The situation in Somalia, where the Islamic Courts Union has overtaken the majority of the country, is set to worsen with the introduction of Ethopian troops. The troops have made Baidoa, the only town still controlled by the transitional government, their base of operations:

The standoff is between the transitional federal government, which has U.N. recognition but little authority on the ground, and the Council of Islamic Courts, which controls most of southern Somalia.

Residents as far away as Bur Hakaba _ 40 miles east of Baidoa _ were evacuating.

“We are seeing strong military movements from both sides,” said Mohamud Ahmed, a father of six. “We don’t believe we will be able to continue living in our town peacefully.”

Ethiopia fears millitant Islam surrounding it, threatening its traditionally Christian culture and government. With an unstable Sudan to the west — a country that glady housed Osama bin Laden in the 1990s — and now Islamic Courts Union-ruled Somalia to the east, Ethiopia is certainly in a precarious position. The question is how much support will Ethiopia receive in its operations against the Courts Union in Somalia; will the US provide military aid?

As scrutiny on extremist elements increases in the Middle East, there is a greater chance that they will view Africa as the central and southern Asia of the 21st century; a relative backwater where extremist elements can operate with little scrutiny. The United States and its allies cannot sit idly by and watch such an outcome occur. Bin Laden chose Sudan and then Afghanistan since it was clear no one paid attention to either Africa or Central Asia. Perhaps attention should be paid this time.

The latest Council on Foreign Relations Backgrounder, which focusses on the relationship between Iran and Syria, sugests that the current situation in Lebanon makes Bashar al-Assad’s position vis-a-vis a regional Sh’ite/Sunni split more difficult:

Experts say the leaders of several Sunni countries in the region are worried about the rising influence of Shiite Iran. “A regional war is a losing proposition for them,” Hokayem says. “Who’s going to be the anti-Israel, anti-United States champion? It’s going to be Iran, not them.” Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia—all Sunni nations—took the unusual step of criticizing Hezbollah at a meeting of Arab League foreign ministers July 15.

However, cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, an Iraqi Shiite leader, has spoken out in support of Hezbollah. Many regional leaders fear a full-fledged sectarian war in Iraq could spark
a similar conflict across the region, which could pose a quandary for Assad’s secular regime. “If there was a regional military war between Sunnis and Shias, the Syrians will be hard-pressed” to choose sides, Hokayem says.

If anything, the continuing conflict has strengthened Assad’s position both domestically and among the more radical Arab public due to his past and continuing support of Hizbollah. The current strain of thought that is emerging is that Syria may move closer to the West if the right signals are sent, both by the US and its Arab allies in the current conflict, but that’s doubtful considering the current upswing Assad is riding. As long as Hizbollah remains popular and embroiled in conflict, Assad will remain popular. While his relationship to Tehran has dragged him unwittingly into the current situation, he is reaping dividends by appearing tougher on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict than the regional Sunni powers. Syria may be a lackey of Iran, but that relationship is currently opening up tremendous regional opportunities for Assad’s regime and proving a massive public relations win.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei today claimed in a meeting with Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir in Tehran that Iran is ready and willing to share its nuclear technology. Via the NY Times:

“Iran’s nuclear capability is one example of various scientific capabilities in the country. The Islamic Republic of Iran is prepared to transfer the experience, knowledge and technology of its scientists,” said the supreme religious leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, to President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan, IRNA news agency reported.

Mr. Khamenei’s comments to the leader of Sudan, one of the most unstable countries in Africa, came a few days ahead of the Friday deadline by the United Nations Security Council for Iran to suspend its sensitive uranium enrichment activities.

If the West wasn’t in all out crisis mode over Iran’s nuclear development before, it should be now. If Iran openly exports its technology, especially to a place like Sudan, it would make it much easier for terrorist elements to attain nuclear material. It’s not so much that Bashir would actively hand nuclear secrets over to al-Qaeda or one of its subsidiaries, but I wouldn’t trust anything nuclear in an extremely volatile country where ultra-Islamist Hasan al-Turabi and his supporters walk around openly. The last thing the world needs is a North African country actively enriching its own uranium as terrorist organizations increasingly shift their central operations from the Mesopotamian hot zone to the relative backwater of Africa.

