– Abstract
Clashes in Iraq are no longer solely related to military and political decisions of the United States-led coalition; they are also subjected to local dynamics, the Iraqi agenda or even the influence of neighboring countries. After the turning point in February 2006, marked by the Samarra attack that “Iraq-ized” the conflict, making it a civil war, the fragmentation of violent events during the year 2007, favored by an American policy that fosters localism, enhances tensions within the Sunnite and Shi’ite communities and also threatens to affect Kurdistan. Iraq’s next challenges (a lighter American presence, general elections in 2009) must not cover the conflict’s deep causes, that is to say the sharing of power, land and resources.
