With anti-U.S. occupation forces, led by Sadr-linked militiamen, clashing with pro-U.S. forces tied to SCIRI (SIIC) in Nasiriya and Diwaniya, the Post today carries a puff piece promoting SCIRI and its suave front man, Adel Abdel Mahdi. It suggests that PM Maliki is getting wobbly, and it reveals that Abdel Mahdi tried to resign last week, amid growing political turmoil in Iraq.

The resignation gambit was leaked to the Post by SIIC-linked forces, and Abdel Mahdi is quoted in the piece posturing about the twin minarets in Samarra, which he compares ludicrously to the Twin Towers:

"The two minarets were as important to us as September 11, and we should be accountable to the people," Abdul Mahdi said in a telephone interview Wednesday. "We should be doing more to move in a positive direction -- on corruption, accountability and defending the important sites."

Such grandstanding by Abdel Mahdi can only mean that he's angling for U.S. support (and probably has it) to replace Maliki when it finally becomes obvious that the Maliki isn't going to meet any "benchmarks." It's also a clear effort by SCIRI-SIIC to head off an anti-Maliki nationalist coalition that could include a wide range of parties outside the chief political axis of SCIRI and the Kurds.

But it's more and more evident that neither Dawa nor SCIRI have much political support in Iraq anymore. Among Shia, Sadr and the Fadhila party (and their allies) seem far more popular. Recent fighting in various Iraqi cities, including the two listed above, is pointing out this truth: that Sadr (and the Sadrists, including Fadhila) have the support of rank-and-file Shia, and SCIRI-SIIC rules by force of arms, through its Iranian-backed Badr Brigade, and by virtue of the fact that it controls many provincial and local government posts.