1) Lebanese Hezbollah
Hezbollah, which is a Shiite terrorist organization, exists politically as well as militarily in the ethnically sundry Lebanon. Hezbollah, which is subsidized as well as armed clandestinely by the Iranian espionage establishment, is particularly potent in southern Lebanon, which borders northern Israel. Israel and Lebanon have certain territorial disagreements such as the status of the Shebaa Farms. Hezbollah has refused to silence itself militarily till the last Israeli soldier departs from Shebaa Farms, which is regarded as Lebanese territory by Hezbollah. Israel, however, has voiced that Shebaa Farms is within Syrian territory and has prolonged its occupation of the Shebaa Farms as Syria and Israel are not at peace. The hostility between Hezbollah and Israel was amply evident in 2006 during their destructive war subsequent to the military belligerence and kidnapping of Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah. Hezbollah has not been deactivated militarily hitherto, which was demanded by the United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1701 that attempted to cease the military animosity between Israel and Hezbollah. Hezbollah continues to be a threat to Israel and regional stability as it is endorsed by Iran, the orthodox President of which, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has never endeavored to conceal his dislike for the Jewish State.
There is absolute political wobbliness in Lebanon at this stage as there is a fledgling national government, the creation of which was compelled subsequent to the departure of Hezbollah from the previous administration headed by Saad Hariri. His Dad, Rafik Hariri, the respected former Lebanese PM, was liquidated in 2005 and the inquisition into Rafik’s assassination by a UN tribunal, which is likely to indict members of Hezbollah for the assassination, is broadly believed to be the rationale behind Hezbollah’s disengagement from Saad’s government.
2) Powerful Iran And Regional Destabilization
Iran has a dodgy record on nuclear proliferation as a consequence of its links with the dishonored Pakistani nuclear scientist, AQ Khan, and its own notorious atomic program has never ceased to spawn suspicion in the West as well as in the UN and the IAEA, the latter being the atomic supervisory entity of the UN. There is a strong likelihood that Iran intends to develop atomic bombs, with its strategy being to sport the diplomatic façade, while surreptitiously accelerating its military atomic program. Iran, it is suspected, desires to lengthen the period of nuclear discussions with the West, while going ahead with its atomic program simultaneously. It is difficult to believe that Iran is interested in a peaceful nuclear program as it has refused to discontinue uranium enrichment and has not illustrated to the global nuclear inspectors all its atomic reactors. Also, numerous rounds of atomic discussions between Iran and the West have failed to arrive at a compromise, notwithstanding the incentives tendered by the West. Economic sanctions against Iran can only work up to a certain point, beyond which a decisive decision will have to be taken by the UN and America on the fashion to cripple the nuclear program. It would be safe to articulate that espionage agents from the West and Israel are operating surreptitiously to destabilize the Iranian atomic program as some prominent Iranian atomic scientists have been bumped off recently. As the Iraq war in 2003 demonstrated, no entity is powerful enough to thwart America and its allies from perpetrating a military strike against their foe. Surgical strikes against Iranian nuclear centers by America or Israel are a possibility. Israel possesses the audaciousness to carry out such a strike as was seen in 1981 when Israel vanquished the Iraqi ‘Osirak’ nuclear reactor.
There is opposition in Iran to the current government as was viewed in 2009 subsequent to the dubious presidential election, which brought about Ahmadinejad’s Presidency again. The supporters of the reformist Iranian political opposition, led by Mir-Hossein Mousavi, have alleged that the presidential election of 2009 was defined by fraudulence, in which Mousavi was the winner. However, there was a severe onslaught thereafter on the opposition by the establishment of Ahmadinejad.
It is pretty unambiguous that Iran, a Shiite nation, is looked at as a hazardous force by the Sunni Islamic world such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Mohammedan countries of the Gulf. Wikileaks divulged the degree of antagonism to and distrust of the Iranian nuclear program in the Sunni world. Shiite Iran is considered as a powerhouse in the Islamic world, notwithstanding years of sanctions against it, which is spawning apprehension in the Sunni community. Sectarianism in the Islamic world has been bloody for ages and has become gorier now subsequent to the emergence of Sunni terrorist groups such as Taliban and Al Qaeda, which have massacred innumerable Shiites as well as the Shiites’ religious shrines.
3) Dissemination Of The Extremist Islamist Venom In Pakistan
Pakistan, which is the epicenter of transnational terrorism, is a country inundated by the toxicity of Islamic terrorism such as that of the Afghan Taliban, Pakistani Taliban, Al Qaeda and other Sunni bigoted organizations. It has been voiced for years that influential ideologues of the Al Qaeda are lodged in Pakistan in a restive city like Quetta. The power of the extremists in Pakistan is mounting, which has been witnessed over the last three years in the unrelenting suicide attacks and vehicular bombs’ detonations that have decimated Pakistani society. There is democracy in Pakistan, but a very fragile one, under the amplifying pressure of the fundamentalist mullahs. The recent grisly liquidation of the Pakistani Punjab’s Governor, Salman Taseer, known for his philosophical liberalness, exhibited more glaringly the percolation of the extremist poison into the Pakistani society. Taseer was shot down by his bodyguard, who was envenomed by Taseer’s excoriation of certain facets of the Pakistani anti blasphemy, which had found a Christian Pakistani female guilty of perpetrating blasphemousness against the Islamic Prophet Muhammad. Denunciations of the severity of this law by Pakistani lawmakers have been almost inaudible, presumably, due to the dread of the Pakistani fundamentalists, many of whom glorified the assassin of Governor Taseer and discharged zilch commiserations for the deceased Taseer and his kith and kin. Attempts to modify the anti blasphemy statute legislatively by politicians such as Sherry Rehman (of the Pakistan People’s Party, which governs Pakistan) have come to nothing, which typifies the burgeoning powerfulness of the Islamic extremism in Pakistan.
Today, Pakistan is, despite the sincere efforts of some broadminded lawmakers, in a political path that has been deviating from the way forward emphasized by the founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who was, arguably, a steadfast secularist, who enacted a partial role in the partition of the mammoth undivided British India.
Pakistan is a keynote player in the international battle against Islamic terrorism and has enacted a constructive role partially by seizing and slaying numerous fanatical Islamists, who have bloodied Pakistan as well as launched attacks in neighboring Afghanistan to undermine the international troops there, who have been battling against the armed Taliban terrorists, many of whom have received ideological indoctrination on Pakistani soil along with schooling on the way to employ the weapons.
4) Sectarianism In The Islamic World
Al Qaeda and its affiliates have permeated into Iraqi soil and have relentlessly maimed the Iraqi populace. Al Qaeda and its fraternal Sunni terrorist outfits have disfigured and slaughtered Shiites in Iraq during their religious ceremonies. Shiite Iran too has been maimed by Sunni terrorism, with the viciousness of Sunni bigotry disseminating through Pakistan as well, where countless Shiites have been massacred by Sunni militancy. The Taliban in Afghanistan represent an ongoing lethal threat for the multinational NATO, whose soldiers, led by America, are skirmishing, with deadly repercussions, against the Taliban terrorists.
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