BAGHDAD, Nov. 24, 2006
Iraqis Burned Alive In Revenge Attacks
Mosques And Homes Burned, Unknown Number Killed Following Massive Attack On Shiite Slum
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Play CBS Video Video Iraq: 5 Sunni Mosques Burned Shiite gunmen apparently burned down five Sunni mosques killing 31 people despite an indefinite curfew in Baghdad today. Elizabeth Palmer reports that high-level talks may avert a civil war.
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Video Funerals Fill Baghdad Streets November has become the deadliest month for Iraqi civilians, as the death toll from sectarian violence keeps climbing. Susan Roberts reports.
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Video Deadly Day For Iraqi Civilians In northern Iraq, a car bombing killed at least 22 people after more than 200 died in the bloodiest attack since the war began. As Elizabeth Palmer reports, the country is in shock.
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A relative reacts while taking part in a funeral procession for a victim of the previous day's attacks, in Sadr City district of Baghdad, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 24, 2006. (AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
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Iraqis inspect the wreckage of the previous day's car bombing in Baghdad's impoverished district of Sadr City, Nov, 24, 2006. (Getty Images/Ahmad Al-Rubaye)
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Women cry as friends and relatives take part in the funeral procession of the victims of previous day's bombing in Sadr City district of Baghdad, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 24, 2006. (AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
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Friends and relatives take part in the funeral procession of the victims of previous day's attacks in Sadr City district of Baghdad, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 24, 2006. (AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
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An Iraqi mourns over the coffin of a relative outside the morgue of a hospital in Baghdad, Nov. 23, 2006. U.S. forces killed four Iraqis and wounded eight more Thursday after a raid in Sadr City. (AFP/Getty Images)
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Interactive Battle For Iraq The government, the insurgency, key players, background and photos.
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Who's Who Iraq Insurgency More on the militant groups behind the insurgency in Iraq and their motivations.
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Interactive Attacks Map Details on the insurgency and terrorism that has continued to take lives since the fall of Saddam.
Iraqi soldiers at a nearby army post failed to intervene in Friday's assault by suspected members of the Shiite Mahdi Army militia or subsequent attacks that killed at least 19 other Sunnis, including women and children, in the same neighborhood, the volatile Hurriyah district in northwest Baghdad, said police Capt. Jamil Hussein.
Last night, Iraqi politicians representing all ethnic groups called for restraint, and unity, but today, the man whose word could do more than any other to to prevent reprisal killings didn't deliver, reports CBS News correspondent Elizabeth Palmer.
At Friday prayers Mosqtada al Sadr did not forbid his followers to take revenge. Instead he made a series of hard-line demands including that:
Most of the thousands of dead bodies that have been found dumped across Baghdad and other cities in central Iraq in recent months have been of victims who were tortured and then shot to death, according to police. The suspected militia killers often have used electric drills on their captives' bodies before killing them. The bodies are frequently decapitated.
But burning victims alive introduced a new method of brutality that was likely to be reciprocated by the other sect as the Shiites and Sunnis continue killing one another in unprecedented numbers. The gruesome attack, which came despite a curfew in Baghdad, capped a day in which at least 87 people were killed or found dead in sectarian violence across Iraq.
In Hurriyah, the rampaging militiamen also burned and blew up four mosques and torched several homes in the district, Hussein said.
Residents of the troubled district claim the Mahdi Army has begun kidnapping and holding Sunni hostages to use in ritual slaughter at the funerals of Shiite victims of Baghdad's raging sectarian war.
Such claims cannot be verified but speak to the deep fear that grips Baghdad, where retaliation has become a part of daily life.
President Jalal Talabani emerged from lengthy meetings with other Iraqi leaders late Friday and said the defense minister, Abdul-Qader al-Obaidi, indicated that the Hurriyah neighborhood had been quiet throughout the day.
But Imad al-Hasimi, a Sunni elder in Hurriyah, confirmed Hussein's account of the immolations. He told Al-Arabiya television he saw people who were drenched in kerosene and then set afire, burning to death before his eyes.
Two workers at Kazamiyah Hospital also confirmed that bodies from the clashes and immolation had been taken to the morgue at their facility. They refused to be identified by name, saying they feared retribution.
And the Association of Muslim Scholars, the most influential Sunni organization in Iraq, said even more victims were burned to death in attacks on the four mosques. It claimed a total of 18 people had died in an inferno at the al-Muhaimin mosque.
