For the first time in many years, hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of Shiite Muslims are converging in the holy Iraqi city of Karbala, where they are paying tribute to the late grandson of the prophet Mohammed — a ritual virtually forbidden in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.

That Iraq’s Shiites have finally been given their freedom is a wonderful thing. But the happy pilgrimage to Karbala could take on an ugly political dimension because of Iraq’s neighbor, Iran, and the Islamic Republic’s oppressive ruling mullahs. With their longtime enemy, Saddam, out of the picture and Iraqi land liberated, Iran’s tyrants see an opportunity to extend their influence — and they are doing so.

While American officials bicker amongst themselves about whom their favorite future Iraqi leader is, Islamist Shiite political groups like the Tehran-backed Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq are capitalizing on the political and power vacuum in southern Iraq. They are organizing politically and fanning the flames of anti-Americanism. Sciri in particular has apparently sent several hundred organizers into Iraq to prepare for the arrival of Ayatollah Mohammed Bakr Al-Hakim, the group’s Iran-based leader, who told Newsweek that he’d be in Iraq at the “earliest suitable opportunity.”

Our sources tell us that there is no one patrolling the Iraq-Iran border, and Iranians are pouring in and out at will. A great many of them are probably doing so just to make the pilgrimage to Karbala. But plenty of bad guys are making their way into Iraq as well, including, we’re told, Iranian Revolutionary Guards.

There is some reason to be hopeful. Iraqis remember the bloody Iran-Iraq war, where the Iranians held many Iraqi Shiites as prisoners. The idea that someone blessed by Iran is a favorite son of Iraqi Shiites is improbable. And it is important to remember that there is a wide diversity of opinion within the Shiite community. Far from everyone wants a republic like Iran’s based on the Islamic law known as Sharia.

Those who have never believed that democracy could work are already saying Iraq could become another Lebanon, fragmented by violence and religious differences. But that doesn’t have to happen. To keep the country glued together, Iraqis will need to choose a leader who is not only able to work with the West but is also able to keep the Iranians at bay. One such leader is Ahmad Chalabi of the Iraqi National Congress.