Dec. 12 (Bloomberg) -- For most of Islamic history, Sunnis
and Shiites have managed to get along under the guidance of
strong governments -- mostly run by Sunnis who kept the Shiites
in their place. But when governments are on the edge of
collapse, as in Iraq a few years ago and in Syria and
Afghanistan today, the old sectarian tensions flare.
The consequences matter not just for victims such as the 63
Shiites killed in Afghanistan on Dec. 6, the Shiite holiday of
Ashura, or the more than 30 unidentified people whose bodies
were dumped in an Alawite neighborhood in Homs, Syria, the same
day. They matter for anyone who wants to see peaceful change in
the Muslim world. Radical transition breeds instability; and
instability has a nasty habit of generating sectarian violence.
Understanding the structure of this violence is the only hope of
preventing it.
