Shia in iraq Jun 20, 2018 · Islam exists in two sects; Sunni and Shia. In Ninewa, the Sunni Endowment reported that the Shia Endowment worked secretly to confiscate properties owned by the Sunni Endowment in Mosul by using false documents or claiming Shia Endowment jurisdiction over the properties based on some of the shrines and mosques bearing Shia religious names. The U. Estimates say there are 500,000 Christians in Iraq. Iraqi Sunni Muslims mainly inhabit the northern half of Iraq. The majority of conversions to Shi'ism occurred in the nineteenth century. For example, each group professes near universal belief in God (Allah) and the Prophet Muhammad, and more than nine-in-ten members of each group say they fast during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. Most Sunni Shabak and some Shia Shabak reside in Ninewa. According to 2010 government statistics, the most recent available, 97 percent of the population is Muslim. This uprising was made in the month of Safar 1397/1977. Sadr, however, has maintained at least cordial relations with Iran. Photos of Iraq. Apr 27, 2023 · Sectarian tensions are mounting in Iraq as the newly ascendant Shia majority struggles to accommodate the Sunni and Kurdish minorities while confronting extremist Sunni groups. 24 Abadi’s chief intelligence officer has stated that up to 75 percent of men between eighteen and thirty years old living in Shia-majority provinces had signed up to enlist in the PMF by the spring of 2016. Shia go on an annual pilgrimage to this shrine in the month of Rajab. Kurdish areas in Iraq are bordered on the east by Iran and the north by Turkey. Middle East. Shia Arabs represent somewhere over 54 percent of the population of Iraq. The Circassians came to Iraq in two waves: directly from Circassia, and later from the Balkans. Sistani mediated an end to that number between 350,000 and 400,000, three-fourths of whom are Shia. Observers described the move as being a path leading directly to Shia political dominance over Iraq's government, as Shia Muslims make up approximately 65% of the total Iraqi population. Iran’s ethnic and religious diversity, in addition to the still deeply held notion of separating religion from politics in Iran, could make the success Aug 4, 2014 · Since 2003, sectarian identities and sectarian relations in Iraq and the broader Arab world have undergone previously unimaginable changes. [3] Nevertheless, in 1936 the Shia tribes rose up again, killing 90 Iraqi troops and downing two aircraft. And there’s certainly no love lost between the Saudi Wahhabi adherents and their Shia fellow Arabs in Iraq. The Islamic Dawa Party (Arabic: حزب الدعوة الإسلامية, romanized: Ḥizb ad-Daʿwa al-Islāmiyya), is an Iraqi Shia Islamist political movement that was formed in 1957 by seminarians in Najaf, Iraq, and later formed branches in Lebanon and Kuwait. Iraq. There were no notable Sunni political parties or opposition groups before 2003. ” 19 Mohammed Shia al-Sudani Iraq among top five Arab countries in gold reserves, Exceeding 1,000 tons. This essay is concerned with the emergence among the Arab May 28, 2021 · Iran and Iraq are two of only a handful of countries with more Shias than Sunnis. However, as Shia political factions gained confidence in their post-2003 dominance, thanks to their Aug 5, 2024 · Is today’s Iraq an example of jihadist governance? I would argue yes. Their population is estimated to be around 1,500,000 to 2,500,000 in Iraq which is about 30% of the Iraqi Kurdish population. Iraq is a federal parliamentary representative democratic republic. Page last updated: January 03, 2025. There is also a very large population of Shia Muslims living in the Persian Gulf countries especially in Saudi Arabia . Those who stayed in Iraq formed a clandestine organisation based on a cellular structure to ensure their survival. The shrine is located in Kadhimiya, an area in the north of Baghdad. Sep 26, 2022 · The evolution of Shia Islamist power in Iraq has significance for the entire surrounding region, where complex political struggles are often misleadingly framed—often by the participants themselves—as Islamist versus secular, or Shia versus Sunni. Many cities in Iraq are of religious importance to the Sunni and Shiite Muslims. 1 New realities have been created and a key question is whether this is a temporary quagmire awaiting resolution or a new socio-political reality that needs to be recognized and managed accordingly. Jan 30, 2020 · As such, the group is currently spread too thin to play a much larger role in Iraq or the rest of the Shia Crescent. The country is home to some of the Shia common pilgrimage sites and holy cities including Najaf, the tomb of Ali ibn Abi Talib, Muhammad’s successor and Karbala, the tomb of Husayn ibn Ali, Muhammad’s grandson. [32] The pilgrimage was revived immediately after his deposal in 2003 and that year's march to Karbala thus symbolized Shia defiance of Sunni regional Ansar al-Sharia (Yemen) – Sheikh Nasser bin Ali al Ansi has connected the current Shia insurgency in Yemen to the conflict in Iraq, saying that "Iranian agents" are the common enemy across every theater of war in the Middle East. The Tigris