The South...Where to?

"In the mean time, the suffering of the silent majority worsens; those people who don't belong to any of the two trends are now looking for hope in the next elections which can rescue them from the control of the parties; there are no well-defined political substitutes though.
Anyway, this morning I came across the Arabic forum on the BBC and on one thread people were posting their comments about the role of religious parties and their militias (namely Badr and Mehdi army) in Basra and it was particularly interesting to read what Basrawis think.

There were around 33 comments by different commentors from Basra, 18 of the comments were against what the parties and their militias were doing in Basra, 9 were supportive of on or both of the two parties, 3 denied the problem, 2 moderately discussed the subject and think that an agreement with the militias can be reached and 1 comment was irrelevant to the subject.

I understand that forums do not necessarily reflect reality but it is always a good idea to hear what the concerned people have to say so I have chosen a bunch of these comments and translated them for you:"
ITM