War in Iraq over Religion - Article Example

RELIGION (WAR IN IRAQ OVER RELIGION) RELIGION (WAR IN IRAQ OVER RELIGION) The Iraqi population is 36, 004, 5522 people and 97% of the population are devoted Muslims. However there are two denominations of Islam “Sunni and Shia” (Denton-Borhaug, 2012). After the death of Prophet Muhammad there was a dispute on who to take over the mantle of leadership and this led to the spilt of the Muslim devotees. Two group rose with different ideas, some believed that the father of prophet Muhammad’s wife Aisha should succeed the prophet in accordance with the Islamic method of choosing leader and they are the “Sunnis” which means “people of the tradition of Muhammad”. The other school of thought “Shia” argued that the rightful successor of Prophet Muhammad should be his son in-law Ali who was believed to have been ordained by the prophet in accordance with the direction of God (Moaddel et al., 2011). Although these two groups disagree on the rightful successor of the prophet, they strongly share fundamental beliefs. They both believe in the wholeness of Allah and that prophet Muhammad was the last prophet. They also believe in similar methods of prayers, fasting and pilgrimage to Mecca with differences in ritual, doctrine, law and theology. In Iraq the Shia are said to be the majority by 65% while the Sunnis are about 32% , interestingly the Sunnis are further split into ethnic groups majorly the Kurds, Turkmen and Arabs (Denton-Borhaug, 2012). The bone of content has always been traced to the thirst for dominance which nurtures bitterness and conflicts. The Sunnis disagree that the Shia makes up the majority of the Muslim population in Iraq and blaming it on propaganda and immigration by Shias from Iran. However many Sunnis complain of marginalization by the majority Shia. The contradictory number of dominance instigates the need for power tussle and on December 2005 elections turnout an Islamic scholar Vali Nasr confirms a strong Shia majority in Iraq (Moaddel et al., 2011). After the independence of Iraq in 1932 the Shias were targeted and they suffered series of attacks directly and indirectly (Simon & Tejirian, 2013). This led to a very rebellious radicalism amongst the Shias having faced prosecutions under the Ba’ath party rule. During the regime of Saddam Hussein there were numerous attacks on the Shias examples are outlawing of Shias religious festivals, execution of over 40 Shia clerics and torture of Mohammed Baqir al-sadr the leader of the Shia movement (Simon & Tejirian, 2013). The Shais were also targeted economically and they occupied the poorest member of the population in the Iraqi society while the Sunnis occupied the ruling class. In 1980 thousand of Iranians and Arab-Iranians were expelled from Iraq, this was a move to liquidate the Shia islamist agenda to replace the Sunni regimes after the Iranian revolution in 1979 (Moaddel et al., 2011). The Shias were subdued by Saddam’s force leaving a death toll of over 100,000 people after they revolted against the Saddam’s regime in 1992; they were motivated by the defeat of Saddam in Kuwait. The Sunnis maintained the upper hand until the 20th of March 2003 when the United States force invaded Iraq. This invasion created an opportunity for the Shia to actualize their agenda. The ousting of Saddam Hussein who was their number one enemy was a plus to their quest. Shia’s clerics and Shia’s political parties seized the government and pressed for elections as quick as possible. They are supported by their neighbors and brothers in faith from Iran as BBC sources said. The Shias for over a century have led movements for parliamentary rule and fair governance in the Middle East but have never ruled any modern Arab country and it will be of significance important it they could utilize the stepping stone the American invasion has thrown at them (Moaddel et al., 2011). The fall of Saddam paved way for them capture Baghdad and projected it to the center if shia power. However this bold step didn’t come easily it came with huge consequences. The backlash among the Sunni Arabs in Iraq turned violent. The Sunni denomination reinforced into insurgency which was firstly directed to the American forces in Iraq because their invasion made power slip of their hands. The Sunnis recruited suicide bombers and formed alliance with other terror groups to lunch attacks on Shias. They targeted Shiite holy sites, Shiite neighborhoods in everywhere mainly in Baghdad, they abducted Shiite civilians and murdered them in cold blood. They Sunni jihadist blew car bombs and truck bombs in Shiite dominated areas and the Shiites retaliate by blowing up vehicles loaded with explosive in Sunni neighborhoods. Shiite’s celebration such as Ashura marks a special day for the Sunni’s to send the waves of terror, people are called upon to volunteer and participate in any form of attack that will hurt the Shiites. These insurgencies and terroristic attacks have left hundreds and of thousands of people dead (Denton-Borhaug, 2012). The Askariya shrine a mosque linked to the