BAGHDAD — It’s been a season of jarring flashbacks in Iraq: a spate of major suicide bombings, including more than 145 dead over two days of bloodshed capped by a blast Friday outside a Shiite shrine.
The spike in attacks since March suggests suspected Sunni insurgents are still capable of striking back hard and recruiting fighters even as the Pentagon increasingly shifts its attention to Afghanistan.
The violence also brings wider questions about the ability of Iraqi security forces to control a resilient insurgency led by al-Qaida in Iraq and how that could influence the U.S. military withdrawal timetable — the next step calls for American forces to leave bases inside cities by the end of June.
In Washington, Gen. David Petraeus told a House panel that attacks in Iraq will persist for some time. He said some of the suicide bombers may be linked to militants from Tunisia brought in to replace dwindling ranks of Iraqis willing to carry out such attacks.
On Friday, at least 60 worshippers were killed in twin suicide bombings at Baghdad’s most important Shiite shrine. A day earlier — the bloodiest single day in Iraq in more than a year — at least 88 people died in suicide blasts in central Baghdad and at a restaurant filled with Iranian pilgrims north of the capital.
by the associated press
The spike in attacks since March suggests suspected Sunni insurgents are still capable of striking back hard and recruiting fighters even as the Pentagon increasingly shifts its attention to Afghanistan.
The violence also brings wider questions about the ability of Iraqi security forces to control a resilient insurgency led by al-Qaida in Iraq and how that could influence the U.S. military withdrawal timetable — the next step calls for American forces to leave bases inside cities by the end of June.
In Washington, Gen. David Petraeus told a House panel that attacks in Iraq will persist for some time. He said some of the suicide bombers may be linked to militants from Tunisia brought in to replace dwindling ranks of Iraqis willing to carry out such attacks.
On Friday, at least 60 worshippers were killed in twin suicide bombings at Baghdad’s most important Shiite shrine. A day earlier — the bloodiest single day in Iraq in more than a year — at least 88 people died in suicide blasts in central Baghdad and at a restaurant filled with Iranian pilgrims north of the capital.
by the associated press
