It felt more like a high school graduation than the signing of a peace accord in the Al-Rasheed hotel's wood-paneled auditorium the other day.  Tribal sheiks from Mahmoudiya, a region of southern Baghdad, were wrapping up a three-day reconciliation conference, and each shook hands with the meeting's facilitators before receiving a certificate saying that he had participated. Senior officials made speeches, praising God and the people of Mahmoudiya, and urged Iraq's national government to look to their region for guidance on how to rebuild the rest of the country.  Depending on what happens next, the government may want to do just that.

With the number of violent attacks down in some parts of Iraq, the question facing Iraqis now is how best to take advantage of it.  The answer is critical, particularly for a place like Mahmoudiya where the fault lines of conflict run in multiple directions. Tribal, religious and generational clashes divide its 400,000 residents, making the region in some ways a microcosm of the country as a whole. Up until about three months ago, violence was widespread, with criminal gangs and sectarian fighting forcing people from their homes and destroying local infrastructure.  But thanks in part to the "surge" of U.S. troops and in part to the high degree of cooperation between the American and Iraqi soldiers working together in the area, a fragile window of calm has opened.