The extreme violence continued to tear at the Iraq's social fabric even after the government had banned pedestrians and cars from the streets and closed the international airport until further notice in anticipation of a storm of retaliation for the five bombings and two mortar rounds which killed 215 in Sadr City on Thursday.
The airport closure forced Talabani to delay his planned Saturday departure for Tehran for meetings with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The Iranian leader also invited Syrian President Bashar Assad, but it now appeared he would not attend.
The chaos also cast a shadow over the Amman, Jordan, summit next week between Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and President Bush.
Politicians loyal to radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr threatened to boycott parliament and the Cabinet if al-Maliki went ahead with the meeting. The political bloc, known as Sadrists, is a mainstay of support for al-Maliki. The Mahdi Army is the organization's armed wing.
Sadrist lawmaker Qusai Abdul-Wahab blamed U.S. forces for Thursday's attack in Sadr City because they failed to provide security.
“We say occupation forces are fully responsible for these acts, and we call for the withdrawal of occupation forces or setting a timetable for their withdrawal,” Abdul-Wahab said.
A U.S. helicopter patrolling above Sadr City came under intense fire from the ground and shot back, wounding two people Friday night, according to police 1st. Lt. Qassim Mohammed and witnesses.
The U.S. military said the helicopter had taken fire from six rockets launched from one site and destroyed the launcher. The military statement did not address whether there were casualties.
White House spokesman Scott Stanzil said there was no change in the president's plans to meet with al-Maliki on Wednesday and Thursday.
Al-Maliki is increasingly at odds with the Bush administration for his refusal to disband militias and associated deaths squads that are believed responsible for killing thousands of Sunnis since an al Qaeda attack last February blew up the Golden Dome Shiite shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad.
Mortar fire rained down again on Sunni Islam's holiest shrine in Baghdad, the Abu Hanifa mosque in the Azamiyah neighborhood, wounding at least five people. Several mortars crashed into the area Thursday night within hours of the attacks in Sadr City, one of them puncturing the dome of the shrine and damaging the interior, including its library.
Also, militia gunmen raided a Sunni mosque in the Amil section of west Baghdad, killing two guards, according to police 1st Lt. Maitham Abdul-Razaq.
And in Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, Sunni insurgents blew up the dome of the important Shiite mosque of leading cleric Abdul-Karm al-Madani.
In the northern Iraqi city of Tal Afar, 23 people were killed and 43 wounded when explosives hidden in a parked car and in a suicide belt worn by a pedestrian detonated simultaneously outside a car dealership, said police Brig. Khalaf al-Jubouri.
Altogether, 56 people were killed across in Iraq on Friday, and police said they found 31 bodies dumped throughout Baghdad, most of them tortured before being shot.
In Sadr City, cleanup crews continued removing remains of the dead from wreckage of the car bombs, and tents were erected throughout the ramshackle district for relatives to receive condolences.
Hundreds of men, women and children beat their chests, chanted and cried as they walked beside vehicles carrying the caskets of their loved ones toward the holy Shiite city of Najaf for burial. Despite Baghdad's curfew, al-Maliki, himself a Shiite, ordered police to guard the processions.
As the funeral processions reached the edge of Sadr City in northeastern Baghdad, the cars and minivans left most of the mourners behind and began the 100-mile drive south to Najaf, a treacherous journey that passes through many checkpoints and areas controlled by Sunni militants in Iraq's so-called “Triangle of Death.”
©MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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- Why don't these liberal morons do a little research before believing everything that is reported on CBS?.. oh, may be swiifting through lie to get to the truth is too much for ya..
Media Body Burning Story is Bogus. But the media including CBS refuse to even mention the press release from Multi-National Corps
http://www.mnf-iraq.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=7540&Itemid=21
The news that six Sunnis were captured by Shiites, doused with kerosine and burned alive, was too sensational to not be picked up by the mainstream media. But it turns out that the event never happened. Furthermore, the Iraqi "spokesman" relied on to give all information regarding this event is as fictional as the story itself.
Jamil Hussein, the man news reports called "police Capt. Jamil Hussein," was the source for all information regarding the burning. Although he is mentioned by USA Today, the Associated Press, CBS News, and other outlets, Central Command says no such person exists. Centcom also asked the Associated Press to retract the story unless it has proof beyond Jamil Hussein's word. - Reply to this comment
- edwindark
I hope that you%u2019re right and Bush, Cheney, et al will step down at the end of their terms, but with the rate and degree at which they have tried and often succeeded at taking power it wouldn%u2019t be a complete surprise if they didn%u2019t. If they put forward some semi-legitimate sounding reason not to step down, it wouldn%u2019t be the first time that have violated the constitution.
