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Mehdi Army (Iraq)

Last modified: 2020-08-22 by ian macdonald
Keywords: iraq | shiite | muqtada sadr |
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[Iraq] image located by William Garrison, 30 October 2013


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Mehdi Army

John Issa, an interpreter who is an American citizen originally from Lebanon, translates words on a Shiite flag found Monday night in the Hurriyah area of Baghdad in a home once used as a kidnappers’ hide-out. The flag reads, "Muqtada Sadr, savior of god," a reference to the Shiite cleric who heads the Mehdi Army, c. 2008 (Shia).
William Garrison, 30 October 2013

The Mehdi Army, sometimes known as al-Dajjal Army or Jaysh al-Mahdi, is an armed movement that appeared in 2003. The name refers to Mahdi, a long-since disappeared Imam who is believed by Shi'a Muslims to be due to reappear when the end of time approaches. The tradition mentions that prophet Muhammad said that the advent of the Mahdi would be signaled by "Black Standards" proceeding from Khorasan. Hence the use of black flags referring to Jihadists movements. This group has periodically engaged in violent conflict with the United States and other Coalition forces, while the larger Sadrist movement has formed its own religious courts, and organized social services, law enforcement, and prisons in areas under its control. Part of the support and relation among this and other groups is that there are some SGs (Special Groups) a designation given by the American military to the cell-based Shi'a paramilitary organizations operating within Iraq, backed by Iran. According to the Americans these groups are funded, trained, and armed by the Iranian Quds Force, part of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. A distinction between these groups and the Mahdi Army has been maintained more clearly since al-Sadr called for a cease fire at the end of August 2007, following Mahdi Army clashes with Iraqi Security Forces in Karbala, Iraq, but the Special Groups continued fighting. After the disbanding of the Mahdi Army in 2008 its successor was announced as a group called the Brigade of Promised Day; however the largest special group which emerged after the Iraq spring fighting of 2008 was a group called the Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq or Qazali Network. According to the Guardian newspaper in March 2014, Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq is controlled by Iran under Al-Quds Force. Another large special group is Kata'ib Hezbollah (or Hezbollah Brigades) which started to operate independently from the Mahdi Army and the other Special Groups.
Sources: Mahdi_Army , Muqtada_al-Sadr , Quds_Force , Abu_Bakr_al-Baghdadi and Special Groups (Iraq).
Esteban Rivera, 17 June 2014

To add further information on this topic I am sending some more information and images. The Mahdi Army, or JAM (Jaysh al-Mahdi) has evolved into the Promised Day Brigades and then into the Peace Companies (Saraya al-Salam), frequently mistakenly still called "Peace Brigades" in United States media. They are an Iraqi armed group linked to Iraq's Shia community. The Peace Brigades were created by the Iraqi Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in June 2003 and disbanded in 2008 only to be revived since 2014 in the much more broad sense of a Popular Mobilization Forces (al-Hashd al-Shaabi). The Peace Companies emerged again in 2014 replacing the Promised Day Brigades into a much more elaborate network of cooperation under the People's Mobilization (Forces).
The People's Mobilization (Forces) (al-Hashd al-Shaabi), also known as the National Mobilization (al-Hashd al-Watani), and as the Popular Mobilization Forces/Units/Committee (PMF/PMU/PMC), is an Iraqi state-sponsored umbrella organization composed of some 40, mainly Shiite, militias (there also Sunni, Christian, and Yazidi groups). The People's Mobilization was formed for deployment against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. The organization was formed by uniting existing militias under the "People's Mobilization Committee" of the Iraqi Ministry of Interior in June of 2014. Despite being a force outside the Iraqi regular armed services, militants of the Popular Mobilization Forces openly reject the qualification of "militia".
This framework of cooperation is coordinated by the Iraqi State and acts (loosely) as a confederation of forces, of which the three main driving forces are: "The League of the Righteous" (As-saib Ahl al Haq), "Hezbollah Brigades" (Kata'ib Hezbollah) and the "Promised Day Brigades" which evolved into the "Peace Companies" (Sources: Popular Mobilization Forces (Iraq) and Peace Companies and Special Groups (Iraq), and other lesser groups, such as the Badr Organization and the Battalion of the Sayyid's Martyrs (Kata'ib Sayyid al-Shuhada - KSS) in Iraq.)
Now, back to Mahdi Army: we feature the above image, sent to the list by William Garrison. He mentions the original source to be Getty images. Here are a few more of those pictures (all of them were taken in Baghdad Shiite district of Sadr City, July 21, 2006):
      - Image #1 (flag in the middle) and (source)
      - Image #2 (flag in the middle) and (source)
      - Image #3 (flag in the middle) and (source)
      - Image #4 and (source)
      - Image #5 and (source).
The flag is a horizontal green flag, with the map of Iraq in the middle in white outline, with fourteen white rays coming out of the center of the Iraq map outwards, with an Iraqi flag in the right corner, and below the Iraq map, two crossed white swords (most likely a type of scimitar) with the black grip.
Esteban Rivera, 27 March 2016

#49a   #49b
Images from Randy Young, 1 April 2016

I attempted to create of the first two Popular Mobilization Forces flags that Esteban listed in his E-mail - the current logo on the white field (#49a) and the previous yellow flag with the red logo (#49b). Unfortunately, I was not able to gif the red flag with the inscription that he also linked in his E-mail. I'll keep trying, though, and hopefully be able to come up with a reasonable facsimile in the future. Please let me know if there are any changes or corrections that need to be made to the attached graphics.
Randy Young, 1 April 2016