The War That Never Ends

In Southern Iraq, local tribal leaders have sorted out property disputes and murder cases for centuries without the help of police and courts. So when Sheik Mohammed al-Ebadi got a call from a British officer to help defuse a riot in Majar al-Kabir, northwest of Basra, he drove there, fast. As he approached the village, he saw British paratroopers engaged in a fierce fire fight with locals armed with AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades. The locals, enraged by reports of heavy-handed searches carried out by British troops, had attacked a patrol. When the fighting was done, four Iraqis had been killed and...