Middle Eastern Politics & Culture: TODAY & YESTERDAY By Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective origins.osu.edu Table of Contents Page Chapter 1: Middle Eastern Politics 1 The Secular Roots of a Religious Divide in Contemporary Iraq 2 A New View on the Israeli-Palestine Conflict: From Needs to Narrative to Negotiation 15 Erdoğan’s Presidential Dreams, Turkey’s Constitutional Politics 28 Clampdown and Blowback: How State Repression Has Radicalized Islamist Groups in Egypt 40 A Fresh Start for Pakistan? 51 Alawites and the Fate of Syria 63 Syria's Islamic Movement and the 2011-12 Uprising 75 From Gaza to Jerusalem: Is the Two State Solution under Siege? 88 The Long, Long Struggle for Women's Rights in Afghanistan 101 Egypt Once Again Bans the Muslim Brotherhood, Sixty Years Later 112 Understanding the Middle East 115 Afghanistan: Past and Prospects 116 Ataturk: An Intellectual Biography 117 A History of Iran: Empire of the Mind 120 Chapter 2: Water and the Middle East 123 Baptized in the Jordan: Restoring a Holy River 124 Who Owns the Nile? Egypt, Sudan, and Ethiopia’s History-Changing Dam 139 Outdoing Panama: Turkey’s ‘Crazy’ Plan to Build an Istanbul Canal 150 Chapter 3: Islam, Christianity, and Culture in the Middle East 163 Two Popes and a Primate: The Changing Face of Global Christianity 164 What's in a Name?: The Meaning of “Muslim Fundamentalist” 177 Tradition vs Charisma: The Sunni-Shi'i Divide in the Muslim World 185 The Dangers of Being a Humorist: Charlie Hebdo Is Not Alone 192 Civilizations of Ancient Iraq 196 Chapter 4: Maps and Charts 200 About Origins 222 Chapter 1 Middle Eastern Politics (Image: Siria Bosra by Jose Javier Martin Esparto, Flickr.com (CC BY-NC- SA 2.0)) Section 1 The Secular Roots of a Religious Divide in Contemporary Iraq EDITOR’S NOTE: By STACY E. HOLDEN In 1991, explaining why it would have been a mistake The Islamic State (ISIS) in Iraq, to invade Baghdad after the Gulf War, Dick Cheney centered in the central and northern warned that removing Saddam Hussein would have part of the country, is a place where inflamed ancient tensions between Sunnis and Shi’i. leaders torture and kill people who do His fears were realized 15 years later when Iraq not follow a draconian interpretation of descended into a civil war from which it has not Sunni Islam. recovered. Journalists, commentators, and policy makers usually refer to this religious conflict as But ISIS has a particular hostility intractable with origins that date back over 1000 years. toward followers of Shi’i Islam, as three The real source of the conflicts in Iraq are But as historian Stacy E. Holden writes this month, the incidents from the summer of 2014 recent and secular and can be traced to the real source of the region's conflicts are more recent highlight. ISIS ordered the mass political patterns and preferences of the Ottoman empire. Artwork of the Battle of and more secular. They can be traced to the political murder of 1,500 Shi'i militiamen in Chaldiran (1514). From Chehel Sotoun patterns and preferences of the Ottoman empire. And, Tikrit, a Sunni stronghold and the palace, Isfahan. (Source: Xiquinho Silva, CC by SA 2.0, wikipedia.org) over the 100 years since the end of Ottoman control in former hometown of Saddam Hussein. Iraq, those same power dynamics have continued to When ISIS forces drove through dominate the region through British imperialists, villages surrounding Kirkuk, Shiite families played dead in the hopes that they Baath-party power, and the U.S. occupation. would not be gunned down with others of their same identity. And when the Islamic State captured a prison in Mosul, its leaders ordered all Shi'is and other (Published November 2015) minority peoples into a ditch and killed them. 2 Such targeted killing of non- Sunnis, particularly of those born as Shi'is, led a reporter for The Economist in September 2014 to write that the Islamic State “is both the product and the chief instigator of the ever deepening Sunni-Shia enmity that runs from Bahrain to Flag of the "Islamic State of Iraq and Syria" (ISIS) or "Islamic State of Iraq Lebanon.” and the Levant" (ISIL). This flag is also used by al-Shabaab, al-Qaeda In Iraq, the population is in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), al- Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb approximately 60% Shi'is (AQIM), and Boko Haram. (Source: and 20% Arab Sunnis. There Public domain, wikipedia.org) is a widespread sense that Religious and Ethnic groups in Iraq. (Source: www.ozpolitic.com) the present conflict between these two sectarian groups is a case of longstanding, theologically driven hatreds reasserting Many posited that Prime Minister al-Maliki's resignation in themselves again. As such, some political pundits conclude, September 2014 and the appointment of the more inclusive negotiations cannot overcome divine