With its Arab nationalist stance, the newspaper has led condemnation of the United States' invasion of Iraq, and has been particularly critical of those Iraqis who have cooperated with the American backed political order: Samira Rajab in 2005 dismissed Iraqi Shia cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani as an 'American general'. This resulted in death threats towards Ms Rajab from Shia Islamists – who hold the Iraqi cleric in high regard – and brought to the surface political fissures in the alliance of Shia Islamists and ex-Marxists that had come together to oppose the 2002 Constitution.