Can You Tell a Sunni From a Shiite?

Excerpted from Jeff Stein writing on the op-ed page of Tuesday’s New York Times:

For the past several months, I’ve been wrapping up lengthy interviews with Washington counterterrorism officials with a fundamental question: “Do you know the difference between a Sunni and a Shiite?”

A “gotcha” question? Perhaps. But if knowing your enemy is the most basic rule of war, I don’t think it’s out of bounds. And as I quickly explain to my subjects, I’m not looking for theological explanations, just the basics: Who’s on what side today, and what does each want?

After all, wouldn’t British counterterrorism officials responsible for Northern Ireland know the difference between Catholics and Protestants? In a remotely similar but far more lethal vein, the 1,400-year Sunni-Shiite rivalry is playing out in the streets of Baghdad, raising the specter of a breakup of Iraq into antagonistic states, one backed by Shiite Iran and the other by Saudi Arabia and other Sunni states.

[…]

But so far, most American officials I’ve interviewed don’t have a clue.

He continues with examples. We’re protected by idiots.

4 thoughts on “Can You Tell a Sunni From a Shiite?”

  2. What ARE the differences between them?

    Just pointing doesn’t help.

    One of the differences I’ve read is that the Shia pray to associates of Mohammed like Catholics pray to saints. The Sunni, on the other hand, try to kill people who pray to the ‘false gods’.

  3. The column by Stein provides a brief explanation:

    I told him briefly about the schism that developed after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, and how Iraq and Iran are majority Shiite nations while the rest of the Muslim world is mostly Sunni.

    I think the point of Stein’s article was that there is an important difference between the two beliefs, as there is between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland, and one cannot understand the region without understanding the distinction.

  4. See: http://www.google.com/search?q=shia+vs+sunni specially the first link.

    Asking the question “What is the difference between Sunni and Shia?” of a muslim is like asking an Irishman the difference between a Catholic and a Protestant. Unless you’re in it it doesn’t make any sense.

    Asking a western politician these questions will produce answers that also don’t make sense. They (the western politicians) will have to make decisions based on the actions of the two sides, not by the reason for the actions. But isn’t that what we want?

Comments are closed.