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July 9, 2007
Around 150, Death Toll in Iraq Attack Among War's Worst
By STEPHEN FARRELL
BAGHDAD, July 8 - The death toll from a suicide truck bombing in a remote
village in northern Iraq rose to around 150 on Sunday, making it one of the
deadliest single bombings, if not the deadliest, since the 2003 invasion.
The attack, in the impoverished Shiite Turkmen village of Amerli, 100 miles
north of Baghdad in Salahuddin Province, has highlighted fears that Sunni
insurgents facing military crackdowns in Baghdad and Diyala Province are
simply directing their attacks to areas outside the concentration of
American troops.
The police in Amerli said that the truck used in Saturday's attack concealed
4.5 tons of explosives beneath watermelons. The blast leveled dozens of
houses and shops, trapping and killing many residents beneath the rubble.
Casualty counts conflicted. Some officials put the toll between 130 and 150,
but Col. Abbas Mohammed Ameen, the police commander of Tuz Khurmato, a town
about 15 miles away, said the toll was 155 dead and 265 wounded.
If that is correct, the Amerli attack would be the single worst bombing in
the war, deadlier than the March truck bombing in Tal Afar that killed 152
people.
Tahsin Kahea, a member of the provincial council and a prominent member of
the Turkmen community, said he believed that the insurgent group Al Qaeda in
Mesopotamia and religious extremists had "started to attack the Shiite towns
outside the main cities after they have been suffocated in Baghdad and
Diyala."
"This happened previously in Daquq, Tal Afar and Bashir, and now in Amerli,"
he said.
The American ambassador, Ryan C. Crocker, and Gen. David H. Petraeus,
commander of the American forces in Iraq, issued a joint statement on Sunday
in which they condemned the attack, praised the Iraqi security and emergency
services, and promised to help the investigation. "We send our thoughts and
prayers to the victims' families and those injured," the statement said.
"This attack is another sad example of the nature of the enemy and their use
of indiscriminate violence to kill innocent citizens."
Near the town of Haswa, about 30 miles west of Baghdad, another suicide
truck bomber killed more than 20 new Iraqi Army recruits and wounded 27
others on Sunday, Iraqi security officials said.
They said the recruits were killed as they were being driven to a
recruitment center in Baghdad from Anbar Province. They were joining the
Iraqi security forces as part of a drive by Sunni tribal leaders to fight
the insurgent group Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, which had seized control of
some areas of the overwhelmingly Sunni province.
Two nearly simultaneous car-bomb blasts on Sunday in the eastern Baghdad
neighborhood of Karrada killed at least eight Iraqis and wounded 12, the
United States military said.
On the outskirts of Amerli on Sunday, fluttering black flags bore the names
of the dead - in some cases more than half a dozen from a single family.
In the middle of the sprawl of rubble that was once the town center, a
12-foot crater gaped. Villagers said 50 houses and 55 shops had been
destroyed and scores more badly damaged, with debris piled alongside
shattered buildings - a testament to where rescuers, their efforts now
ended, had tried to dig out survivors. The town has been cut off from
electricity and water since the blast.
The village's medical services - one small treatment center - were
immediately overwhelmed after the attack, and many of the wounded were sent
to Tuz Khurmato, Kirkuk and Sulaimaniya. Some were even flown to Turkey.
The governor of Salahuddin Province, Hamed Hamoud, arrived along with his
police commander to console residents on Sunday. But the villagers refused
to meet with them, instead throwing stones and cursing them for failing to
protect Amerli.
As he arrived at work in Amerli on Sunday, Imad Abdul Hussein, a policeman,
said: "I came to do my job and to take revenge for my uncle killed
yesterday. We will fight Al Qaeda organization to the last drop of our
blood; we will destroy them or they will destroy us."
No group claimed immediate responsibility for the attack, but Abu Omar
al-Baghdadi, leader of the jihadist group Islamic State in Iraq, issued an
audiotape warning Iran to stop supporting Iraq's Shiites. The tape, posted
on a Web site, said, "We are giving the Persians, and especially the rulers
of Iran, a two-month period to end all kinds of support for the Iraqi Shiite
government and to stop direct and indirect intervention." He added,
"Otherwise, a severe war is waiting for you."
The attack on Amerli came 12 hours after a blast in a Shiite-dominated
farming district in neighboring Diyala Province, close to the Iranian
border. That attack, in Zakoosh, killed 17 people, and came as further
evidence of the bombers' ability to attack outside Baghdad and Baquba, where
tens of thousands of American troops have been waging an offensive to reduce
insurgent activity.
American commanders conceded that 80 percent of the insurgents' leadership
in Baquba evaded the siege and are thought to have escaped the city.
It is rare for insurgents to mount such large attacks in remote villages
like Amerli, often preferring to strike in crowded city centers and at
religious sites and Iraqi security forces. But since the start of the
Baghdad security plan in February, they have frequently struck outside the
capital within major cities or targets that are less well defended.
In May, for instance, two truck-bomb attacks in the Kurdish region -
including one in the center of Erbil - killed at least 69 people. In April,
two suicide car bombings about two weeks apart killed 42 and 71 people well
south of the capital, near Shiite shrines in the holy city of Karbala. A
month earlier a double car bombing in the Shiite town of Hilla killed 90
pilgrims, with 28 more killed elsewhere on the same day.
All these bombings came after the Feb. 14 start of the new Baghdad security
plan, which brought tens of thousands more American troops into the city as
part of the latest crackdown aimed at restoring order to the capital.
