PSM’s Al-Sadr: No place for Israel normalization in Iraq
Shafaq News – Najaf
On Wednesday, Muqtada Al-Sadr, leader of the Patriotic Shiite Movement (PSM), stressed that anyone advocating normalization with Israel should be held accountable.
In a statement, Al-Sadr said normalization was “a crime punishable by Iraqi law,” adding that “anyone who incites or calls for it, whoever they may be, is not immune from punishment.”
“There is no place for normalization or its legitimization in Iraq.”
— مقتدى السيد محمد الصدر (@Mu_AlSadr) December 24, 2025
His comments followed remarks by Louis Raphael Sako, head of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Iraq and worldwide, who used the term “normalization” during Christmas Mass at St. Joseph’s Church in Baghdad.
Caretaker Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani also addressed the issue during the service, saying “the word normalization does not exist in the Iraqi dictionary,” and linking the term to what he described as an occupying entity that had violated land and people, in reference to Israel.
In 2022, Iraq’s Council of Representatives passed a law criminalizing normalization with Israel, a bill proposed by al-Sadr’s bloc and its allies at the time. The legislation provides for penalties including life imprisonment or fixed jail terms and seeks to bar any diplomatic, political, military, economic, cultural, or other relations with Israel.
In November, a criminal court in Dhi Qar province sentenced a man to eight years in prison under that law for urging the Iraqi government to normalize relations with Israel.
