BAGHDAD, Iraq – A suicide car bomber turned a book market into a deadly inferno and gunmen targeted Shiite pilgrims Monday as suspected Sunni insurgents brought major bloodshed back into the lap of their main Shiite rivals. At least 38 people died in the blast and seven pilgrims were killed.
The blast tore through booksellers and other stores on narrow Mutanabi Street, a mostly Shiite-run commercial area in Baghdad’s historical heart along the Tigris river.
Within seconds, flames engulfed open-air stalls and shops brimming with books and magazines. Gas-powered generators – needed because of frequent cuts in power – exploded one by one.
Bloodstained pages that escaped the fire were carried away in a wind-whipped pillar of black smoke.
Firefighters had to spray huge arches of water from blocks away because their trucks were too large for the warren of lanes in old Baghdad. Fire crews still battled the blazes nearly 12 hours after the attack, said civil defense Maj. Gen. Abdul Rasoul al-Zaidi.
A worker at a nearby shoe store, Youssef Haider, 24, said the blast flipped burning cars with charred bodies trapped inside. He and co-workers used two-wheel pushcarts to carry away some of the more than 100 people wounded.
In other violence, gunmen opened fire on Shiite pilgrims in several places around Baghdad, killing at least seven people, police said.
The Shiites were heading to shrines and holy sites in southern Iraq for the annual commemoration to end a 40-day mourning period for the death of a revered 7th century Shiite martyr, Imam Hussein.
Also Monday, 30 bullet-ridden bodies were found across Baghdad. Many of those killings are blamed on Shiite death squads, and Monday’s figure was the highest in weeks.
Meanwhile, Iran’s foreign minister indicated Monday his country would take part in at least part of an international conference on Iraq on Saturday in Baghdad, which would be the first U.S.-Iranian contact in more than two years.
Separately, Iraq’s foreign minister said his government would oppose efforts to involve the U.N. Security Council in plans to stem the violence in Iraq, insisting his country would solve its own crisis.
The latest identifications reported by the U.S. military of personnel killed in Iraq:
Navy Lt. Cmdr. Morgan C. Tulang, 36, Hilo, Hawaii, died Friday in a noncombat related incident; assigned to the U.S. Central Command Deployment Distribution Operations Center, Kuwait City, Kuwait.
Navy Hospitalman Lucas W.A. Emch, 21, Kent, Ohio, was killed Friday by an explosive in Anbar province; assigned to the 1st Marine Logistics Group, 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, Calif.
Army Staff Sgt. Paul M. Latourney, 28, Roselle, Ill., and Army Spc. Luis O. Rodriguez-Contrera, 22, Allentown, Pa., died Friday in Baghdad when their vehicle struck an explosive; assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division, Fort Hood, Texas.
Marine Staff Sgt. Dustin M. Gould, 28, Longmont, Colo., died Friday during combat operations in Anbar province; assigned to the 7th Engineer Support Battalion, 1st Marine Logistics Group, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, Calif.
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