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Sunni protesters demonstrate against reprisal attacks on Sunni mosques (Photo: AP)
The most heated violence of the postwar period erupted last week following the bombing of a shrine sacred to Shiites. There are fresh signs, though, that political talks will resume (NYT), as Shiite and Sunni Arab leaders have called for calm and an end to the sectarian bloodshed.
The violence erupted after ten masked gunmen dressed as police commandos attacked the revered Shiite mosque. Violent reprisals ensued (WashPost), resulting in what the Wall Street Journal terms “the first truly widespread backlash against anti-Shiite terrorism.” W. Patrick Lang, former head of Middle East Affairs and Counterterrorism at the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, tells cfr.org he disagrees with those who say shrine attack will lead to civil war and scuttle Iraq's political process. Reports indicate violence may be subsiding (al-Jazeera) despite minor Shiite-Sunni clashes; this CFR transcript and this GlobalSecurity.org backgrounder explain the history of Shiite-Sunni relations in Iraq.
Prominent Shiites, including the radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad—who blamed the United States and Israel for the mosque attack (al-Jazeera)—regard the Golden Mosque as one of the holiest sites in Shiite Islam. Sadr has ordered his militia, the Mahdi Army, to defend Shiite holy sites throughout Iraq; his Mahdi Army is one of many Shiite militant groups allegedly supported by Iran, which the United States has accused of seeking to destabilize Iraq. Cfr.org’s Lionel Beehner examines the links between Iran and Iraq in this new CFR Background Q&A. Kenneth Pollack, an expert on the Persian Gulf region, tells cfr.org that militias, not the insurgency, are the “principal threat for civil war in Iraq.” And keeping militias—outlined in this CFR Background Q&A—out of Iraq's security forces will be crucial to ensuring future stability, says Matthew Sherman, former director of policy to Iraq’s Ministry of Interior, in an interview with cfr.org.
The violence has taken a serious toll on the already difficult political process of forming a national-unity government, outlined in this CFR Background Q&A. Not since the U.S.-led invasion have Iraq’s politicians “appeared so insignificant and its religious leaders loomed so large” as in the days following the Golden Mosque attack, writes the Los Angeles Times. Sunni politicians have pulled out of emergency talks with the government (BBC) despite calls for unity. CFR Fellow Vali Nasr, appearing on PBS’ NewsHour, warns that, given how quickly sectarian tensions are spiraling out of control, there is “little that the U.S. can do at this moment to veer Iraq in a new direction.”
As talks aimed at forming a national-unity government continue, new reports from the International Crisis Group and Brookings Institution suggest Washington's leverage in the ongoing conflict may be diminishing even as the insurgency remains potent and unbowed. In addition, as Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said at CFR, the U.S. is struggling with a global media environment often unreceptive and sometimes downright hostile to U.S. aims (Cfr.org News Brief).
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