Americans puzzled by the violence between Sunnis and Shi’ites
in Iraq need to be reminded that internecine animosities have plagued
Islam since the death of the Prophet Muhammad in 622.
Eighty-five percent of all Muslims, who call themselves the Sunna (i.e., the
way), believe that Abu Bakr, Muhammad's father-in-law, was chosen by his followers
to succeed him as caliph (spiritual leader). Soon, however, dissidents known
as the Shi’a (i.e., the sect), claimed that Muhammad had designated his
cousin Ali to be his first successor, and that the caliphate should pass down
only to direct descendants of Mohammed via Ali, the second person ever to embrace
Islam.
When Uthman, the third caliph, was murdered in 656, Ali succeeded to the caliphate.
He was opposed, however, by Aisha, Mohammed’s widow. In a violent confrontation,
Ali's army defeated Aisha's forces but Ali’s followers, the Shi’ites,
remained a minority of 15-percent among Muslims. Today they are concentrated
mainly in Iran, Iraq, Yemen, and Lebanon.
Sunnis and Shi’ites agree on the Five Pillars of Islam--monotheism, prayer,
charity, fasting, and pilgrimage to Mecca--and recognize each other as Muslims.
Ever so often, however, words and deeds of both Sunnis and Shi’ites reveal
how much they harbor deep-seated disdain toward each other, so that any perceived
provocation may trigger violent strife between them.
Although Shi’ites account for some 60 percent of Iraq’s population,
they have always been politically impotent and economically depressed. For 300
years, the Sunni rulers of the Ottoman (Turkish) Empire denied Shi’ites
educational and employment opportunities. Aside from a small number of wealthy
landowners and merchants, Shi’ites found themselves exploited as sharecropping
peasants or menially employed slum dwellers. Even the prosperity brought by Iraq’s
oil boom of the 1970s trickled only slowly down to the Shi’ites communities.
When Saddam Hussein, a Sunni, became Iraq’s dictator in 1979, his populist
economic policies at first seemed to improve the Shi’ites’ living
conditions, but he left the Sunni minority largely in control of Iraqi society.
During the eight-year war against Iran, roughly three-quarters of the lower ranks
of the Iraqi army were Shi’ites who loyally fought against their fellow
Shi’ites in Iran.
Nevertheless, feeling threatened by Shi’ite demands for autonomy, Saddam’s
regime increasingly subjected them to harassment by secret police, torture, targeted
assassinations, attacks with chemical weapons, and the destruction of their wetlands
near the Persian Gulf. When Saddam was captured by American troops, many Shi'ites
demanded his execution, not only as an act of justice but also as an act of revenge
and a demonstration against his Sunni backers. After his execution, those raw
emotions became painfully evident in the street celebrations in Shi’ite
strongholds.
Misled by Ahmed Chalabi and other Shi’ite opponents of Saddam, President
Bush, Vice President Cheney, and their neoconservative advisers thought the fall
of Saddam would make the Sunni-dominated Baathists lie low and Shi’ites
would enthusiastically welcome American troops. Much to the administration’s
dismay, almost the opposite happened. Sunnis organized armed resistance while
Shi’ite militias began driving Saddam’s Sunni supporters out of the
Baghdad area.
Shi’ites urged on by the radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr wanted the parliamentary
election of January 2005 because it would give them more power than ever: a majority
in parliament and in the fledgling government. The favorable election results,
however, did not stop al-Sadr’s militias from escalating their attacks
on Sunnis with snipers and death squads.
U.S. leaders responded to the increased tit-for-tat war between Shi’ites
and Sunnis by accelerating the training of Iraqi armed forces and police. Very
soon, however, it became apparent that al-Sadr’s militias and Sunni insurgents
were heavily infiltrating army and police units. Too many recruits deserted or
surreptitiously attacked American and Iraqi targets.
It is difficult to see how Americans or any other Westerners can end the
enmity that has marred Sunni-Shi’ite relations for centuries and particularly
in post-Saddam Iraq. Most Muslims seem agreed, however, on one common desire:
to regain control over their societies from non-Muslim invaders and occupiers.