This article features a critical cause of the current violence in Iraq. ("The Hatfields and the McCoys"; Iraqi style.)

“Younger Clerics Showing Power in Iraq's Unrest”

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Feb. 25 — American officials have been repeatedly stunned and frequently thwarted in the past three years by the extraordinary power of Muslim clerics over Iraqi society. But in the sectarian violence of the past few days, that power has taken an ominous turn, as rival hard-line Shiite clerical factions have pushed each other toward more militant and anti-American stances, Iraqi and Western officials say.

. . .

The violence and new militancy has come in part from a competition among Shiite factions to be seen as the protectors of the Shiite masses. The main struggle has been between the leading factions, both backed by Iran, and their spiritual leaders.

Many of the retaliatory attacks after the bombing were led by Mahdi Army militiamen loyal to Moktada al-Sadr, the Shiite cleric whose anti-American crusades have turned him into a rising political power.

His main rival, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, a cleric and the leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or Sciri, defended the right of Shiites to respond to the bombing, and has shown a new willingness to publicly attack the American role in Iraq — once the preserve of Mr. Sadr. He also commands a powerful militia, the Badr Organization.

The more political clerics, Mr. Hiltermann added, "are quite willing to push their agendas no matter what it might lead to, including civil war and the breakup of the country."

. . .

To some extent, the American government did recognize a need to court moderate religious figures who could play roles in Iraq's future. Even before the 2003 invasion, American officials allied themselves with exiled clerics like Ayad Jamal Addin and Sheik Abdel Majid al-Khoei, a member of one of Iraq's most prominent Shiite families.

But the Americans seemed unaware of the complex and deadly rivalries among Iraq's religious factions. After being brought back to Iraq by the Americans in 2003, Mr. Khoei was stabbed to death in the Shiite holy city of Najaf by followers of Mr. Sadr. That killing led the American occupation authority to issue an arrest warrant for Mr. Sadr, which was dropped after he led two bloody uprisings in 2004 and became one of Iraq's most powerful figures.

. . .

Much enmity existed between the Sadr family and the Hakim family. The respected head of the Hakims, Ayatollah Muhammad Bakr al-Hakim, fled to Iran and formed the Supreme Council in the early 1980's. He returned to Iraq after the American invasion, and was killed, along with 100 or so followers, in a car bomb explosion in August 2003. That was when his younger brother, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, took over.

The stridency of Mr. Sadr and Mr. Hakim has also contributed in pushing the older clerics to adopt a more aggressive tone toward Sunni militants, especially as the patience of the Shiite people wears thin in the face of relentless slaughter. After the shrine bombing on Wednesday, Ayatollah Sistani called on "believers" to defend religious sites if the government was unable to do so — exactly the same language that Mr. Sadr used in telling the Mahdi Army to defend places of worship.

The tensions between Mr. Sadr and Mr. Hakim have affected virtually every aspect of Iraqi society. Each man has staked out territory in the police and commando forces by swelling the ranks of those units with their militiamen. This month, Mr. Sadr played the role of kingmaker by throwing his support to Mr. Jaafari during a Shiite vote for the prime ministerial nominee, effectively blocking Mr. Hakim's candidate. Occasionally the rivalry explodes into violence, as it did last summer when Sadr militiamen stormed Supreme Council offices across the south.

Given all this, and amid the growing sectarian bloodshed, the voices of religious moderates like Ayatollah Sistani are increasingly falling on deaf ears. Shiite tribes "have put a lot of pressure on Sistani in the last year to go for revenge," said Mr. Hiltermann of the Crisis Group. "People are just not listening anymore in the face of these sick outrages."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/26/internation...0000&partner=homepage

"Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum."
Lucretious c.94-55 BC

For those who do not understand it in the original

"So much wrong could religion induce"

Just to further prove nothing we are seeing now is particulalry new, might I suggest reading Francis Bacon's [1561-1625] essay 'Of Unity of Religion' [1625]

http://www.worldwideschool.org/library/books/...y/FrancisBacon/chap3.html

Particular attention should be paid to paragraph six, and the third sword.

Perhaps we delude ourselves and in the light of history, those we see as moderates are the extremists and the extremists are the true representatives of Islam.

Yes, bb, in the absence of any evidence, I agree that this hypothesis appears to best fit all of the available facts. But ...

We are still stuck with the anomoly of why the Wahaabi would attack the oil facility in SA if they are the "political action arm" of the Saudi regime as ns (amongst many other observors) appears to believe.

Of course, the most likely explanation is that there is really no "one cause/group/force at work" any more than there is "one explanation." All of these events may simply be almost random erruptions in a landscape of endlessly shifting, unstable and unpredictable forces so powerful and deep-rooted, that there simply is no logic other than chaos and violence itself. So why even bother?

If we have any hope of somehow minimizing the inevitable pain of rapid and widespread cultural/economic transformation, we must attempt to isolate and contain as much of the counter-productive, anti-evolutionary forces from interferring with this difficult historical process as we possibly can.

Right now, it's the "as we possibly can" part that's giving me fits.

We must be careful in the linkages we make whilst the Saudi Regime (House of Saud) are Wahhabis, and SA is exporting Wahhabism to the Islamic World, it does not follow that it is the Saudi regime that is doing the exporting. After all there are many Wahhabi or Salifi (to use the non-derogatory term) who do not believe in the right of the House of Saud to rule Saudi Arabia or in their policy to the west and the SA oil reserves, namely the Qutbist Salfis. Which goes to show that there was no anomoly in the attempted oil field attack.

You are probably right, that there is no one cause/group/force at work though it/they may well fall under the umbrella of al-Qaeda. The problem in the West is that we are hung up in science, politics and medicine on single causes and effects.

For further reading on Sayyid Qutb, I have found this informative article:

Is this the man who inspired Bin Laden?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,584478,00.html

I have also found this site which appears to explain much, however I am drawing a blank on ascertaining the author's credentials. He is either the best thing since sliced bread according to muslims or an illiterate muslim and an apologist for the wahhabis according to non-muslims (many of whom could be classified as C-PAC). All I can find so far is:
"Haneef James Oliver was majoring in history when he decided to branch off in his studies and research the world's major religions. After becoming Muslim in 1994, he began to examine the creeds and methodologies of the past and contemporary Muslim sects. "The 'Wahhabi' Myth" is a product of Oliver's analysis of the various paths which people have taken to worship God. " and only this, which for me sets alarm bells ringing.

The 'Wahhabi' Myth by Haneef James Oliver
http://www.thewahhabimyth.com/index.htm

Perhaps ns, can give us further guidance.