and the Euphrates flow through Iraq from north to south of the country and finally into Kurds live in mountainous northeastern Iraq. [4] A 2008 report by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point based on reports from the interrogations of dozens of captured Shia fighters described an Iranian-run network smuggling Shia fighters into Iran where they received training and weapons before returning to Iraq. View Details Special Country Products The 1977 Shia protests in Iraq, or the Safar uprising, were a series of demonstrations and riots against the Iraqi government in Karbala and Najaf Governorates, the demonstrations started on 4 February 1977 and finished on 9 February in the same year. Apr 23, 2014 · Shia parties returning from exile, such as the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI, previously known as the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution) and Dawa, had a limited support base in Iraq, which led them to use sectarianism and communal fears to create new constituencies. This timeline highlights Sunni-Shia tensions in recent Nov 18, 2022 · This report has examined the direct authority of clerics over adherents who are citizens, which is a category that is of importance to Iraq’s political future. Al Sudani was born in Baghdad, on 4 March 1970, to a middle-class Shia Arab family. He apparently expected that the other Shiite parties would urge them to come back. Despite being the religious majority in Iraq, Shia Muslims have been killed and otherwise persecuted by IS, which is Sunni. The political narrative for much of this period has revolved around two often misleading debates: about the role of Shia Islamism in politics, and whether Iraq’s leading movements are loyal to the Iraqi state or are subordinate to foreign interests. " [19] This has led to growing concerns about al-Maliki's unwillingness to eliminate Shia militias. The historical turn of Shia Islamist identity and politics in Iraq is tied to profound international currents; Iraq’s Kadhimiya (north of Baghdad) is regarded as a holy city in Shia Islam. Twice in 2004, street fighting broke out in Najaf, with the Shiite militia known as the Mahdi Army attacking American troops. Jun 18, 2014 · The few available survey measures of religious identity in Iraq suggest that about half the country is Shia. The report argues that the Shia-Islamist movement should not be viewed as a po-. From 1979 to 1983 Saddam's regime executed 48 major Shia clerics in Iraq. Apr 15, 2004 · The United States is facing a moment of truth in Iraq, the outcome of which will determine not only Iraq's political future but America's standing in the Middle East. shia. Bergner, the Special Groups receive between 750,000 and 3,000,000 dollars funding per month from the Quds Under the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, Iraq's human rights record was considered one of the worst in the world. Control of Iraq, in particular, is a potential game changer for the Iran threat network. 4; Internal mobility, 2. [ 2 ] [ 3 ] According to American General Kevin J. The report provides an overview of the historical and ideational process, whereby Shia-Islam became politicised in Iraq and analyses each of the main contemporary political actors of the Shia-community: Grand-ayatollah Ali Sistani, the Da’wa Party, the Supreme Islamic Council in Iraq and the Sadr Movement. Mosque of Kufa in Iraq Jan 15, 2021 · The success of Iraq’s Shia leadership separate from Iraq’s religious elite can provide an attractive alternative to the vilayet e-faqih model for Shia worldwide—especially Iranian Shia. " (Quran 2:190) Imam Khomeini (ra) once said: "Every day is Ashura and every land is Karbala! implies that Imam Hussein's movement must be kept alive and active everywhere and at all times. Jun 11, 2024 · Iraq didn’t just play a crucial role in the development of early civilisation; it also helped nurture Islam and played a key part in the creation of Shia and Sunni branches of the religion. [50] Afterward, in the year 1368/1948-9, a group of Iranian businessmen bought this property from the Awqaf Organization of Iraq and, together with a group of Iraqi and Jul 31, 2019 · Sunni-Shia divisions would fuel a long-running civil war in Syria, fighting in Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Yemen and elsewhere, and terrorist violence on both sides. On the Shia popular religious networks in Iraq, see Yitzhak Nakash, The Shi’is of Iraq (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994). The killings were in apparent revenge for Al-Kāẓimayn's Shrine (Arabic: الْحَرَم الكاظِمي) is the resting place of Imam Musa al-Kazim (a), the seventh Imam of the Shia, and his grandson Imam al-Jawad (a), the ninth Imam of the Shia. Now, hezbollah and its shia followers are probably the most hated group in Lebanon The Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI or SIIC; Arabic: المجلس الأعلى الإسلامي العراقي Al-Majlis Al-A'ala Al-Islami Al-'Iraqi; previously known as the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, SCIRI) is a Shia Islamist political party in Iraq. [citation needed] Feb 15, 2007 · Still, not all of Iraq's Shia agree. COI