Shia Sunni divide

weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/834/focus.htm

The Shia-Sunni divide: myths and reality

Omayma Abdel-Latif examines the causes, and effects, of the growth of
sectarian rhetoric across the region

As the US-led occupation of Iraq enters its fifth year, conflicts and
political rivalries in the region appear to be assuming a sectarian
edge
unseen since the 1982-1989 war between Iraq and Iran.
The debate over why this should be so is increasingly dominated by two
approaches. Proponents of the first argue that concepts corruption,
autocracy, occupation, nationalism, etc..., can no longer explain the
range
of conflicts and alliances within the region. "It is, rather, old feuds
between Shia and Sunnis which will forge attitudes and define
prejudices,"
writes Vali Nasr in his book, The Shia Revival.
As a consequence, argues Nasr and his fellow travellers, sectarian
identity
will play an increasingly significant role in drawing political lines
and
determining regional alliances, shaping not just how states and
sub-state
actors behave but the political attitudes of ordinary people as well.
Sectarian-inspired conflicts, along the lines of those seen in Iraq,
will
come to constitute a major fault line in Middle East politics. Seen
from
this perspective, the political conduct of Iran or Hizbullah can be
explained as a reawakening of Shia identity. By the same token Saudi
Arabia's condemnation of Hizbullah as provoking Israel's attack on
Lebanon
last summer can be reduced to Riyadh's concern over growing Shia
influence
in Lebanon. Supporters of such a view would also argue that the Saudi
Arabian mediation that resulted in the Mecca agreement between the two
main
Palestinian factions was also a product of Riyadh's desire to reassert
Sunni
influence. "Saudi Arabia fought to get Hamas back," said Martin Indyk,
director of the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings
Institute, in a recent New York Times interview. Concerned over
Tehran's
growing influence in Palestine, the Saudis were determined to reassert
themselves. Hamas, argued Indyk, may well be viewed as extremists by
Riyadh,
but at least they are Sunni extremists.
Proponents of the second approach, while acknowledging the role played
by
sectarian identity in shaping the attitudes of some political actors,
argue
that other factors, including the foreign policy goals of the countries
involved, state structures and chronic regional problems such as the
Arab-Israeli conflict, political reform and Washington's Middle East
policies, all play a part. While Saudi Arabia views Iran's influence
over
Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian issue with increasing alarm, they
argue,
Riyadh acts less out of sectarian motives than concern over the
regional
balance of power. Tehran's foreign policy, they say, with the exception
of
Iraq, has transcended communal loyalties to embrace causes that were
once
the exclusive domain of Arab nationalist forces.
SO IS THERE A SHIA REVIVAL? The discourse on sectarianism is hardly
new. The
region fell prey to a similar bout of sectarian fever during the first
Gulf
War between Iraq and Iran. In an attempt to rally Arab public opinion
former
Iraqi president Saddam Hussein resorted to anti-Shia rhetoric which was
disseminated through the legions of Arab commentators and intellectuals
on
the Baathist payroll.
This time round, though, a new element is in play. It has to do with
what is
perceived as the growing role being played by Arab Shia who many see is
making a radical break with a long tradition of political inactivity.
Different terms have been coined to describe this phenomenon. Two years
ago
King Abdullah of Jordan spoke of the emergence of a "Shia Crescent";
more
recently commentators have referred to "the rise of the Shia, the Shia
wave,
Shia awakening and Shia revival".
For those who seek to read the prevailing conditions in the Middle Easy
along exclusively sectarian lines the developing Shia identity has been
manifested in several ways. For the first time in their history the
Shia
have been handed power in an Arab country and inspired by the Shia
assumption of power in Iraq, argues one of the lead theorists of the
Shia
revival, Hizbullah is now seeking to replace the Lebanese government
headed
by Fouad Al-Siniora. Hizbullah opposition is consequently reduced to an
attempt to redraw the power-sharing model established by the Saudi-
brokered
Taif Agreement in 1989. Hizbullah's ambition would not, it is argued,
be
sustainable without the emergence of Iran as a key regional power with
nuclear ambitions. Iran maintains ties with Shia groups across the Arab
world, providing them not only with material support but a model state
and
sense of empowerment.
A number of Lebanese Shia thinkers and academics refute such arguments.
The
most important fault lines, they insist, are, and will remain,
political,
not sectarian: the tendency to frame conflict and politics in the
Middle
East within an exclusively sectarian frame is no more than a rehash of
the
colonial attempt to reduce the region to a serious of tribes, sects and
communal groups rather than viable states.
