Muslim nations move to prevent violence
By David R. Sands
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
January 31, 2007

Terrified that sectarian Muslim bloodshed could soon engulf the region, U.S. allies and adversaries in the Middle East have stepped up joint efforts to head off a religious civil war.

Sunni Muslim Saudi Arabia and Shi'ite Iran have held intensive talks in recent days on ways to tamp down sectarian violence in Iraq and Lebanon. Over the weekend, Saudi King Abdullah issued an unusual public call for calm.

Top Islamic clerics and scholars in Egypt, Qatar and Iraq also have issued statements urging Muslim unity, often blaming the United States and other outside actors of trying to divide the faithful.

"All scholars are condemning the ongoing sectarian war between Sunnis and Shi'ites as a threat to the unity of Iraq and drawing the attention of Muslims away from the real enemy of the [Islamic world]," Aisha al-Mannai, an Islamic law scholar at Qatar University, said last week at the conclusion of an emergency conference in Doha on the growing tensions among various strains of Islam. the rest