Brain Fertilizer

I hope you are paying attention to the violence going on in Iraq during the holy celebration of Ashura.

One year and a few weeks ago, we had captured Saddam Hussein, progress was being made on the interim constitution, and it was looking like we had turned a corner. It turns out it was just the calm before the storm.

A few weeks ago, we'd cleaned up Fallujah and Samarra, attacks are way down in Kirkuk and Balad and Mosul, the people had participated in an historic election. Maybe a turning point had been reached....and then the insurgents attack religious pilgrims.

This is holiday is prominent only to the Shia. In fact, it celebrates the martyrdom of a Shia leader who came to prominence in the controversy of succession that defines Shia vs Sunni sects. And so attacks on the pilgrims are almost certainly to be Sunnis. The Baathists who held power under Saddam are nominally Sunnis, as are most al-Qaida members.

Three weeks after the election, if the best target the insurgents can find is pilgrims, this says something about the state of the insurgency.

Last year, it took all the influence of the top Shia leader, al-Sistani, to prevent the Shias from rising up in retaliation. However, perusing the news this year, a civil war between the sects seems to be less likely than last year*. It seems like perhaps the opportunity for democracy and self-rule is more powerful than the chance for retribution.

*Perhaps a subscription is required...I was able to access it through Google News. Anyway, here's the relevant portion:

The country's interim government and Shi'ite political parties said they would not allow the country to slip into civil war just days before the religious group's political parties take control of Iraq for the first time in modern history.

...

"The bombings on Shi'ite mosques and shrines on Ashura by terrorists that call themselves Muslims are in fact actions by terrorists only attempting to spill even more Muslim blood by encouraging sectarian violence," Mouwaffaq al-Rubaie, the national security adviser for the interim government, told The Associated Press.

He said the suicide bombings were attempts "to create a religious war within Iraq. Iraqis will not allow this to happen, Iraqis will stand united as Iraqis foremost, and Iraq will not fall into sectarian war."