Sunni-Shiite War Expands in Mideast

Previous posts have followed the Shiite-Sunni conflicts that have spread across several Mideast nations. This conflict has now escalated on a major scale. A previous post examined the development of an Al-Qaida army and embryonic emirate within the rebel-held areas of Syria. This “army” now has a name and it had gained so much strength and boldness that it is staging attacks in neighboring Iraq. This Al Qaida-affiliated entity of radical Sunni Islamists is called the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

The ISIL has effectively seized control of two Iraqi cities, Fallujah and Ramadi, which are located just west of Baghdad, Iraq’s capital. This ISIL attack against the Shiite-led government of Iraq is very bold, and shows just how tenuous is the hold of the Iraqi central government over its territory. The first three links [1, 2, 3] give overlapping reports on this seizure of these two Iraqi cities by Al Qaida-led forces either invading from or armed by the rebel-held region of Syria. The Sunni vs. Shiite fighting has erupted inside Baghdad itself with more car bombings taking additional lives there.

The Sunni vs. Shiite conflict has grown wider in Lebanon as well with both sides targeting and killing leaders of the opposing factions. This fighting is a result of the civil war between Sunnis and Shiite-aligned factions in Syria spilling over into Lebanon on a wider scale. Sunnis in Lebanon are doubtlessly becoming more open in attacking Hezbollah and Iranian-allied Shiite groups in Lebanon after Hezbollah has sent its fighters into Syria to aid the Shiite-aligned Assad government against Sunni rebels. The fourth, fifth and sixth links report on the expanding Sunni vs. Shiite fighting in Lebanon.

With Sunni-Shiite fighting continuing on an intense level in Syria’s civil war and spreading rapidly into Lebanon and Iraq, the chance of an all-out Sunni vs. Shiite war in the Mideast is steadily rising. If such a war erupts, it will involve many nations and will likely rearrange alliances and national borders, as my previous posts have also noted.

At this juncture, Obama’s Secretary of State, John Kerry, has virtually invited Iran, the leader of the Shiite bloc, to become involved in the negotiations to end the Syrian civil war (last link). This pro-Shiite move by the Obama administration combined with the warming of US-Iranian relations under Obama re: the Iranian nuclear facilities talks and sanctions, must be making Sunni leaders in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt and other Sunni-led nations virtually apoplectic. The Israelis, under nuclear threat from Iran and seeing Obama’s administration steady cozying-up to Shiite Iran, must even more be making internal decisions to abandon hopes of normal relations with the USA as long as Obama is president. Expect the Israelis to look fervently for new allies and weapons-suppliers to replace the now-unreliable and utterly unpredictable USA. Obama’s extending more favor to the Iranians via Secretary Kerry’s comments can only hasten a growing alliance of Israel with the Sunni nations of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, etc. to counter Iran and its proxies in Syria and Hezbollah in Lebanon. The ISIL is a radical Sunni entity which seems to be emerging as an unexpected and very dangerous element in Mideast politics. It is the ISIL that would have benefited the most if Obama had launched missiles at Assad’s forces and if the USA had supplied more advanced weapons to the Sunni rebels in Syria, as Sen. McCain had urged. Seeing the extreme violence and intolerance of the ISIL entity growing in Iraq and Syria, the Obama administration may have made a decision that Assad’s regime is, indeed, the lesser of two evils in Syria. If so, that viewpoint may actually be correct. However, the ramifications of such a decision upon the rest of the Mideast is very destabilizing.

The new ISIL force is growing rapidly and may do something that will provoke a wider Sunni vs. Shiite war throughout the Mideast. Who will the US help or will it fight on either side? No one really knows. It is now well-known that Obama’s “red lines” don’t mean anything. There is no question that Russia will be on the side of the Assad regime. The Mideast is now a dangerous cauldron of strange bedfellows and shifting alliances. This needs to be watched closely. If such a war erupts, it may not be stopped very easily. It would also send shock waves through all the stock, bond and commodity markets throughout the world which could have major impacts on nations not actually involved in the fighting.

The growing Sunni-Shiite conflict within the Islamic world is one factor that will ultimately determine which nations will be in the Gog-Magog alliance prophesied in Ezekiel 38 and which ones will not be. Ezekiel 38:5 reveals Persia (Iran) will certainly be in that alliance as well as descendants of Cush (somewhat misleadingly translated “Ethiopia” in the King James Version of the Bible). The name “Cush” is most evident on global maps in the virulently anti-American, anti-western Taliban regions of Afghanistan and Pakistan which share the Hindu Kush Mountains, named after Cush. Importantly, not a single nation descended from Abraham is named in the Gog-Magog alliance. The Arab Sunni nations are descended from Ishmael, Abraham’s son via Hagar, while the Turks are descended from the Edomites, descendants of Esau–Jacob’s brother and Abraham’s grandson. The Israelis are descended from Judah, the great grandson of Abraham, and they are but one of the many nations in the modern world descended from the ten tribes of Israel. It is God’s Divine hand that will determine how the geopolitics of the Mideast and the world unfold as God declares he will keep his prophesies so all flesh can know that he is the Creator God who controls the destinies of nations (Isaiah 41:21-26). My books, free articles and free audio messages document the migrations and modern locations of the rest of the tribes of Israel in today’s world.