Iraq death toll raises new fears

Thursday 10th August 2006

Iraq death toll raises new fears http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Story.asp? Article=152164&Sn=WORL&Issue...

BAGHDAD: More than 2,000 bodies were taken to Baghdad's morgue in July, the highest tally in five months of rising sectarian bloodshed which has forced the US to boost troop levels in the capital to head off a civil war. Morgue assistant manager Doctor Abdul Razzaq Al Obaidi said yesterday that about 90 per cent had died violently.

'Most of the cases have gunshot wounds to the head. Some of them were strangled and others were beaten to death with clubs,' he said.

The grim statistics came as a new poll showed the Iraq war had become more unpopular with Americans and four Iraqis suspected of involvement in the abduction of American journalist Jill Carroll were arrested by coalition forces.

The CNN poll showed that 60pc of Americans were against the US war in Iraq, the highest level of opposition since the 2003 invasion, and a majority would back a partial withdrawal of US forces by year's end.

In Baghdad, five people were killed when gunmen opened fire on a street vendor grilling fish in the western district of Jamiaa, an Interior Ministry source said. Police also found nine bodies of civilians in various parts of the capital.

The July morgue toll of 1,815 marked a big jump over the 1,595 in June and is the largest since the aftermath of the February bombing of the Shi'ite Golden Mosque of Samarra, which triggered an explosion of sectarian violence.

Mounting sectarian violence has prompted the United States to reinforce troop levels in Baghdad, which is regarded as the key to security in the whole country but is increasingly divided along sectarian lines.

About 6,000 additional Iraqi forces and 3,500 US soldiers of the 172nd Striker Brigade combat team are being deployed in the Baghdad area and are expected to start systematically clearing neighbourhoods of militants and insurgents.

US Major General William Caldwell, chief US military spokesman in Iraq, said US and Iraqi forces had conducted operations against 10 death squads throughout Baghdad in the last week, and also found 222 roadside bombs.

Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki has vowed to confront the armed militias, but must tread carefully as some of these groups have close ties to parties in his government.

Maliki said a consensus was building between religious leaders and prominent tribes to condemn the killings, and he was echoed by US Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad.

Killings

Three policemen were killed and another seven wounded when a suicide car bomber rammed his car into a police station in the former tourist area of Habaniya, 85km west of Baghdad.

Five civilians died and 20 were hurt by a rocket attack in Baquba, north of Baghdad, which collapsed a three-storey building near to a mosque, police said.

The US military said two servicemen were missing in the insurgent hotbed of Anbar province after a helicopter

But see later in same article:

Who is the idiot who believes that 1,815 is more than 2,000?

And what kind of idiot thinks that the difference between 1,815 and 2,000 dead is something to quibble over??? Ghoul!!! The number of dead is both remarkable and tragic.

Not the point. Two would be too many. That an Arab news source would blare 'more than 2000' at the top of the article while burying a significantly lower figure farther down the page is clearly yellow journalism and casts the rest of the article's facts in doubt. We don't need critics of the war to exaggerate or lie about it, the truth is plenty bad enough.