Israel-Palestine and the Schisms Within the Ummah

The affiliates and proxies of each of many ‘blocs’ are at loggerheads and mired in bloody conflict with each other.

Kashmiri Shia Muslim protesters shout anti-Israeli and anti-U.S slogans during their protest march against the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Israeli airstrikes in Beirut, Lebanon, at Magam in Budgam district of Central Kashmir, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024.

(Photo: PTI)

The Quranic concept of Ummat al-Mu’minin (colloquially, the Ummah) or the Commonwealth of the Islamic believers, was never really united historically, isn’t so now, and is unlikely to be so either, looking at the sectarian divide that besets the Islamic world.  

While Ummah literally translates to ‘nation’ in Arabic, history is instructive of ‘divides’ within, which ensure that regionalism, culturality, ethnicities or sectarian pride practically triumph over the collectiveness of the generic concept, Ummah, for Muslims.  

Attempts like the United Arab Republic (pursuant to championing of Pan-Arabism by Gamal Nasser), a sovereign state created between 1958-61, encompassing Egypt and Syria, soon imploded owing to regional one-upmanship. Closer home, the purported ‘land of the pure’ and the only country to be created in the name of religion, Pakistan, tore into two distinct parts in 1971; the regional and cultural pride of the Bengalis was at the heart of animosity between the dominant West Pakistan, and the then East Pakistan.

Today, despite all the rote platitudes of ‘brother Muslim country’, Afghanistan and Pakistan are engaged in a bloody face-off that has led to more killings on the restive Durand Line (Af-Pak border) than the tensions due to the traditional enemy across the Line-of-Control (read, India). It is believed that more people have died in Af-Pak clashes in recent times, than all the Pakistani casualties put together in all Indo-Pak Wars. 

Even within Islamic countries, tensions between various irreconcilable sects (principally understood in the context of the oversimplified lens of the Sunni-Shia divide), run deep.

In Yemen, it manifests in the bloody war between the Shia Houthis versus the assorted Saudi Arabia-supported Sunni militias. In Afghanistan, it manifested in the Sunni Taliban turning on the minority Shia Hazaras, whereas in Pakistan, where beyond the tense Sunni-Shia divide, some like the intensely persecuted Ahmediyas are not even considered Muslims! In the longstanding battlefields of Lebanon, the Shia militias can readily turn on or ally with Druze militias or Sunni militias, depending on the circumstances.    

While the Shiite ‘bloc’ may look monolithic, it isn’t. It too has sects within, like the Ja’fari, Zaydi, Isma’ili, Nizari and many more, which have regional presence and differences amongst themselves. Similar differentiation prevails with the various theological schools within Sunni Islam. However, at an overall political level, the Ummah can be divided into two broad ‘blocs’ – the Shia ‘bloc’ led by Iran versus the Sunni ‘bloc’ led by Arab Sheikhdoms (principally, by Saudi Arabia).

The affiliates and proxies of each of these ‘blocs’ are at loggerheads and mired in bloody conflict with each other.  

There are aberrational exigencies like the Palestinian Hamas (predominantly Sunni-led but supported by Iran as the Saudi-led ‘bloc’ has stopped support), or tensions caused due to the Afghan Taliban (predominantly Sunni and created by Pakistan) turning on its progenitor, that is, Pakistan, owing to regional issues of sovereign pride amongst the same (predominant) sectarian ‘bloc’.  

The principal schism within the Ummah is between the umbrella Sunni-Shia realm, with the latter accounting for about 15 percent to 20 percent of the total Muslim population (only Iran, Iraq, Bahrain and Azerbaijan are Shia majority). The extreme air of sectarianism has not only led to each side asserting its presence, often by discriminating against the ‘other’, but has also given rise to the case of the relative minority denomination of Shias coalescing with Iran as the ‘bloc’ leader.

Take, for example, the Yemeni Houthis, the Lebanese Hezbollah or the case of the Alawite (Shia offshoot) Bashar Al Assad’s Syrian Government, despite the fact that Sunnis are the majority in Syria. Basically, battle lines in the Middle East are drawn on sectarian lines.  

