Najaf
Najaf (نجف in the Arabic language) is a city in Iraq, about 160 km south of Baghdad, located at 31.99ÃÂðN 44.33ÃÂðE. Its estimated population in 2003 was 585,600 people. It is the capital of An Najaf Province. It is one of the holiest cities of Shi'a Islam and the epicenter of Shi'a political power in Iraq.The city was reputedly founded in 791 (178 A.H.) by the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashid. It became famous as the site of the tomb of Ali ibn Abi Talib, founder of Shi'a Islam and first Imam. The city is now a great center of pilgrimage from throughout the Islamic world. Only Mecca and Medina receive more Muslim pilgrims.
The Meshed Ali (Tomb of Ali) is housed in a grand structure with a gilded dome and many precious objects in the walls. Nearby is the Wadi-us-Salaam (Valley of Peace), the largest cemetary in the Muslim world (and the second largest in the entire world), containing the tombs of several other prophets including Ibrahim and Ishaq. Many of the devout from other lands aspire to be buried here, to be raised from the dead with Imam Ali on Judgement Day. Over the centuries, numerous hospices, schools, libraries and Sufi convents were built around the shrine to make the city the centre of Shi'a learning and theology. Najaf lost its primacy to the Iranian city of Qom in the 19th century, but regained its leading role in the late 20th century.
Because of the common religious affinities between Iraq's Shi'a majority and the Iranians, Najaf was regarded with suspicion by the Sunni-dominated regime of Saddam Hussein, which severely restricted Shi'a religious activities. A mass revolt broke out at the end of the Gulf War in 1991, which was put down by the Iraqi military with considerable brutality and damage to the city. Much of the damage was repaired fairly quickly but great resentment against Saddam's regime lingered for a long time afterwards.
In February 1999, Najaf's most senior cleric, Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr, was murdered along with his two sons - the third killing of clerics in the city in less than a year. Although the Iraqi government claimed to have caught and executed the supposed killers, all Sh'ia, one of whom was actually in prison at the time, many opposition figures and ordinary Shi'as blamed the killings on Saddam's regime, which was said to be systematically attempting to suppress independent voices in the Shi'a community. A surviving son of al-Sadr, Moqtada al-Sadr, has assumed his father's role.
During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Najaf was a key target of the invading United States forces. The city was encircled during heavy fighting on March 26, 2003 but the Americans declined to storm it, apparently fearing the political consequences of damage to Najaf's shrines. In the event, it surrendered peacefully about ten days later around the time of the fall of Baghdad.
The clerical authorities of the Shiite enclave of Saddam City in Baghdad, which claimed autonomy in April 2003 after the fall of Baghdad, claimed to be taking their orders from senior Shiite clerics in Najaf.
On August 29 2003 a car bomb exploded during prayers outside the Imam Ali Mosque, just as weekly prayers were ending. More than 80 people were killed, including the influential cleric Ayatollah Sayed Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim, the Shiite leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). Dozens of others were injured. Nobody claimed responsibility for the attack - Saddam himself, in hiding at the time, denied any involvement in a taped message. Though the followers of the al-Sadr were engaged in a power struggle with the al-Hakim faction at the time,exacerbated by questions of cooperation with the U.S.-led occupying forces, it was widely reported in U.S. media that al-Qaida terrorists were possibly to blame.