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Shi'ites issue warning over Iraqi violence
Attacks by suicide bombers killed as many as 130 people in Karbala and Ramadi on Thursday, rekindling fears of a return to mass sectarian killings after a relative lull and prompting Iraq's most powerful Shiite political faction to warn of retribution and indirectly blame the United States for the bloodshed.In a separate attack, a roadside bomb killed at least five American soldiers near Karbala, Iraqi and American officials said. At least two other Americans were reported killed in one of the suicide attacks. More than 60 Shiite pilgrims died just steps from the Imam Hussein shrine in Karbala, one of Shiite Islam's holiest sites, when a terrorist detonated an explosive vest just after 10 a.m., the Iraqi authorities said. Pools of blood and body parts were strewn about, and survivors shrieked and cried while people ripped benches from buildings to use as stretchers. The police chief in Karbala said the suicide vest had contained at least 15 pounds of high explosives and was studded with ball bearings that shot through the crowd to maximize the slaughter. Health officials said the dead included Iranian visitors and a 3-month-old baby, and that at least 63 people had been wounded. Forty minutes later, a bomber in Ramadi waded into a crowd of about 1,000 men and ignited a suicide vest as the men waited to be interviewed for jobs as policemen. The blast killed more than 50 and wounded at least 60, according to Dr. Amar al-Rawi, who works at the main hospital in Ramadi, a Sunni Arab insurgent hotbed west of Falluja. A firefighter, Maan Abdul-Jabbar, said that he had helped load at least 40 bodies into trucks and that survivors had recalled hearing two blasts. A Los Angeles Times reporter embedded with the military in Ramadi said two Americans - a marine and a soldier - had also died in the attack, and quoted an American commander who put the death toll at about 70. Amid the recent surge in violence, Lt. Gen. John R. Vines, the senior American operational commander in Iraq, has expressed concern that growing sectarian rifts in Iraq could compromise the government and security forces. The brutal assaults of the past two days, including a suicide bombing that killed more than 30 Shiite mourners at a funeral in Miqdadiya on Wednesday, have killed almost 200 people. And they have thrust the country back into an atmosphere of violence not seen since the car-bomb massacre of Shiite day laborers in Baghdad in September. Unlike that attack and the killings in Miqdadiya, Thursday's bombings successfully struck better-guarded areas. Though no group claimed responsibility for the new attacks, the top American intelligence officer here, Maj. Gen. Richard Zahner, said in an e-mail message that suspicion was focusing on foreign fighters organized by the terrorist groups Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia or Ansar al-Sunna. In recent days, overtures by the largest Sunni Arab party to join political negotiations with Shiite and Kurdish leaders have brought hope for forming a new coalition government that could help deflate the insurgency. The interlude of relative calm surrounding the elections on Dec. 15 has been at least partly attributed to efforts by some Iraqi insurgents, as opposed to Qaeda fighters, to not attack Sunni voters in hopes of Sunni parties' gaining more power in the soon-to-be-formed government. But hours after Thursday's bombings, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the head of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, accused both Sunni Arab political parties and the United States of responsibility for the last two days of massacres. Sunni Arab groups that have warned of potential civil war "bear the responsibility for every drop of blood that was shed," said Mr. Hakim, whose party is allied with Iran and is the most influential group in the governing Shiite coalition. He said "pressure" from American forces had impeded the Interior and Defense Ministries from "doing their job chasing terrorists and maintaining the souls of innocent Iraqi people." "We're laying the responsibility for the blood of innocents shed in the past few days on the multinational forces and the political powers that declared publicly their support for terrorism," he said. "Our people will not be patient for much longer with these dirty sectarian crimes." As evidence has mounted that Iraqi security forces under the command of Shiite leaders have carried out a program of torture and assassination of Sunni Arabs, American commanders have sought to rein them in. For Sunni Arabs, a particular concern has been the Interior Ministry, controlled by Bayan Jabr, a former Shiite militia leader. He has denied accusations of the killing and torture of Sunnis, but American soldiers have raided jails under his control and found Sunni inmates showing clear signs of abuse. On Tuesday, insurgents kidnapped Mr. Jabr's sister in what was widely seen as retaliation for abuses by security forces, prompting a huge search effort throughout Baghdad. Some Sunni Arab political groups, including the Iraqi Islamic Party, were quick to condemn the Karbala and Ramadi bombings on Thursday. President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, vowed that "these groups of dark terror will not succeed through these cowardly acts in dissuading Iraqis in their bid to form a government of national unity." In recent weeks, American military officials had noted a decline in mass-casualty bombings. Still, "the enemy retains the ability to be extremely dangerous," General Vines said Thursday, adding that "many attacks are relatively ineffective" efforts by "thugs" linked to the former regime of Saddam Hussein. On the other hand, Qaeda terrorists "tend to be more focused and lethal to include the use of suicide bombers," he said. "We have seen some of that as recently as today." General Zahner described the attacks in Karbala, Ramadi, and Miqdadiya as "small numbers but large impact against soft targets designed to generate sectarian violence." Referring to information operations, the military's shorthand jargon for propaganda, he added, "This is their effort to regain the I.O. momentum in the wake of an ineffective effort to derail the elections." Posted by: Dan Darling 2006-01-06 |
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