Good Fences For Bad Neighbors

Am I wrong to think that building a wall between a Sunni neighborhood and a Shi'ite neighborhood, without the permission of the community, is probably not a wise call? It's certainly not a long-term solution, since it's basically treating the symptoms at the risk of exacerbating the disease. It's also not likely to help us win hearts and minds, since people feel they're being imprisoned. And this can't be good:

"A few days ago, we met with the U.S. army unit in charge of Adhamiya and it asked us, as a local council, to sign a document to build a wall to reduce killing and attacks against Iraqi and U.S. forces," said Dawood al-Azami, the acting head of the Adhamiya council.

"I told the soldiers that I would not sign it unless I could talk to residents first. We told residents at Friday prayers, but our local council hasn't signed onto the project yet, and construction is already under way."

In related news, the numbers of Americans killed is now 3,316.