The Iran/Shiite, Saudi/Sunni Divide

"The mastermind and commander of the team [that had carried out the assaults in Tehran has been killed']."
"[He] was sent to hell by the Unknown Soldiers of the Imam of the Age."
"Terrorists do not wear a special uniform. They are like other people, like other youths. They are not easy to recognize. Sometimes, finding a terrorist in the 14-million population of Tehran is like finding a needle -- not in a haystack, but in ten haystacks."
Mahmoud Alavi, Iranian Intelligence Minister

"The Salafi groups have been very active in mosques and public places in Iranian Kurdistan, and even they have been socializing with families and the youths."
"They were peaceful [men wearing long beards]. As long as the Salafi groups are not taking arms, they must be tolerated."
Jalal Jalalizadeh, (former) member of Parliament, Iranian Kurdistan

"To us, it feels as if those Salafis can easily roam around in Iranian Kurdistan."
"I want to get as far away from these people as possible. They give us Kurds a bad name."
Nikvan Ghaderi, 24, tire shop worker, Baneh, Iran

"Unlike other countries where Kurds live, in Iran we are part of the social fabric, share a common history and our languages are very close to each other."
"There is no apartheid for Kurds, like in Turkey, for instance."
"Over the past  ten years, we have suddenly seen these extremists coming out of nowhere. I feel that if there was more political openness in Iranian Kurdistan, more dialogue with us, we would not witness the rise of these extremist groups."
Hiwa Aminnejad, 43, Kurdish documentary filmmaker, Sanandaj, Iran

People attend the funeral of the victims who were killed on the June 7 attack at the Iranian parliament and Ayatollah Khomeini's mausoleum, in Tehran [Reuters]

The two attacks purportedly carried out by Islamic State, one on the Iranian Parliament and the other on the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's mausoleum -- the two most sensitive political/religious sites in Iran -- appears to have concluded with the Islamic Republic of Iran being avenged on those they claim were Kurdish terrorists. In a sense, it is a departure for Iran to accuse those living within the confines of their borders for violence against the Republic. Usually Israel ('the Zionist entity') or the United States (the 'Great Satan') are named as the perpetrators.

Such grave impudence, violence committed directly upon the blessed memory of the founder of the Republic, the man who engineered the Islamic Revolution for Iran, transforming it from a troubled but emerging-into-the-20th Century Middle East, non-Arab, Shiite nation, into a Sharia-driven, hostile, theocracy of social/cultural backwardness. Unbelievably intolerable. And so, Saudi Arabia, Iran's political-religious arch-enemy would have to be involved. Practising Salafist Sunni Wahhabism, Iran accuses the Saudis of nurturing Islamic State for its nefarious purposes.

The most obvious of which purposes is to deny Iran its goal of achieving a Shiite crescent of allies to counter the power and influence of the greater Arab Sunni bloc of Middle East and North African nations. Iranian intelligence operatives searched the region representing the contiguous border with Iraqi Kurdistan to find the transgressors. Iranian intelligence is increasingly convinced that Iranian radicalized Kurds are responsible for the attacks. All five of the attackers were killed, with one identified among them as an Iranian Kurd from a city close to the border with Iraq; a recruiter for ISIL.

A research study conducted by Iran's Interior Ministry claims that Sunni 'extremists' have a foothold in the Kurdish areas of Iran. How that might be infuriating to Iran could be balanced against Iran's support for the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah terrorists whom the Republic directs against Iraqi Sunnis, for example. Iranian Kurdistan, according to an Interior Ministry report, has embraced ultraconservative Salafist ideology enabling Islamic State to increase its recruitment of Iranian Kurds to the Sunni ISIL cause of establishing its broad-based caliphate.

Dozens of Iranian Kurds have been arrested after being accused of responding to recruitment efforts by ISIL terrorists, linking them to last Wednesday's attacks in Tehran. The arrests are increasing in Iranian Kurdistan, with a safe house being raided where suicide vests, weapons and bomb-making equipment were purported to have been discovered, according to a report by the Intelligence Ministry. On Iranian social media Kurds are being increasingly singled out for accusations of pending war and aspirations toward separation.

And in Saudi Arabia, Internet posts supporting Kurdish independence have been reported, infuriating Iran at Saudi Arabia's role in promoting Iran's geographic sundering. That, playing off against others using social media in Iran in expressions of support for the Kurds, recognized as having taken up an important role fighting ISIL in Iraq and in Syria. Iran has neglected the well-being of the eight million Kurds where employment opportunities are scarce and state investments equally scarce.

Police officers outside the shrine of the late Iranian revolutionary founder Ayatollah Khomeini, after an assault of several attackers in Tehran on June 7, 2017. Ebrahim Noroozi/AP Photo