Attack on Baghdad Shiite Slum Kills 44

[maddezmom]

BAGHDAD, Iraq - The feared resumption of mass sectarian violence erupted Sunday in a Baghdad Shiite slum when bombers blew apart two markets shortly before sundown, killing at least 44 people and wounding about 200.

The bloody assaults on Sadr City came only minutes after Iraqi political leaders said the new parliament will convene Thursday, three days earlier than planned, as the U.S. ambassador pushed to break a stalemate over naming a unity government.

The attackers struck with car bombs, including a suicide driver, and mortars at the peak shopping time, destroying dozens of market stalls and vehicles as the explosives ripped through the poor neighborhood as residents were buying food for their evening meals.

The neighborhood was quickly sealed off by Mahdi Army militiamen of radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr amid pandemonium as residents searched wildly for survivors and put charred corpses into ambulances and trucks to be taken away.

more:http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060312/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq;_

[psychopomp]

1. I wonder how much longer Sadr will hold back

Even though he knows he is being pushed into a Shia-Sunni war by dark actors, he must realize that there is a limit to how much the people will put up with before they demand an organized resonse.

The result will be a political severence from the Sunni provences.

[ConcernedCanuk]

2. "bloody assaults on Sadr City" - gee could the PNACers have done this??

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I see 2 solutions available to prevent Iraq from destabilizing further

Sadr rules the country, or Saddam

USA hasn't done shit to make Iraq "better"

But the USA hasn't spent billions to put Military bases in Iraq for naught . . .

USA has no intention of leaving

(sigh)

[NoGOP]

3. I wonder how long the administration will keep denying......

Iraq is exploding into a civil war?

[bemildred]

4. Mr. al Sadr seems to have made some enemies.

I wonder what he's going to do about it?