Beirut – Last week, Saudi writer and journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, wrote a piece in the London-based al-Hayat newspaper in which he argued that “Sunnis” were targeted as a group and called on them to ‘defend themselves as a sect’.

Such flawed, reductionist and ill-informed analysis contributes to little more than reminding us that sectarianism is actually a fait accompli.

Sectarianism is real. It is neither a myth, nor an illusion. It is real in its implications and its revelations in our everyday life. In many countries in the Middle East and beyond, sectarianism is experienced as a tool for identification, political organisation, discrimination, othering or alienation.

It operates at the social level as a form of everyday identity marker; but, more importantly, it also operates at the political and economic level and becomes a tool for party recruitment and mobilisation, as we are witnessing today in many parts of the Arab world.

Since its inception, sectarianism has been consciously devised and used by local political leaders and regional powers to maintain their positions of power [Getty Images] Read more