"Before ... there was no Sunni, no Shi'ite. We were one."

[sabra]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/GEO723987.htm

<snip>

Still fearful of reprisals, some families on both sides of Baghdad's religious divide abandoned homes where they felt threatened by neighbours -- or threw barricades up in streets.

"They threatened us and said: 'You have two hours and after that anyone we find we will slaughter with their family'," said Shi'ite Salem al-Halbusi, whose family took refuge in a sports hall. "Before ... there was no Sunni, no Shi'ite. We were one."

"I thought civil war had begun after the angry reaction to the Samarra bombing," said Sunni taxi driver Abu Marwan; he was back at work but had his family's valuables packed ready to flee if necessary to Tikrit, his Sunni home town to the north.

In several districts, people blocked off roads with palm trunks and joined neighbours on armed watch for outsiders.

[Dunvegan]

1. Civil War, the US destablization of Iraq, is underway.

The only formality left is for a figurehead of any one of the three domestic players to make a formal statement.