One of the recurrent themes in the speeches of Hizbullah
Secretary-General
Hassan Nasrallah is his insistence that the Shia "cannot be lumped
together
in one basket". Nasrallah's assertion is commonly interpreted as an
attempt
to distance the resistance movement from Shia political groups
elsewhere,
particularly in Iraq, where they maintain an intimate relationship with
their occupiers.
In one of his Ashoura speeches last month, Nasrallah fell just short
denouncing Iraq's current rulers as a liability. He was nonetheless
keen on
emphasising the need to understand political developments in Iraq
within an
Iraqi context. Such a discourse, coming from the leader of one of the
biggest socio-political Shia movements in the Arab and Muslim world,
exposes
the fallacy of supposing the Shia's rise to power in Iraq as part of
some
grand Shia design.
It was military success against Israel in Lebanon and not the rise to
power
of a corrupt ruling elite in Iraq, says one Shia thinker close to
Hizbullah,
that has empowered the Shia, just as has the Sunnis. What is happening
in
Iraq, he continues, is not something from which strength can be drawn;
rather, the opposite is true, and the Iraqi situation weakens political
Shiism.
This seems to be the general consensus among Hizbullah's leaders about
the
Iraqi situation, complicated as it is by Iranian involvement, the
operation
of death squads and the ambivalent relationship between occupiers and
occupied.
Hizbullah prefers to focus on issues that unite rather than divide.
This is
not to say that the party has avoided taking a clear-cut stand on
sectarian
strife in Iraq, Iraqi Shia parties' close ties with the US or even the
lack
of a fatwa from Shia religious authorities to fight the Americans.
Nasrallah's speeches are replete with condemnations of atrocities
committed
in Iraq regardless of the sectarian identity of the perpetrators. But
Hizbullah's leaders believe their focus should be on causes and not
effects.
The cause, in the case of Iraq and Palestine, is occupation. And it is
Iran's support for the Palestinian cause and for resistance movements,
according to one Lebanese academic, that has created a favourable Arab
public opinion towards Iran despite continuous efforts by pro-US
regimes to
turn the tide of public opinion in an opposite direction.
A recent Zogby International poll found that close to 80 per cent of
Arabs
consider Israel and the United States to be the biggest external
threats to
their security whereas only six per cent cited Iran. The survey of a
total
of 3,850 respondents in Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Morocco and
Lebanon was carried out in November and early December. According to
the
poll less than one in four Arabs believe Iran should be pressured to
halt
its nuclear programme while 61 per cent, including majorities in all
six
countries, said Tehran had the right to pursue a nuclear programme even
if,
as most believe, its ultimate aim is to develop nuclear weapons.
The popular view is a result, says Ali Fayad, head of the Consultative
Centre for Strategic and Documentation Studies, a Hizbullah think tank,
of
Iran's pursuit of Sunni foreign policy goals.
"At the heart of Iran's foreign policy are two key issues; the
Palestinian
cause and confronting Washington's hegemonic schemes in the region,"
says
Fayad. "There is nothing particularly Shia about the two issues. Indeed
both
have been presented as the causes for the majority Sunni Arabs. In this
sense Iran's foreign policy is Sunni. One can say that the Islamic
Republic
has transcended the sectarian issue in its foreign policy."
Western hostility towards Iran's nuclear ambitions, says Fayad, is
fuelled
by Tehran's support of the Palestinians. By the same token Hizbullah's
strategy in the Arab-Israeli conflict transcends its communal identity
since
it serves national and pan-Islamic goals, not sectarian ones.
Iranian policy in Iraq remains for many the weak link in its foreign
strategy. Arab commentators from across the board have been scathing of
the
Iranian regime's failure to hold its Iraqi allies back from falling
into the
sectarian trap. While Fayad acknowledges that Iraq represents a huge
problem
he still holds the Americans responsible for working to foment
Shia-Sunni
strife in Iraq. "We cannot describe the present order in Iraq as a Shia
state just as we cannot describe other regimes in the region as Sunni
regimes," he says.
So what should be made of the Shia revivalists' claims about
Hizbullah's
attempts to increase its powers?
Party members, including its leader, have repeatedly said Hizbullah has
no
ambitions to expand the quotas the Shia have already been allotted
within
the Lebanese system.
