In an unprecedented show of raw hatred, Sunni Muslims who are the majority in Pakistan took out a huge demonstration and participated in a huge anti-Shia protest in Karachi.
Video on social media has emerged where tens of thousands of Sunni extremists can be seen shouting, “Kafir, Kafir Shia Kafir,”.
Kafir in Islam means infidels. Hindus, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and other non-Muslims are called Kafirs in Pakistan and regularly suffer injustices at the hands of Sunni Muslims.
Hindus girls are kidnapped, forcibly converted to Islam to and marry them off to Muslims men.
The protests were held after Sunni community in the country was provoked by a broadcast of an Ashura procession last month that commemorates the killing of Hussein, grandson of Muhammed, at the Battle of Karbala in 680 AD.
Hussein is recognized as the ‘Martyr Of Martyrs’ by both Sunni and Shia as he is a member of the Ahl al-Bayt (the household of Muhammad). In the battle of Karbala that took place just 48 years after the death of Prophet Mohammad, Hussein and many of his blood relatives were killed by Yazid ibn Mu’awiya ibn Abi Sufyan, commonly known as Yazid I, who was the second caliph of the Umayyad caliphate.
On September 6, a brutal video was posted in twitter were Qaisar Abbas, a Shia Muslim in Kohat city in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan was gunned down in cold blood by an unidentified man as he tended to his shop.
CCTV footage of assassination of #Shia shopkeeper Qaisar Abbas in Kohat, KP province. No claim of responsibility yet, but the likely culprits are members of local #Deobandi militant outfits or their splinters. pic.twitter.com/M9JNShnW16
— SAMRI (@SAMRIReports) September 7, 2020
The Shia Muslims form 20% of the population in Pakistan and the persecution of Shia Muslims in a Sunni-majority Pakistan is not new. They are often targeted during Muharram processions. Even in India, fights have broken out between the two sects during Muharram.
For the Shia Muslims, Ali ibn Abi Talib, cousin and son in law of Mohammad was the rightful person to become the leader of the faithful and after him his direct descendants to take the rightful place.
Other minorities who face constant persecution are the Ahmadiyas who are considered Kaffir, infidel by both Shias and Sunnis, the people of Balochistan, and Pashtuns.