After all, a shared vision for the country could help bridge its ethnic and sectarian fractures.
Meanwhile, as fighting also raged in the northern city of Mosul, in Falluja and in villages surrounding Baquba, the capital of Diyala Province, there were signs that Mr. Maliki's military was fracturing along sectarian lines.
Armed groups who advocate fracturing Syria along sectarian or regional lines should be denied funds; there should be absolutely no aid for rebel groups who target Alawites and other minorities for reprisals or who commit war crimes.
Fracturing the country along sectarian lines, however, "may give Washington several strategic advantages": "After eliminating Iraq as a sovereign state, there would be no fear that one day an anti-American government would come to power in Baghdad, as the capital would be in Amman [Jordan].
Meanwhile, the Syria crisis has strained the capacity of Lebanese security forces to tamp down sectarian violence, forced the prime minister's resignation and delayed elections, fracturing Lebanon's fragile democracy.
As the army and government fractured along sectarian lines, the Christian defeat by the more numerous Muslim factions seemed a foregone conclusion.
It is "national unity," and while skepticism abounds, it could well signal the decline of the religious and sectarian parties that have fractured Iraq since 2003.
Shia militias have quickly mobilized volunteers to defend Baghdad and other Shia-dominated areas as Iraq finally fractures along sectarian lines.
The king has called for a spiritual intervention to counter extremist ideologies with a message of peace and tolerance; a cultural intervention to foster a new, post-sectarian identity for countries fractured by ancient differences; and political and economic interventions to alleviate the root causes of disaffection that render societies vulnerable to extremist ideologies.
The short and fierce political campaign could end up either solidifying Iraq's nascent democracy or leaving the country fractured along ethnic and sectarian lines.
