Posted on 02/02/2008 11:48:52 AM PST by NormsRevenge
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's prime minister vowed on Saturday that attacks by two female bombers which killed 99 people in Baghdad would not derail improved security, but angry residents demanded the government do more to protect them.
Nuri al-Maliki said Friday's nearly simultaneous bombings at two crowded pet markets, the deadliest attacks in the city since April, would not herald a return to the savage violence that took Iraq to the brink of sectarian civil war.
The U.S. military said there were indications the women were mentally handicapped, and probably unaware they were being used as human bombs. It blamed Sunni Islamist al Qaeda for the attacks.
"I swear on the blood (of the victims), we will achieve all our goals in securing a stable Iraq. We will continue to ... crush the terrorists and target their strongholds," Maliki said in a statement.
Highlighting that Iraq faced serious security challenges across the nation, Maliki went to the northern city of Mosul and said a vital offensive was about to begin there after attacks that were also blamed on al Qaeda.
"The battle that our armed forces will engage in will tear out terrorism, criminal gangs and outlaws in this province," Maliki said of operations in Mosul, where a blast on January 23 killed up to 50 people and wounded 220.
The attack at the Ghazil pet market in central Baghdad on Friday killed 62 people and wounded 129, just minutes after another blast killed 37 and wounded 67 at a bird market in southern Baghdad, police said.
Iraq's military said the bombs were detonated by remote control. Major-General Jeffery Hammond, the commander of U.S. troops in Baghdad, told reporters there were indications the two women were mentally impaired.
"It appears the suicide bombers were not willing martyrs, they were used by al Qaeda for these horrific attacks," he said.
Al Qaeda in Iraq, blamed by the U.S. military for most other large-scale bombings, has increasingly used women wearing suicide vests to carry out strikes after increased security and protective concrete walls made car bombings more difficult.
Hammond suggested using unwitting bombers could be a new tactic to circumvent tougher security measures.
"These two women were likely used because they didn't understand what was happening and they were less likely to be searched," he said.
GRIEF AND ANGER
As grieving relatives buried the dead, some Iraqis said the government was partly to blame.
"The two coordinated bombings proved the failure of government in maintaining peace in Baghdad," said teacher Basim Abdul-Ameer, 30, whose brother was wounded at the Ghazil market.
Friday's death toll was the worst in Baghdad since April 18, when multiple car bombings killed 191 people around the city.
The scale of the devastation seems to have shattered growing confidence among Iraqis that their streets were getting safer.
The Ghazil market, which opens only on Friday, sprawls into side streets and is difficult to secure. Local police said they would take steps to surround it with protective walls.
Ra'eed Hussain, 34, who normally takes his young son there, said he would not return until security improved.
"We need really thorough checks, especially of women wearing black abayas who could hide something underneath," said Hussain, referring to black robes that many older women in Iraq wear.
The attacks raise questions for the U.S. military, which has begun to reduce troop levels following a big drop in violence.
Attacks have fallen by 60 percent across Iraq since last June when 30,000 extra U.S. troops became fully deployed.
Troop levels will fall to around 135,000 by the middle of the year when more than 20,000 combat soldiers are withdrawn.
A group of US Army soldiers from the 1st Cavalry Division walk past concertina wire in the late afternoon at camp Black Jack near Baghdad, in 2004. In its ideological struggle against Al-Qaeda, American anti-terrorist strategy too often overlooks the basic tenets of the infamous Chinese warlord Sun Tzu, namely: know your enemy. (AFP/File/Roberto Schmidt)
The terrorists have made another crucial mistake. This kind of thing turns public opinion and unites people regardless of stripe against them. This was a horrible attack but it is also something that will push Iraq further towards stability in the end. Not even the liberal press here can spin such an ugly attack.
The lengths these maniacs will go to never cease to amaze and sicken me.
Any Democrats want to talk about this one?
Nope that is the Democrat way.
If the facts do not fit their template then ignore the facts and pretend they do not exist.
LA, LA, LA, I can’t hear you. LA, LA, LA
I believe that now that the Iraqi government and military have decided to address the terrorist problem, and with the success of the US military’s surge, that total victory in Iraq is not far away. We will probably see the terrorists defeated this summer.
I think you’re a little optimistic on the timeline (Whoops! Did I use the “T” word?!?).
But no group of sane human beings can tolerate this. Now if they would only form a group...
We're seeing the beginning of their defeat now. Yesterday's horrible bombings were clearly an act of desperation. Using women with Down's Syndrome who thought they were going to look at pets as bombers...those poor women had no idea what was going on. And all of those innocent victims...
I haven't seen an event anger and sadden the Iraqis (and Americans here as well) as much as this one has in a very long time.
This was a sick, horrid, devastating act, but it will backfire on the terrorists.
Woooo-hooooo! Go get ‘em, Iraq!!
What idiot said the above?
Our enemy is defeated. That he can lash out in a few cruel ways in no way reverses this defeat.
Each month, there are fewer attacks inside Iraq. Online terrorist forums decry the loss of Al Qaeda's last bastion inside Baghdad, and focus their rhetoric on non-Iraqi areas now such as Algeria and Morroco.
after the terrorist enabler Nasty Pelosi’s latest remarks, alQ figured the time was ripe for another atrocity!
They’ll never get away with “crushing” terrorists if McCain is President. He’ll make any further aid to them conditional on their being nice to terrorists and giving tehm trials.
“...but angry residents demanded the government do more to protect them...”
Mmmm, democracy seems to be working...
You want me to send my remaining son over there to help protect you? Or maybe send me a ticket, and I’ll come over and show you how to skin animals.
These souls have come from HELL and must be sent back by any possible means.
” but angry residents demanded the government do more to protect them....some Iraqis said the government was partly to blame”
Ah good old Reuters. Always blaming either the U.S. or the pro-western Bagdad government. But never blame the terrorists.
Yep. You and I might look like raving war mongers, but I have no tolerance for people who cannot recognize the necessity to defeat evil.
sure. i’m a democrat. and i am for the war. your generalizations are part of the problem. we need to win in iraq and iran and in pakistan. now more than ever. we need to deal with foreign countries as burgeoning democracies and deal with them when they offer the basic human rights as we do... freedoms defined in a secular constitution. this is a top down problem.
teeman
ibelieve the remark was intended for the al qaeda... they neglected to know the us soldier...
teeman
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