A brutal logic underlies the apparent madness in Iraq, writes Shlomo Avineri
The daily news from Iraq about car bombs and attacks on Iraqi officials and police stations, as well as on US and coalition soldiers, continues unabated. The formal transfer of power from the Coalition Provisional Authority to the Iraqi interim government under Iyad Allawi, the prime minister, does not seem to have changed the picture of constant violence.
To the outsider this mayhem seems a senseless amalgam of lawlessness, brigandry and the inability of both the coalition forces and new Iraqi authorities to assert control.
What is lost in the confused reporting is that there is logic in the apparent madness.
The situation in Iraq is simple: since the 1920s, the Sunni Arab minority has ruled Iraq with an iron fist, lording it over the Shia Arab majority and the Kurdish minority.
Saddam Hussein's regime was only the latest - and bloodiest - of these Sunni Arab minority regimes to maintain power through brutal oppression.
It was this Sunni minority regime, not only Mr Hussein, that was toppled by the American invasion of Iraq.
With the exception of one case - Moqtada al-Sadr's renegade Shia Mahdi Army - all the violence is a rearguard action of the Sunni minority that had ruled Iraq, which is desperately trying to cling to power by the only means it knows: violence.
The targets are diverse, yet the aim is one. The attacks were first against US and other coalition forces, then on Iraqis co-operating with the coalition.
These were followed by suicide bomb attacks against Shia holy shrines in Kerbala during Ashura, the Shia holy week of mourning.
Then there were attacks on Kurdish party headquarters in the mixed Arab-Kurdish cities of Kirkuk and Mosul. With the formal transfer of power to the Iraqi interim government, the attacks have focused on the government's officials and sites, including the assassination of the governor of Mosul and an attempted assassination of the minister of justice.
The aim of these attacks is clear: if a coherent form of government is established in Iraq, it will mean power-sharing between the various religious and ethnic groups, and an end to the historical Sunni Arab hegemony.
The composition of the interim government signifies this new pluralism: the president is a Sunni, the prime minister a Shia and the foreign minister a Kurd. In the provisional constitution, an autonomous regime is guaranteed in the Kurdish regions, and both Arabic and Kurdish are declared official languages.
This is anathema to the traditional Sunni Arab power-holders in Iraq. Mr Hussein may be in jail awaiting trial, with most of the leaders of his Ba'ath party in prison or in hiding. But the insurrection in Iraq - and it has to be called by its rightful name - is not limited to hardline Ba'athists.
It is the battle of a privileged minority which feels that almost a century of ascendancy and hegemony is slipping away.
While some in the Shia majority have indicated they are unhappy with the Kurds' minority rights being entrenched in the constitution, unlike the Sunni Arabs, they have not resorted to violence.
The Sunni Arab insurrection in Iraq could have wider ramifications for the Middle East. With the exception of Lebanon, all Arab countries are Sunni-ruled.
In most Arab countries, Sunnis form the majority; and even in those where they are in the minority, they have maintained hegemony.
Both Saudi Arabia and Bahrain have large Shia populations, but in different ways have ensured their political marginalisation.
If the Sunnis lose the monopoly of power in Iraq, which will happen if (more or less) free elections are held and the interim constitution upheld, this will be a novelty in the Arab world: an Arab country not ruled exclusively by Sunnis; even turned into a bi-national state if Kurdish rights are maintained.
This also explains why Sunni Arabs in Iraq may be getting support from Sunni Arab fundamentalist groups in other countries.
Something much more basic may be at stake than the matter of who rules Iraq: the historical equation of Arab rule with Sunni hegemony is being challenged.
To western eyes this may seem merely "sectarian", but transpose yourself to 17th-century England or Europe in general and you immediately realise that something significant is at play.
Just as the wars between Catholics and various Protestant groups were not just theological disputations but contests about power, the same is happening in Iraq.
• Shlomo Avineri is professor of political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.