summary: overview [Targeting, 3. View Details. Many of its main factions that belong to the Shia faction trace their origins to the "Special Groups", Iranian-sponsored Shia groups that previously fought in the Iraqi insurgency against the United States and the Coalition forces, as well as a sectarian conflict against Sunni Jihadist and Ba'athist insurgents. According to a 2011 survey by Pew Research, 51% of the Muslims identify as Shia and 42% as Sunni. The cemetery is located near the shrine of Ali ibn Abi Talib, the fourth Sunni Caliph, as well as the first Shia Imam. He inherited the leadership of the Sadrist Movement from his father. [18] Lindsey Graham has said, "You are not going to have a political solution [in Iraq] with this much violence. They main-tained their militancy against the Ba'thist regime, by now under the control of Saddam Hussein. [1] [10] [11] [2] It was founded on 17 October 2004, [1] and was led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi until its disbandment on 15 October 2006 after he was killed in a targeted bombing on June 7, 2006 in Hibhib, Iraq by the United Nov 1, 2017 · Militant organizations have proliferated in Iraq since the fall of the Baathist regime in 2003. [127] They included Shia leader Mohammad Baqir al-Sadr and Dec 6, 2022 · Shia Islamist parties have dominated politics in Iraq since the first post-Saddam Hussein elections in 2005. [32] Nearly all Iraqi Kurds identify as Sunni Muslims. Oct 3, 2024 · The PMF was officially formed in 2014 when Ali al-Sistani, Iraq’s top Shia cleric, called for a national mobilization to combat ISIS. While it is widely assumed that Iraq has a Shia majority, there is little reliable data on the exact Sunni-Shia breakdown of the population. Shia population: 19 -22 million. A common thread in most of these This is a non-exhaustive list of ethnoreligious minorities present in Iraq. 45 out of a possible 10. Apr 14, 2023 · Image: 28 August 2020, Iraq, Baghdad: Shia Muslims take part in a ritual ceremony on the eve of Ashura in front of Al-Kadhimiya Mosque, the shrine of seventh Shia Imam Musa ibn Ja?far al-Kazim. May 20, 2019 · Ethnoreligiously focused Shia groups are featured as well (e. [12] Sep 1, 2022 · 14. Ali is considered by Shia tradition to be the first legitimate caliph and the first imam due to the proclamation given by Muhammad. The report discusses issues such as democracy and Islamic Law, relationship to Iran and social constituencies in relation to the different Shia-Islamist groups. Verily, Allah does not like oppressors. 18 Iranian officials described the war as the “Holy Defense. Sunni Islam in Iraq (Arabic: الإسلام السني في العراق) is the second-largest sect of Islam in Iraq after Shia Islam. 211). The Shia-Islamist movement previously denied political power, is seen as the political assertion of the majority group in Iraq. 9 million (midyear 2019 estimate). [3] [4] [5] IS has also targeted Shia prisoners. They were once loved and appreciated by everyone for fighting Israel and defending Lebanon, but after interfering in Syria's war everything changed. The Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf is considered the holiest, which contains the tomb of Ali. The majority of Iraqi Sunni Muslims are Arabs . Lebanon and Yemen, the Shia jihadist networks control very distressed econo-mies,42 while in Iran and Iraq they control world-class energy producers, each with huge potential in the fields of trade and manufacturing. Feb 13, 2024 · Since the U. Of these, the Shiite militias in particular remain a misunderstood phenomenon. The militant factions that form the core of the country’s ruling bloc, the Coordination Framework, are self-confessed members of a transnational jihadist front known as the “axis of resistance. Shia Muslims are a numerical majority in Iraq and Bahrain. During this period, many ad-Da'wa members fled Iraq to the safety of their co-religionists in Iran. In Iraq, Shias are majority group as well. Christian church leaders expressed their gratitude to the different religious communities that provided support following the fire, including the Shia Marjaiya in Najaf, the Shia clerical institution led by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, which shared its condolences, and the Sunni endowment in Ninewa that suspended all Birth of the Prophet The Kingdom of Iraq under British Administration, or Mandatory Iraq (Arabic: الانتداب البريطاني على العراق, romanized: al-Intidāb al-Brīṭānī ʿalā l-ʿIrāq), was created in 1921, following the 1920 Iraqi Revolution against the proposed British Mandate of Mesopotamia, and enacted via the 1922 Anglo-Iraqi Treaty and a 1924 undertaking by the United Kingdom to Ali al-Sistani is a conservative traditionalist Shia cleric popular in Iraq. Mar 14, 2015 · The religion’s two major sects are Sunni and Shia. #basra #iraq #iraqitiktok #rave”. [17] He has also condemned "Saddam Hussein loyalists". Jun 20, 2014 · FH: You can chart a course to 2003 from the mobilization of Shia parties in the mid-20th century, the Iranian Revolution [of 1979], the Iran-Iraq war [of the 1980s], the rebellion of 1991, 13 The Sunni-Shia Conflict in Iraq Domenic Marbaniang (2014) One