It also could push Maliki's government to accelerate steps to integrate armed Sunni groups that have joined the fight against Al Qaeda in Iraq and other extremists. The United States has credited the so-called Awakening Councils with helping uproot insurgents and has urged Iraq's Shi'ite leadership to reward the new Sunni allies with security force posts.
The Awakening Councils have played a role in a major US offensive launched this week, an operation that included one of the most intense airstrikes of the war.
A top US commander said Thursday's bombing blitz south of Baghdad destroyed extremists' "defensive belts" and allowed American soldiers to push into areas where they have not been in years.
The United States is also counting on political support from Hakim and his father, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, the leader of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council - the country's preeminent Shi'ite political grouping.
The elder Hakim, who has been a close ally of the United States since the 2003 invasion, has been diagnosed with lung cancer and underwent chemotherapy last year in Iran, where he spent years in exile during Saddam Hussein's rule.
Ammar al-Hakim, a moderate Shi'ite like his father, has taken an increasingly vocal role as his father has undergone medical care.
"I hope that the government will take all needed measures to secure" the return of key Sunni political groups, Ammar al-Hakim said from the pulpit of the Buratha mosque. The main Sunni political organization - the Accordance Front - and the secular Iraqi List left the government after disputes over Maliki's leadership.
But in a bid to address both sides of Iraq's Sunni-Shi'ite sectarian split, Hakim also said Maliki needs to reach out to "our brothers" in two Shi'ite parties that are deeply at odds with the prime minister. One is the religious Fadhilah party and the other is the powerful movement led by cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
Rival Shi'ite groups have waged increasingly bloody power struggles for preeminence in oil-rich southern Iraq.
"Our strength is in our unity. The bigger the circle of participation, the stronger we will be in solving our problems and making progress," Hakim said.
Hakim's pointed words yesterday echoed frustration being voiced by many in Iraq and the United States over what appears to be foot-dragging by Maliki and the country's fractured parliament to adopt changes aimed at bridging sectarian rifts.
A US-led military offensive, meanwhile, sought to reclaim control of areas formerly held by insurgents around Baghdad.
In the massive raid south of the capital, two B1-B bombers and four F-16 fighter jets dropped 48 precision-guided bombs on 47 targets, US Air Force Colonel Peter Donnelly, commander of the 18th Expeditionary Air Support Operations Group, told reporters.
The targets consisted mainly of weapons caches and powerful roadside bombs buried deep underground, said Donnelly and Army Colonel Terry Ferrell, commander of the Second Brigade Combat Team, Third Infantry Division. Extremists were believed to have controlled Arab Jabour, but Ferrell said "the predominant number" have now fled to the southwest since his troops' operations began.
