Fallujah is a little town in the "Sunni triangle" of Iraq. In the days after the fall of Baghdad, Fallujah was the site of several firefights between US forces and locals (e.g.), as well as a highly dubious story about US shooting sprees and ramming ambulances with tanks. It was a frontier town in the sense that the new world of post-Saddam Iraq and the old world of tribal politics and rumor mongering were running head to head. It was often wild and bloody as a result.
You'd have expected it to stay that way, but progress is being made:
After months of bitterness, the heads of the seven major tribes of Fallujah have met for the first time with the Iraqi town's mayor and its American forces commander.Good work, lads. Good work. (Hat tip: Taranto.)
Clan leaders and their hangers-on packed the mayor's office at the morning meeting, described by Lt-Col Chris Hickey, US army Fallujah commander, as "an extremely important day".
They came from the Albuaisa tribe, from the al-Jumela and from the al-Halabsa. They greeted the sheikhs of the al-Mahamuda tribe, the Albu al-Wan, the al-Zuba'a and Albuaisa-Qais.
At a rowdy session, they agreed to work with American troops to stamp out the looting as well as the rocket and grenade attacks, that have made Fallujah a byword for instability and danger.
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