We are further along in our development, but drop the holier than they BS. No, there wasn%u2019t a shot fired in anger after the Democrats retook the Congress. However, the Civil War produced more than enough bloodshed.
People certainly have been burned alive in America. Some so-called witches were also drowned, both methods of dispatching the witches were heartily approved in our churches.
America%u2019s system of democracy is not found anywhere else.
Who are the real criminals? Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld come to mind right away. Beyond their crimes against humanity, they've ignored the US Constitution whenever it got in their way.
Congress may decline to impeach Bush, but there are more legitimate grounds for impeaching and removing Bush than in the case against Clinton. Remember that WHEN CLINTON LIED, NO ONE DIED. Bush%u2019s oath of office was too-often ignored in much of his decision-making. Instead of preserving, protecting and defending the Constitution, he has frequently, simply ignored it or twisted it to seize or expand his power. - Reply to this comment
- TO Selah you said "The Lions of Allah have come up with an even more novel way of torturing innocent civilians besides boring holes in their skulls with electric drills and cutting the heads off with big knives. I guess that gets a little old and blase after a while.
Burn them to death with kerosene? Much more fun and animated to watch! And to think this is done in the name of Allah. Wouldn't he be so proud!
Just another example of how depraved and sick fundamentalist muslim extremists can get."
sh*% its cold in the desert. it's NOV..
We need to burn more people to keep warm ....
Hell yeah we can put them in to the ovens... - Reply to this comment
- Tank you are right
'Bring on the civil war in Iraq and help slap BUSH in the face for starting all this!!!!!!!!
Impeach this moron NOW'
disinformation agents of foreign gov's ??? Or people so blinded by there hatred of the president that they wish for the death and destruction of Iraqi people to serve there political purpose,, sick people... sick dems - Reply to this comment
- Would I send my son to this war? You might ask would I send him to WW II? Or Vietnam? Maybe you would distinguish those conflicts and whether you would send your son to fight in them. But that question is misdirected in a very important way: I can't command my son to go to war. He has to make that choice. So the better question would be: would I volunteer to fight in Iraq, WW II, Vietnam? Would I volunteer to fight in any war? Respond if drafted? I don%u2019t know. I'm not equivocating, only addressing that it is a hypothetical. To a hypothetical, I can answer, sure I'd fight. But I have nightmares of battle (from my past life as a Jacobite). So how do I feel toward those who do volunteer? Impressed and maturely knowing that many things go into their decision. But I do strongly believe that a country that can't find those men is doomed. The fact that we can find them is one reason why I say there is no failure in Iraq. Objectively, I also believe it for other reasons. An attempt to establish democracy in the Middle East is a bold, brilliant, noble effort, facing a high chance of failure. That's why I greatly respect and admire those who have made the attempt--the Bush administration. They have been resolute, something I have not seen in my lifetime. They may not succeed, for reasons outside their control or fault: traitors on the home front, being a big one. But now those traitors have apparently occupied the high ground. Yet... we're still in Iraq. Why?... I'm waiting.
- Reply to this comment
- QUOTE:
'Bring on the civil war in Iraq and help slap BUSH in the face for starting all this!!!!!!!!
Impeach this moron NOW'
You ever wonder how many poeple who post messages here might be disinformation agents in the employ of foreign governments that are hostile to the United States? - Reply to this comment
- Dear CBS.COM Readers and Writers,Savageness and Sectarian war dont specifically belong to Middlr East.During the thirteen century innocent people were burnt alive in synagogs by christians.Jan Darc was burnt alive.Who burnt the house of Sitting Bull.Catholic Orthodox fight lasted centuries for ONE WORD until mongolian arrival.Catholic Protestant Thirty years war was bloody.The Blooddrinkers drank the blood of six million innocent in the twenty century.The War and carnage in middle east,with USA or without USA will unfortunately go on years.
- Reply to this comment
- Unlike places like Irag, Iran, and the other so-called Cradles of Civilization, Bush, Cheney, et al will step down without bloodshed when their terms expire. No revolution, no bloodshed, no torturing and killing others who belong to a different political or religious party. A peaceful transition of power from one group to another just as it has been since the founding of the great United States of America.
The world just witnessed American justice and peace when the Democrats won back the House and Senate and the Republicans in true American spirit accepted their defeat--without firing a shot in anger or burning down houses of worship!
Shiites and Sunnis are killing each other in Arab countries when one group wins over another. Do you see such idiotic response and bloodshed in America?
