Outside the Beltway

Truck Bomber Kills 132 in Baghdad Market

James Joyner · Sunday, February 4, 2007 · 1 comment

At least 132 were killed this morning by a truck bomber in a Baghdad market.

Stunned Iraqis loaded coffins onto minivans and picked through the rubble of buildings Sunday after a suicide truck bomber obliterated a Baghdad market in a mainly Shiite area, killing at least 132 people in the deadliest single strike by a suicide bomber since the war started. The explosion Saturday was fifth major bombing in less than a month targeting predominantly Shiite districts in Baghdad and the southern Shiite city of Hillah. It also was the worst in the capital since a series of car bombs and mortars killed at least 215 people in the Shiite district of Sadr City on Nov. 23.

[…]

Suspicion fell on Sunni insurgents — al-Qaida in Iraq and allied groups in particular. The militant bombers are believed to have stepped up their campaign against Shiites in the final days before the joint U.S.-Iraqi crackdown in Baghdad. Many saw the operation as a last-chance effort to clamp off violence that has turned the capital into a sectarian battleground.

Sadly, it’s virtually impossible to stop this type of terrorism, short of putting up concrete barriers to bar vehicles from the area.