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Iraqis Differ on Obama's Plans
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"We hope they will stay until 2020," said Brig. Gen. Bilal al-Dayni, a commander in the southern city of Basra, where about 30,000 Iraqi soldiers patrol the streets after a major offensive in March against extremist militias.
Obama's background shaped the perceptions of many Iraqis. "I would be very pleased if Obama wins the elections; I consider him like me, because he is a man of color and from Africa. It will be a global victory," said Ali Abid Freyeh, 42, an electrical engineer in Baghdad.
And there was also a sense that Obama seemed more understanding of the plight of Iraqis. "Obama is a calm man, unlike Bush," said Ahmad al-Ani, an official with the Sunni Iraqi Islamic Party in Anbar Province in western Iraq. "We hope that he will gain some advantage from the Bush administration's mistakes."
Other Iraqis want Obama to become president because the policies of presumptive Republican nominee Sen. John McCain would echo those of President Bush, they said. "I think that McCain will commit the same old mistakes of Bush's policy," said Saleem Abdullah al-Jubouri, spokesman for the largest Sunni political bloc. "But I think he will win the election."
Supporters of anti-American Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said it will not matter who is elected president. "U.S. foreign policy would not be changed by changing the president," said Nassar al-Rubaie, the head of Sadr's political bloc in parliament. Whether the next president is "Republican or Democrat, we completely reject the occupation under any circumstances."
In the Anbar city of Fallujah, Khalid al-Dulaimi, a commander of U.S.-backed neighborhood patrols that have turned against Sunni extremists, said Sunnis like him welcome Obama because their community, once dominant under Saddam Hussein, had been marginalized.
"We hope that he is going to look at things from the right angle," Dulaimi said. "We Sunnis prefer him to McCain, because McCain is the other face of Bush, and we don't want another Bush."
Dulaimi said he hopes Obama will visit with U.S. soldiers in the field because "their experience with the Iraqi situation is better than the experience of any American diplomats in the Green Zone."
Special correspondents Zaid Sabah, Saad al-Izzi, Dalya Hassan, Qais Mizher and Aziz Alwan in Baghdad and Washington Post staff in Mosul, Najaf, Baqubah, Basra, Fallujah and Kirkuk contributed to this report.
