Man that's aweful. There are some seriously disturbed people out there. Attacks in Iraq kill at least 152 Associated Press RESOURCES Current time in Baghdad: 8:06 p.m. Wednesday BAGHDAD, Iraq — More than a dozen explosions ripped through the Iraqi capital in rapid succession today, killing at least 152 people and wounding 542 in a series of attacks that began with a suicide car bombing that targeted laborers assembled to find work for the day. Al-Qaida in Iraq claimed responsibility. The one-day death toll was believed to be the worst in the capital since major combat ended in May 2003, and Al-Jazeera said Al-Qaida in Iraq linked the attacks to the recent killing of about 200 militants from the city of Tal Afar by U.S. and Iraqi forces. Before dawn today, 17 men were killed by insurgents in the village of Taji north of Baghdad, which pushed the death toll in all violence in and around the capital to 169. Today's worst bombing killed at least 88 people and wounded 227 in the heavily Shiite neighborhood of Kazimiyah where the day laborers had gathered shortly after dawn. The carnage was the worst single day of bloodshed since March 2, 2004, when coordinated blasts from suicide bombers, mortars and planted explosives hit Shiite Muslim shrines in Karbala and in Baghdad, killing at least 181 and wounding 573. The blasts coincided with Iraqi lawmakers announcing the country's draft constitution was in its final form and would be sent to the United Nations for printing and distribution ahead of an Oct. 15 national referendum. Sunni Muslims, who form up the core of the insurgency, have vowed to defeat the basic law. At Baghdad's Kazimiyah Hospital, dozens of wounded men lay on stretchers and gurneys, their bandages and clothes soaked in blood. One older man in a traditional Arab gown and checkered head scarf sat in a plastic chair, his blood-soaked underwear exposed with a trail of dried blood snaking down his legs. The hospital received 47 dead and 75 wounded, said Dr. Qays Abdel-Wahab al-Bustani. In Kazimiyah's Oruba Square, twisted hulks of vehicles blocked the main street after the suicide attacker drove a small van into the midst of the assembling laborers. Politicians denounced the attack, with Husein al-Shahristani, deputy speaker of the National Assembly, calling it "barbaric and gruesome." The Kazimiyah district also was the site of a bridge stampede involving tens of thousands of Shiite pilgrims on Aug. 31 that killed 950 people. In the pre-dawn attack in the Sunni village of Taji, about 10 miles north of Baghdad, the 17 men were handcuffed, blindfolded and shot to death by gunmen wearing military uniforms who had searched the area, said police Lt. Waleed al-Hayali. The dead included one policeman and others who worked as drivers and construction workers for the U.S. military, said al-Hayali. Most of the violence, however, was concentrated in and around the capital. U.S. forces were the targets of at least three of the attacks. In the most serious, an American military convoy was hit by a car bomb in eastern Baghdad, wounding two U.S. soldiers, the military said. Hours later, in the northern district of Azimiyah, gunmen opened fire on a police car, killing two top police officials and two officers. Three Iraqi soldiers and four policemen died when a suicide car bomber struck as rescuers arrived to help, said police Capt. Nabil Abdul Kadir. Another car bomb exploded alongside an Iraqi National Guard convoy in the northern Baghdad district of Shula, killing at least two people, authorities said. A suicide car bomber attacked a U.S. convoy in central Baghdad, just a few hundred yards outside the northern border of the heavily fortified Green Zone, police said. An exchange of heavy machine gun fire rattled for about 10 minutes after that blast, which injured 14 Iraqi police officers and sent columns of black smoke billowing over the city. It was not clear if there were an U.S. casualties. With the constitution finally going to the printers for distribution ahead of the Oct. 15 referendum, Hussein Al-Shahristani, a leading Shiite lawmaker, said the latest changes included an apparent bow to demands from the Arab League that the country be described as a founding member of the 22-member pan-Arab body and that it was "committed to its charter." But that amended clause falls short of demands by Sunnis, who wanted the country's Arab identity clearly spelled and mentions of federalism be struck from the document. They argue such language could ultimately lead to the disintegration of the multiethnic nation. Still, the changes were significant after weeks of discussions on the draft. They included clarifying that water resource management was the federal government's responsibility and that the prime minister would have two deputies in the Cabinet. U.S. and Iraqi forces continued their offensive on insurgents in Tal Afar and along the Euphrates River valley to the south, striking hard at what officials have said were militants sneaking across the border from Syria. Today, two Iraqi troops were seriously wounded in an explosion as they entered a house in Tal Afar that had been previously cleared of threats, authorities said. Also, fierce fighting broke out between suspected militants and Iraqi forces in the Tal Afar district of Kadisiyah. That operation was a continuation of an almost 2-week-old offensive in the insurgent-plagued city that killed about 200 militants over the past few days and captured hundreds more. Troops also found large swaths of the city abandoned by militants who fled in underground tunnels. Iraq's defense minister earlier this week pledged to clear the towns along the Iraqi border with Syria, from where officials say the militants sneak in unfettered. On Tuesday, U.S. forces launched an attack on the Euphrates River stronghold of Haditha, and residents reported American air strikes in the same region near Qaim, also along the Syrian border. In other violence today: — A mortar shell landed on a civilian vehicle in eastern Baghdad, killing the driver, police said. — Gunmen shot to death an Iraqi army officer and wounded a man nearby in the southern Dora district of Baghdad, police Capt. Firas Qity said. — Gunmen killed a police officer in Rumatha, about 217 miles south of Baghdad. http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/printstory.mpl/topstory2/3353212 Chron.com has videos about it.
