Word: sunni
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...years in power are a record. His Baath Party has imposed stability through control of the army and a network of secret police and informers that penetrates every niche of Iraqi society. If that is swept away, simmering tensions between the Shi'ite Muslims (55% of the population), Sunni Muslims (20%) and Kurds (25%) could conceivably erupt into a communal bloodbath, fragmenting the country into another Lebanon...
...dealings outside his borders, Assad's conduct has been equally ruthless. In 1986, for instance, pro-Syrian militiamen (using grenades and poison gas) killed more than 200 Sunni Moslem fundamentalists in Tripoli, Lebanon...
Much as they want to see Saddam killed, overthrown or tried for war crimes, several top Bush Administration advisers and Arab leaders are quietly pulling for some of Saddam's nastiest henchmen to survive in power. If Iraq's Sunni Muslim ruling elite were to be ousted wholesale, no alternative government could easily take charge of the country's highly politicized military and secret police. Fear of these institutions is the strongest glue binding Iraq's fractious populace, including its long-oppressed Shi'ite Muslim majority and its rebellious northern Kurds. "When the Iraqis stop fighting us," says a senior...
...embargo against Baghdad in the run-up to the war, Iran last week announced openly that it would be sending food and medicine to Iraqi noncombatants, as is permitted under U.N. guidelines. Both countries have Shi'ite Muslim majorities, though the Baathist government of Saddam Hussein is dominated by Sunni Muslims. Tehran's ultimate goal, some analysts say, is to foment a takeover by Baghdad's Shi'ites. If the day ever comes that friendly Shi'ites do control Iraq, Iran might offer the new government a generous gift: say, 100 or so fighters and bombers confiscated during the gulf...
...religious authority to declare jihad? In Islam's dominant Sunni branch, that power formerly belonged to the caliph, or political successor of Muhammad, who united religious and temporal rulership. But no caliphate has existed since 1924, and Sunni jurists today believe the power rests with any legitimate Muslim political authority. Lufti Dogan, a former Turkish Religious Affairs Minister, says all Muslims can be called to jihad, but there is greater receptivity to the call in Shi'ism, the minority branch of Islam that is dominant in Iran...