Bombing Strikes at Iraqi Sheiks Allied to U.S.

06/25/2007

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By JON ELSEN
NY Times
Published: June 25, 2007


More than 40 people died today in a wave of suicide bombings across Iraq, including an attack on a hotel in Baghdad where a group of sheiks opposed to Al Qaeda was holding a tribal conference.

The bombing at the Mansour Hotel, which is also headquarters to several news organizations, killed 12 people and wounded 18. Members of Anbar Awakening, a group of Sunni tribal leaders and former insurgents opposed to Al Qaeda, were meeting at the hotel at the time of the explosion. The group has joined forces with police units backed by the United States to fight Al Qaeda, prompting a power struggle in the region.

“According to initial reports, six sheiks are among the dead,” Lt. Col. Scott Bleichwehl, an American military spokesman in Baghdad, told Reuters. Also among the dead were Rahim al-Maliki, a noted Iraqi poet, as well as a ministry of defense consultant.

Despite heavy security at the hotel, the suicide bomber, wearing traditional Arab dress, was able to enter the lobby and blow himself up there. Bodies of the dead and wounded were scattered across the lobby, which was strewn with broken glass.

In Baiji, north of Tikrit, 20 people died, including 11 police officers, and 50 more were wounded when a fuel tanker was detonated at a police station, the police said. Buildings and shops nearby collapsed or burned, and 30 cars were damaged. Five American soldiers who shared the post with the Iraqi police had minor wounds, The Associated Press reported, citing the American command.

In the southern, mainly Shiite city of Hilla, a car bomber struck near the police academy’s main gate, killing eight people and wounding 25, an official from the health office in Hilla said. Most of the victims were police academy students scheduled to graduate next week.

A traffic officer who witnessed the attack said “we found many dead bodies and human remains, and we also saw a man and a woman were killed by shrapnel inside a red car that was near the explosion.”

In Mosul, north of Baiji, a car bomb in a residential area killed three and wounded 40, Reuters reported.

Coalition forces announced that during a raid in Mosul today they killed a terrorist leader, Khalid Sultan Khulayf Shakir al-Badrani, also known as Abu Abdullah. He was described as the Al Qaeda in Iraq emir of western Mosul.