Question

Evaluate how the major branches of Islam, Sunni and Shia, create conflict. Your response should be a minimum of 200 words.

Answer 1

Three key milestones that would sharpen Sunni-Shia divisions by the end of the 20th century. First came the rise of the Safavid dynasty in the 16th century, which transformed Iran (through force) from a Sunni center into the Shia stronghold of the Middle East. In the early 20th century, the victorious Allies divided the territory held by the former Ottoman Empire after World War I, cutting through centuries-old religious and ethnic communities in the process. Finally, in 1979, the Islamic Revolution in Iran produced a radical brand of Shia Islam that would clash violently with Sunni conservatives in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the decades to follow.

Amid the increasing politicization of Islam and the rise of fundamentalists on both sides of the divide, sectarian tensions intensified in the early 21st century, especially amid the upheavals caused by two Persian Gulf Wars, the chaos that followed the U.S.-backed ouster of Saddam Hussein’s Sunni regime in Iraq, and the mass uprisings across the region that began with the Arab Spring in 2011.

Sunni-Shia divisions would fuel a long-running civil war in Syria, fighting in Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Yemen and elsewhere, and terrorist violence on both sides. A common thread in most of these conflicts is the ongoing battle between Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shia Iran for influence in the oil-rich Middle East and surrounding regions.

Despite the long-running nature of the Sunni-Shia divide, the fact that the two sects coexisted in relative peace for many centuries suggests their struggles may have less to do with religion than with wealth and power.

“Neither of them are representative of the vast majority of Sunni Muslims or the vast majority of Shia Muslims around the world,” says Hazleton of the fundamentalist regimes governing both Saudi Arabia and Iran.

“When society breaks down, you fall back on old forms of identity, and Shia and Sunni are 1,400-year-old forms of identity.”