8A
ISLAMIC STATE
• SUNDAY, JULY 13, 2014
OMAHA WORLD-HERALD
Ancient shrines fall to modern hatred
As they cement their hold
in Iraq, militants blow up
what they see as heresy
SAAD BIN AQEEL HUSSEINIYA, TAL AFAR, IRAQ
JAWAD HUSSEINIYA, TAL AFAR, IRAQ
The Islamic State militant group, which
follows a strict interpretation of the Sunni
Muslim faith that forbids idolatry of anything
except for Allah, has destroyed at least 10
ancient shrines or monuments in the territory
the group has captured.
The militant group posted pictures of the
destruction as part of an online statement
titled “Demolishing shrines and idols in the
state of Nineveh.” Ninevah is a northern Iraqi
province under the Islamic State’s control.
Shiite and Sunni shrines alike were demolished, though Shiite sites seemed to be
blown up, while Sunni sites were more often
demolished by bulldozer.
Saad bin Aqeel Husseiniya: This golden-domed
Shiite mosque in Tal Afar, about 35 miles west
of Mosul, was destroyed, along with at least
four other mosques in the city — Imam Sadiq,
al-Abbas, Ar Mahmoud and Ahl al-Beit —
each one identified as a “Temple of Hussein.”
The mosques were used for ceremonies to
remember the death of Hussein Ibn Ali,
the third Shiite imam. He died in the Battle
of Karbala in 680, and Shiites mourn him
annually on Ashura.
Al-Qubba Husseiniya: Shiite mosque in Mosul
Jawad Husseiniya: The Shiite mosque in Tal
Afar was targeted by suicide bombers in
2008. The attack killed four people in addition
to the two bombers.
Shrine of Sheikh Fathi: The Shiite shrine
in Mosul dates to 1760, but it may have
contained artifacts from the 13th century.
The militants had previously targeted the
shrine but failed to destroy it.
Shrines of Imam Saad and Khider al-Elias:
Shiite shrines on a site where Christians and
a Kurdish minority sect also worshiped
Shrine and tomb of Ahmed al-Rifai: The
monuments were in the Mahlabiya district
near Tal Afar. Ahmed al-Rifai, who died in
1183, founded an order of Sufi mysticism. The
Islamic State considers Sufism to be heresy.
Shrine and grave of Sheikh Ibrahim: In the
Mahlabiya district near Tal Afar
“The Girl’s Tomb” shrine: Local legend says
the shrine, sitting in the middle of a Mosul
street, held the tomb of a girl who died of a
broken heart. Historians say it could be the
tomb of Ali Ibn al-Athir, a noted 12th-13th
century historian and Sunni who wrote a
history of the Islamic world. Some say that
the tombstone destroyed by the Islamic State
was a replica and that the original tombstone
was moved to safety years ago.
Grave of Abu al-Hassan al-Jazari: He was a
12th- and 13th-century historiographer; the
desecrated grave was in Mosul.
Mecca, one of the holiest sites for Muslims,
may be one the Islamic State’s list of future
targets, according to reports and speculation
about the group’s online comments.
Mecca, in Saudi Arabia, is the site of the
Al-Masjid al-Haram mosque, considered by
Muslims to be the most sacred mosque. It is
the home of a granite and marble building
called the Kaaba, which is believed to contain
a footprint from Abraham and a cornerstone
laid by the Prophet Mohammed.
A member of the Islamic State was quoted
as saying: “If Allah wills, we will kill those
who worship stones in Mecca and destroy
the Kaaba. People go to Mecca to touch the
stones, not for Allah.”
This report was written using reference
materials from Agence France-Presse, the
Associated Press, the Times of London, Human Rights Watch, the Assyrian International
News Agency and the Gates of Nineveh blog,
which was written by Christopher Jones,
a Ph.D student in Near Eastern history at
Columbia University.
AL-QUBBA HUSSEINIYA, MOSUL, IRAQ
“THE GIRL’S TOMB,” MOSUL, IRAQ
Too many uncertainties in Iraq crisis make trying to read tea leaves futile
Even scholars are unsure
what the future holds
for the artiicially created
state of ethnic blocs
MCCLATCHY WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON — In a sign
of the complexity of the crisis
in Iraq, where Islamic radicals have declared a modern
caliphate that stretches across
century-old borders and politicians appear deadlocked on who
should lead a new government
in Baghdad, scholars who have
devoted their lives to studying
the Middle East express no
consensus on what the future is
likely to hold.
