Shia cleric Moqtada Al Sadr
The longer the USA takes to leave Iraq and 'disarm' the area, the more blood will be shed and the more lives will be lost to the current genocide existing in Iraq.
64 killed in Baghdad twin blasts (click here)
Atul Aneja
DUBAI: Two bomb blasts in Baghdad on Friday killed at least 64 persons — the highest death toll since the middle of 2007 when American forces were beefed up in Iraq.
Forty-six persons were killed in an explosion caused by a woman suicide bomber in a busy animal market.
Twenty minutes later, the second explosion rocked another crowded market area of Jadida in eastern Baghdad, killing at least 18 persons and injuring around 80.
The police and medical staff piled up the dead and the injured in wheelbarrows, pick-up trucks and cars, and took them to the five main hospitals in the city. The Al Kindi hospital alone received at least 30 bodies.
The twin blasts have dented the creeping sense of normality in Iraq. Analysts point out that violence had diminished partly on account of the decision by the Mahdi militia loyal to Shia cleric Moqtada Al Sadr to observe a ceasefire against American troops in August. Some of the Sunni tribes also reportedly decided to target Al Qaeda affiliates in Iraq, thereby bringing down violence.
Atul Aneja
DUBAI: Two bomb blasts in Baghdad on Friday killed at least 64 persons — the highest death toll since the middle of 2007 when American forces were beefed up in Iraq.
Forty-six persons were killed in an explosion caused by a woman suicide bomber in a busy animal market.
Twenty minutes later, the second explosion rocked another crowded market area of Jadida in eastern Baghdad, killing at least 18 persons and injuring around 80.
The police and medical staff piled up the dead and the injured in wheelbarrows, pick-up trucks and cars, and took them to the five main hospitals in the city. The Al Kindi hospital alone received at least 30 bodies.
The twin blasts have dented the creeping sense of normality in Iraq. Analysts point out that violence had diminished partly on account of the decision by the Mahdi militia loyal to Shia cleric Moqtada Al Sadr to observe a ceasefire against American troops in August. Some of the Sunni tribes also reportedly decided to target Al Qaeda affiliates in Iraq, thereby bringing down violence.
5 US Soldiers Killed in N. Iraq (click here)
By KIM GAMEL and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA – 5 days ago
BAGHDAD (AP) — In a daring ambush, insurgents blasted a U.S. patrol with a roadside bomb Monday and showered survivors with gunfire from a mosque in increasingly lawless Mosul. Five American soldiers were killed in the explosion — even as Iraqi troops moved into the northern city to challenge al-Qaida in Iraq.
Iraqi reinforcements, along with helicopters, tanks and armored vehicles, converged on Mosul for what Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki pledged would be a decisive battle against al-Qaida in its last major urban stronghold.
The attack on the U.S. patrol — the deadliest on American forces since six soldiers perished Jan. 9 in a booby-trapped house north of Baghdad — raised the Pentagon's January death count to at least 36.
The toll so far is 56 percent higher than December's 23 U.S. military deaths and marks the first monthly increase since August. But the figures remain well below monthly death tolls of more than 100 last spring.
Tensions in Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, have spiked after the explosion last week in an abandoned apartment that authorities say was used to stash insurgents' weapons and bombs. As many as 60 were killed and 200 injured....
By KIM GAMEL and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA – 5 days ago
BAGHDAD (AP) — In a daring ambush, insurgents blasted a U.S. patrol with a roadside bomb Monday and showered survivors with gunfire from a mosque in increasingly lawless Mosul. Five American soldiers were killed in the explosion — even as Iraqi troops moved into the northern city to challenge al-Qaida in Iraq.
Iraqi reinforcements, along with helicopters, tanks and armored vehicles, converged on Mosul for what Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki pledged would be a decisive battle against al-Qaida in its last major urban stronghold.
The attack on the U.S. patrol — the deadliest on American forces since six soldiers perished Jan. 9 in a booby-trapped house north of Baghdad — raised the Pentagon's January death count to at least 36.
The toll so far is 56 percent higher than December's 23 U.S. military deaths and marks the first monthly increase since August. But the figures remain well below monthly death tolls of more than 100 last spring.
Tensions in Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, have spiked after the explosion last week in an abandoned apartment that authorities say was used to stash insurgents' weapons and bombs. As many as 60 were killed and 200 injured....
Maliki will say anything to 'close out' the deal for an American withdrawal even saying this is the last major urban stronghold of Al Qaeda in Iraq. What kind of horse manure is that? These terrorist networks aren't 'located' in single facilities whereby destruction is simply destroying same. They are roving carpetbaggers with buried munitions where ever the need arises.
Maliki wants the USA out of Iraq, no less than the American people do. The Iraqi people want to get on with their lives under their own concept of freedom and justice. As long as the Americans are in Iraq there will be war. So long as there is war there will be an al Qaeda presence in Iraq and they will seek to do exactly as they have done here. They will kill innocent people to spark the outrage necessary to escalate a war of hate and continue to indulge the 'War of the Neocons' that continues to plague idiots in Washington DC that need to simply cut off funding.