Where do we find such a peaceful transition in the Arab world? Egypt? Syria? Iran? Jordan? Saudi Arabia?
I don't remember reading any stories lately about people being burned alive when they left church in America or Britain or France or Germany or any of the other civilized Western cultures!
Bush, Cheney, et al were legally elected under an American system of democracy that is not found in the barbaric and medieval Arab world where burning worshipers alive seems to be an acceptable response to any small dissatisfaction.
Who are the real criminals? Where is this so-called religion of peace? - Reply to this comment
- Unlike places like Irag, Iran, and the other so-called Cradles of Civilization, Bush, Cheney, et al will step down without bloodshed when their terms expire. No revolution, no bloodshed, no torturing and killing others who belong to a different political or religious party. A peaceful transition of power from one group to another just as it has been since the founding of the great United States of America.
The world just witnessed American justice and peace when the Democrats won back the House and Senate and the Republicans in true American spirit accepted their defeat--without firing a shot in anger or burning down houses of worship!
Shiites and Sunnis are killing each other in Arab countries when one group wins over another. Do you see such idiotic response and bloodshed in America?
Where do we find such a peaceful transition in the Arab world? Egypt? Syria? Iran? Jordan? Saudi Arabia?
I don't remember reading any stories lately about people being burned alive when they left church in America or Britain or France or Germany or any of the other civilized Western cultures!
Bush, Cheney, et al were legally elected under an American system of democracy that is not found in the barbaric and medieval Arab world where burning worshipers alive seems to be an acceptable response to any small dissatisfaction.
Who are the real criminals? Where is this so-called religion of peace? - Reply to this comment
- Unlike places like Irag, Iran, and the other so-called Cradles of Civilization, Bush, Cheney, et al will step down without bloodshed when their terms expire. No revolution, no bloodshed, no torturing and killing others who belong to a different political or religious party. A peaceful transition of power from one group to another just as it has been since the founding of the great United States of America.
The world just witnessed American justice and peace when the Democrats won back the House and Senate and the Republicans in true American spirit accepted their defeat--without firing a shot in anger or burning down houses of worship!
Shiites and Sunnis are killing each other in Arab countries when one group wins over another. Do you see such idiotic response and bloodshed in America?
Where do we find such a peaceful transition in the Arab world? Egypt? Syria? Iran? Jordan? Saudi Arabia?
I don't remember reading any stories lately about people being burned alive when they left church in America or Britain or France or Germany or any of the other civilized Western cultures!
Bush, Cheney, et al were legally elected under an American system of democracy that is not found in the barbaric and medieval Arab world where burning worshipers alive seems to be an acceptable response to any small dissatisfaction.
Who are the real criminals? Where is this so-called religion of peace? - Reply to this comment
- Unlike places like Irag, Iran, and the other so-called Cradles of Civilization, Bush, Cheney, et al will step down without bloodshed when their terms expire. No revolution, no bloodshed, no torturing and killing others who belong to a different political or religious party. A peaceful transition of power from one group to another just as it has been since the founding of the great United States of America.
The world just witnessed American justice and peace when the Democrats won back the House and Senate and the Republicans in true American spirit accepted their defeat--without firing a shot in anger or burning down houses of worship!
Shiites and Sunnis are killing each other in Arab countries when one group wins over another. Do you see such idiotic response and bloodshed in America?
Where do we find such a peaceful transition in the Arab world? Egypt? Syria? Iran? Jordan? Saudi Arabia?
I don't remember reading any stories lately about people being burned alive when they left church in America or Britain or France or Germany or any of the other civilized Western cultures!
Bush, Cheney, et al were legally elected under an American system of democracy that is not found in the barbaric and medieval Arab world where burning worshipers alive seems to be an acceptable response to any small dissatisfaction.
Who are the real criminals? Where is this so-called religion of peace? - Reply to this comment
- Bring on the civil war in Iraq and help slap BUSH in the face for starting all this!!!!!!!!
Impeach this moron NOW!!!!! - Reply to this comment
- The Bush regime is a criminal act in progress. Bush and Cheney and co-conspirators sought objectives in Iraq which had nothing whatever to do with national security or al Qaeda. To conceal their designs, Bush, Cheney and co-conspirators lied to the American people in congress assembled, and to this day continue to lie about the reasons and justification for the American presence in Iraq.
The ten secret, multibillion-dollar military bases Halliburton builds are intended to provide American control of Iraqi oil for decades to come, and a power projection base for further American military intervention in the region. The billion-dollar American embassy bunker in the heart of Baghdad has essentially the same purpose.
