the real `Abdul-`Aziz Al-Hakim

The real record of the commander of the Badr sectarian Shi`ite militia (which terrorized the Palestinians in Iraq): "CNN and other news organizations reported that Hakim was a behind-the-scenes operator who never held a political position in Iraq. That’s not entirely true – Hakim was on the American-appointed Iraqi Governing Council, the interim government under the U.S. occupation authority. In fact, Hakim quickly infuriated Iraqi women’s advocates by using his position on the council to try to repeal the country’s secular family and inheritance laws, which were considered to be among the most progressive in the Middle East. The old laws made polygamy difficult and guaranteed women custody rights in divorce cases. Hakim favored implementing a strict interpretation of Islamic jurisprudence. Hundreds of Iraqi women marched in protest in Baghdad and Kurdistan, and it took then-U.S. viceroy Paul Bremer’s veto to kill the plan.-- Hakim favored carving the oil-rich, majority-Shiite southern part of Iraq into a confederacy, in the style of the mostly autonomous Kurdish north. Voters rejected the plan in January 2009."