Inter and intra-religious conflicts have had served one of greatest cause of human butchery, history records. Undoubtedly, the politicization and exploitation of religion was preliminary reason behind these bloody conflicts that claimed lives of billions of innocents. The horror of the Syrian conflict appears to have no bounds. Every day brings news of a new atrocity and it is clear that both the rebels and the Assad government are guilty of human rights abuses on an enormous scale.
We are beyond the point where one side can be said to be worse than the other. We are also beyond the point of the Syrian war being seen purely in terms of a rebellion against a dictatorial regime. The conflict can’t be confined into a limited region but hastily spread across the globe where the conflicts already exist to a certain degree.
It is now largely a sectarian conflict and as the experience in Iraq in the middle of the last decade, and over many years in the north of Ireland, demonstrates, sectarian warfare brings with it a brutality, all of its own.
An analysis of the current state of Syria that pays close attention to the antecedents and driving forces behind the sectarian tension and fighting may help to explain the many and varied aspects of this religious, ideological and military crisis.
Within a relatively short span of time, the situation in Syria deteriorated into a war that not only involves governments, but also ideological/political groups, non-state militants, multi-national corporations and, most importantly, sectarian groups.
Pakistan is another sectarian conflict hit country. Sectarian violence in Pakistan did not receive the attention it deserves, possibly because the Western media views it as a domestic problem on par with many other issues that occupy the international community vis-à-vis Pakistan: radicalism, Afghanistan, Taliban, nuclear weapons, etc. The reality, however, is that sectarian violence is not only pervasive, but it accentuates divisions within Pakistan and underlines the ineptness of the government and the security services in stemming this phenomenon.
Principally, the attacks on minorities and on those challenging political Islam is another indication as to why Pakistan continues to exist on the precipice of sectarian turmoil. The latest act of sectarian violence was a suicide explosion on a busy Abu Talib Road, located at the heart of Hazara Town on June 30, claiming 30 lives and injured 70. This was not the first mass attack against the Hazaras in Baluchistan—a population of approximately 600,000—as in January, a twin suicide attack in a Quetta snooker club left more than 90 people dead and 121 injured and subsequently a month later a bomb blast at the Hazara Town Market on Feb. 16, claimed the lives of 85 people with more than 180 wounded. All attacks were attributed to the militant Sunni group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LJ), a radical off-shoot of the militant Sunni group Sipah-e-Sahaba. No, confidential breakthrough has taken place to apprehend the culprits till date.
Pakistan has turned to be one of the countries where inter-faith and intra-faith harmony are worst plagued by growing sectarian divide. It will deteriorate all the cohesive forces operating in a society and inflicts irreversible harm on social fabrics of society. Many intellectual agree that these malicious sufferings are by design not by fate. Eighty four thousand Madrasahs have mushroomed over a period of three decades that provide fertile ground for widening sectarian divide and escalating extremism.
Identically Kabul too experienced deadly blasts. In December 2011, Ashura procession was attacked by unknown assailants claiming 55 lives and injuring over 150. Previously an attack on Shiite mosque was foiled by security forces, in state capital, Kabul. These incidences are red alarm for the Kabul government, self indicating the insurgents will use variants means to reach their goals, and widening sectarian rift can be one way out.
The fundamental reason behind all these issues is the exploitation of religion for personal interests. The religiously motivated literate directors enjoying important positions play decisive role in decision making. Religion is used as a guiding tool on most if not all occasions. Religion is unnecessarily incorporated in constitution as a guiding tool. The fact being is religion is a personal matter of a person; the state is not to interfere in personal affairs of a person so that a person’s right to practice a religion is safeguarded. The religious, sectarian or ethnic differences are determining factor that establish the role and contribution one can play for betterment of larger sum. Consequently, differences must be celebrated than contradicted and the religio-political vested interests of variant groups’ exploiting of the differences must be curtailed.
Formerly, the birth of a human being would bring us pride. We used to have a single human orientation shared politico-economical and social interests. With the passage of time our religious and sectarian divide widened and the discourse altered. Gradually the tune transformed and unconscious promotion of vested interests started.
Members of a religious or political group may feel that their own salvation, or success of their particular objectives, requires aggressively seeking converts from other groups; adherents of a given faction may believe that for the achievement of their own political or religious project their internal opponents must be cleansed.
"Sometimes a group feeling itself to be under economic or political pressure will attack members of another group thought to be responsible for its own decline. It may also more rigidly define the definition of orthodox belief within its particular group or organization, and expel or excommunicate those who do not agree with this new found clarified definition of political or religious 'orthodoxy. In other cases, dissenters from this orthodoxy will secede from the orthodox organization and proclaim themselves as practitioners of a reformed belief system, or holders of a perceived former orthodoxy. At other times, sectarianism may be the expression of a group's nationalistic or cultural ambitions, or exploited by demagogues. "
"In democratic politics, pluralism is a guiding principle which permits the peaceful coexistence of different interests, convictions and lifestyles. In this context it has normative connotations absent from its use to denote a theoretical standpoint. Unlike totalitarianism or particularism, pluralism acknowledges the diversity of interests and considers it imperative that members of society accommodate their differences by engaging in good-faith negotiation."
Pluralism is connected with the hope that this process of conflict and dialogue will lead to a definition and subsequent realization of the common good that is best for all members of society. This implies that in a pluralistic framework, the common good is not given a priority. Instead, the scope and content of the common good can only be found out in and after the process of negotiation. There are several queries to respond to reach to realistic solution. How long the divided people across the globe take to learn this very findings that lead to peaceful coexistence? May the minor differences turned into strength than weakness?