World

Baghdad Blast Kills Dozens

March 17, 2004 / 6:38 PM EST / CBS/AP

A powerful car bomb destroyed a five-story hotel in central Baghdad on Wednesday night, killing 27 people and injuring at least 41, according to the U.S. military.

The blast came just three days before the one-year anniversary of the start of the U.S.-led war to topple Saddam Hussein.

Flames and heavy smoke burst skyward from the Mount Lebanon Hotel, torching nearby homes, offices and shops along with palm and eucalyptus trees. Rescuers pulled bodies from the rubble and searched for other victims. Americans, Britons, Egyptians as well as other foreigners were staying at the hotel, said Baghdad resident Faleh Kalhan.

CBS News Reporter Lisa Barron said the explosion site was a scene of complete chaos, with the building in flames and a large hole blasted in it.

Barron said she's seen other car bombings, but "this is one of the worst, if not the worst, in terms of chaos and ensuing flames and debris."

Army Col. Ralph Baker of the 1st Armored Division estimated that the bomb contained 1,000 pounds of explosives. He said the bomb was a mix of plastic explosives and artillery shells. That was the same mixture of explosives used in the Aug. 19 suicide attack on the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad, which killed 22 people.

Dazed and wounded people stumbled from the wreckage. A father cradled his young daughter, who was limp in his arms. Coated in dust, some rescuers dug through the debris with bare hands as uniformed firefighters fought the blaze and ambulance workers stood by with orange stretchers.

"It was huge boom followed by complete darkness and then the red glow of a fire," said 16-year-old Walid Mohammed Abdel-Maguid, who lives near the hotel. A U.S. soldier a mile away said the blast felt as though it were next door.

The explosion left a crater 20 feet wide and 10 feet deep, and American forensic experts studied the scene. The area of the blast, Karrada, is a mix of residential and commercial buildings.

The Bush administration offered prayers for the victims but said such attacks would not change U.S. policy.

"Democracy is taking root in Iraq and there is no turning back," said Scott McClellan, White House spokesman. "This is a time of testing, but the terrorists will not prevail."

In other developments:

The Iraqi Governing Council asked U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to send back a U.N. team to help put together a government that would take over from the U.S.-led coalition on June 30. The council also requested technical assistance ahead of a general election due by the end of January 2005.

U.S. and Iraqi military forces launched a large operation to weed out insurgents and seize illegal weapons. They used troops, helicopters and armored vehicles to raid a suspected arms market in the capital.

A homemade bomb exploded in central Baghdad, wounding a U.S. soldier and two Iraqi security personnel as they patrolled the area, U.S. Army Col. Peter Jones said.

A U.S. Bradley fighting vehicle overturned into the Tigris River in central Iraq, killing one 1st Infantry Division soldier and injuring two others, the military said.

A CBS News/New York Times poll shows the share of Americans who feel Iraq was a threat requiring military action has dropped, but most people still think the war was right.

Insurgents used dynamite to attack an overpass on the main highway leading from Baghdad to Jordan, causing it to partly collapse and block one side of the road, witnesses said. The highway is regularly used by U.S. military convoys and allows them to avoid driving through Fallujah and Ramadi, two cities in the so-called Sunni Triangle, a hotbed of anti-coalition activity.

Wednesday's hotel attack came just three days before the first anniversary of the start of the Iraq war, and as Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry launched new criticism of the Bush administration's Iraq policy.

"We are still bogged down in Iraq and the administration stubbornly holds to failed policies that drive potential allies away," Kerry said in a speech in Washington. "What we have seen is a steady loss of lives and mounting cost in dollars with no end in sight."

Vice President Dick Cheney fired back at Kerry, charging "the senator from Massachusetts has given us ample doubts about his judgment and the attitude he brings to bear on vital issues of national security."

At the scene of the bombing, dozens of U.S. soldiers in Humvees and Bradley fighting vehicles arrived and started to clear crowds.

Earlier, ambulances raced to the scene. Two U.S. soldiers tried to help pull bodies from the wreckage of the hotel, but angry Iraqis pushed them back.

The explosion occurred behind Firdaus Square, where a bronze statue of Saddam Hussein was felled April 9 with the help of U.S. Marines who had just entered the center of the Iraqi capital.

"I do not think that these people have the support Of the Iraqi people," said Iraqi Governing Council member Muwaffaq al-Rubaie of the bombers. "They will not succeed. They are choosing soft targets because — they failed in targeting military targets."

The blast shook the nearby Palestine Hotel, where many foreign contractors and journalists are based. It also damaged the nearby Swan Lake Hotel, home to many foreigners, including several journalists. The power of the bomb left the bureau of Arabic Al-Jazeera satellite television in a shambles, with windows smashed and televisions hanging from cords.

"All of our offices in this hotel are nearly destroyed. I was typing some information for a story and the windows blew in and covered me," said the bureau's senior editor, Mohammed Abdul Rahim, a Syrian.

No one in Swan Lake Hotel appeared to be wounded.

Gwenaelle Lenoir, a reporter for French Channel 3 television, was dazed.

"We were just finishing mixing our story and we heard a very big boom and there were no more windows and no more lights," she said.