principles dictating distinct Haider al-Abadi would improve the situation in Iraq. After all, Mr. worldviews that preclude peaceful coexistence and the forging of al-Abadi formed a government consisting of both Shi'is and a coherent nation-state. Sunnis, thereby making a deliberate effort to draw support from the Sunni Islamic State. And yet, more than one year after his When the Western media does inject pragmatic power appointment, the Islamic State has yet to be neutralized. considerations into its analysis of sectarian tensions in Iraq, they are of courte durée. Journalists often blame the present crisis on Sunni and Shi'i identities have both religious and political former Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. He came to office in 2006 dimensions. And it is the politics, I argue, that causes the conflict and used his position to promote Shi'i interests at the expense of in Iraq, while the religion provides a rhetoric accentuating the Sunni minority. difference between political players. In this way, there are secular 3 roots to the animosity that many outsiders view as an ancient and long-term implications for the development of modern Iraq, irreconcilable religious divide. because these Sunnis and their descendants were able to perpetuate their monopolization of the institutions of the Iraqi In order to understand the interplay between politics and religion state. we need to look back at the closing stages of the Ottoman era and the rise of modern nations in the Middle East. The recent The present aggravation of relations between Sunnis and Shi'is in Sunni-Shi’i struggles for power and for influence over the Iraq is less a legacy of religious conflict than a manifestation of institutions of the state emerged within the dynamics of the Ottoman policies enunciated amidst that empire's troubled end. Ottoman era, when this Sunni empire contended for land and treasure with Shi'i Persia. The Sunni-Shi'i Split The Sunni-Shi'i split dates to 10 October 680 CE (10 Muharram 61), and its origins stem from a war over control of the power— both political and economic—of the nascent Islamic empire being forged at that time. Power and influence, not dogma and doctrine, were at the core of the Sunni-Shi'i divide from its very beginning. Islam spread quickly in the area now called the Middle East. By the time of the Prophet Muhammad’s death in 632, Muslims had united the Arabian Peninsula. The Prophet’s successor, Abu Bakr (r. 632-634), led the first military excursion into the area that is nowSyria and Iraq. (This historic detail explains why Islamic State “caliph” Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi took this nom de guerre.) Abu Imam Ali Mosque, Najaf, Iraq.(Source: by Toshiro, wikipedia.org) Bakr as well as the next three so-called Rightly Guided Caliphs were chosen by a consensus of the community. This was not a The Ottoman Empire ended 100 years ago, but its legacy still democracy; it was instead a participatory oligarchy. influences sectarian relations in Iraq. When European powers disbanded it after World War I, most power brokers in its Iraqi The concord sustaining this oligarchy during the first 48 years of provinces were Sunni Arabs who had proven loyal to the the Islamic Empire crumbled in 680, as the Muslim elite and their Ottomans in the 19th and early 20th centuries. This would have 4 followers struggled to control the financial and political structures later. Yazid proclaimed himself a king of the new Islamic empire of the emerging Islamic empire. by virtue of family ties. And so, community participation gave way to a system of dynastic succession by which power was The defining crisis stemmed from the assassination of Ali (r. transferred based on bloodlines, not merit or a consensus of the 656-661), son-in-law of the Prophet and the last of the Rightly community. Guided Caliphs, as he prayed at a mosque in Kufa, a city in present- day Iraq. After Ali's death, two factions supported two different rulers. Some championed the appointment of Hassan, a son of Ali and so a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad. Others backed Muawiyya, based in what is now Syria, who controlled the most powerful army in the Pilgrims gather for the ashura commemoration in Karbala, Iraq, January Islamic Empire. 19, 2008. The 10-day event commemorates the death of Husayn. ( Source: photo by Sgt. Nicole Dykstra, wikipedia.org. ) Hasan ibn Ali served his father, Ali, during the Battle of Siffin, 657 CE. Folio Ultimately, Hassan and This conflict of dynastic succession culminated in Karbala, in from a 14th century Tarikhnama(Book of his brother Husayn, history) by Balami. (Source: Public modern Iraq, when Yazid’s troops mercilessly slaughtered Husayn fearing civil war, came to domain, wikipedia.org) and 70 of his followers in an event now commemorated an agreement with as ashura.