"We are not interested in any redistribution of power," announced one
Hizbullah official. The current conflict in Lebanon is over foreign
policy,
Lebanon's position vis-à-vis the Arab-Israeli conflict and the
question of
Hizbullah's arms. The group has always respected the political
mechanisms
established by the Taif Agreement and any change, its leaders stress,
must
target political sectarianism not the system itself.
While many argue that talk of a Shia revival is exaggerated, there are
clear
signs of growing Shia political activism. The model that is being
adopted,
though, is the one furnished by Hizbullah and not that of the Supreme
Council for Islamic Revolution. Its arch enemies are the Israeli
occupation
and US hegemony rather than co-religionists.
SUNNI-SHIA CONFLICT: While there appears to be a consensus that
sectarian
violence is no longer limited to Iraq but has expanded to influence
developments from the Gulf to Lebanon, public debate in the Arab world
offers interesting insights about how both sides view the possible
repercussions of deepening sectarian divisions.
The consensus in both Sunni and Shia circles appears to be that
attempts to
emphasise Sunni- Shia rivalries are intended to deflect attention from
both
the US occupation of Iraq and continuing Israeli aggression. That the
US is
working to fuel such tensions is almost an article of faith for Muslims
on
both sides. In its attempt to create an anti-Iran alliance, they say,
the US
is resorting to a strategy which aims to raise the spectre of
sectarianism
across the Muslim world.
Even before Seymour Hersh blew the whistle in The New Yorker on
Washington's
role in fuelling Sunni-Shia tensions, leading Shia and Sunni figures
had
warned that the US was behind much of the sectarian violence in Iraq
and
Lebanon.
When, in an Al-Jazeera interview two weeks ago, prominent Shia leader
Sayed
Mohamed Hussein Fadlullah was asked who it was that is threatened by
the
Shia he answered, simply, "Israel".
Fadlullah has been a staunch critic of US policy in the region and
Sunni-Shia strife has been the subject of the majority of his Friday
sermons
for months now. In his most recent sermon, Fadlullah accused Washington
of
replacing its plans to spread democracy with schemes to incite Shia-
Sunni
sedition. Continuing rhetoric about a Shia revival and false stories
about
Shiisation of Sunnis were, he said, all part of a scheme to divide the
two
communities.
Echoing similar views, Mohamed Mahdi Akef, the supreme guide of the
Muslim
Brotherhood, has criticised the increasingly vociferous rhetoric about
the
rise of Shia influence. He sees it as part of the ongoing efforts to
set
Shias and Sunnis against one another. Akef blamed the "enemies of Islam
and
the foreign occupiers for the division and the spirit of hatred which
has
recently spread".
For these leaders, Hersh's revelations about the US propagation of
sectarian
divisions in an attempt to make the case against Iran came as no
surprise.
The fact that the CIA is financing -- through Al-Siniora's government
--
Salafi groups in Palestinian camps in Lebanon lends credence to the
views
put forward by Lebanese writer Jihad Azine. In an article published in
the
daily An- Nahar two weeks ago Azine questioned US motives in fuelling
sectarian strife. "Could it be that the US endgame is to weaken Islam
from
within," he wrote, "and divert attention from targeting US interests to
targeting the Shia?"
What is not clear is whether leaks made to Hersh by CIA officials are
meant
to increase sectarian tensions in Lebanon.
For months the Egyptian daily Al-Akhbar has been publishing reports
about
Sunni groups receiving military training in Tripoli and in Palestinian
camps. In one story published on 10 January Al-Akhbar reported that the
US,
Egypt and Saudi Arabia had agreed on a strategy of fostering increased
cooperation between Tayyar Al-Mustaqbal and Fatah in an attempt to
offset
the influence of Hizbullah and Hamas. Although most of the reports are
unsourced, the parties mentioned have not issued denials. The newspaper
has
also reported that Ahmed Al-Khatib, a former leader of the Arab Army, a
Lebanese Sunni militia with Nasserist leanings, and Tayyar Al-Mustaqbal
were
coordinating their activities. Al-Khatib is said to have to have set up
recruiting and training centres in the Beqaa Valley. During Lebanon's
civil
war Al-Khatib fought alongside the Palestinians.
While it would be interesting to explore the type of training and the
ideologies that are on offer in such camps a more significant issue
when it
comes to the Salafi groups and the former Nasserist militia, is just
who it
is that is being defined as the enemy.
"Sectarian animosity is a temporary and false construct in Lebanon,"
insists
one Lebanese sociologist. "It might offer a basis for outbreaks of
friction
here and there but it is not a reason to take a whole sect to war and
it's
too weak, as yet, to sustain an all out war."