In 2003, US-led forces invaded Iraq, dismantled the state, and brought an end to Baathist rule.
Chaos followed, giving rise to civil war and laying the foundations of a new order.
Sectarianism is one of the pillars of that order. Until the invasion of Iraq, it was mostly associated with Lebanon, where Christians and Muslims shared power in peacetime, and fought over it during successive civil wars.
But after the invasion, Iraq lapsed into Sunni-Shia civil war, and almost a decade later, sectarianism has been wired into the Iraqi system.It began with defeat. Abu Muhannad, a former colonel in Saddam Hussein's army who lives in Fallujah, recalls with bitterness the end of his service in 2003, after the army was disbanded.
"A whole segment of Iraqis who served and built Iraq have been forgotten - thrown to the wind overnight," he says.
It was not only army officers. Professors who had no choice but to join the Baath Party lost their jobs in a campaign of "De-Baathification".
"When you're hurt, you don't forget your wound," said Abu Muhannad. "It is a very difficult psychological situation we're in."
As that feeling spread, the Sunni community sank into collective alienation.
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