Across Arab World, a Widening Rift - washingtonpost.com

Across Arab World, a Widening Rift - washingtonpost.com: "Across Arab World, a Widening Rift Sunni-Shiite Tension Called Region's 'Most Dangerous Problem' By Anthony Shadid Washington Post Foreign Service Monday, February 12, 2007; Page A01 CAIRO -- Egypt is the Arab world's largest Sunni Muslim country, but as a writer once quipped, it has a Shiite heart and a Sunni mind. In its eclectic popular culture, Sunnis enjoy a sweet dish with raisins and nuts to mark Ashura, the most sacred Shiite Muslim holiday. Raucous festivals bring Cairenes into the street to celebrate the birthdays of Shiite saints, a practice disparaged by austere Sunnis. The city's Islamic quarter tangles like a vine around a shrine to Imam Hussein, Shiite Islam's most revered figure. The syncretic blend makes the words of Mahmoud Ahmed, a book vendor sitting on the shrine's marble and granite promenade, even more striking."