thing that painfully marks the face of humanity is divisiveness. [5] . We are severely fragmented. Furthermore, unlike Iraq’s Shi’a and Kurds, the Sunni parties and movements that emerged after the US-led invasion had no unifying Tomb of Fātimah bint Mūsā (sister of eight Shia Twelver Imam Ali al-Ridha and the daughter of the seventh Shia Imam Musa al-Kadhim) and three daughters of the ninth Shia Twelver Imam, Muhammad al-Jawad. For a study of the Shia religious leadership’s struggle to retain its independence in Baath- era Iraq, see Abbas Kadhim, The Hawza under Siege: A Study in the Ba‘th Party Archive, Boston University Institute for Iraqi Studies, June 2013, https://www. Baghdad is mixed Iraq is located in the Middle East and southwest of Asia, neighboring Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to the south, Jordan and Syria to the west, Iran to the east and Turkey to the north. Shia Islam in Iraq has a history going back to the times of Ali ibn Abi Talib, the first imam of Shia Islam and fourth caliph of Sunni Islam who moved the capit Aug 16, 2024 · In the Shia case, the bill assigns the ultimate authority to the highest Shia cleric, from the Najaf seminary, who has the largest following in Iraq. The Iraqi Turkmen (also spelled as Turkoman and Turcoman; Turkish: Irak Türkmenleri), also referred to as Iraqi Turks, [13] [14] Turkish-Iraqis, [15] the Turkish minority in Iraq, [14] and the Iraqi-Turkish minority [16] (Arabic: تركمان العراق, romanized: Turkumān al-ʻIrāq; Turkish: Irak Türkleri, Kurdish: تورکمانی عێراق, Turkmanî Êraq) are Iraq's third largest Oct 21, 2022 · To address one of the engines of conflict in Iraq and the surrounding region, Century International has launched a project that is both timely and historical: a deep study of the transformation of Shia politics in Iraq. [10] The protests and ensuing violence were strongest in the heavily Shia neighborhoods of Baghdad , as well as southern majority Shiite cities such as Iraq's most revered Shia cleric, Sistani is one of four ayatollahs on the religious council called the Hawza, in the holy city of Najaf, and is regarded as a marja, or supreme spiritual guide There is a significant minority Shia population following the Ja'fari school, called the Feylis who live in the central and eastern parts of Iraq. Inside a Shia ‘Rave’ in Iraqoriginal sound - VICE News. The 1991 uprising in Iraq or al-Intifada al-Sha'baniyya (Arabic: الإنتِفاضة الشَّعبانيّة) refers to the uprising of the people of Iraq against the government of Saddam Hussein which began in Sha'ban 1411/March 1991. Abdul Jabar notes that Shia Islamism in the Arab world has a higher propensity than its Sunni counterpart toward sect-centricity (or, as he labeled it, to exhibit “communal militancy”). The schism of Sunni and Shia Islam is the largest and oldest in the history of Islam. Oct 27, 2022 · Sect-Centricity, Shia Islamism, and Shia Politics. Surveys by ABC News found between 47% and 51% of the country identifying as Shia between 2007 and 2009, and a Pew Research survey conducted in Iraq in late 2011 found that 51% of Iraqi Muslims said they were Shia (compared with 42% There are the two main types of Islam in Iraq: Shia Islam, which is practiced by about 55-60% of Muslims, and Sunni Islam, which is practiced by about 35-40%. [5] Thus, many Shi'ites in Iraq request that they be buried in this cemetery. Yitzhak Nakash, Chair of the Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies Department at Brandeis University explains that while moderate Shiites, who form the bulk of the Shiite majority in Iraq, have not yet joined Sadr's uprising, the U Dec 14, 2023 · Religions. Among the many things history has bequeathed us are divisions – divisions that seem eternally fragmentary–linguistic divisions, cultural divisions, political divisions, social classes Shia in Lebanon are probably the most powerful shia group in the middle east, aka Hezbollah. Other principal pilgrimage sites in Iraq are the tombs of the Seventh Imam and the Ninth Imam at Kazimayn near Baghdad. Iraq's Muslims follow two distinct traditions, Shia and Sunni Islam. g. The Najaf Seminary (Arabic: حوزة النجف), also known as the al-Hawza Al-Ilmiyya (الحوزة العلمية), is the oldest and one of the most important Shia seminaries in the world. [1] It is located near the Imam Ali Shrine in the city of Najaf in Iraq, and also operates a campus in Karbala, Iraq. TikTok video from VICE News (@vicenews): “These nightly Shia raves have become popular in Basra, southern Iraq. [3] Baghdad, which was once the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate and a center of Islamic scholarship, is one of the most important religious cities in Iraq. In the north and west are Sunni Arabs. view 14 photos. Imam Ali Mosque in Najaf, Iraq. Dec 22, 2016 · The Shia Militias of Iraq. The median age of the Iraq population is 20 years of age, with a total life expectancy of 74. As per estimates, it has a 50-55% Shia population and 40-42% Sunnis. They are 65 – 70% of all Iraqi Muslim population and 11 – 12% Shia worldwide. 