The Beginning of a New Iraqi Unity

Yahoo! News has the story.

A Sunni Cleric calls for an end to bloodshed and the killing of Iraqis by foreign Arabs. His timing could not be more significant. Terrorists have targeted Shia mosques, laborers and worshippers in a brutal campaign recently:

A leading Sunni cleric called for religious and ethnic groups to take a stand against violence as
Iraq endured a third consecutive day of sectarian killings — the worst, a suicide car bombing at a Shiite mosque that killed at least 12 worshippers as they left Friday prayers.

The bombing in Tuz Khormato, where a young Saudi man was later arrested wearing a bomb belt on his way to a second mosque, was the latest suicide attack following al-Qaida in Iraq's declaration of all-out war on Iraq's Shiite Muslim majority.

Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's terror group said it was taking revenge for a joint Iraqi-U.S. offensive against its stronghold in Tal Afar, a city near the Syrian border.

With more than 20 people killed Friday, the death toll over the past three days surpassed 200, with more than 600 wounded.

Sheik Mahmud al-Sumaidaei, a leading Sunni cleric whose group is linked to the country's insurgency, criticized militants for targeting civilians. He called for Iraq's religious and ethnic groups to take a stand against further bloodshed.

"I call for a meeting ... of all the country's religious and political leaders to take a stand against the bloodshed," al-Sumaidaei said during his sermon at Baghdad's Um al Qura Sunni mosque.

"We don't need others to come across the border and kill us in the name of defending us," he declared, a reference to foreign fighters who have joined the insurgency under the banner of al-Qaida. "We reject the killing of any Iraqi."

Al Qaeda has made a serious strategic error. They have killed Iraqis in order to save them. The trouble is, the Iraqis don't see any saving; they see plenty of killing, however. They don't welcome it.

The US and the interim Iraqi government should do whatever it takes to ensure that this seed of unity grows. When a Sunni cleric associated with the "insurgency" publically calls for "all the country's religious and political leaders to take a stand against the bloodshed," there's an opportunity for Sunnis, Shia and Kurds to come together first and foremost as Iraqis. This should not become a lost opportunity.