FRENCH-IRAQI RESEARCHER DESCRIBES RECENT RAMADAN

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 PARIS 007745

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/7/2015
TAGS: PREL PTER PGOV PINR IR IZ FR
SUBJECT: FRENCH-IRAQI RESEARCHER DESCRIBES RECENT RAMADAN
VISIT TO QOM, CONTACTS WITH SISTANI REPRESENTATIVES

REF: PARIS 7675

Classified By: Political Minister-Counselor Josiah Rosenblatt, reasons
1.4 (b) and (d).


1. (C) Summary: A local French-Iraqi anthropologist, Hosham
Dawod (protect),briefed us on a recent visit to Qom, Iran,
reportedly at the invitation of supporters of Ayatollah
SISTANI. Dawod, who is a former IVLP participant and an
expert on Iraqi tribes and Shi'ism, told us he spent 12 days
in Qom as the guest of Sayyid Jawad Sharistani, an in-law of
Ayatollah SISTANI, who reportedly acts as a go-between
SISTANI and the senior Iranian leadership. Dawod described
Ayatollah SISTANI as having a large clerical base of support
in Qom, and attracting more popular support in Qom than
partisans of Supreme Leader Khamenei. Dawod described an
intense internal debate and shifting rivalries in the wake of
Iran's recent presidential election, based on what he
observed in Qom. Dawod viewed Supreme Leader Khamenei's
influence as weakened by supporters of Iranian President
Ahmadinejad, whom he described as a follower of rival,
hard-line Qom-based Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi. At the same
time, Dawod described a negative popular reaction in Qom to
President Ahmadinejad's threats "to wipe Israel off the map,"
which were viewed locally as contributing to Iran's
isolation. Dawod asserted that VOA appeared to be a
preferred source of news for the Iranians he met in Qom, and
that VOA could be an important tool in persuading the Iranian
public that intransigence on the nuclear issue would only
further Iran's isolation and erode modest openings secured in
recent years. End summary.


2. (C) Poloff met recently with French-Iraqi anthropologist
Hosham Dawod, upon his return from a 12-day visit to Qom,
Iran. (Comment: Dawod is an established embassy contact and
a noted French expert on Iraqi tribes and Shi'ism, based at
the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS).
He fled Iraq under Saddam's regime as a teenager, before
eventually settling and pursuing graduate studies in France,
where he obtained French nationality. He is a Shi'a Kurd,
secular and left-leaning in outlook, and does not appear to
support a particular political camp in Iraq. Dawod
participated in an IVLP program to the U.S. in April 2005.
End comment.) Dawod reported that he visited Iran at the
invitation of Jawad Sharistani, whom he described as a
Qom-based representative and in-law of Ayatollah SISTANI.
Dawod described Jawad as a cousin of Iraqi National Assembly
Deputy Speaker Husayn al-Sharistani but more important than
his Iraq-based cousin, given Jawad's reported access to the
highest levels of the Iranian leadership, including Supreme
Leader Khamenei. Dawod told us he established contact with
Jawad Sharistani during a research trip to Mecca during the
hajj season earlier this year, and that SISTANI's camp had
expressed appreciation for Dawod's writings on Iraq. Dawod
told us that during the Qom visit, Sharistani asked him to
pursue a documentary project on Ayatollah SISTANI, for which
he offered Dawod access to SISTANI's archives and family
members as well as an interview with SISTANI himself in Iraq.
Dawod accepted the offer, which he described as a "coup"
from a research perspective.


3. (C) Dawod described SISTANI as having a large base of
clerical support in Qom, larger than its counterpart in Iraq;
he asserted that SISTANI had some 1,300 "wakils" or official
representatives in Iran, compared to a dozen or so in Iraq.
Dawod described the Ramadan iftars hosted by SISTANI's
supporters in Qom as packed and better attended than those
organized by supporters of Supreme Leader Khamenei, and
concluded that SISTANI had more popular support in Qom. He
noted that SISTANI's supporters were careful not to create a
sense of rivalry with Iranian authorities, who were also
constrained to remain hospitable to SISTANI's base in Qom,
despite the obvious sense of competition between Najaf and
Qom for theological preeminence. At the same time, Dawod
described Jawad Sharistani and other Qom-based SISTANI
supporters as deeply concerned by the depth of Iranian
infiltration in Iraq and Iranian influence among leading Iraq
Shi'a parties in Iraq, which Dawod speculated could generate
friction between SISTANI and the SCIRI and Dawa parties after
December elections.


4. (C) Dawod said that throughout his visit to Qom, he sensed
an intense internal debate taking place in the wake of
election of President Ahmadinejad. Dawod described Supreme
Leader Khamenei as weakened by Ahmadenijad's election, and
cited Ahmadinejad's allegiance to rival, hard-line Qom-based
Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi. Dawod stressed that although
Ahmadinejad continued to publicly pay deference to Khamenei,
the Iranian president and his leading appointees, including
FM Motaki and Supreme National Security Council Chief Ali
Larijani, were "graduates" of Mesbah's religious institute in
Qom. According to Dawod, although Mesbah had played a key
role in drafting a theological argument for Khamenei's
succession of Ayatollah Khomeini, some of his supporters in
Qom were calling for Iran to have a younger Supreme Leader.
Dawod opined that internal rivalries were driving shifting
alliances in Iran, such as Khamenei's undermining, and more
recent rehabilitation of former Iranian president Rafsanjani.
Dawod cited the recent recall of Iranian ambassador to Paris
Sadegh Kharazi (reftel),noting that the envoy's relations by
marriage to Khamenei could not protect him from being swept
aside in Ahmedinejad's wholesale dismissals of Iran's
overseas representatives.


5. (C) Dawod described a negative reaction in Qom to
President Ahmedinejad's public threats to "wipe Israel off
the map," which he said most of his Iranian interlocutors
viewed as likely to push Iran into further isolation. Dawod
said one young Iranian asked him in jest why the U.S.
couldn't use its satellite communications to find the fabled
"hidden imam," which would mean that Iran's theocratic regime
would have to step down. Dawod observed that "every taxi
driver" he met and most other Iranians with whom he spoke in
Qom relied on Farsi-language VOA as a preferred source of
news. He commented that radio was a much more effective news
medium than television in Iran, since most Iranians he met
dismissed state TV entirely. Dawod concluded that despite
Qom's reputation as a theocratic foothold, citizens displayed
a surprising degree of openness; for example, he observed
single, casually veiled women smoking shisha in cafes in Qom,
an unthinkable act in neighboring Iraq. Dawod concluded that
despite Iran's domestic problems, Iranians, particularly
young people, had been able to carve out some openings in the
past 10 years -- breathing room which they would not want to
give up. He opined that VOA could be a useful tool in
persuading the Iranian public that further intransigence on
the nuclear issue would mean forfeiting the openings achieved
in recent years; in Dawod's view, no one in Iran, except
perhaps a hard-line minority, wanted to return to the
isolation of 1979.


6. (C) Comment: We view Dawod as a reliable interlocutor and
hope his observations are of some use to Iran and Iraq
watchers in Washington. Dawod's observations on an internal
debate in Iran track with what we have heard from the MFA
(reftel),but he does not share the MFA's cautious approach
against isolating Iran. End comment.

Please visit Paris' Classified Website at:
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/paris/index.c fm
Hofmann