VI. THE POLITICAL RISE OF SHIISM
The split between Islam's Shiites and Sunnis dates back to the Prophet's succession. When Mohammed died in Medina in 632 he left no descendants or instructions, opening the way for a lasting conflict between two groups. Sunni Muslims refer to the "tradition" (sunna) the prophet established. They say the "successor" (caliph) must be chosen for his moral, religious and political qualities. Shiites argue that only a member of the prophet's family can guide the Muslim community. They were "partisans" (shiites) of Mohammed's cousin and son-in-law, Ali. The Kharidjites, literally "those who left" (after the first battle between Shiites and Sunnis at Siffin in 657), belong to neither camp and form an extremely small group 9 ( * ) 10 ( * ) .
The exact figures are hard to come by, but there is no doubt that Sunni Muslims are demographically the majority by far (87%), accounting for 1.13 billion of the world's estimated 1.3 believers, of whom just 20% live in the Arab world.
Together the various Shiite communities total just 160 million believers, or slightly fewer than 12% of Muslims. The Kharidjites account for less than one percent of Muslims and live in Oman, Djerba and Zanzibar.
The rivalry between Shiites and Sunnis runs through all the Middle East countries but has not been a constant in the region's history. The rift becomes politically important only when governments exploit it, which happened in the 16 th century when Iran's Safavid dynasty emphasized the Shiite identity to resist the Ottomans and vice versa. In the 20 th century the trend in Muslim law schools was to recognize Shiism as one doctrinal school among others.
That changed with Iran's Islamic Revolution and the US invasion of Iraq.
In the early 1980s Ayatollah Khomeini's desire to export the essentially anti-Western and vaguely Third-World Islamic revolution led the regime to gloss over its Shiite specificity and stress its Muslim identity.
In the Iraq War confessional identity was stressed as a component of Iraqi nationalism and exalted to fuel the soldiers' enthusiasm.
Clashes between Shiites and Sunnis broke out in 1980s Pakistan, Saudi Arabia's Hassa and Qatif regions in late 1979 and early 1980, and in Bahrain, Iraq and Lebanon. Fighting has occurred nearly everywhere that Shiites and Sunnis live together.
It is symptomatic that, outside Pakistan, those clashes broke out in the Persian Gulf, which has the Middle East's main oilfields and a Shiite-dominated "religious geography" 11 ( * ) .
Arab Shiites have always been a socially and politically excluded minority. Shiite Islam's strong comeback in Iran kindled those populations' aspirations and alarmed Sunni governments.
In the 20 years between 1984 and 2004 the Shiite-Sunni rift became a key feature of the Muslim world from the Mediterranean to the Indus. However, the "Shiite renewal" 12 ( * ) that accompanied Iran's Islamic Revolution failed to catch on except in Iraq, where Shiites acceded to power, but for other reasons.
Jordan's King Abdallah II denounced the threat of the "Shiite crescent" in a December 2004 Washington Post interview. The fact that he is not a demagogue but a quiet, levelheaded leader made his comments all the more forceful.
Like Olivier Roy, it might be safe to say that "the Shiite question is becoming dominant" and that Arab nationalism, unsuccessful in defending the Palestinian cause, is turning into a defense of Sunnism against Shiism, heralding a "tectonic shift" in the "greater Middle East 13 ( * ) .
Source: "Le dessous des cartes - Atlas d'un monde qui change - Tallandier 2009 - Jean-Christophe Victor - Virginie Raisson - Frank Tétart
* 9 See François Thual, Géopolitique du Chiisme - Arléa 1995 - Olivier Roy : le croissant et le chaos - Hachette 2007 p. 127 and following as well as an interview with the author in Moyen-Orient n° 1 August-September 2009 p. 6.
* 10 The first four caliphs after Mohammed (the "rightly-guided caliphs") were his brother-in-law Abû Bakr (632-634); Omar ibn al-Khattab (634-644), one of his most faithful lieutenants; Uthman ben Affan (644-656); and Ali Ibn Abi Talib (656-661), the prophet's cousin and son-in-law. Their succession is not hereditary and they are elected.
For the majority duodecimal Shiites, the line of succession after Mohammed and his daughter Fatima had 12 "imams" from the family of Ali Ibn Abi Talib to Muhammad Al-Mahdi, better known as the hidden imam because he is said not to have died but to have "hidden" himself in 868 and his return will signal the end of days. Each imam is the son of the previous one (except the third, Hussayn, who was the brother of the second, Hasan, both of whom were sons of Ali). The Ismailian Shiites of India and Central Asia recognize just seven imams and the Zaydites of Yemen, five. The Alevis of Turkey, Alawites of Syria and Druses of Lebanon, Israel and Syria belong to the Shiite community but have different beliefs and practices. The prophet's and spiritual guides' line of imam-successors thus stops in the 9 th century. These imans are not the same as the simple im a ms who lead prayers in Sunni Islam and, like Protestant pastors, are appointed by the community of believers. Duodecimal Shiites call these prayer leaders, who belong to a clergy, mullahs or ayatollahs.
Sunni Muslims do not recognize imams but caliphs, who are also hereditary. Several caliphates have existed since the founding of Islam following conflicts between the various pretenders to the title of Mohammed's successor after the first four caliphates. The most important were the Omeyyades of Damascus (661-750), Abbassides (750-1517) and Ottomans (1517-1924). Mustafa Kamal Ataturk officially abolished the institution of the caliphate in 1924, two years after the sultanate. The last and 101 st caliph after Abû Bakr was called abdul Mejiid. He died in Paris in 1944 and was buried in Medina.
* 11 François Thual, op. cit. p. 101
* 12 See Vali Nasr Le renouveau chiite - Demopolis 2008
* 13 The "greater Middle East" is a term President George W. Bush and his administration used to indicate an area stretching from North Africa to Mauritania, Pakistan and Afghanistan, including Turkey, the Mashrek and the whole Arabian peninsula.