Tom Friedman: In Iraq Al Qaeda and Iran both went too far as extremists usually do.

Tom Friedman writes in The New York Times:

What seems to have happened in Iraq in the last few months is that the Iraqi mainstream has finally done some liberating of itself. With the help of the troop surge ordered by President Bush, the mainstream Sunni tribes have liberated themselves from the grip of Al Qaeda in their provinces. And the Shiite mainstream — represented by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and the Iraqi Army — liberated Basra, Amara and Sadr City in Baghdad from both Mahdi Army militiamen and pro-Iranian death squads.

Al Qaeda and Iran both went too far. I’ve always believed that there is only one good thing about extremists: They don’t know when to stop. Al Qaeda in Iraq went on murderous rampages against any Sunnis who opposed them, severing heads, forcing marriages, mowing down tribal leaders and slaughtering Shiites by the hundreds. Meanwhile, pro-Iranian Shiite extremists tried to impose a Taliban-like order in Basra and Baghdad — from head scarves to bans on liquor — on what is still a mostly secular-oriented Shiite majority.

Eventually, this Muslim-on-Muslim oppression seemed to spark the “we’re-not-going-to-take-this-anymore” rage, which prompted both the Sunni and Shiite mainstreams to liberate themselves from their own extremists and, in so doing, actually take ownership of their own country.

These parallel wars of self-liberation still don’t amount to a single national unity movement. Civil war could still be in Iraq’s future. . . . Iraq is miles away from being healthy. And now that Iraq’s Shiite and Sunni communities are taking more responsibility for their own country, you are also going to see an intense power struggle over who dominates within each community. With oil dollars piling up, there is a lot more to fight for.

But if we’re lucky, this struggle will play out primarily in the political arena. If we’re not lucky? Well, let’s just hope we’re lucky.