Shiite

A Turkish high court ruled that religious education classes geared toward Sunni Muslims should not be compulsory, a major victory for a Shiite branch of Islam. The ruling affecting Turkey's Alevi community is also likely to please the European Union, which has made religious liberties a condition for Turkey's membership bid. The Alevis are followers of a tradition rooted in Shiite beliefs, and have long complained of discrimination and forced assimilation through mandatory courses on Sunni Islam in schools.

IDLIB, Syria - In a rickety office building once used by agricultural engineers in the village of Hazano, rebels with the Missiles of Justice militia waited to hear word of negotiations about a hostage swap that night. Sitting at an old metal desk, a Sunni Muslim rebel named Mustafa manned a phone, waiting for new reports of kidnappings. He had started a list of missing Sunnis in a notebook, including a young man in a white Mazda and a pharmacist. The list didn't include the names of the Shiite Muslim hostages the rebels were holding in a building somewhere in the village.

A bomb tore through a minibus during morning rush hour in a mainly Shiite area in Baghdad, killing at least nine people and wounding 24, Iraqi officials said. The bomb was attached to the minibus in the southern area of Abu Dshir, a Shiite enclave in the mainly Sunni neighborhood of Dora, police said. "A ball of fire rose into the sky. We saw a minibus thrown about five meters into the air, then come down in flames," said Omar Abdul-Ghafar, a university student who was waiting with his friend for another bus. The explosion left a crater at the entrance of the bus station.

A string of explosions targeting Shiite Muslims that killed at least 71 people bore the hallmark of Sunni Arab insurgents who have a history of trying to capitalize on tensions among Iraqi politicians to reignite the communal violence that nearly tore the country apart. The bombings Thursday in the south of Iraq and in mainly Shiite neighborhoods of the capital, Baghdad, were the second major wave of attacks since the last U.S. troops departed from Iraq less than three weeks ago. Sectarian tension has escalated sharply as a political dispute threatens to unravel U.S.-backed power-sharing arrangements among the country's Shiites, Sunni Arabs and ethnic Kurds.

Contrary to popular reports, Iraq has not satisfied the Bush Administration's deadline to fully comply with all U.N. resolutions. Saddam Hussein's government is still maintaining its embargo against the Kurds in an attempt to starve them out and regularly shells civilian populations centers in both Kurdistan and the Shiite south. While the Bush Administration vigorously acts to eliminate weapons of mass destruction, it can't seem to lift its voice, let alone supply weapons, to the millions of Kurds and Shiites who are being silently starved and assaulted by Saddam and his Baath compatriots.

Re "Surging Shiite Demands Put U.S. in a Bind," Jan. 18: It seems quite possible that the Shiite majority in Iraq could be decisive in whether George W. Bush gets reelected to another four years. The Shiites are starting to become very impatient with the Bush administration's timetable in Iraq. Your typical religious Shiite, of which there are many, knowing of Bush's strong commitment to Israel and to those who want to convert all Muslims to Christianity, will be hard pressed to want to give much breathing space to this U.S. administration.

Re "The perils of partition," editorial, Feb. 5 There are merits and demerits with the concept of the partitioning of Iraq. However, The Times' bald statement, "First and more important, the Iraqis do not want it," seems mainly to be wishful thinking. The Times should be editorializing that first and foremost, the Iraqis want the security needed to permit normal living with good jobs and a stable, efficient infrastructure. Sunni and Shiite migrations in Iraq may be more useful in leading to the end of the war than all of the political planning and military action by the Iraqi government and the Bush administration.

Re "A world full of Cold Wars," Opinion, May 15 Niall Ferguson demonizes and mischaracterizes Iran's leadership and their Shiite religion. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's letter to President Bush is not "long and nutty." It was probably constructed carefully by the clerical leadership of Iran to appeal to Bush on common religious grounds. Our Christian apocalyptic expectation of God's millennial kingdom is widely believed by fundamentalist Christians in the U.S. Ahmadinejad's millenarian expectation of the Mahdi (the Shiite savior)

Let's get one thing straight. Tragic as their plight is, most of the Americans held hostage in Lebanon are there because they did not heed warnings from the American government to get out. Levin, on at least five occasions, refers to the Shiite and Palestinian thugs held in Israeli prisons as hostages. They are not hostages. They are people who planned or carried out mayhem and murder. By comparing these prisoners to American hostages, Levin plays the fool, for the two groups are totally different.

