THE Shia crowd, more than a thousand strong, stood silent beneath the boiling midday sun as the polemic of the Friday prayer sermon picked up in tempo, gaining in threat.

“The British raid upon our jail was an abuse of Iraqi sovereignty and respect! Is this the sovereignty Iraqis want?” Sheikh Asad al-Nasiri, the speaker, called out across the square in Twasa district, central Basra.

“The British are afraid of the Sadrists who are so capable of stabbing them! And they should take our requests seriously, especially with regard to the handing back of the two British criminals, or face the consequences of a deteriorating situation.”

Sheikh al-Nasiri is a staunch supporter of Moqtada al-Sadr, the radical cleric who leads one of the two dominant Shia parties in southern Iraq. But even he stopped short of calling for attacks on British troops, and contrasted them favourably to the Iraqi Government. “We don’t like them,” he told worshippers, “but at least they acted courageously to save their two soldiers, whereas our Government doesn’t care for its people at all.”

Of 40 people asked by The Times on the streets of Basra whether or not the British should leave Iraq after Monday’s clashes, 23 said “no”. Reaction among the city’s 1.5 million predominantly Shia population divided roughly into three camps.

The rogue police unit who first detained the two British special forces soldiers were believed to be a splinter faction of Hojatoleslam al-Sadr’s powerful militia, the Mahdi Army, hence Sadrists in Basra generally condemn the British. Their propaganda machine claims that one of the arrested soldiers was an Israeli spy, and that the undercover troops were intending to plant bombs in Basra.

Supporters of the leading Shia party, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, who have recently clashed with Sadrists, tend to view the British raid on their rival’s police station more even-handedly, taking the classic Arab attitude: “My enemy’s enemy is my friend.”

Between the two Shia factions lies a large percentage of Iraqis sick of corruption and violence, who regard the British as the only credible source of stability before the constitutional referendum on October 15.

British patrols driving through the centre of Basra yesterday were not attacked, lending credence to the expectations of British commanders that sensitive negotiations and low-profile redeployment would win the day, at least for the time being.

“I like to think that we are accepted by 70-80 per cent of (Basra’s) population,” Lieutenant-Colonel Nick Henderson, commander of the Coldstream Guards in the city, remarked this week. “They understand why we are here, to establish stability. However, they are looking to the day we are gone.”

The Interior Ministry has yet to confirm reports that the police in al-Jameat police station were a renegade faction responsible for numerous assassinations and linked to a terrorist group.

• The commander of the team sent in to free the captured British soldiers defended his mission. “There is no doubt in my mind that two men would now be dead if we hadn’t acted when we did,” Lieutenant-Colonel Huw Lloyd-Jones, of the Royal Regiment of Wales, told the South Wales Argus yesterday. “I think it was probably the high point of my career.”

STAY OR GO?

“They should certainly stay, because should they leave there will be a war for authority in Iraq.”

Miad Ahmed, 22-year-old female university student

“Not only the British but all multinational troops should stay for the time being. We need them now. But it is a matter of time to the day when we ask them to leave, as we do see them as occupiers.”

Dr Walid Khaled, 33, a Dean at Basra university

“They should stay as we need their help preparing for the next election.”

Amjad Nasar, 32, student

“What the British did was some sort of violation to the dignity of Iraqis and the people of Basra. They should leave now.”

Nazar Aziz, a member of Basra’s city council

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