(The article doesn't explain all the names as well as some articles do, though, so you may want to pop over to Wikipedia occasionally while reading it.)
Also, this article and Wednesday's bombing of a major Shi'ite mosque in Iraq heighten the sense that a large civil war may be opening up in the Islamic world soon between Sunnis and Shi'ites. Governments of both stripes seem to have something to gain from it (Shi'ites to expand their realm of power into a stable base in Iraq and a "Shi'ite Crescent," Sunnis to prevent this), and it looks like there's no shortage of willing volunteers. A sufficiently cynical US could even use this to cover a retreat, although it would go counter to the work we've been (finally) doing successfully lately of building some real positive measures in Iraq.
Anyway, this suddenly much-deeper rift (after Wednesday) between Sunnis and Shi'ites is as big a deal as the Hamas victory a few weeks ago was. Middle East politics is reshaping itself Right Now; everything could change course at the drop of a (probably bomb-laden) hat. Keep your eyes on the news. (And updates from here will continue)
