Anti-Shia propaganda threatens a sectarian civil war which will engulf the entire Muslim world

[dipsydoodle]

Anti-Shia hate propaganda spread by Sunni religious figures sponsored by, or based in, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf monarchies, is creating the ingredients for a sectarian civil war engulfing the entire Muslim world. Iraq and Syria have seen the most violence, with the majority of the 766 civilian fatalities in Iraq this month being Shia pilgrims killed by suicide bombers from the al-Qa'ida umbrella group, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (Isis). The anti-Shia hostility of this organisation, now operating from Baghdad to Beirut, is so extreme that last month it had to apologise for beheading one of its own wounded fighters in Aleppo – because he was mistakenly believed to have muttered the name of Shia saints as he lay on a stretcher.

At the beginning of December, al-Qa'ida in the Arabian Peninsula killed 53 doctors and nurses and wounded 162 in an attack on a hospital in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, which had been threatened for not taking care of wounded militants by a commentator on an extreme Sunni satellite TV station. Days before the attack, he announced that armies and tribes would assault the hospital "to take revenge for our brothers. We say this and, by the grace of Allah, we will do it".

Skilled use of the internet and access to satellite television funded by or based in Sunni states has been central to the resurgence of al-Qa'ida across the Middle East, to a degree that Western politicians have so far failed to grasp. In the last year, Isis has become the most powerful single rebel military force in Iraq and Syria, partly because of its ability to recruit suicide bombers and fanatical fighters through the social media. Western intelligence agencies, such as the NSA in the US, much criticised for spying on the internet communications of their own citizens, have paid much less attention to open and instantly accessible calls for sectarian murder that are in plain view. Critics say that this is in keeping with a tradition since 9/11 of Western governments not wishing to hold Saudi Arabia or the Gulf monarchies responsible for funding extreme Sunni jihadi groups and propagandists supporting them through private donations.

Satellite television, internet, YouTube and Twitter content, frequently emanating from or financed by oil states in the Arabian peninsula, are at the centre of a campaign to spread sectarian hatred to every corner of the Muslim world, including places where Shia are a vulnerable minority, such as Libya, Tunisia, Egypt and Malaysia. In Benghazi, in effect the capital of eastern Libya, a jihadi group uploaded a video of the execution of an Iraqi professor who admitted to being a Shia, saying they had shot him in revenge for the execution of Sunni militants by the Iraqi government.

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/sunni-monarchs-back-youtube-hate-preachers-antishia-propaganda-threatens-a-sectarian-civil-war-which-will-engulf-the-entire-muslim-world-9028538.html

[xchrom]

1. du rec.

[intaglio]

2. k&r

[tonybgood]

3. This has been going on for centuries.

The only reason you hear about it now is modern media. There is nothing new about this.

[hobbit709]

4. Ain't religion wonderful?

[CanonRay]

5. I hope to live long enough

to see all the hate and evil perpetrated by Saudi Arabia come back on them. They are not alone, but they seem to be behind much of the trouble in this world.

[anti partisan]

7. I hope to live long enough to see peace in the region (nt)

[anti partisan]

6. K&R

Hopefully the Middle Eastern people will soon enough see prosperous enough living conditions that they will be reluctant to give up their lifestyles for more bloody civil war. Sadly it seems our policy is creating fear and instability in the region which feeds violence and civil war. Religion is misidentified as the root of the problem, when it is really poverty and desperation.

[go west young man]

8. Once again...

the US and the West choose to look the other way on Saudi Arabia.

[riderinthestorm]

9. K&R. Been saying this for several years now on DU.

Been called a bigot and worse for pointing out that the "Arab Spring" revolutions had troubling elements.

It would be helpful if discussions about some of the problematic issues could be raised and not automatically slammed.

[countryjake]

12. The reliance on NATO strikes & other USA interests...

rather than developing their own needed strategy to build on unity and a program that could have provided direction post-uprising is glaringly obvious now, I think.

Of course, when this country interferes with the intent of building future McDonald's and Starbucks rather than feeding the hungry, military bases rather than jobs for the poor, and sucking the oil revenues right from beneath their feet, it's sort of understandable that the actual rebels might become distracted from what their nations need.

[Ichingcarpenter]

10. Fill in the Blank... Which country Saudi Arabia or Iran

is this more true of?



The Government of ______ denies its people fundamental freedoms, including freedom of the
press, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, and freedom of conscience.



you know what the answer should be if one was honest and knew the facts




That's in the new senate bill




http://www.foreign.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Nuclear%20Weapon%20Free%20Iran%20Act.pdf


That's why I nominated this tread.

[davidpdx]

11. I'm currently taking a class on the Constitutional Struggles in the Muslim World on Coursera

We have 30 to 40,000 students from all over the world including tons from middle eastern countries. I made friends with a guy in Iran and we have been sharing notes on the recent talks between the western countries and Iran. It is very fascinating to get a chance to interact with people from the region and here what is gong on from their perspective.