Al Qaeda Claims Responsibility for Green Zone Attack
Al Qaeda in Iraq has claimed responsibility for yesterday’s attack on the Iraqi Parliament:
BAGHDAD – The Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella insurgent organization that includes al-Qaida in Iraq, claimed Friday it carried out the parliament suicide bombing in Baghdad’s Green Zone, a major security breach that left one Sunni legislator dead. The Islamic State said in Internet postings that it had delayed claiming responsibility to allow its men to flee from investigators who have been rounding up and questioning parliament employees.
The United States military, which reported on Thursday that eight people were killed in the suicide bomb attack in the parliament dining hall, revised the death toll sharply downward on Friday to one killed and 22 wounded. Iraqi officials said seven of the wounded were members of parliament.
“A knight from the state of Islam … reached the heart of the Green Zone … the temporary headquarters of the mice of the infidel parliament and blew himself up among a gathering of the infidel masters,” the Islamic State said in the statement posted on one Islamist Web site commonly used by insurgents.
The Site Institute, which tracks militant postings, said the claim by the Islamic State appeared authentic.
I don’t know that this makes a great deal of difference other than in asserting that al Qaeda is still able to carry off attacks in Iraq which, presumably, we already knew.