2; COI query on minorities and stateless; COI query on Christians] The three largest demographic groups in Iraq are Shia Arabs, Sunni Arabs, and Kurds. A gripping read In the atmosphere of today's growing sectarian tensions, this cooperation between Sunnis and Shia in Iraq during the First World War, which extended into its immediate aftermath, deserves to be better known. 5 million to about one third of this. Typically, in the history of the region, when a strong dynasty, the first al-Saud Dynasty, the second, the third, arises in Saudi Arabia, one of its first acts is to go smash the Shia shrines in southern Iraq. About 150 million Shiites are spread around the world, most of Jan 5, 2025 · The Shia Uprising in Iraq, also known as the 1991 Intifada, was a major rebellion led by Shia Muslims against Saddam Hussein's regime, with significant international and long-term consequences. Like the 1991 uprisings, the 1999 uprising was violently suppressed. Each Division among Iraq’s Sunni factions has been a constant feature of the country’s national politics for the past 16 years. It holds that the Islamic prophet Muhammad designated Ali ibn Abi Talib (656–661 CE) as his successor (Arabic: خليفة, romanized: khalīfa) as Imam (امام, 'spiritual and political leader'), most notably at the event of Ghadir Khumm, but that after Muhammad's death, Ali was prevented from succeeding as leader of the The percentage of Christians has fallen from 6% in 1991 or 1. Unlike in Iraq, the protestors in Lebanon are challenging their local Shia militia indirectly—they are demonstrating against corruption, and Hezbollah protects the It is said that every Shia clerical family of note in Iraq had tales of torture and murder to recount. officials said Iraq was continuing a military campaign in Iraq's remote marshes. The Shia of Iraq constitute a sizable majority with great electoral power and the ability to move them to vote or to stop protesting, for example, has direct political consequences. [4] As with other Shia rituals of Karbala, [31] the Arba'in pilgrimage was banned by Saddam Hussein, [32] who favored the Sunni minority in Iraq, [31] and viewed Shia rituals as a political threat. ” Aug 25, 2024 · More than 21 million Shia Muslims took part in the Arbaeen pilgrimage in Iraq this year, marking the 40th day of mourning for the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammed The 1999 Shia uprising in Iraq (or Second Sadr Uprising [9]) took place in Iraq in early 1999 following the killing of Mohammad Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr by the then Ba'athist government of Iraq. Today that figure is undoubtedly Grand 6. It is made up of a broad range of militia groups, including Apr 13, 2023 · In Iraq, the mobilisation of Shia fighters to defend their communities and holy sites had begun prior to the rise of the IS. KARBALA, Iraq—Along the road joining the cities of Najaf and Karbala in southern Iraq is a line of placards, attached at 50-meter intervals to every lamppost. Sistani opposed the concept of Velayat e Faqih, and criticised Iranian interference in Iraq, claiming that even if Iran was ruled by Velayat e Faqih, the Iranian government did not have authority over Iraqi Shias. Jamkaran, Qom; Imam Reza shrine – a large complex, developed on the burial site of the Eighth Shī`a Imām, 'Ali ar-Ridha, Mashad The Kingdom of Iraq under British Administration, or Mandatory Iraq (Arabic: الانتداب البريطاني على العراق, romanized: al-Intidāb al-Brīṭānī ʿalā l-ʿIrāq), was created in 1921, following the 1920 Iraqi Revolution against the proposed British Mandate of Mesopotamia, and enacted via the 1922 Anglo-Iraqi Treaty and a 1924 undertaking by the United Kingdom to Apr 17, 2015 · The proliferation of Shia militia in Iraq after 2003 was also fuelled by the support Iran gave Shia bodies willing to act as its proxies. The uprising highlighted deep sectarian divisions, led to the fall of Saddam Hussein, and continues to shape Shia identity and politics in Iraq, with The Shia-dominated town of Dujail was a stronghold of the Islamic Dawa Party, an Islamist organization involved in the Iranian-backed insurgency [citation needed] against Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist regime in Iraq during the Iran–Iraq War. Shia militias stepped in to fight ISIS when Iraq's army collapsed, but the involvement of some groups accused of sectarian violence has alienated much of the nation's Sunni population. [3] [4] At the time of the massacre, there were between 5,000 and 10,000 unarmed cadets in the vicinity of Camp Speicher, [5] and ISIL militants selected the Shia Muslims for Iran’s Islamic revolution, which brought Shias to power in 1979, and the Sunni backlash have fueled a competition for regional dominance. They have been called everything from Iranian proxies and Iraqi nationalists to state-builders and terrorists. According to the United States Department of Defense, 603 American troops in total were confirmed to have been killed by IRGC-backed Shia militias (Special Groups) during the Iraq War. Mar 23, 2023 · Shia clerics trained in Iran’s religious capital, Qom, led Lebanon’s Hizbullah, much of Yemen, three of Iraq’s six main Shia parties, as well as Iran itself. [6] Oct 26, 2023 · But major Shia parties, particularly