Iraq - Not quite the civil war the media hoped for

Is it?

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Abu Salah heard the screeching tires and gunfire outside his home in central Baghdad, and cowered. He'd feared this moment. He'd even plotted leaving the city, though he'd never followed through on his plan.

Now invaders had entered his street, and he knew that as the only Sunni on a street filled with Shiites, he was probably their target, whomever the invaders might be - insurgents, kidnappers or sectarian death squads.

"I was shaking; it was the fourth time in three days they'd invaded," he said. "I knew they were coming for me."

Then he heard another sound: the gunfire being returned.

He rushed from his house to see his neighbors - Shiite neighbors - on their roofs, in their windows, in their yards, firing at the attackers. In a trembling voice, he explained that at that moment he felt life change. He realized that his neighbors weren't going to stand by and let the bad guys win.

And

Sheik Salam, a local tribal leader, said Sunnis and Shiites had agreed to defend the area, night and day, in shifts.

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