Around 150, Death Toll in Iraq Attack Among War's Worst
By STEPHEN FARRELL
BAGHDAD, July 8 - The death toll from a suicide truck bombing in a remote
village in northern Iraq rose to around 150 on Sunday, making it one of the
deadliest single bombings, if not the deadliest, since the 2003 invasion.
The attack, in the impoverished Shiite Turkmen village of Amerli, 100 miles
north of Baghdad in Salahuddin Province, has highlighted fears that Sunni
insurgents facing military crackdowns in Baghdad and Diyala Province are
simply directing their attacks to areas outside the concentration of
American troops.
The police in Amerli said that the truck used in Saturday's attack concealed
4.5 tons of explosives beneath watermelons. The blast leveled dozens of
houses and shops, trapping and killing many residents beneath the rubble.
Casualty counts conflicted. Some officials put the toll between 130 and 150,
but Col. Abbas Mohammed Ameen, the police commander of Tuz Khurmato, a town
about 15 miles away, said the toll was 155 dead and 265 wounded.
If that is correct, the Amerli attack would be the single worst bombing in
the war, deadlier than the March truck bombing in Tal Afar that killed 152
people.
Tahsin Kahea, a member of the provincial council and a prominent member of
the Turkmen community, said he believed that the insurgent group Al Qaeda in
Mesopotamia and religious extremists had "started to attack the Shiite towns
outside the main cities after they have been suffocated in Baghdad and
Diyala."
"This happened previously in Daquq, Tal Afar and Bashir, and now in Amerli,"
he said.
The American ambassador, Ryan C. Crocker, and Gen. David H. Petraeus,
commander of the American forces in Iraq, issued a joint statement on Sunday
in which they condemned the attack, praised the Iraqi security and emergency
services, and promised to help the investigation. "We send our thoughts and
prayers to the victims' families and those injured," the statement said.
"This attack is another sad example of the nature of the enemy and their use
of indiscriminate violence to kill innocent citizens."
Near the town of Haswa, about 30 miles west of Baghdad, another suicide
truck bomber killed more than 20 new Iraqi Army recruits and wounded 27
others on Sunday, Iraqi security officials said.
They said the recruits were killed as they were being driven to a
recruitment center in Baghdad from Anbar Province. They were joining the
Iraqi security forces as part of a drive by Sunni tribal leaders to fight
the insurgent group Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, which had seized control of
some areas of the overwhelmingly Sunni province.
Two nearly simultaneous car-bomb blasts on Sunday in the eastern Baghdad
neighborhood of Karrada killed at least eight Iraqis and wounded 12, the
United States military said.
On the outskirts of Amerli on Sunday, fluttering black flags bore the names
of the dead - in some cases more than half a dozen from a single family.
In the middle of the sprawl of rubble that was once the town center, a
12-foot crater gaped. Villagers said 50 houses and 55 shops had been
destroyed and scores more badly damaged, with debris piled alongside
shattered buildings - a testament to where rescuers, their efforts now
ended, had tried to dig out survivors. The town has been cut off from
electricity and water since the blast.
The village's medical services - one small treatment center - were
immediately overwhelmed after the attack, and many of the wounded were sent
to Tuz Khurmato, Kirkuk and Sulaimaniya. Some were even flown to Turkey.
The governor of Salahuddin Province, Hamed Hamoud, arrived along with his
police commander to console residents on Sunday. But the villagers refused
to meet with them, instead throwing stones and cursing them for failing to
protect Amerli.
As he arrived at work in Amerli on Sunday, Imad Abdul Hussein, a policeman,
said: "I came to do my job and to take revenge for my uncle killed
yesterday. We will fight Al Qaeda organization to the last drop of our
blood; we will destroy them or they will destroy us."
No group claimed immediate responsibility for the attack, but Abu Omar
al-Baghdadi, leader of the jihadist group Islamic State in Iraq, issued an
audiotape warning Iran to stop supporting Iraq's Shiites. The tape, posted
on a Web site, said, "We are giving the Persians, and especially the rulers
of Iran, a two-month period to end all kinds of support for the Iraqi Shiite
government and to stop direct and indirect intervention." He added,
"Otherwise, a severe war is waiting for you."
The attack on Amerli came 12 hours after a blast in a Shiite-dominated
farming district in neighboring Diyala Province, close to the Iranian
border. That attack, in Zakoosh, killed 17 people, and came as further
evidence of the bombers' ability to attack outside Baghdad and Baquba, where
tens of thousands of American troops have been waging an offensive to reduce
insurgent activity.
American commanders conceded that 80 percent of the insurgents' leadership
in Baquba evaded the siege and are thought to have escaped the city.
It is rare for insurgents to mount such large attacks in remote villages
like Amerli, often preferring to strike in crowded city centers and at
religious sites and Iraqi security forces. But since the start of the
Baghdad security plan in February, they have frequently struck outside the
capital within major cities or targets that are less well defended.
In May, for instance, two truck-bomb attacks in the Kurdish region -
including one in the center of Erbil - killed at least 69 people. In April,
two suicide car bombings about two weeks apart killed 42 and 71 people well
south of the capital, near Shiite shrines in the holy city of Karbala. A
month earlier a double car bombing in the Shiite town of Hilla killed 90
pilgrims, with 28 more killed elsewhere on the same day.
All these bombings came after the Feb. 14 start of the new Baghdad security
plan, which brought tens of thousands more American troops into the city as
part of the latest crackdown aimed at restoring order to the capital.
