While the vigorous and often bitter debate around depictions of “White Jesus” continues to rage, a similar, but quieter discussion is taking place within Islamic communities on the subject of overly white illustrations of key figures in the Muslim tradition, particularly the twelve imams so revered in Shiaism, an subsect of Islam that comprises approximately ten percent of the world’s Muslim population.
Out from the ashes of the two mega projects of this expiring decade – i.e. the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) attempted Mideast take-over, and, contrarily, the Gulf project to rupture the MB – and to reconstitute hereditary, tribal absolutism (the ‘Arab System’) – two different oppositional ventures are arising. They are gaining greater mass and inevitably will vie with each other – sooner or later. In fact, they already are. The question is how far will the vying go?
BEIRUT – In a signal of foreign powers’ inability to dictate terms to regional forces involved in the Syrian conflict, Russian Ambassador to Lebanon Alexander Zasypkin has made clear that Russia has no intention to press resistance movement Hezbollah or Iranian military advisors to vacate Syria.
GAZA – A new video released by an Israeli Defense Force (IDF) spokesman has unnerved many in the global Muslim community for its use of sectarian rhetoric and slurs targeting Shia Muslims that are often used by leaders of extremist Wahhabi terror groups.
SANA’A, YEMEN — A phalanx of flickering video cameras frames the portly Saudi Imam in a shimmering half-light, as he exhorts a brigade of Sunni Muslim mercenaries from the East African nation of Sudan to prepare for battle with rebels from Yemen’s Shia sect known as Houthis.
The (Saudi) King Salman Bin Abdulaziz brought you to defend the Prophet Muhammad; Salman gave you the honor of defending the Prophet Muhammad’s companions.”
With Donald Trump’s decision to shred the Iran nuclear agreement, announced last Tuesday, it’s time for the rest of us to start thinking about what a Third Gulf War would mean. The answer, based on the last 16 years of American experience in the Greater Middle East, is that it won’t be pretty.
They heeded a Shia leader’s call-to-arms, were equipped and trained by Iran’s elite military and were forged in the crucible of war against the Islamic State.
In little more than three years the Hashd al-Shaabi, or Popular Mobilisation Units, have risen from a disparate alliance of volunteer militias to become a battle-tested force in Iraq.
Opinion — Some sections of the crazy quilt that makes up the Trump administration want to push Iran back out of the Arab world and weaken it, in support of Israel and Saudi Arabia. Those actors have just been handed a big setback by Trump’s slurred and crazed announcement that he will move the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem and recognize it as the capital.
Saudi Arabia is attempting to mend its historically antagonistic relations with Iraq’s Shia, at Iran’s expense.
In early November, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman launched a domestic shake-up, as well regionally, ratcheting up tensions with Iran, and sabre-rattling against the Houthis in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
However, as Riyadh seemed to stoke tensions with the region’s Shia, there had been a quieter Saudi campaign unfolding to co-opt Iraq’s Shia.
Even as Iraq’s pro-government forces close in on Rawa, one of the very last strongholds of the extremist group known as the Islamic State, ordinary Iraqis everywhere are wondering where the extremists will turn up next.
A series of recent attacks and arrests are cause for concern. In Kirkuk, the headquarters of the Shia Muslim militias in that city was attacked and a day after that, authorities announced they had arrested a terrorist network inside the city.
