THE WORLD - Rift over Shiites is seen in Bahrain's royal court

MANAMA, BAHRAIN — Leading members of Bahrain's royal family have thrown their weight behind hard-line Sunni Muslim groups, some of whom share the outlook of Al Qaeda, in an attempt to counter a perceived Shiite threat, government officials and critics say.

The strategy, first exposed in a government report that surfaced last year, has revealed a rift within the court of the ruling Khalifa family.

One faction believes in reconciliation with the Persian Gulf nation's disenfranchised Shiite Muslim majority. The other believes in suppressing Shiite aspirations, even if it means supporting Sunni groups propelled by the same ideologies that inspire Osama bin Laden.

A ranking government official who is a member of the royal family said there was "no doubt" that a hard-line movement existed within the Bahraini power structure.

"Then, there are the moderates who believe that cohesion is the way to go forward," he said.

The official, who counts himself among the moderates, spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. Members of the royal family are unanimous in public, and analysts say they rarely discuss internal rifts.

But Bahrain, a small, oil-rich nation of 750,000 people where the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet is based, is anything but united.

It rests uneasily on the increasingly volatile sectarian fault line rattling the Middle East. Impoverished Shiites, some of whom share close religious and cultural ties to Iran, demand more power from the dominant Sunnis, who have ties to Saudi Arabia. Intermarriage between the sects has become rare. Bahrain's Shiites and Sunnis have different last names and speak Arabic with different accents.

Crown Prince Salman ibn Hamed Khalifa, a 37-year-old graduate of American University in Washington and Cambridge University in England, leads the moderates, who have focused on creating job opportunities for Bahrain's young as a way of staving off sectarian tensions. Khalid ibn Ahmed Khalifa, minister of state for royal court affairs, is known as the leader of the hard-liners.

Few know where King Hamed ibn Isa Khalifa, the ultimate authority in Bahrain, stands.

"The royal court minister is backed by the Sunni extremists and he backs them," said one Bahraini analyst, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "It's a very dangerous game. They're going down a slippery road."