| 1 | The kingdom is ruled by a Sunni minority, which has long discriminated against the Shiite majority. | |
| 2 | The militias are said to use the weapons sparingly, mainly in response to attacks on Shia targets. | |
| 3 | Sunni insurgents are still a worse threat to the Americans, in part because most of the Mahdi Army seems to be lying low, perhaps on orders from its leader Muqtada al-Sadr. | |
| 4 | Aides to a radical Shiite Muslim cleric meet with a key Sunni group in Iraq to ease sectarian tensions amid a spree of violence that's killed hundreds. | |
| 5 | In Iran, intolerance toward all non-Muslim minorities took a sharply negative turn from the 16th century onward with the forced Shiification of Iran by the Safavid dynasty. |