ABSTRACT
Regional dynamics ebbed and flowed, with revolution and counter-revolution taking place across the Middle East and North Africa. Sectarian violence has come to be at the core of regional geopolitics and foreign policies of contending states, and is increasingly being used as a tool to balance competing hegemonies and proxy conflicts and actors through the Middle East. The revolution in Iran that established the Islamic Republic in 1979 would also bring religion into geopolitical considerations across the Middle East. There is a small–yet burgeoning– academic literature on the topic of sectarianism, which also touches on broader questions of identity. Understanding the rivalry is one example of the prominence of sectarian discourses as a means of engaging with Middle Eastern politics. Regardless of whether sectarianism is related exclusively to religious differences or is expanded to include political and ethnic diversity as well, the power of discourses that arise from it needs to be examined.
