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Shia Iran is publicly unwavering in its commitment to forge unity among Muslim states. Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is again reaching out to Arab Salafists and Wahhabists and has declared the present Iranian year as the Year of National Unity and Islamic Solidarity. Sunni Saudi Arabia is also emphasizing dialogue. Two recent pan-Islamic conferences have been held in Tehran (May) and Mecca (June) to lessen intra-Muslim differences. However, neither conference produced concrete steps toward achieving this goal.

In May 2008, Tehran hosted 850 Muslim clerics (ulema) and intellectuals from 45 countries for the 21st annual Islamic Unity Conference. The Iranian conference organizers said they wanted to provide a forum for debate among different sects and to push for a charter on Islamic unity. A key facet would be the rejection of takfirism, a school of thought among hard-line Sunnis that considers Shiites as heretics and sanctions violence against them. According to Iran’s state-funded Press TV, the charter had already been signed by 2,000 Muslim scholars by the time of the conference.

Ayatollah Mohammad-Ali Taskhiri, Iran’s Director-General of the World Forum for the Proximity of Islamic Schools of Thought, chaired the conference. No senior Salafi/Wahhabi clerics attended, although there were Arab Salafi participants from Kuwait, United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.

At the conference on May 9, former Iranian President Rafsanjani – presently chairman of two of Iran’s most powerful political institutions- the Assembly of Experts and the Expediency Council - notably urged the Shia to rethink some of the sect’s beliefs and practices. “You can see how much Sunnis refer to the exaggerated statements in our books and traditions, and accordingly call us pagans,” and that unless “corrective measures are implemented the Sunnis will retain the opinion that Shias are apostates because they see their [Shia] imams as gods, which is not the case.” He also urged Shias to refrain from “insulting Prophet's [Mohammed] disciples, the four Caliphs and those who are regarded as saints by Sunnis”.

Curtailing unorthodox Shia traditions has been a constant feature of the theological debate in Iran since before the 1979 revolution. The matter has become more urgent in recent years due to the rise of Islamic mysticism in Iran, and the emerging reverence in some rural and poor urban communities of Imams Ali, Hussein or Hassan and Fatima al-Zahra, the Prophet’s daughter. A number of Iranian Shia clergy have spoken against such trends, warning that it effectively amounts to kufr (disbelief in Islam) since no human being should be worshipped in Islam.

The state views the religious practices of Islamic mystic Sufi sects as a challenge to the regime’s monopoly on religious authority, which underpins its political legitimacy. Iran has witnessed a number of government crackdowns on Sufi orders since February 2006, which seem to contradict their calls for Islamic unity.

Regardless of motive, Iranian pleas for Islamic unity made little impression on some of Saudi Arabia’s most senior Wahhabi clerics. Twenty-two of them issued an anti-Shia statement on June 1 in which they accused Shiites of abusing Sunnis under their control. "If they [Shiites] have a country, they humiliate and exert control in their rule over Sunnis," and specifically mentioned conditions in Iran and Iraq. "They sow strife, corruption and destruction among Muslims and destabilize security in Muslim countries ... such as Yemen." The tone of the letter is similar to the 2007 statement of Ayman Al-Zawahiri accusing Iranian Shia leaders to be “intent on establishing certain [Islamic] concepts which nullify the intellects of their followers and prevent them from understanding the Quran and Sunna, except through [Shia clergy’s] interpretations and explanations”.

The letter reflected a common sentiment among Saudi Wahhabis, but it was issued only three days before the opening of the inter-faith conference held by King Abdullah in Mecca June 4-7. Bringing together some 500 Islamic scholars and academics, the organizers hoped to present Saudi Arabia and King Abdullah to the West as forces of moderation in the Islamic world. Despite efforts by Saudi officials to distance themselves from the letter, the fact that Saudi Arabia’s indigenous Shia minority was officially banned from the Mecca conference lessened their credibility among the Shia.

Iranian media reported the ban and covered the arrest of eight Shia clergy and community elders in the Eastern Province but avoided any condemnation, perhaps in recognition of King Abdullah’s own struggle with radical Wahhabi clergy within the kingdom. Nonetheless, the intended political message in Mecca was clear. King Abdullah walked into the opening ceremony alongside Rafsanjani who then sat on the King's left, interpreted by Saudi media to mean that the Wahhabi kingdom does not have a problem with moderate Shiites.

The failure of these conferences to produce tangible plans toward Islamic unity is a reflection of the level of suspicion and doctrinal divide between the two main groups, exacerbated by their geo-political rivalry since 2003. Still, these recent Iranian and Saudi attempts should not be dismissed. Ayatollahs Khamenei and Rafsanjani, often deemed as fierce rivals, both judged the events sufficiently worthy to rally behind them. King Abdullah too has maintained the momentum for dialogue in his kingdom despite stiff opposition from some Wahhabi clerics.

For sure, political and not religious motives have been the primary catalysts in both instances. Both Iranian Shia and Saudi Wahhabi clerical establishments continue to contain dangerous sectarian voices that will prove stubborn in their views. Still, in an age when sectarian violence has almost become the norm in Middle Eastern arenas from Iraq to Lebanon and from Pakistan to Yemen, these two leading Shia and Sunni states can ill afford to let others take the initiative.