Does the declaration of the Islamic State herald the erasure of
borders that France and Great
Britain drew on the region’s map
100 years ago?
Or have those borders become
so accepted that it would be
all but impossible to separate
the different ethnic blocs that
have found themselves living
with one another within modern
countries?
Will the tumult in Iraq lead at
last to an independent homeland
for the Kurds, whose population
is spread across four nations?
What other forces will be unleashed if Iraq splits into three
separate nation states: a Kurdish
one, a Shiite Muslim-ruled one
and a Sunni Muslim one, dominated, perhaps, by fundamental-
U.N. warns Iraq of ‘chaos’ if there’s no political progress
BAGHDAD — The United Nations urged Iraq’s leaders Saturday
to overcome their deep divisions and move quickly to form a new
government that can unite the country and confront a militant threat,
warning that failure to do so “risks plunging the country into chaos.”
The Sunni insurgent blitz over the past month has driven Iraq into its
deepest crisis since the last American troops left in 2011.
Iraq’s new Parliament is scheduled to hold its second session today
amid hopes that lawmakers can quickly decide on a new prime minister,
president and speaker of Parliament — the first steps toward forming a
new government. It failed to make any progress in its first session.
U.N. special envoy to Iraq Nickolay Mladenov called on lawmakers to
attend the meeting and forge an agreement on new leaders. He warned
of dire consequences if the current political deadlock drags on.
— The Associated Press
ists from the Islamic State, the
al-Qaida offshoot whose leader,
Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, has
demanded the allegiance of all
Muslims as the Caliph Ibrahim?
“We have not seen such a period of instability in the region
since World War I,” said Orit
Bashkin, a professor of Middle
Eastern history at the University of Chicago. “The Arab uprising certainly unleashed new
forces, and this idea that you
can challenge the regime and its
autocrats.”
Paul Salem, the vice president
for policy and research at the
Middle East Institute in Washington, gave only a slightly more
conservative historical perspective for the crisis. “I would say
for the Levant this is on par with
massive changes of the world
wars,” referring to the region
that includes Syria, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Cyprus and parts
of Turkey.
One seemingly universal point
of agreement among scholars
with expertise in Middle East
politics and history is that the
border between Iraq and Syria
is no longer a viable political
line. The Islamic State has
decreed that the border between
Syria and Iraq no longer exists.
But there’s no consensus on
what that actually will mean.
Salem predicts that the region
will devolve into “rump states”
around Baghdad and Damascus,
with separate Sunni and Kurdish
states operating with regional
autonomy. “The borders are
hardly there anymore.”
Fred Donner, the director of
the Center for Middle Eastern
Studies at the University of
Chicago, disagreed.
“Even if (the borders) don’t
make sense, they’ve become
a reality,” he said. In Iraq,
where there have been calls for
separation into three entities
along ethnic and religious lines
between Kurds, Shiites and Sunnis, Donner said generations of
people living within the modern
borders have created a “mosaic
of small communities.”
“Dividing people up into such
hard-and-fast enclaves is going
to be problematic,” he said,
noting that intermarriage has
often blurred the lines between
groups.
At a recent panel discussion
at the Washington Institute for
Near East Studies, two senior
officials from the Kurdistan
Regional Government noted
that the regional government
has operated in a de facto state
of autonomy since being cut off
from Baghdad by the spread of
the Islamic State.
Fuad Hussein, chief of staff
for Kurdistan Regional Government President Masoud Barzani,
and Falah Mustafa Bakir, head
of the regional government’s
Department of Foreign Relations, said the Kurdish government still was willing to work to
establishing a federal Iraq, but it
would not accept a return to the
conditions in the country before
the Islamic State’s capture.
Some experts said the largest
threat the Islamic State poses
to the region is that it would attract militants from neighboring
countries to fight in proxy wars.
“If they continue to be
successful, they will continue to galvanize other Sunni
jihadi groups,” said Itamar
Rabinovich, a former Israeli
ambassador to the United States
and distinguished fellow at the
Brookings Institution’s Saban
Center for Middle East Policy.
That’s likely to mean bloodshed on an unprecedented level.
“We didn’t have such horrible
events, even before or after
World War I,” said Amatzia
Baram, a professor of Middle
Eastern history at the University of Haifa in Israel.
Baram called the turmoil
in Iraq and Syria the most
pronounced fighting between
Muslims since fundamentalist
Sunnis known as Wahabbis
attacked the Shiite shrines at
Karbala in 1801.
“This is worse than anything
we have had in the last few hundred years.”
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