The brazen criminal act of Bush and his co-conspirators goes down in history as the worst and most costly political scandal in American history, a black mark of shame on all who supported and endorsed Bush and his party. We who witness the suffering of American soldiers, their families and Iraqi civilians must do all in our power to end this criminal administration. Lies created Iraq, but more lies will not prevent disaster of major proportions. - Reply to this comment
- Partitioning Iraq--
Partitioning the country is likely, simply because (1) Iraq is not a nation, but a political amalgam crafted by Europeans after WWI (2) partitioning Iraq allows all sides to win something, since the violence stops, and there is no longer the issue of US withdrawal from Iraq, because there is no Iraq. The Sunnis join Syria, the Shia join Iran and the poor Kurds have no sponsor but us and a lot of diplomacy-- for example, letting Turkish Kurds migrate safely to the south to join the Kurds in North Iraq. The Turks might buy in, because that would depopulate the Kurdish rebellion in south Turkey.
In the British model for partitioning, lines are drawn and refugees allowed to pass to their home sector. In the case of India, there was no effective officialdom to safeguard passage, and groups of refugees of opposite faiths set upon each other with massive carnage. Obviously, the way to avoid that is to have the US forces-- under auspices of the UN-- shepherd the respective groups. There is no other means to keep each side from attacking refugees of the other. - Reply to this comment
- Partitioning Iraq-- 2
Yes, Iran would get something out of it, but so would the Saudis in secured protection for the Shia. The end point being, regional resolution of a regional problem. More than one diplomat has counseled an end to unilateralism from Bush, because he obviously does not have the attention of anybody-- least of all, those who count most.
Iraq is the epicenter of a web of political fault lines and a history predating the United States, so the height of folly is Bush imposing his Emerald City of Democracy. Only a neocon with oil reserves in his eyes would think like that... only a neocon would want to. - Reply to this comment
- Curfew in Iraq seems to mean that the police and Iraqi army aren't allowed on the streets. It doesn't seem to have stopped anyone else.
The people who object to partitioning Iraq must be more impressed than I with the result of arbitrarily putting the 3 areas/groups of such diverse ethnicities and religions together back in the last century. The only time they got along was under a brutal dictator who didn%u2019t allow otherwise. The Shia might just have to "depend upon the kindness of strangers" or the Saudis. They had no oil in their region before they were included in Iraq. al-Maliki has as much independence from the other Shi-ites as they choose to give him and they aren%u2019t known as champions of the rights of minorities.
There is no reason for the Shia to meaningfully participate in a democratic government with the Sunni. They have the numbers and at some point are sure to act the way Bush did when the only checks and balances from the Congress were the blank checks they gave him and watching the balances plummet. When the opposition can%u2019t effectively stop the majority they tend to get carried away. Anyone think some ethnic cleansing isn%u2019t on the horizon of a unified Iraq?
The only group in Iraq who haven%u2019t said the US should get out or set a timetable for withdrawal are the Kurds. Since the others want us out, maybe the only delay should be regrouping to be able to protect against attack from the rear on the way out. - Reply to this comment
- Was Cheney supposed to be in Baghdad to learn about burning people alive since he isn%u2019t a very good shot?
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- Too much death.
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- With this detailed gory coverage we 1. Now know what the Jews in Israel have been putting up with all these years. 2. Suspect that the "even handed" reporting of our media has been a national disaster- since it shielded us from the true Evil of this ? Culture, where bully govern and kill innocent people esp. and torture and weird stuff we never imagined. 3. Now know that our Universities are full of crapola, braying about "ALL CULTURES ARE THE SAME. " THAT IS PRETTY PRETTY STUPID.
If anything, Iraq is a success in that it has educated us about what these not job ISlamicfascists want to do, and will do. - Reply to this comment
- I love reading reading about those idiots killing themselves on a daily basis. I think they should kill each other faster. The faster they kill themselves off the faster our uniformed service can stop fighting a losing battle and come home. There will never be peace in the mideast as long as people walk the deserts there. Look at history. As far back as it is written those fools have been killing each other in the name of their God so lets help them out. Lets bring home everyone and just nuke the place. With all of the mideast nuked the world will have very few terrorists left. Who are the terrorists? 99% of them are muslims from the mideast anyway. Nuke em before they can blow anything else up.
Thats all - Reply to this comment
The road ahead in Afghanistan, and the crucial decision Obama faces.
