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Hizbullah's Role in Syria Fighting Threatens to Spread Holy War
(Los Angeles Times) Jeffrey Fleishman - "Arab states see Syria as a place to exhaust Iran's capabilities and keep it distracted," said Rabha Alam, a researcher at the Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo. "Hizbullah entering the equation has quickened the pace of sectarian rhetoric and turned it into a Sunni-Shiite conflict." The specter of Hizbullah militants set loose in Syria, where they recently were victorious in the battle for Qusayr, has sent tremors through Egypt and other Sunni-dominated nations. "A Saudi cleric was on TV thanking Nasrallah for getting the Sunnis to finally unite," said Riad Kahwaji, founder of the Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis in Dubai, UAE. "For the Gulf states, the fight in Syria is with Iran." Hizbullah's entry into the Syrian civil war "has led preachers and leaders in Gulf states to adopt the discourse of 'victory for [Sunnis],'" said researcher Alam. "This keeps populations distracted from internal issues."