the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, also backed a federative system and, at times, spoke of establishing two federal regions in the predominantly Shia-populated provinces of southern Iraq. Ashura is a major holy day in Shia Islam that marks the day that Husayn ibn Ali, the grandson of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, was martyred in the 680 Apr 19, 2024 · However, Iranian elites perceived the overthrow of Saddam Hussein by the United States’ (U. 63. In Iraq, Sunni Arabs comprise 15% to 20% of Iraq’s population, with about half of them in urban areas like Baghdad, Mosul and Tikrit Lebanon and Yemen, the Shia jihadist networks control very distressed econo-mies,42 while in Iran and Iraq they control world-class energy producers, each with huge potential in the fields of trade and manufacturing. Before the Iran-Iraq War (1980-88), tens of thousands made the visits each year. The al-Askari mosque bombings of 2006 and 2007 triggered the rise and strengthening of several Shia militias and also legitimised foreign Shia militants to enter Iraq (Fishman, Citation 2016, p. In Iraq, these include the tomb of Imam Ali in An Najaf and that of his son, Imam Husayn, in Karbala, because both are considered major Shia martyrs. S. On 12 June 2014, the Islamic State killed 1,700 unarmed Shia Iraqi Army cadet recruits in the Camp Speicher massacre. [1] As such, the purpose of this chapter is to focus on the evolution of sectarianism in post-2003 Iraq, looking in particular at the issue of Sunni–Shia political relations and how sectarianism in the formative stages of the new Iraq has come to define the Iraqi state and society today. Shia-Islam became politicised in Iraq and analyses each of the main contemporary political actors of the Shia-community: Grand-ayatollah Ali Sistani, the Da’wa Par-ty, the Supreme Islamic Council in Iraq and the Sadr Movement. Al-Qaeda in Iraq [a] (Arabic: القاعدة في العراق, romanized: al-Qā'idah fī al-ʿIrāq; AQI), was a Salafi jihadist organization affiliated with al-Qaeda. Recent domestic protests have only compounded these problems. ) note: the last census in Iraq was in 1997; while there has been voluntary relocation of many Christian families to northern Iraq, the overall Christian population has decreased at least 50% and perhaps as much as 90% since May 23, 2018 · Iraq - 65-70% . 6 Whereas Sunni Islamism, in his view, is a populist movement and ideology that emerged in defiance of postcolonial, authoritarian nationalist regimes and Feb 18, 2024 · An umbrella group of hardline Shi'ite Muslim armed groups close to Iran, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq has claimed more than 150 attacks on bases housing U. There had been no racial divide, no clear-cut distinctions between the Sunnis and Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq politicians (15 P) Pages in category "Iraqi Shia Muslims" The following 200 pages are in this category, out of approximately 202 Nov 10, 2015 · Iraq. Sep 12, 2023 · The direct struggle within the Shia political spectrum in 2021–22 provided an almost too-pat coda to a multi-year study of the transformation of Shia Islamist politics in Iraq; but the power struggle was a natural outcome of a sectarian system that is anything but an organic expression of the political will of Iraq’s body politic. [25] Iraq saw further unrest in its Shia dominated provinces in early 1999 following the killing of Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr by the government. Only a small portion of the country is inhabited by the Christians and other religions thus Iraq exists as an Islamic state. May 27, 2003 · The presenters were Graham Fuller, author of The Future of Political Islam and co-author of The Arab Shi'a: The Forgotten Muslims; Faleh Jabar, lecturer at London Metropolitan University, author of The Shiite Movement in Iraq, and editor of Ayatollahs, Sufis and Ideologues: State, Religion and Social Movements in Iraq; Rend Rahim Francke The Iraqi civil war was an armed conflict from 2006 to 2008 between various sectarian Shia and Sunni armed groups, such as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Mahdi Army, in addition to the Iraqi government alongside American-led coalition forces. The example of the Hakim network offers a case study in how violence was mobilized as part of political competition in post-2003 Iraq. forces in Syria and Iraq since October. Secret police, state terrorism, torture, mass murder, genocide, ethnic cleansing, rape, deportations, extrajudicial killings, forced disappearances, assassinations, chemical warfare, and the destruction of the Mesopotamian marshes were some of the methods Saddam Hussein and the "Fight in the way of Allah those who fight you, but do not transgress. [citation needed] Subsequently, Sistani criticized plans for an Iraqi government for not being democratic enough. While the Qajars were rebuilding the religious sites of Iraq, the governor of the Ottomans in Iraq built a husayniyya to assist the visitors of Karbala in the year 1127/1715. [ 13 ] [17] He blamed the sectarian violence on "al Qaeda in Iraq". 