Word: sectarianism
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...During a marathon day of meetings, Rice made no secret of her exasperation that factional and sectarian disputes have left the government in limbo three and a half months after the December 15 elections. ?I was very direct that the United States and indeed Great Britain and a number of others, but most especially the United States and Great Britain, have put a lot of treasure - and I mean human treasure - on the line to try to give Iraq an opportunity for a democratic government,? Rice said. ?I said that we were very proud of what they had achieved...
...Baghdad today, the militias are consolidating their power. A wave of sectarian killings since the Feb. 22 bombing of a holy Shi'ite shrine in Samarra has left hundreds--possibly thousands--of Shi'ites and Sunnis dead across the country, with more tortured and dismembered bodies turning up each day. The U.S. military is pinning its hopes on the Iraqi army and police to stand between the two sides and bring calm to a volatile situation, but in many parts of the capital, the U.S.-backed forces wield less authority than the forces taking their orders from men like Saed...
...armed fighters on both sides is loath to allow the extremists to drag them into full-scale war--for now. In more than a dozen interviews with militia leaders, insurgent commanders and clerics, TIME sought out the men likely to be on the front lines of a full-blown sectarian conflict. What they have to say won't necessarily bolster hopes that Iraq can avoid all-out civil war indefinitely. But few militia members interviewed by TIME believe that they are fighting one now. Their assessments largely accord with those of U.S. military intelligence: that while rival death squads roam...
What no one denies is that the violence is becoming more brutal. U.S. officials say 25 bodies are found each day, although it's unclear how many are victims of sectarian killings. Unlike the terrorist attacks committed by al-Zarqawi, sectarian violence rarely bears a calling card. Shi'ite and Sunni militants interviewed by TIME say the worst killings are carried out by small, secretive death squads that the militants conveniently describe as rogue elements. Windows into the machinations of the death squads are rare, but U.S. and Iraqi forces have gained some intelligence on them. Some operations have been...
...might be tomorrow or one year from now; it all depends on the sparks made by those seeking to inflame it," says Abu Mohammed, a former top-ranking officer in Saddam Hussein's army and now a key Baathist insurgent strategist. Another Baathist insurgent downplays the pervasiveness of sectarian hatred: "It's true there are death squads killing Shi'ite and killing Sunni, and while they're Iraqi, they're really the instruments of foreign interests"--referring to al-Qaeda and Iran. His Shi'ite counterparts in al-Sadr's militia agree. Two mid-ranking field commanders...