TEHRAN – Tens of millions of Shiite Muslims in Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and all over the world on Friday commemorated Ashoura, a remembrance of the Seventh-century martyrdom of the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson, Hussein, that gave start to their religion.

In Afghanistan, the Taliban minimize cell phone providers in key cities holding commemorations for concern of militants concentrating on Shiites, whom Sunni extremists take into account heretics. Safety forces in neighboring Pakistan as properly stood on excessive alert because the commemorations there have seen assaults prior to now.

Not all Shiites, nevertheless, have been to mark the day Friday. Each Iraq and Lebanon deliberate their remembrances for Saturday, which is able to see a serious suburb of Beirut shut down and the devoted descend on the Iraqi metropolis of Karbala, the place Hussein is entombed in a gold-domed shrine.

Shiites characterize over 10% of the world’s 1.8 billion Muslims and think about Hussein because the rightful successor to the Prophet Muhammad. Hussein’s dying in battle by the hands of Sunnis at Karbala, south of Baghdad, ingrained a deep rift in Islam and continues to at the present time to play a key position in shaping Shiite id.

Over 1,340 years after Hussein’s martyrdom, Baghdad, Tehran, Islamabad and different main capitals within the Center East have been adorned with symbols of Shiite piety and repentance: crimson flags for Hussein’s blood, symbolic black funeral tents and black gown for mourning, processions of males and boys expressing fervor within the ritual of chest-beating and self-flagellation with chains.

In Iran, the place its theocratic authorities views itself because the protector of Shiites worldwide, the story of Hussein’s martyrdom takes on political connotations amid its tensions with the West over its advancing nuclear program.

Iranian state tv aired photographs of commemorations throughout the Islamic Republic, tying the occasion to criticizing the West, Israel and the U.S. drone strike that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in 2020. Anchor Wesam Bahrani on Iran’s state-run English-language broadcaster Press TV referred to America because the “biggest opponent of Islam” and criticized Muslim nations allied with the U.S.

Males wore black, rhythmically beating their chests in mourning or utilizing flails to strike their backs. Some wore crimson headbands, as black and crimson banners bore Hussein’s identify. Some sprayed water over the mourners within the intense warmth.

The commemoration in Iran additionally comes as Tehran prepares for the one-year anniversary of the dying of Mahsa Amini. Her dying launched protests nationwide in Iran that reportedly noticed greater than 500 protesters killed and a few 20,000 others detained. Authorities have begun stepping up their enforcement of obligatory hijab, or scarf, legal guidelines for ladies in current weeks.

In Pakistan, authorities stepped up safety as an Inside Ministry alert warned “terrorists” might goal Ashoura Processions in main cities. The primary Ashoura processions will likely be held within the japanese metropolis of Lahore within the Punjab province, the place 1000’s of cops have been deployed. Processions additionally will likely be held in Karachi and elsewhere.

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Related Press writers Munir Ahmed in Islamabad and Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report.

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