can possibly be seen as a victory for imperialism if Hezb becomes more of a political movement with a base in the whole of Lebanon rather than a Shiite militia aiming at exporting the Iranian revolution.
>
> An Iranian government driven by the reformist and/or Rafsanjani
> faction might work with Washington to get rid of Moktada al-Sadr and
> the Mahdi Army, too, as they are closer to Abdul Aziz al-Hakim than
> Ahmadinejad's faciton or Ali Khamenei for that matter is:
> <http://www.juancole.com/2003/10/iranian-factions-divided-on-which.html>
> <http://www.juancole.com/2003/11/khatami-recognizes-igc-according-to.html>.
Yoshie, these references are three years old and have been utterly overtaken by events. In 2003 it was an interesting question to ask about links between Sadr and Iran, but we've had a lot of Iraqi politics since then. Iran can't "get rid of" al-Sadr unless it is going to invade Iraq (I am presuming, perhaps wrongly, that we would all regard this as a bad idea). Sadr neither gets nor wants any help from Iran - he is the Shi'ite face of Iraqi nationalism and a big part of his selling point has been to successfully portray his SCIRI opponents as Iranian puppets. The only person who might be able to undermine Sadr would be Sistani if he decided to completely break with precedent and get involved in politics, but I don't see any reason to believe that Ahmadi-Nejad's electoral success would be relevant to that decision.
>
>
> Washington certainly looks like it's gearing up to eliminate Sadr.
>
> <blockquote><http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/12/world/middleeast/12iraq.html>
> December 12, 2006
> Iraqis Consider Ways to Reduce Power of Cleric
> By EDWARD WONG
This story basically disqualifies itself from serious consideration simply by the headline. Moqtada al-Sadr isn't a cleric. He doesn't issue fatwas; he has a middle-ranking Islamic academic title which is the equivalent of an honorary degree. His religious status is entirely based on who his father was, and his importance in Iraqi politics is entirely based on his ability to keep a militia together and to be a successful guerilla general. This article is all about an attempt to stick together a coalition in the Iraqi Parliament to "marginalise" Sadr; since he has about 60k street fighters, I would have thought this is about as relevant as trying to get him blackballed from the local tennis club. If by "eliminate", you mean "kill", then it is hard to see how Ahmadinejad could protect him from that.
best dd
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