Sadr's ministers will quit the Iraqi coalition government today. Can Bush’s precious Oil Law, a major hidden priority of pushing the “surge” plan on Iraq, be passed? Unlikely with crippled ministres and these conditions in the streets:
Bodies littered the street and body parts were found as far as 160 yards from the site of the explosion. Three buses of passengers were charred and storefronts lay in shambles.
At least 167 people were injured in the bombing, but the death toll was expected to increase because of still-unidentified bodies and serious injuries, said Saleem Kadhim, spokesman for the Karbala health directorate.
As police and ambulances approached to carry away victims, angry residents shot at them, witnesses said. The police responded, firing bullets into the air to dissipate the angry crowd. As the bullets rained down, a child and elderly man were killed, witnesses said.
In Baghdad, the city was alive with mortar rounds, assassinations, gunfights and roadside bombs. At least 20 corpses, telling of sectarian violence, were reported. In the central city a car bomb detonated near Jadriyah bridge, a main thoroughfare, killing 8 and wounding 11.
Also Saturday the Islamic State of Iraq, a Sunni insurgent umbrella group dominated by al-Qaida, claimed it had kidnapped 20 Ministry of Interior employees in northeast Baghdad. A picture was posted with uniformed men in blindfolds.
They demanded the release of Sunnis from interior ministry prisoners and the officers who participated in the alleged rape of a woman in February.
In Karbala, a mob of hundreds of people let out collective frustration pelting police cars and ambulances with stones, rocking the cars.
Karim Hussein, 43, wept as he held his two dead sons. “Death to the governor,” he shouted. “I can’t understand. How did a car bomb get here to kill these people?”
An old man combed through the rubble searching for his wife.
“I can’t find her,” he cried. “I can’t find her.”
The angry crowd chanted “Betrayers,” in between outbursts of “Muqtada, Muqtada,” invoking the anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
The centerpiece of the Bush-Petraeus "surge" plan is the fortified Iraqi police stations in Baghdad staffed with new joint postings of US and Iraqi troops. They're supposed to "eat, drink and sleep together," and this has been hailed as Petraeus' vaunted "classic counterinsurgency technique." Networks have done one hopeful piece after another about this key tactic. But today:
And in a rare gesture of dissent from America's partners in Baghdad, dozens of Iraqi policemen demonstrated in front of their station, accusing U.S. troops of treating them like "animals" and "slaves."
"Seems a setback," really? 289 dead on Saturday, 50 at least on Sunday doesn't look so good? Somebody warn John McCain.
By the way, the collapse of the Bush-Petraeus "Fort Apache" police station plan could have been foreseen earlier if CBS wouldn't force its best reporters to use blogs to relate prophetic, key news stories, keeping their scoops off the air.
Once inside the walls of the fortified police station of their students and supposed allies, no American soldier took off a single piece of protective gear. American sentries backed up the Iraqis on the gate and roof. Humvee drivers stayed with their vehicles.
A young sergeant was assigned to accompany myself and cameraman Mark LaGanga wherever we went. When I suggested that it was fine and the sergeant could take a break, he replied quietly; "No sir. I need to be with you. Wouldn't want to take the risk of you being kidnapped."
"In a police station?" I asked. "You're kidding."
"No sir," he replied, "I am not."
Let's send Katie Couric to Baghdad right now so this guy can give her a tour.