(Commentary) Michael J. Totten - Ashura is a Shia religious holiday, a day of lamentation that marks the date when the forces of the Umayyad caliph Yazid killed Hussein, son of Ali and grandson of the Prophet Mohammad, during the Battle of Karbala in the year 680. The Shia - the partisans of Ali and his lineage - have been at war with the Sunnis - those who took the side of Yazid - for thirteen centuries. That Khamenei's security people would murder unarmed demonstrators on this day of all days, and that his opponents now denounce him as the Yazid of Iran, may very well set most of the religious conservatives against him for as long as he and his government live. Ayatollah Khomeini compared the Shah Reza Pahlavi to Yazid during the revolution he led in 1979.
2010-01-01 07:25:27Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive