This really doesn’t augur well for the passage of the U.S.-Iraq Status of Forces Agreement:

A session of Iraq’s Parliament collapsed in chaos on Wednesday, as a discussion among lawmakers about a three-year security agreement with the Americans boiled over into shouting and physical confrontation.

The New York Times has an almost baroque portrayal of the Preston-Brooks-on-Charles-Sumner-style display in the Green Zone today. Moqtada al-Sadr’s supporters are, perhaps unsurprisingly, at the heart of it:

As Mr. Sneid began reading, witnesses said, Sadrists and other opponents of the agreement continued to trade shouts with lawmakers who supported it. Then, Ahmed Masu’udi, a Sadrist lawmaker, approached the dais. Mr. Masu’udi said later in an interview that he was simply trying to reach Mr. Mashhadani to persuade him to stop the reading; several other witnesses said Mr. Masu’udi attacked Mr. Sneid. The security guards rushed toward Mr. Masu’udi, who said that they grabbed him and struggled to push him away. At that point, witnesses said, the hall was filled with shouting, lawmakers rushed toward the front and the session ended in chaos.

Legislators poured out of the hall and into the cafeteria, an area of the parliament building that is cordoned off by low walls but is in full view of the spacious, patriotically decorated lobby. There, shouting and accusations continued among the lawmakers, echoing in the building and quickly attracting a company of camouflage-wearing security guards, who surrounded the cafeteria and tried to keep away the journalists and other onlookers who had gathered.

Tomorrow is another day, and another parliamentary reading. But prospective violence on the floor of a legislature never augurs well for a bill’s passage. Didn’t anyone tell these guys the SOFA ends the occupation?