America and many Western governments seem to have an enmity towards the Shi'ites, possibly, in part, stemming from Islam being taught in Western universities from a Sunni point of view. We are taught that Shi'ism is heterodoxy -- not the "true" Islam -- and consequently not really "legitimate." It should not be particularly surprising, therefore, that so many government experts in the Middle East and Islam – both in the U.S. and abroad – refer to Shi'ism as the "terrorist branch of Islam" -- which is the equivalent of alleging that all Catholics in Northern Ireland were members of the Sinn Fein, the Irish terrorist group that tried to expel the British from Northern Ireland.

As an example: when, just before a meeting with the UK Foreign Minister in the 1990s, a Middle Eastern Sunni leader brought with him a Western-educated, Western-oriented Shi'ite advisor, a British aide told the Minister to keep in mind that the advisor was a Shi'ite. Although this might have been a disinterested observation, according to witnesses in the room it was not. Worse, the British aide had apparently not even been embarrassed to voice his remark in front of his Shi'ite visitor.

Such occurrences, though minor, play into the Shi'ites' worst fears, of which Western policy-makers seem unaware. Shi'ite history is filled with examples of how Sunnis slaughtered Shi'ites since the beginning of Islam 1,400 years ago. Shi'ites are, therefore, constantly looking for protectors to hold the Sunnis at bay. Consequently, the Shi'ites could be potential U.S. allies. We would not have to be anti-Sunni; we could just stabilize the situation in the Gulf by keeping the Strait of Hormuz open to help all countries in the Gulf export oil and gas.

by Harold Rhode