shias

If Sunnis and Shias did not cease their wrangling, he said, Muslims would end up turning to secularism as their saviour.

Most Shias and many Kurds seem to welcome the verdict: they do not care a jot about the technical defects of the trial.

These bombings were widely believed to have been the work of Sunni extremists trying to kill and provoke Shias.

No one of his stature can now gently counter Hizbullah's claim to represent all Lebanese Shias or question its fealty to Iran.

Lebanon's government will tread a fine line between appeasing the Shias and preventing a new conflict with Israel.

All the main non-sectarian alliances are headed by Shias, for Sunnis and Kurds have no chance of electing a prime minister.

Much of his support comes from disaffected Sunnis in the north and west and from pragmatic, secular-minded Shias in Baghdad.

The Shias would be foolish not to give Mr Allawi and his Sunni supporters a clutch of decent jobs.

The downtrodden Shias, including followers of Mr Sadr, now so dominate the government that it is no longer seen as a neutral arbiter.

A few months ago, hopes were rising that cross-sectarian parties, appealing to both Sunnis and to the majority Shias, were gaining strength.

This would deepen the rifts between Iraq's Sunnis and Shias, which had slowly been healing after the sectarian bloodbath of 2006 and 2007.

The outnumbered Sunnis feel locked out of a new Iraq dominated by Shias.

But the Shias are the angrier, saying they are generally excluded from the army, the police and the higher ranks of the civil service.

The body still excludes Shias, a minority numbering about 10% of Saudis that faces widespread discrimination.

Once again, one of the world's great religions has a bloody divide (this time it is Sunnis and Shias, not Catholics and Protestants).

Most Shias and many Kurds do not care a jot about the technical defects of the trial.

In short, the new establishment of Shias, Sunnis and Kurds sorely needs to build a sense of nationhood.

The city has a history of Baathist loyalty to Saddam Hussein and hostility to the Shias, who count for barely 5% of its people.

Sunnis, Shias and Kurds alike still see their respective militias as a hedge against an uncertain future.

A constitution has been written, but this has not resolved the big differences between Shias, Sunnis and Kurds.

And there is one less ayatollah to challenge Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, in his claim to lead all the world's Shias.

One year after U. S. troops left Iraq, observers say the fragile network of Sunnis, Shias, and Kurds may be unraveling.

Shias and Sunnis embrace at press conferences as they present electoral alliances.

Many non-Shias admire the party and take pride in the courage and skill of its fighters.

At least 32 people, mostly Shias, were killed.

Oppressed under Saddam Hussein, the majority Shias grabbed power in the first free elections and held on despite endless crises.

Even al-Qaeda, which detests Shias and murders them in Iraq, has felt obliged this week to join the fray.

Even as America tries to reduce sectarian violence, its soldiers still come under attack by Sunnis and Shias alike.

"I have always had a soft spot for the Shias of the south, " said Shahristani, himself a Shia Muslim.

This angered many Iraqi Sunnis and increased sectarian tensions, even though more Shias are on the list.

While Shias are celebrating the nabbing of Israeli soldiers, most other Lebanese are gloomy.

The surge has yet to dampen down the civil war between Sunnis and Shias.

Along with Hizbullah's devoted followers, many non-Shias readily accept such arguments.

So why are many Shias for federalism and many Sunnis for centralisation?

Yet communal feelings are rising even where Shias, around 15% of the world's Muslims, have little or no presence.

The Iranians should stop egging on their fellow Shias to humiliate the Sunnis.

Human-rights people say 300-odd campaigners, most of them Shias, have since been detained. That number will now grow.

One suspected terrorist, for instance, a founder member of the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, was charged with 70 murders, almost all of them Shias.

And he is rattling a lot of fellow Shias with his powers of patronage and purse.

Sunni Muslims who demonise Christians loathe Shias.

More than anywhere else in the world, Sunnis and Shias still fear each other in Iraq.

Misconception 7: Shias combine all five prayers into one prayer in the evening.

Their fear is that milder-minded Sunnis and Shias will be pushed to extremes, risking the island's destabilisation.

That is better than last time, in 2005, when the divide was between Shias, who voted en masse, and Sunnis, who largely boycotted the poll.

Relations between Iraq's Shias and Sunnis have again been badly damaged