Second of three parts

NAJAF, Iraq — The anticipation is palpable. After more than 80 years on the margins, the Shiites of Iraq will finally get their due: a controlling stake in the government commensurate with their majority status.

Beyond the ubiquitous posters bearing the image of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and the United Iraqi Alliance slate the leading Shiite cleric helped assemble, there's little in the way of active campaigning in Najaf just a week before national elections.

With the power of al-Sistani, there's no need.

Most expect the Alliance list to grab the lion's share of votes in the country's Shiite-dominated south, with the slate led by interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite, coming second. Few in Najaf can even think who might come third.

But if there's confidence, there is also awareness among Shiite leaders that for the sake of national unity and stability, they will have to be graceful winners, despite their decades of subjugation under Sunni Arab rule and the ongoing insurgency that has left hundreds of Shiites dead.

They must reach out to the Kurds in the north and the Sunni Arab minority, whose refusal to accept the new political order has fed the bloody insurgency.

"Yes, there is fear. There is fear among the Sunnis. There is fear among the Kurds," said Salah Battat, head of the Basra office for the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or SCIRI, one of the Alliance's top Shiite religious parties.

Efforts to placate leery Sunnis are already under way. In southern Basra province, SCIRI has focused on encouraging voter turnout in the largely Sunni town of Zubeir.

Even if residents avoid the polls in mass numbers, as local Sunni politicians predict, Battat said the next provincial council would make it a priority to appoint Sunnis to prominent positions.

"It's part of our patriotic duty," he said. "We cannot rebuild Iraq without our Sunni sons."

Shiite religious leaders have also joined the inclusiveness campaign. In an early January sermon, Sheik Sadreddin Qubanchi of Najaf endorsed the still-controversial idea of granting extra postelection seats in the new national assembly to Sunni leaders if Sunni turnout is low.

"We think that it is important for them to participate, to respect their votes, and to offer them multiple choices if they couldn't vote," Qubanchi said.

In the lead-up to the election, the Shiites have been models of patience and forbearance, shrugging off provocations, insurgent attacks on Shiite mosques and political offices and accusations that their parties serve as stalking horses for sinister Iranian ambitions.

"To a certain extent, they've been more graceful than I would have expected," said a U.S. official with an international organization advising Iraqis on political-party development.

With the numbers inalterably on their side, the Shiites can afford to be magnanimous. But Western diplomats have also worked steadily behind the scenes to keep Shiite leaders on the high road.

"We urge them to show restraint, which they have," said a senior Western diplomat in Iraq. "Their response is always: 'Trust us. We will do this. These are our brothers.' They say all the right things."

Now the question is: What will the Shiites do when they finally ascend to power? King Abdullah II of Jordan and interim Iraqi Defense Minister Hazem Shalaan, himself a Shiite, have issued dark warnings of a hidden agenda to establish an Iran-style theocracy — one that would only reveal itself once it's too late.

Shiite politicians dismiss the charges as either unfounded hysteria or electoral scare tactics.

"Elections are a competition. It's normal for parties to use accusations to weaken other parties. We saw it in America with Bush and Kerry," said Sheik Ali Merza, head of the Najaf office for the Dawa party, a member of the Alliance slate. "It is not possible to achieve an Islamic republic in Iraq. ... The fear is built on something imaginary."

Fears of a monolithic Shiite hegemony do seem unlikely, largely because the Shiites are far from unified.

The Alliance list gathers a diverse and probably incompatible cross section of Shiite political trends, including SCIRI, two competing wings of the Dawa party, several candidates loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and former Pentagon protégé Ahmed Chalabi, who embraced a populist persona after falling out with Washington.

A far more likely prospect than Shiite dominance is Shiite infighting. Tellingly, many of the parties that are standing side by side for the national assembly campaign are in direct competition in the simultaneous election for the Najaf Provincial Council.

"The Shiites will always be a powerful group in parliament on the issues on which they are united. But I'm at a loss to tell you what those issues are," said the international party-development official.

Although cracks in the Shiite united front have yet to appear, there are signs patience is wearing thin on Sunni resistance to the new, political reality.

Merza, the Dawa party official, expressed little sympathy for the plight of Sunni voters in unstable regions such Anbar province and the northern insurgent bastion of Mosul. If Sunni citizens and politicians really wanted to take part in the political process, he said, they would do something about the insurgents in their midst.

"That's not the fault of America or the Iraqi government," Merza said. "Maybe they prefer that the Americans will rule them and not the Shiites."

Special correspondent Saad Fakhreddin contributed to this report.