messianic hidden imam or also called the twelfth Shiite imam was bombed and the Shiitte militia also fought back through bomb attacks and murders. The structure of the sea-saw attacks deepens the conflict as the American invasion overshadows the real nature of the Iraqi instability (Denton-Borhaug, 2012). There are suspicions that the new Shiite government in Baghdad enjoys a close relationship and support with the Tehran government as they share similar ideology, however there are no doubts that at some level this relationship exists. There have been speculations that Iran has interest in the remodeling of the political system of Iraq but this was cleared when Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani an Iraqi senior cleric although he was born and raised in Iran, advocated that a political future very different from the Iranian model. Unlike the Iranian Ayatollah Khomeini who structured a model of Islamic republic with all powers bestowed on the clerics. The disharmony is not just based on only religious differences but political differences where a lot of people from each of the denominations simply do not agree. The tables turned in 2004 when Mahdi army a Shiite militia attacked American troops (Fast, 2010). The need to stop the bloodshed was stressed and the Iraqi Ayatolah al-sistani tired to bring an end to the fight but all was to no avail (Fast, 2010). The paradox is that the American invasion which led to the fall of the Sunni regime was cheered by the Shiites but after they took over power, insurgency against the American troops was initiated. The white house blames external forces for the escalation of violence in Iraq and fingers were pointed at Iran, Saudi and Syria as secondary actors (Norris & Inglehart, 2011). However the situation is complex and gives room for a lot of speculations. The intensification of the religious violence in Iraq has drawn the interest of the Saudi Arabian monarchy and they fear it may spread to the Eastern Saudi Arabia where they have great numbers of oil fields and locals are manly of the minority Shiite denomination. The Saudi s and Sunni fronts became difficult as a result of the outbreak of war between Israel and the Shiite militia in Lebanon (Hezbollah) (Fast, 2010). It was a tough decision time for the Sunni sect in Iraq because a common enemy “Israel” is involved, this leaves them with a choice of either joining forces with the Shiites or face attack if Israel defeats Hezbollah (Moaddel et al., 2011). The Sunnis were afraid that their support for Hezbollah against Israel will strengthen the Shiites. The United States of America sided with Sunnis leaders and countries. Several efforts have been to reconcile the two sects of Islam (the Sunnis and the Shiites) but the uprising and consequent civil war in Syria has crippled these efforts, because it’s believed that Iranian weapons, monies and Shiite fighters called the Alawite has been unremittingly slaughtering its Sunni population, and has sent two hundred thousand citizens displaced and turned into refugees and millions subjected to sufferings and misery (Moaddel et al., 2011). However, over the years there has been a tremendous decrease in the number of attacks targeted against the west but on the other hand the Sunni sponsored terrorism flourished up to the global stage and the strongest group is al-Qaeda and a whole lot of other groups. However their actions and agendas received a wide condemnation by regime in Iran and all the Shiite groups, the Lebanese Hezbollah organization and the Sadr movement (Norris & Inglehart, 2011). On the 4th of January BBC reported that the Iraqi government lost control of the strategic city of Falluja, west Baghdad, the fighting erupted after troops broke up a protest camp by Sunni Arabs in the city of Ramadi (Fast, 2010). The Sunni sect have accused the Shia-led government of marginalization of the Sunnis, this is a replica of what the Shia population before the fall of Saddam accused the Sunni’s of. They also claimed that the Shia led government targeted their population with “anti-terrorism” measures aimed at stirring and escalating the sectarian violence (Fast, 2010). This is the pathway of the violence rotating along the same reasons irrespective of where power goes, the Sunnis are stopping at nothing and it has stepped up attacks across Iraq in recent months while the Shia groups began deadly reprisals. At least 7,818 civilians and 1,050 members of the security forces had been killed in 2003 according to the United Nations (Denton-Borhaug, 2012). References Denton‐Borhaug, K. (2012). Beyond Iraq and Afghanistan: Religion and Politics in United States War‐Culture. Dialog, 51(2), 125-134. Fast, A. (2010). Iraq: The Culture. Crabtree Publishing Company. Moaddel, M., de Jong, J., & Dagher, M. (2011). Beyond Sectarianism in Iraq.Contexts, 10(3), 66-67. Norris, P., & Inglehart, R. (2011). Sacred and secular: Religion and politics worldwide. Cambridge University Press. Simon, R. S., & Tejirian, E. H. (Eds.). (2013). The creation of Iraq, 1914-1921. Columbia University Press. Read More