What I find rather difficult to figure out is why Khamenei is openly announcing this by way of the Islamic Republic’s state-run media. Is it a bluff designed to reiterate Tehran’s independence from the West, or something else? If anything, it’s reckless. Saudi Arabia has to be looking at its supposedly dormant nuclear program currently and moving toward a hard decision. After all, with Iranian influence spreading deep into southern Iraq, how long can the Saudis remain oblivious to Iran’s nuclear posturing? An unstable regime in the very center of the world’s most unstable region locked in a nuclear showdown is the true nightmare scenario.

The WaPo has a decent op-ed up on the ascension of Jawad al-Maliki to the Iraqi prime ministership and the current political situation he faces:

The obstacles to the consolidation of a democratic political system nevertheless remain daunting. Mr. Maliki still has to form a cabinet, something that will probably take most or all of the 30 days he has been allotted and which involves crucial decisions about control of the defense and interior ministries. Should he succeed he will then have to oversee even more difficult negotiations over revisions to the constitution; Iraqis have not yet agreed on such fundamental questions as how much power will be given to federal regions that may be established in the future or how they will share future oil revenue.

Despite his conciliatory remarks on Saturday, Mr. Maliki’s record as a hard-line Shiite opponent of concessions to the Sunni minority does not bode well.

Well worth the read for those who know little about Maliki. In short, he’s a long-time Dawa party member, a dedicated ally of Jaafari’s, and a  staunch anti-Ba’athist. Obviously, the Sunnis are going to have issues with him, which begs the question: why have they agreed to him being Jaafari’s replacement? Most likely because there are no other viable options left, as most don’t want to see Hakim and the SCIRI in direct control over the national government since that could easily mean the break-up of the Iraqi state and no oil wealth sharing. Maliki’s selection closes the process and disallows the SCIRI the opportunity to rise to the top of a fierce intra-Shi’ite political battle.

However, it seems the SCIRI did in fact know when to call it quits. Hakim et all withdrew their bid for the PM spot, most likely because they continue to hold the most seats in the majlis. A renewed campaign for the prime ministership would have seemed like an overtly aggressive attempt at grabbing unbridled power, which would have caused more trouble than Hakim is currently willing to deal with. Dawa, with Sadrist support, will continue to act as a counterbalance to SCIRI (and Iranian) influence, even while the SCIRI retains control over important ministry posts, including Interior, most likely. Rivalries within the Shi’ite alliance will continue, although lessened with the PM battle out of the way, as will the Ba’athist insurgency, perhaps even intensified by Maliki’s hardline stance against such former regime elements.

Which brings up a rather key point: Maliki wishes to place the varying Iraqi militias under the umbrella of the armed forces instead of disbanding them completely (which the Iraqi constitution technically calls for.) Full militia disarmament and disbanding is highly unlikely since the Shi’ite-led Iraqi government does not have the ability nor the incentive to undertake such a campaign. Sadr’s Mahdi Army and the SCIRI’s Badr Brigades are not  going to go home and peacefully lay down their arms because the Iraqi government asks them to, and that’s operating under the assumption that Maliki or other Shi’a would want that to begin with. Maliki himself currently benefits from the Dawa’s alliance with Sadr and his Mahdi Army as it affords protection in case of an SCIRI-led attempt to wrest power away from him and the Dawa leadership. With the Shi’a not willing to disband their militias, the Kurdish peshmerga and other militias will remain active, as well, and Sunnis will feel free to organize their own armed resistance movements and support the insurgency. While Maliki’s rise marks an important milestone in the ongoing drama of Iraqi reconstruction, peace remains a far off possibility.

I have to disagree with Asia Times writer Syed Saleem Shahzad’s conclusion that Iran is a logical ally of al-Qaeda, prepped to serve as a central base for Islamic revolution throughout the Middle East and South Asia. Take the following passage, featuring commentary by a Pakistan-based Muslim scholar, with a rather hefty grain of salt:

[A]lthough the Afghan resistance is linked with the Iraqi resistance and they have started open battles against US-led forces in Afghanistan, the question of a unified command that would control resistance movements whether they be in Iraq, Palestine or Afghanistan is still unanswered.

