Word: ites
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Commemorating the death of Caliph Ali (A.D. 600-661), who is revered by Iran's 34 million Shi'ite Muslims as the only true successor to Muhammad, is always a solemn occasion. But last week's observances were especially subdued. Tehran was tense and quiet. The Club Discotheque, normally a place of frenzied activity for Iran's newly rich upper middle class, was shuttered. Hotels and restaurants decreed a four-day prohibition of alcoholic beverages. Television stations broadcast readings from the Koran and Islamic sermons in place of Cannon and Police Story...
...circumstance. Camels, sheep and donkeys moved lazily beside a tiny reservoir, seemingly unbothered by the throngs of waving and shouting Lebanese villagers massed around the dusty, brown dirt field where the handing-over ceremonies were about to begin. Thus at Meisel-Jabal, a village of 6,000 Shi'ite Muslims in southern Lebanon, one mile west of the Israeli border, the last units of the Israeli Defense Forces departed for home last week, 91 days after they had invaded Lebanon. The Israelis turned over the fight against Palestinian terrorists in the region to the 6,000-man United Nations...
...ite branch of Islam split off from the main Sunni branch during the 7th century; it now predominates in Iran and much of Iraq and Lebanon...
...current troubles began early this year when police killed nine people during a demonstration in the mullahs' holy city of Qum (pop. 300,000), a traditional center of Shi'ite learning located 75 miles south of Tehran. After observing the traditional 40-day Muslim mourning period for the victims, demonstrators took to the streets. Again, several people were killed. On May 10, during observances for the death of Fatima, daughter of the Prophet Mohammed, paratroopers entered the Qum headquarters of Shi'ite Leader Sharietmadari, which is considered a religious sanctuary. A theological student was shot and killed...
...incident inflamed Shi'ite feelings as never before. In an interview last week in his spartan house in Qum, Sharietmadari told TIME Correspondent Wilton Wynn: "In the eyes of the nation, this incident is enough to cause a revolution in Iran. [The authorities] stopped cables being sent to me, but still the people came to me asking for the order to make a revolution. I advised them to remain quiet. But an attack on a Shi'ite leader will never be forgotten by the people." The roots of the recent trouble, charged Sharietmadari, lay in "many illegal actions...