Shi'ite Muslims Outraged by Saudi Execution of Cleric

Smita Nordwall, Voice of America

The execution of a prominent Shi'ite critic of Saudi Arabia’s ruling royal family has caused international outrage and a serious escalation of diplomatic tensions in the region, with unrest predicted in Shia-majority areas.

Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, who was among 47 people executed Saturday in Saudi Arabia, was a widely revered Shi'ite Muslim cleric who was convicted in 2014 of sedition and other charges and sentenced to death. He was an outspoken critic of the kingdom's ruling al-Saud family and a key leader of Shi'ite protests in Saudi Arabia in 2011.

The U.S. warned that Nimr's death would only add to strife between religious sects in the region.

"We are particularly concerned that the execution of prominent Shia cleric and political activist Nimr al-Nimr risks exacerbating sectarian tensions at a time when they urgently need to be reduced," U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said Saturday in a statement.

Shia-majority Iran, which made frequent requests to the Saudis to pardon Nimr, had some of the strongest reaction to the news, saying Saudi Arabia would pay a high price for the execution. Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Hossein Jaber Ansari, strongly attacked Saudi Arabia for ramping up sectarian tensions in the region.

The speaker of the Iranian parliament said Saudi Arabia, which is founded upon an ultraconservative Sunni ideology known as Wahhabism, would face a "maelstrom'' from which it would not escape.

A top Shi'ite cleric in Lebanon warned there would be a backlash because of Nimr's execution. Sheikh Abdul-Amir Kabalan, said, "This is a crime at a human level and will have repercussions in the coming days."

Iran and Saudi Arabia have been vying for leadership in the Muslim world since Iran's 1979 revolution, which elevated hard-line Shi'ite clerics to power. The U.S. war in Iraq further enflamed religious and ethnic tensions by leading to a Shi'ite-led government in Baghdad and a crucial shift in the sectarian balance of power in the region.

After Arab Spring protests erupted in 2011, Saudi Arabia and Iran entered into a fierce proxy war in Syria, where they support opposite sides of the conflict, and in Yemen, where Saudi Arabia has been bombing Iranian-allied rebels since March. They also support opposing political groups in Lebanon, Iraq and Bahrain.

Protests over the Nimr execution were held in Bahrain, where police used tear gas on the crowds, as well as in India and outside the Saudi Embassy in London.

More demonstrations were being planned for Sunday in Lebanon and Tehran, where the majority of outrage is expected to be focused.

Suicide Note

Chaveso Cook

The radio chirped and a panicked voice came over the net.  “Cold Steel 6, Cold Steel 6 this is SGT Grant down at the motorpool, Sir.”  My CO respond, “Cold Steel 6 here.”  “Sir, uh, you better get down here ASAP, Sir.  SPC Jones[i]… he, uh, he just freakin’ shot himself in the chest and we’re out here trying to revive him. We just pulled him from behind a barricade in his shop… how copy, over?” I heard the CO’s chair abruptly thump the back wall of his office as it rolled away when he jumped upright. He bolted out of the door.  

It was two days before Christmas in 2006 and I was a battery executive officer in Iraq.  We were nine months into our deployment.  Conducting a Counter-Rocket, Artillery and Mortar mission (C-RAM), not only had we not lost anyone during our deployment but we had also saved many lives on and around our base.  It was supposed to be an easy deployment.

Jones was one of our commo guys.  A puzzling fellow, he kept to himself most of the time.  He would take any challenger on a chessboard and liked talking about astrology.  It was his first deployment.  He just made Specialist before our trip to Iraq and was only 21. We never really had any trouble with him outside of what we considered ‘distractors’; lack of? personal hygiene, oversleeping and a penchant for lateness.  That morning Jones was late again. 

His NCO had grown tired of Jones’ tardiness; he had a stack of counseling statements, had run through a number of corrective training measures and felt it was time to step up the punishment.  We woke him up, brought him in, and counseled him that morning.  We included a plan of action – a summarized Article 15.  Jones was very distraught and stormed out.  He went to his commo office in our motorpool across the base, penned a suicide note via email, barricaded the door, loaded his issued 9mm, turned it toward his heart and squeezed the trigger.  The nearby mechanics heard a shot followed by the hollow clang of an empty shell and the metallic thud of his weapon hitting the concrete.  Our mechanics acted swiftly, busting the door down and dragging his limp body out.  The first-aid they provided did not help.  

The face of Army suicide looks very much like SPC Jones.  Those who attempt it are generally junior enlisted soldiers who are single, white and male.  The events generally involve a firearm as opposed to an overdose, hanging or a cutting incident.  Historically, suicide in the military has been lower than that of the civilian population.  In 2004 that changed, however, and the Army rate has slightly exceeded the US population rates in recent years.[ii]  The greatest increase in military suicides has happened in the Army and Marine Corps, which have shouldered the greatest burden of ground combat.[iii]

Our resiliency training and Ask-Care-Escort (ACE) cards are helping by giving us a few tools, but they are simply not enough.  We need a larger discussion about reframing crises and contributing factors to facilitate post-traumatic growth (PTG).  PTG is not just about being the tennis ball and bouncing back versus being the egg that cracks.  It is about learning from your experiences in a way that builds strength, hardiness and new learning.  PTG is a reminder that “permanent disorder is not the inevitable outcome of trauma.”[iv]  Understanding and teaching ways to develop PTG as opposed to just resilience would not only help to lower causal factors leading to suicide, it could also help those of us that have to endure that after-effects when suicides do happen.

Moving toward PTG will require a greater understanding of the initiators of suicidal ideation.  Suicide attempts materialize from a confluence of many factors.  Compounding stress, financial issues, depression, weight/body concerns, and relationship difficulties are but of few.  Co-morbidity with PTSD, alcohol and drug abuse, and other behavioral health issues add to its complexity.  These contributing causes are all confounded by the stigma our formations have against seeking help.  Data from OEF and OIF tell us that a large percentage of those who would actually benefit from behavioral health treatment often do not pursue care due to a perception of potential peer disapproval.[v]  Having a little PTSD is almost seen as a mandatory insert added in one’s already stacked medical records; in a warrior’s military there is only time to ‘suck it up and drive on’.  Soldiers assume that everyone else is taking it all in stride, which creates a false sense of comfort with brokenness.  Those identified as having a true behavioral health issue may even adopt negative stereotypes, creating what some call a self-stigma.[vi] These trends all indicate that those who most need behavioral health care are traditionally the least likely to pursue it.  We need to curb these trends before we can ever grow from the inevitable traumatic events that occurred in Iraq and Afghanistan and will occur in other tours.  It all starts with more discussion.

As I visited Jones’ gray body in the CASH I wondered if we did all we could.  I wondered if I was a contributor to the lifelessness before me.  Did I see the warning signs?  Was I looking in the right places?  I knew that we needed to do a better job of helping him reframe the issues he was having.  Hopefully we do not have to have a higher suicide rate to transform our perceptions of mental health and what we teach with regard to how we react when trauma inevitably occurs.

End Notes