U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden acknowledged at Harvard's Kennedy School what had already been a widespread belief: that Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia fueled a proxy Sunni-Shia war by funneling hundreds of millions of dollars and tens of thousands of tons of weapons to Islamic State and other Sunni jihadist groups. Indeed the Middle East is embroiled in an ever-deepening confessional quagmire, and many actors are complicit - from regional leaders and secular rebels to religious fanatics. Americans and Europeans cannot solve this. Only the Muslim nations that ignited jihadism can now defuse it, working with moderate Iraqis and Syrians who are directly affected by it. There's no need to defer to the feigned fury of the governments Biden rightly criticized. They are abettors, so let's instead thrust them to the forefront of the confrontation against Islamic extremism.
Under Baathist rule, Iraq's Sunni minority enjoyed wealth and status. Stripped of the privileged control of resources, after Saddam Hussein's ouster, by the newly empowered Shiite majority, Iraq's Sunnis turned to insurrection and extremism. When Shiite Iraq then allied itself with Iran, those Sunnis took in cash, guns, and a penchant for jihad from the nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council. In Syria, the regime of President Bashar al Assad concentrated authority, influence, and resources among Alawites, who link themselves to Shiites confessionally, and thus to Iran regionally. Deprived of resources and rights, Syria's Sunnis launched a civil war in 2011 and, as in Iraq, deadly resources flowed mostly to the extremist-minded among them from neighboring Sunni countries.
Beyond urbane circles, Iraq and Syria lack an entrenched notion of the equality of citizens within the nation state - both countries are less than a century old. The strongest affiliations are those connected to sect, followed by regional and tribal ties. U.S. attempts at nation-building sought to overcome those identities, but they were futile in Iraq despite billions of dollars of investment.
Extremism fueled from abroad
Yet ethno-tribal divides have been bridged in the interest of common wellbeing. Negotiations took three months, but the Sunni Shammar tribe did ally with Kurdish Peshmerga forces to push Islamic State militants away from the Rabia border crossing. Iraq's Kurds are largely Sunnis themselves, but even sectarian boundaries can be dissolved. Sunni residents recently joined with Shiite militias to repel jihadists from Dhuluiya and Balad along the Tigris River. In like fashion, Sunni Aza tribesmen have joined Shiite fighters in Diyala.
