Gunmen fire on teenage soccer game in Iraq, 2 dead

Gunmen opened fire on a crowd of teenage boys playing soccer in the Iraqi town of Baquba on Sunday, killing two youngsters and wounding five in what a police official said was a sectarian attack.

"This destruction was an attempt to spread sectarian tensions," said the official, who asked not to be named.

The official said three gunmen in a car drove up to the area where the boys were gathered and opened fire. They were playing soccer in a mixed Shi'ite and Sunni neighbourhood in Baquba, he said.

The attack came after the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine in the town of Samarra north of Baghdad on Wednesday triggered post-war Iraq's gravest crisis and appeals for calm by leaders fearful of civil war.

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/GEO652867.htm

Civil war makes it sound like a mutual battle - rather than murdering civilians and children. Maybe it could be called mutual genocide.

Things like that also happened during the American Civil War, a minor historical point that seems missed by the "reenactors" of that war.

We can expect the Iraq civil war to follow the pattern of the one in Lebanon, which raged for a decade until Syrian troops came in and helped put an end to it.

Provide sources where American Civil War fighters would go up to innocent civilians and shoot them while they're playing games.

...primary modes of military operation. When these events occured in the American Civil War, they were isolated, and universially condemned by the officers. Rape was generally the "worst" thing to happen.

the atrocities, just a few wrong doers, officers condemn. etc, ad nauseum.

Brilliant Insight--technically though virtually every attack noted is 'attack came after the bombing'--I wonder why they don't want us to forget this.

Apparantly this type of thing is what Shi'ite fundies have been doing for the past three years--attacking public gatherings of youth, mostly, for engaging in inappropriate Un-Muslim behavior. The soccer players were probably playing in shorts or women were watching...

US troops arrested a bunch of them the other day, and they also found torture chambers ran by the Interior Ministry. These are the folks we sided with when we toppled Saddam.

in National Geographic (January 1985) regarding Saddam's Iraq. It is pathetic to compare modern day Iraq with what it was in 1985. Saddam was moderizing Baghdad's infrastructure creating beautiful buildings, improving the sewer and steets, preserving historical background, supporting the arts; truly a beautiful city (in spite of the war with Iran). People were free to mingle safely in the streets; worship freely. Women were entering the commercial and political fields; not subjected to repressive dress. Saddam was a progressive, bringing Iraq into the modern world. We have heard only the bad side of Saddam's regime , but ultimately I feel Saddam was trying to do what was best for his country. It has all been destroyed.

Saddam was a secular thug, but he could be bought. Saddam's enemies were our enemies: bin Laden and his brand of religion.

Women lost all they gained through the Baathists.

BTW, all Middle Eastern leaders are thugs, practice torture, and have no free press or allow political opposition. The list includes such allies as Mubarak in Egypt and King Abdullah of Jordan.

leader can be bought and sold, ignore domestic and international law, can destroy countries/lives indiscriminately, practice torture, incarcerate people without legal recourse and atempt to take away Constitutioanl rights. Suspected that same leader would also like to destroy political opposition and control free press. Yes, it would be easier to be dictator.

I have it right here on the desk now. There are some fascinating contrasts I note reading this.

Probably have it here with the rest of the NG issues I keep. Thanks. I'll have to read it. Can you elaborate on the contrasts?

:cry: