Many kneeling in prayer, Shiite Muslims were attacked in their mosques and on the streets Friday on the eve of their holiest day, with five bombings killing 36 people in the deadliest day in Iraq since the Jan. 30 national elections.
There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the blasts — three of them suicide attacks — in Baghdad and Iskandariyah, south of the capital. But Shiites blamed radical Sunni Muslim insurgents,
[Note: Al-Presseera is still calling the killers "insurgents."--Jen]
who have staged car bombs, shootings and kidnappings to try to destabilize Iraq's reconstruction.
"Those infidel Wahhabis, those Usama bin Laden followers, they did this because they hate Shiites," said Sari Abdullah, a worshipper at Baghdad's al-Khadimain mosque who was injured by shrapnel from the explosion. "They are afraid of us. They are not Muslims. They are infidels."
[Mr. Abdullah has it exactly right--this is the Enemy, although the Iranian mullahs are Shi'ites and they also ascribe to this death cult.]
[...]
Mouwaffaq al-Rubaie, the national security adviser for the interim government, accused Jordanian-born terror suspect Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and former Baath party members of trying to provoke a sectarian civil war.
"It's a paradoxical idea when they claim that they are fighting the infidels and at the same time, they kill Muslims during Friday prayers," he said.
He said Shiites, who make up 60 percent of the population, would not call for retaliation against the minority Sunnis who were favored by Saddam Hussein's regime.
I am happy and proud of the people's reactions," al-Rubaie said. "Those who lost their sons and relatives didn't call for retaliation against Sunnis, which reflects their awareness and understanding of what is going on."
[Good for them!
I hope this is more widespread than just these few men quoted.]
Walid Al-Hilly, a leading figure of the Shiite-led Dawa Party, said the attacks would not stop the Shiites from trying to cooperate with Sunnis and other minorities in a new government.
[That's the spirit!]
"They kill unarmed men, women and children who want to glorify the ceremonies of Ashoura. These terrorist actions will not intimidate us nor make us change the way that we choose freedom from tyranny and oppression," he told Al-Jazeera television.
[You know, in that this went out all over the Arab world on Al Jizzeera, I can't help but think that statements like these make quite an impact on the "Arab street.--Jen]
"We chose the path of brotherhood, cooperation and unity between Sunnis, Shiites, Kurds, Shabak, Turkomen and Christians and all other sects."
[...]
Friday's attacks on Shiites began with two suicide bombings outside mosques in predominantly Shiite neighborhoods of Baghdad.
The first explosion at the al-Khadimain mosque killed 15, while the second, at al-Bayaa, took 10 more lives, an official at Baghdad's al-Yarmouk Hospital said on condition of anonymity. The al-Khadimain bombing occurred just outside the entrance to the mosque as people were still inside praying. The al-Bayaa attack also took place outside the mosque, as prayers were about to end.
[Notice how the bad guys refuse to respect the "holy" nature of these mosques, the way our troops do.
And notice also that the MSM doesn't point out the "holiness" of the Muslim sites like they do when our troops are involved.]
Another explosion hit a Shiite religious procession, killing two and injuring five, according to Iraqi police Lt. Waed Hussein. A fourth attack, involving a suicide bomber, struck an Iraqi police and National Guard checkpoint in a Sunni neighborhood, killing at least one policeman.
Later Friday, a car bomb exploded outside a Shiite mosque in Iskandariyah — 30 miles south of the capital — where hundreds had gathered, killing eight people and wounding 10, doctors said.
[...]
A little known insurgent group, the Mujahedeen in Iraq, released a videotape showing two Indonesian journalists who disappeared Feb. 8. The group threatened to kill them if the Indonesian government did not explain why the journalists were in Iraq.
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono appealed for the release of 26-year-old reporter Meutya Viada Hafid and Budiyanto, 36, a cameraman.
Isn't it a strange world where CNN's Eason Jordan can complain that U.S. soldiers were targeting journalists (when they most certainly weren't and wouldn't) and yet men like him never hold the IslamoNazis responsible for their overt targeting of journalists?
Good thing President Bush, 61 million Americans, the Iraqis and the U.S. military don't pay them any mind.
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