This is where Iran could now fit in, by evolving from an inspirational anti-US model to taking a lead role in orchestrating resistance movements, in collaboration with al-Qaeda.

For radical Islamists, the situation is a major turnaround for their cause of pan-Islamicism and one that could even resolve 1,400 years of historical, ideological and political differences in the Muslim world.

"The Islamic Revolution of Iran [1979] was in fact a victory of all Islamic movements which were striving to establish one Islamic role model in the world so that it would be an inspirational force and would convince the masses that the Islamic system of life was still workable after 1,400 years," Muslim intellectual Shahnawaz Farooqui explained to Asia Times Online.

…

"The Iranian revolution was in fact a complete revolution under the leadership of imam [Ruhollah] Khomeini. It was above any sectarian bounds. After the revolution, Khomeini announced that the base of Shi’ite-Sunni differences was historical rather than theological.

…

"Unfortunately, imam Khomeini could not convince anybody - neither his internal circles of clerics nor Al-Howza [the supreme Shi’ite religious council in Iraq] as no one among the Shi’ites was ready to give up their historical position on the question of the caliphate.

"However, the situation turned bad after the demise of Khomeini and it was felt that during the period of [ex-president Hashemi] Rafsanjani and [former president Mohammed] Khatami the Iranian revolution was somewhere lost.

"However, the victory of President Ahmadinejad has once again revived the very spirit of the Iranian revolution, and once again all Islamic movements, whether it is the Muslim Brotherhood, Jamaat-i-Islami, Hamas, Islamic Jihad or any other, are joining hands with Tehran," said Shahnawaz.

"To me, President Ahmadinejad has redeemed the Iranian Islamic revolution with all its ideological legacies," Shahnawaz added.

Note the phrase I bolded: historical rather than theological. I am certain Shanawaz is easily more versed than I on Islamic issues, but the divisions between the two sects are historical and theological; the two cannot be logically separated. The history of Islam in and of itself is theological — the disagreement over who would lead the caliphate following the Prophet’s death was obviously a question of religion. Besides, there are also political concerns. Shanawaz (and Shahzad by association) seem to be foregetting that Iran actively attempted to topple the Taliban-led regime in Afghanistan due to its ideology, religious and political, and for the instability it fomented on Iran’s border by simply existing. Certainly Iran was not serving as the happy-rainbows-and-sunshine pan-Islamic regime then.

If anything, the expansion of al-Qaeda-linked control in the mountainous regions of the Pakistan/Afghanistan frontier is not being greeted warmly by those in Tehran, and is, in fact, creating concern for the same reasons Taliban-led Afghanistan did. The US and NATO presence in Afghanistan is, in actuality, acting as a buffer that protects Iran’s interests nearly as much as it protects the West’s.

Iran’s preference for the wilayat-al-fiqh system of government (or, rule by Islamic jurists), clashes with Sunni ideas of rule by the umma, or the Muslim community. That combined with the historical/theological disagreements held between the sects over a millennium maintains an environment where little revolutionary cooperation between Iran and extremist Sunnis can exist. Certainly Iran will work with extremist Sunni elements to push its agenda (as it has in the past), but to suggest it would actively support the rising of Taliban-esque governments in southern Asia and throughout the Middle East borders on ludicrous. The rise of radicalized Sunni regimes in the region would not only undermine Iran’s desire to push its own style of revolution, but incite its ethnic minorities, includig Arab Muslims living primarily in its border regions, toward their own sort of localized revolutions. In short, such cooperation could very well create instability within Iran itself.

Also, the article suggests Iran needs al-Qaeda to seriously undermine Western efforts in the case of a strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities. Unfortunately, Tehran’s own terrorist networks — including Hizbollah, but more importantly the IRGC, Quds Force, and Basij militia (basically an army of potential suicidal "martyrs") — are more than adequate to cause chaos throughout the region and the world. Why would Tehran want to be beholden to outside groups for its security and quick strike capability, regardless of who it is?