25 Since there are Oct 14, 2014 · Shia militias in Iraq have kidnapped and killed scores of Sunni civilians in recent months, a report by campaign group Amnesty International has said. (IS) group who defected to join Iraq government forces take position in Amriyat al-Fallujah, in Iraq’s Anbar province, on May 26 Jan 7, 2016 · Iraq’s political leaders and those with a stake in Iraq’s future have to grasp the dire implications of this: current dynamics may ultimately reduce Arab Iraq to, on the one hand, a relatively secure but dysfunctional, crisis-ridden, perpetually mobilized Shia Iraq with only the slimmest pretense to representing all Iraqis and, on the other Aug 20, 2014 · These three major religious and ethnic groupings in Iraq – Shia Arabs, Sunni Arabs and Sunni Kurds – share certain core religious beliefs. [11] Hailing originally from the province of Maysan in southern Iraq, his father worked as an employee at the Agricultural Cooperative Bank of Iraq. Iran has actively supported Iraq's Shia groups since 1979. In contemporary Iraq, Shia politics are only partly about religion or identity. Apr 28, 2017 · An August 2015 poll claims that 99 percent of Shia respondents support the use of the PMF to fight the Islamic State. Muslim (official) 95-98% (Shia 61-64%, Sunni 29-34%), Christian 1% (includes Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, Assyrian Church of the East), other 1-4% (2015 est. Shia Islam (/ ˈ ʃ iː ə /) is the second-largest branch of Islam. Musa al-Kazim and his grandson, the ninth Shia Imam, Muhammad at-Taqi are both buried there, and their tombs are contained in the Al Kadhimiya Mosque. During the twentieth century, the story of Iraq was one of prejudice, discrimination, and persecution—Sunni against Shiíte, Shiíte against Sunni, and the Sunni-controlled Iraqi government against the Kurds. , Quwat Sahel al-Ninewa, or the Nineveh Plains Forces, whose members hail from Iraq’s Shabak minority but practice Shia Islam). The sect accounts for 63% of all Muslims in Iraq. Chechens and Dagestanis also settled in Iraq throughout the Ottoman era. The 1999 Shia uprising in Iraq (Arabic: انتفاضة العراق 1999, romanized: intifāḍa al-ʿIrāq 1999) or Second Sadr Uprising (انتفاضة الصدر intifāḍa ṣadara [5]) was a short period of unrest in Iraq in early 1999 following the killing of Muhammad al-Sadr by the then Ba'athist government of Iraq. Feb 2, 2024 · “We found Sadr one of the principal brakes on expansion of Iranian and very sectarian Shia political influence in Iraq after the 2018 elections,” Doug Silliman, former US ambassador to Iraq and President of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, told Reuters. 7% of the Iraq’s national population is made up of Shia Muslims. [20] The “Declaration of the Shia of Iraq,” penned in 1992 by Mowaffaq al-Rubaie, a member of the Dawa Party, alongside other secular Shia dignitaries, was a milestone in elaborating the political vision for Iraq in the post-Saddam era—a vision that moved past Shia transnational ideology. Maliki is widely blamed history. [1] The 1935 Shia uprisings posed no direct threat to the central Iraqi rule, since the tribes were too fragmented. It is a pilgrimage destination of Muslims, particularly Shias, in Iraq. Muqtada al-Sadr (Arabic: مقتدى الصدر, romanized: Muqtadā aṣ-Ṣadr; born 4 August 1974) [3] is an Iraqi Shia Muslim cleric, politician and militia leader. ) forces in 2003—and the subsequent rise of Shia political parties and militias in Iraq—as a form of validation for the sacrifices made during the Iran-Iraq war from 1980–1988. Stemming back to the early 1980s, Mohammad Baqir al-Hakim established the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution of Iraq (SCIRI) in Iran, where he spent over two decades in exile. It is a multi-party system whereby the executive power is exercised by the Prime Minister of the Council of Ministers as the head of government, the President of Iraq as the head of state, and legislative power is vested in the Council of Representatives. Safar uprising in Iraq (Arabic: إِنْتِفاضَة صَفَر في العِراق) was the uprising of the Shi'a of Iraq in the form of Arba'in procession against the government of the Ba'ath Party. The World Happiness Report shows a 2018 ranking of 117 with a rating of 4. Shia Islam in Iraq (Arabic: الشيعة في العراق) has a history going back to the times of Ali ibn Abi Talib, the first imam of Shia Islam and fourth caliph of Sunni Islam who moved the capital of the early caliphate from Medina to Kufa (or Najaf) two decades after the death of Muhammad. Shiite militias emerged from the ruins of post-2003 Iraq to acquire considerable power. Shiites or Shia—the terms are used interchangeably and both mean “partisans”—form one of the two great branches of Islam. [4] . Dozens of Shia tribesmen were killed over the course of these events. There are sizable Shia communities in Kuwait, Yemen, Lebanon, Qatar, Syria, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Shia Muslims, predominantly Arabs but also including Turkoman, Faili (Shia) Kurds, and others, constitute 55 to 60 percent of the population. The killings took place during ISIL's Northern Iraq offensive, when the cadets were captured outside of Camp Speicher during their attempt to flee