I'm not one that believes we need to pull out right away, but we do need to change what we are doing. We aren't doing anything different, and we aren't gaining control. This won't stop until we make some changes. If we are over there to just keep doing the same thing over and over again, then we should get out. If we are over there to actually win, then we need to get some help, get in there and secure the place. We don't control diddly over there, and nobody seems to be making a change in plans. It is frustrating and it is wasting human life.
We sure as hell arent protecting the Iraqi innocent civillians from the wrath of AlQaeda. Atleast with Saddam they had some sort of protection and safety. Now its just anarchy.
We is winnin tha war!! We winnin tha war out there! Let the good times roll!! Yeeeeeeeehawwwwwww!!!!!!!!!
over our news service at work they just said some al queda website said al zarcharwi (sp?) has declared war on the shiites
You will never be able to stop someone from filling a van with explosives, telling a large crowd to come over as there is work to offer, and then blowing them all up. This could happen anywhere...anytime. The difference is Al Qaeda are the only sicko individual idiot nitwits who are capable of such low-life actions. They will justify this as revenge but they actually killed all civilians. This does nothing to help Al Qaeda's cause...only to strengthen the resolve against them. This is an act of desperation on the part of a bunch of losers. They want to say "we're still in the fight" but it's clear they are on the sidelines of the fight only. They will hide, plant their roadside bombs, blow up cars, and do anything but face their enemy head-on...cause they know they will lose a head-on fight. They will do this because of the brainwashing of going to paradise to get their virgins. The fact is if we stopped operations in Tal Afar or whereever they are getting sniffed out of...they would still do something like this. They will do something like this when we are long gone as well even when Iraq is under its own control. Why? Because they will say it is a puppet US government. If Al Qaeda is not in control, then they will claim it is illegitimate. This sick act changes nothing...other than the lives of innocent Muslims who they claim to be on the side of. What's the justification? We killed all these innocents looking for work? Why was that? It's so twisted...it's hard to believe.
I guess it is true that Zarqawi did indeed declare war on all Shiites. I hope this leads to the end of him...once and for all...the sick b*stard. Of course, he's probably running the show in Syria...who by all accounts supports the insurgency and lets them operate freely flying into their airport and crossing over with ease.
This is yet another example of why you don't start preemptive wars under international law. The dogs of war lead to unpredicictable but frequent deaths. This is why the great majority of the world's religions found the war to be unjust except for certain evangelicals and Baptists in the US, which function practically as arms of the GOP in politicla matters.
Well, it's been said before and it could be said again that the only way these people can be controlled over there is via brutal dictator with a legion of secret police who can whisk anyone away for any reason and torture/bind/kill them to silence whatever it was they were doing to create dissent. What we have possibly seen is, without that strict control, "some" of these people or groups on what they perceive as the losing end descend off into the ways of anarchy that basically has no limits. All these dang religious factions who follow their own sets of clerics and so forth...then spin off into their violent ways. How do you control such a mess? The Iraqi government and US certainly don't have the answers as of yet.
There is no organization known as Al Qaeda or the Arabic translation of "the base". Osama is merely a philanthropist of his militant brand of Islam. Remember the CNN footage from the end of the 90s? The men who were supposedly training were paid for the day to show up. The guns were brought from home, remember Afghanistan had a long war of attrition with the former USSR and an active civil war. Money could only be traced to Osama, he did little to none of the planning for the attacks he is accredited. During the months following 9/11, the Defense Department tried to sell us this idea that Osama had a huge following and a massive defensive structure in the mountians of Tora Bora. All marines and journalists who were in the region can attest there was nothing of this magnitude. There were caches; however, they were either small or remnants of the wars in the 80s. Our actions are actually creating an Al Qaeda, though. Many Muslims in the west feel disconnected from the Islam of their fathers. They see these atrocities which are accredited to the United States, the UK, and Israel, and want to revenge them because they have no identity.
Um..ok Anyways, Iraq is going to hell, or rather it's already in hell. There will be no Iraq anymore, it will just break down to 3 different unstable states and that will be that. It will only serve to destabilize the region even further and always be a source of terrorism/violence. Let me repeat a question I have asked before: Did Saddam rule Iraq with an iron fist because he was a 'tyrant' or was it because Iraq created/necitated Saddam to be who he was? In other words, did Iraq create Saddam? Will the current Iraq and Iraqis in the near future choose another heavy-handed leader to rule their country and restore some semblence of normalcy/security? THIS is why Bush Sr. didn't invade Iraq, for those who are still wondering...
