Insurgents retaliate
BAGHDAD, September 14 – As dawn arose Baghdad had a rude awakening as the gathering place of day workers was targeted by a huge suicide-bomber. The mass of people gathered there to look for work were struck by a devastating bomb killing at least 88 people instantly and wounding another 227. The havoc then continued to around 4PM, blasts shocked the city and at the end of the afternoon a total of 152 deaths had been confirmed with over 542 wounded.
These attacks have been rated the second-worst since the start of the war in Iraq. U.S. officials immediately assessed that this was a retaliatory strike for the clean-sweep of Tal Afar, an insurgent stronghold and an important point to smuggle in terrorists from Syria. Last week this town was swept completely and thus severely injured the operations that normally took place from this strategic point.
Al Qaeda claimed the bombings not long afterwards, confirming the assessment by the U.S. officials that this was payback for the Tal Afar breakdown. The night before 17 men had been executed in a small village just north of Baghdad.
