The Islamic Summit called by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, while focused on Syria had, in one sense, served to exacerbate the sectarian divisions within the Muslim world. These divisions first acquired global importance after the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979 and the perceived effort by the new rulers to “export the revolution” to the rest of the Muslim nations-particularly those in its immediate neighbourhood. The Iraq-Iran war was portrayed partly as an Arab-Ajam conflict but it rapidly acquired sectarian dimensions. Not only did the Saudis, Kuwaitis and other Persian Gulf states offer financial and political support to Saddam Hussain but in seeking support for Iraq in the rest of the Muslim world emphasised that the Iranians were Shias and were intent on imposing their sect’s beliefs on the rest of the Islamic world. Their efforts were helped no doubt by the policy of “export of the revolution” followed by the first religious leaders in Iran and by the furore that the Iranian revolution had created in the Muslim world.
Nowhere was the impact of this felt as strongly as in Pakistan, which in many ways became the secondary battlefield of the Iraq-Iran conflict but many other countries in Iran’s immediate neighbourhood and further afield were also affected. Today Pakistan is being torn apart by sectarian strife with Shias being under attack everywhere- a far cry from the tolerance and harmony that had characterised relations between the two Muslim communities in South Asia. There is no definite empirical evidence to suggest that the Syrian situation- viewed as a struggle by the Sunni majority to displace a minority Alawite or Shia regime has added fuel to the sectarian fire in Pakistan but many analysts believe that the extremist Sunni religious parties use the Syrian example to inflame anti Shia sentiment.
In Lebanon the confessional system that had been in vogue and that had come under attack in the 1975 civil strife gave fresh impetus to the Shia community’s efforts to get a greater share of power than they had hitherto enjoyed. It was however only in the early 1980s’ that Hezbollah came into being with the active support of Iran. It recognised in those early years that its guidance would come from Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and proclaimed its goal as being to convert Lebanon into the same sort of Islamic Republic as had been brought into being in Iran by the Iranian Revolution. Hezbollah reportedly receives some $400 million dollars from Iran but it was also dependent in the course of its development on the patronage of Syria, which was the occupying power. It did later achieve much popular support in Lebanon for its valiant battle against the Israelis and it was the Lebanese parliament that allowed it to maintain an independent militia in recognition of its efforts to recover Israeli occupied territory.
Since the Syrian turmoil began Hezbollah’s popularity in Lebanon, already affected by the Hariri assassination has been fallen further. Its initial expressions of support for the Bashar regime in 2011 dented its standing further. It has now refrained from statements in favour of Bashar but there is no doubt that the Hezbollah is now seen as a Shia organisation owing greater loyalty to Iran and Syria’s Bashar regime than to Lebanon itself. The situation in Syrian affects Lebanon in many ways but the exacerbation of sectarian is certainly one of the most difficult given the prominence that Hezbollah has acquired in Lebanese politics By all accounts the people of Lebanon are deeply enmeshed in Syria. Hezbollah, the Shiite militant group, has been accused of fighting in Syria on behalf of the Assad government while Sunni commanders in the Lebanese city of Tripoli boast that several hundred of their own men have gone there to fight Mr. Assad’s forces.
In the Arabian Peninsula there have been problems in Bahrain between the Shia majority and the Sunni rulers. These have been a cause of concern to Saudi Arabia, which has offered military support to Bahrain’s ruling family. Support has also been forthcoming, despite verbal criticism of the repressive measures taken by the rulers against the Shias, by the Americans who want to preserve their naval base and who certainly do not want to add another element of discord in Saudi American relations. Of equal if not greater concern is the situation in Yemen where recent clashes between the Shia Howthi tribe and the Salafists has brought sectarian differences to the fore again. Whether there is any truth to assertions made from time to time that the Shias in Yemen as also in Bahrain tend to owe loyalty to Iran the fact is that the situation in Syria and its portrayal as a Shia-Sunni divide will harden the views of the Sunnis in the Arabian Peninsula not least in Saudi Arabia itself where the 10 to 15% of the population that is Shia has always been looked upon with suspicion.
In Iraq the month of August was a particularly bloody one with Sunni extremists and so-called Al-Qaeda adherents launching attacks that left hundreds of Shias dead all over Iraq. There was no doubt in anybody’s mind that the situation in Syria had contributed to this unhappy development. Iraq’s Shia dominated government is now being accused of allowing Iranian aircraft to ferry arms to Assad’s forces across Iraqi airspace and is being asked to insist on making all Iranian flights land in Iraq for inspection. Iraq has neither the means nor perhaps the desire to impose such a condition on a country that the regime sees as an important neighbour with whom relations have to be maintained on an even keel. Yet this may again cause the Sunnis to react with more violence. Iraq is saddled also with the consequences of the virtual takeover of areas in Syria by the Syrian Kurds and the support they are apparently getting from the Kurdish regional government in Iraq.
One can say that the longer the strife continues in Syria the greater will be the impact on Shia-Sunni relations through out the Muslim world and particularly in Syria’s immediate neighbourhood.
It is clear however that there is no early resolution of the warlike situation in Syria. Lakdar Brahimi says that each party says that they will prevail in a month or so but the only prospect he sees is for the situation to worsen. Quite clearly he has had no success in getting the parties to agree to a peaceful solution…
Assad in an interview with an Egyptian magazine, Al-Ahram al-Arabi has assailed the Qataris and Saudis for the assistance they have provided to the rebels and has asserted that they would not succeed in imposing a Libyan model on Syria. He also suggested that he was open to dialogue, which was the only way for a solution. His information minister however said that there was no formal interview and that his words in an informal chat has been taken out of context by the magazine. It is not clear whether this was meant to negate the offer of talks.
The Egyptian proposal for the Saudis, Egyptians, Turks and Iranians to work out a solution has not gained much traction and the war continues. The defections that had been trumpeted as heralding the fall of Assad seem to have tapered off. The movement of Allawites from their relatively safe districts in Damascus for the coastal areas in which the Alawites are dominant appears to have stopped. The Syrian Free Army commanders have announced in Turkey that they are moving into liberated areas of Syria. This has been greeted with scepticism wince there is no area in Syria that is insulated against attack by the Syrian air force but the very fact that the Syrian Free army leaders felt constrained to make this announcement suggests that they are afraid of losing their relevance to the struggle in which other contending parties may then take the lead. There is little indication of unity between the various faction of the opposition beyond the common desire to see Assad step down.
One can only hope that Lakdar Brahimi or the Egyptian initiative comes up with some innovative ways of getting some sort of talks going that will require Assad to step down, grant him safe passage and safeguard his Allawite and other supporters from reprisals. Perhaps this is too much to hope for. Perhaps what lies ahead is only a long and grinding war that will reduce more of Syria to rubble and increase the flow of refugees.