The aggressive tact of ‘othering’ has led (especially for the minority and the often-persecuted Shias) to valourize the likes of Ayatollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Khamenei, General Qasim Soleimani or even the recently killed Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah. Circumstantially, the belligerent stand taken by Iran and its proxies (despite lesser numbers) is seen as retaining moral high ground as the true defenders of the causes of Ummah, for example, Palestine.

Iran has been flexing its demonstrated intransigence with Israel, as opposed to the ‘normalisation’ of relations by Arab capitals towards Israel, to insist on its commitment and therefore legitimacy for leadership within forums like the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). 

This obvious divide within the Ummah led the Jordanian King Abdullah to coin the term ‘Shia Crescent’ (landmass from the Persian Gulf starting with Iran-Iraq to the swathes of Syria-Azerbaijan-Bahrain in the middle, up to Levantine Lebanon on the Mediterranean Sea) in 2005 to suggest the dangers of Shiite territorial ambitions. The relations between the rival ‘bloc’ remain fractured, wounded and bloody with both sides arming their proxies to attack the other.

In a move that looked surreal, the Jordanian military actually shot down Iranian drones on their way to attack Israel, an action which ran counter to all the previous Wars with Israel as Jordan had remained steadfastly against Israel in the Israel-Palestine War (1948), Six-Day War (1967), War of Attrition (1967-70), Yom Kippur War (1973) etc. However, now, the sectarian fears have virtually led Arab Sheikhdoms to willy-nilly side with Israel (their mealymouthed support to the Palestinian cause, notwithstanding) – as they presumably see Iran and its Shiite ‘bloc’ as a bigger threat than Israel.  

Such division of emotions on the basis of sectarianism is fraught with risks in regions where adherents from both sectarian faiths coexist cheek-by-jowl, like the Indian subcontinent.

The killing of Hassan Nasrallah saw disquiet and protest in Shia enclaves of Lucknow, Budgam, and Srinagar to Kargil. Even though the killing fields of Lebanon or the Gaza Strip are far away from the Indian subcontinent with little or no direct stake or involvement, the emotional ‘connect’ is ripe, heavy and unmistakable. The Shia leaders, (especially from the Avadh region) who have traditionally been the supporters of the ruling dispensation in ‘Delhi’, would be watching and evaluating the Indian government's reaction closely, as they will invariably conflate the same to their own identity and sensitivities.  

Sadly, ensuing societal polarisation and the politics of majoritarianism have made Israel an aspirational model that is overtly cheered, in the conjoined and misplaced spirit of my-enemy’s-enemy-is-my-friend. Just as Indian Shias affixing emotions to Hezbollah is perhaps stretched (though understandable given the larger Ummah context), similarly, many in India cheering the Israeli bludgeoning of the Gaza Strip or the killing of Hassan Nasrallah may be avoidable.

The divide within the Ummah must be understood, and simplistic binaries avoided – just as every Palestinian is not Hamas, every Israeli is not a Netanyahu supporter, and everyone in the Ummah is also not a Nasrallah/Hezbollah supporter. There are layers within layers.  

The Middle East is a complex region given to many intrigues within by competing foreign powers and even topical geopolitics that has a logic and rationality of its own, depending on time and situation. Commenting on the same without due care or sensitivity could hurt many, and appropriation of forces like Israel may seem tempting to vent one’s own instinct for ‘othering’, but it could do immense disservice and aggravate an already polarised Indian reality, when it is not our war directly.

If anything, being a moral nation, the lens of humanity must be deployed, which will enable us to call out the brutal terror attack perpetuated by Hamas (not Palestinians, sweepingly and collectively), and also to call out the genocidal, supremely disproportional and amoral retaliation on Palestinian civilians, as done by Benjamin Netanyahu (not Israelis or Jews, collectively). Such a nuanced reaction befits a 5000-year-old noble civilisation and not the boorish support of a terror organisation like Hamas or that of the insecure and unhinged, Benjamin Netanyahu. 

(The author is a Former Lt Governor of Andaman & Nicobar Islands and Puducherry. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)