Prime Minister Nouri Maliki, battling for another term in office, lashed out at Iraq's neighbors Monday for meddling in its affairs as political leaders negotiate the composition of a new government. The tough comments were broadcast on state TV and came as representatives of Iraqi parties tour the region. Some Middle East countries have issued statements in recent days on Iraq's ongoing negotiations. Without naming any neighboring countries, Maliki warned them not to intervene in Iraqi affairs.

When Vice President Joe Biden slipped into Baghdad this month to commemorate the end of eight bloody years of war in Iraq, there was one face conspicuously absent from the host of solemn ceremonies and farewell meetings he attended: that of Ahmad Chalabi. The Iraqi politician, who lived in exile before Saddam Hussein's ouster, is shunned by Washington these days. But there has never been a foreigner more crucially involved in a decision by the United States to go to war than Ahmad Chalabi.

The balding head of Hamid Hussein had been sliced open with a sword. Bright scarlet blood flowed down his sunburned face, trickling down and staining the white robes worn by his 5-year-old son, Hussein. It was a momentous day for father and son. They were observing Ashura, the annual religious holiday when Shiite Muslims display penance and mourning with self-inflicted wounds to commemorate the 7th century martyrdom of Imam Hussein, a grandson of the prophet Muhammad. There was one more reason to note the day: U.S. forces were nearly gone from all of Iraq just three weeks before the Dec. 31 deadline for their withdrawal.

Bomb blasts targeting Shiite Muslim gatherings Tuesday in two Afghan cities killed at least 59 people and injured 150, a rare outbreak of sectarian violence in a country racked by 10 years of war with Taliban insurgents. A noontime blast in Kabul, the capital, involved a suicide bomber hidden among a throng of Shiite worshipers outside the Abul Fazal Abbas shrine, said Gen. Mohammed Zahir, head of criminal investigations for the Kabul police. That attack killed at least 55 people and injured 134, the Interior Ministry said.

Iran has just defeated the United States in Iraq. The American withdrawal, which comes after the administration's failure to secure a new agreement that would have allowed troops to remain in Iraq, won't be good for ordinary Iraqis or for the region. But it will unquestionably benefit Iran. President Obama's February 2009 speech at Camp Lejeune accurately defined the U.S. goal for Iraq as "an Iraq that is sovereign, stable and self-reliant. " He then outlined how the U.S. would achieve that goal by working "to promote an Iraqi government that is just, representative and accountable, and that provides neither support nor safe haven to terrorists.

Four bomb blasts rocked Karbala on Sunday, killing at least 10 people less than two weeks after 22 pilgrims from the Shiite holy city were shot to death in a bus hijacking in remote western Iraq. The explosions took place in an area of Karbala close to an Iraqi government building where ID cards are issued. The attacks, in which at least 95 people were injured, occurred during rush hour. Prime Minister Nouri Maliki, a Shiite Muslim, called the bombings "gruesome" and promised a thorough investigation.

International jurists Wednesday released details of how an analysis of cellphone calls led investigators to conclude the Shiite Muslim militia Hezbollah was behind the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri six years ago. The unsealing of the 47-page indictment, which suggests a complicated three-month plot by at least 11 conspirators to trail Hariri for months, establish his travel patterns and then dispatch a suicide bomber...

The bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad on Tuesday makes it clear that American forces are not only fighting remnants of the Saddam Hussein regime and disgruntled Iraqis but also facing a panoply of factions that could begin to use Iraq as a new arena for pursuing jihad against America. These are the same kinds of motivated individuals who spent nine long years fighting and defeating the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. Iraq will be the prime magnet of every militant Muslim in the world.

It sounded like a dream job: $10,000 a month, a fleet of fancy cars, a house and best of all, said Nawal Samarai, a chance to improve the lives of widows and millions of other Iraqi women affected by the U.S.-led invasion and its aftermath. But in a rare show of public muscle-flexing by an Iraqi woman in a high-profile role, Samarai has quit in a rage, saying she had been given a Potemkin Cabinet post created to fill a quota for Sunni Arab lawmakers such as herself, and make it appear that the Shiite Muslim-dominated government cares about women's issues.

At least 40 people were killed in a series of explosions Thursday in two Shiite neighborhoods of Baghdad in some of the worst violence to hit the capital in months. Early Thursday evening, three bombs exploded outside a Shiite mosque, near outdoor stalls at a market in the Shurta neighborhood of southwest Baghdad. At least 34 people were killed and another 82 people were wounded, police said. "I was drinking juice from a shop together with some of my friends when the first explosion happened," said Ahmed Dandar, 25, who suffered injuries to his arm and shoulders.