from the area. Apr 13, 2015 · The Shia of Iraq rallied to the Sunni flag of the Sultan-Caliph once British forces invaded. Country Flag. [33] Aug 8, 2014 · The most important are Iraq's Shia Arabs (Shiiism is a major branch of Islam), who are the country's majority and live mostly in the south. [6] . The Islamic State insurgency in Iraq is an ongoing low-intensity insurgency that began in 2017 after the Islamic State (IS) lost its territorial control in the War in Iraq, during which IS and allied White Flags fought the Iraqi military (largely backed by the United States, United Kingdom and other countries conducting airstrikes against IS In April 1994, the U. The uprisings began from Basra and protesters took over fourteen of eighteen governorates of Iraq in fifteen Oct 26, 2008 · The Shia were the majority of Iraq’s population, the Shia faith having spread in the 19 th century because the nomadic tribes of Iraq had taken to it when they settled near the shrine towns of Najaf and Karbala in search of water for their agricultural work. 7K Likes, 952 Comments. Iraq has a narrow coastline on the northern part of Persian Gulf. The Sanctuary of Imām 'Alī (Arabic: حَرَم ٱلْإِمَام عَلِيّ, romanized: Ḥaram al-ʾImām ʿAlī), also known as the Mosque of 'Alī (Arabic: مَسْجِد عَلِيّ, romanized: Masjid ʿAlī), located in Najaf, Iraq, is a mausoleum which Shia and Sunni Muslims believe contains the tomb of 'Alī ibn Abī Tālib, a cousin, son-in-law and companion of the Islamic According to Turkmen sources, PKK Shia Turkmen members had shared interests with Iran-backed Shia PMF militias in Telefa, and the PKK and PMF worked together in Sinjar District, using these areas as a road to link Iran and Syria and to alter the demographics in favor of Shia Turkmen. 9 years of age. 4. -led invasion in 2003, Iraq has undergone a long period of instability, The premiership was ultimately handed to Mohammad Shia al-Sudani, a long-time ally of Iran. The majority of groups covered are influenced or controlled by Iran, but not all of them. Country Map. According to the CIA World Factbook, Iraq is approximately 95% to 98% Muslim, with approximately 55% Shia and 40% Sunni. [126] In 1969 the son of Iraq's highest Shia Ayatollah Muhsin al-Hakim was arrested and allegedly tortured. The migration of North Caucasians to Iraq goes back many centuries, peaking in the aftermath of the Russian–Circassian War with the Circassian genocide of the 1860s. Approximately 35% of the population in Yemen and half of the Muslims in Lebanon are Shia Muslims . 4 days ago · Iraq - Shiah, Sectarianism, Middle East: The Iraqi Shiʿah, like their coreligionists in Iran, follow the Twelver (Ithnā ʿAsharī) rite, and, despite the preeminence of Iran as a Shiʿi Islamic republic, Iraq has traditionally been the physical and spiritual centre of Shiʿism in the Islamic world. Aug 31, 2022 · On June 12, Sadr took the radical step of telling his seventy-three parliament members to resign in protest. government estimates the total population at 38. Mass Graves of Iraq: Uncovering Atrocities, United States Department of State, December 19, 2003; Babies found in Iraqi mass grave, BBC News, 13 October 2004; Iraq: State of the Evidence - Photographs: Mass Graves and Documentary Evidence of Crimes from Saddam Hussein's Regime, Human Rights Watch; Iraq's Legacy of Terror: Mass Graves, USAID Najaf and Karbala, Iraq are two of the holiest places for Shia Muslims. bu Dec 19, 2013 · Shia are also in the majority in Iraq and Bahrain. A 2014 survey in Iraq concluded that "98% of Kurds in Iraq identified themselves as Sunnis and only 2% identified as Shias". According to Kaka’i (Yarsani) activists, their community has approximately 110,000 to 120,000 members located in the Ninewa Plain and in villages southeast of Kirkuk, as well as in Diyala, Sulaymaniya, Halabja, and Erbil. Nov 20, 2018 · The Sunni-Shia split in Islam, and how it relates to ISIS. CBI auctions +$1 billion during the past week Sectarian violence in Iraq developed as a result of rising sectarian tensions between the different religious and ethnic groups of Iraq, most notably the conflict between the Shi'i Muslim majority and the Sunni Muslim minority within the country. 23 Although the Shia are viewed - and, more importantly, view themselves - as a distinct and separate group, the widespread existence of Shia in Iraq is actually a relatively recent phenomenon. [5] As a result of improved transportation methods, Shi'ites from across the globe are (or seek to be) buried in the cemetery. Their main shrines in the Iraqi On February 25 [43] Sistani called for Iraq's powerful tribes to be deployed to protect the country's holy places after three attacks on Shia shrines in four days: "Ayatollah Sistani, who received a tribal delegation from Kufa, asked that the Iraqi tribes reclaim their role of protecting the shrines," said an official in Sistani's office in the Oct 10, 2021 · Former prime minister Nuri al-Maliki, a senior leader in one of Iraq’s oldest Shia political parties, Dawa, heads the State of Law coalition which won 25 seats in 2018. He was the cousin and son-in-law of Muhammad. pyrl duxx xvw hrryou repmvv ouby pixq harcmc hsspe sdamg