Iraq: Dozens Die in Truck Bombs North of Baghdad (Ghazi/Arango)

Yasir Ghazi and Tim Arango report for The New York Times:

First, at midday, a truck exploded near a municipal building in Taji, north of the Iraqi capital. As people rushed to help the injured, a second, larger explosion struck. Nearly three dozen were killed, and many more wounded.

In the afternoon at a nearby hospital in the Baghdad neighborhood of Kadhimiya, a macabre scene unfolded, as women cried and shouted over the bodies of their husbands and sons, and the wounded, bloody and covered in dust, sought care. A list of the dead and wounded adorned a wall; the youngest victim was 3 years old.

“Why am I still alive?” moaned Hesham Hasoon, 23, sitting on the floor. “My brothers, friends, everyone left me.”

Mr. Hasoon, who works at a light bulb factory, said two of his brothers were killed.

“When the first explosion happened, I saw the people and the kids start to gather near the car bomb and I knew something else would happen,” he said. “I called on the stupid soldier to evacuate the place, but he didn’t care.”

Some witnesses said a third attack came from a suicide bomber, although this was not verified by an official at the Interior Ministry.

But at the hospital, two police vehicles arrived, one carrying four charred bodies, the other the ashen hulk of the truck and a severed head that one officer said was that of a suicide bomber.

As is usual in the aftermath of such attacks, precise casualty figures were hard to come by. The list at the hospital showed 32 dead and 61 wounded. The Interior Ministry official said that 35 were killed and 28 wounded. The Associated Press reported 35 killed and 47 wounded.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but it was in the same style as similar strikes by Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, which frequently singles out the infrastructure of the state --- whether it be government buildings, police stations, army barracks or security forces on patrol.

“Our district is mixed with Shiites and Sunnis, and we haven’t witnessed any sectarian problems, but we know Al Qaeda is active and we are always afraid of them,” said Ali Shakir, 40, a member of the local council who was in the area when the attack occurred but was uninjured.

Large-scale attacks in the capital that take aim at civilians had abated compared with previous years, but Tuesday’s bombings came less than two weeks after three explosions tore through a public market, killing at least 21 people.

As the final months for the American military presence here approach — all troops are scheduled to be out by the end of the year barring a request from the Iraqi government to extend the deadline — the layered attack on Tuesday highlighted the fragile state of security here, even eight years after the American invasion.

As Sunni insurgent groups, like the Qaeda affiliate, continue attacks against the government and civilians, Shiite militant groups — including the Promised Day Brigade, which is linked to the anti-American cleric Moktada al-Sadr — have stepped up attacks against American troops. In June, 14 American soldiers were killed by enemy attacks, the most since 2008.

On Monday night, a rocket fired at the Green Zone in Baghdad struck near Al Rasheed Hotel, killing three people, according to the Interior Ministry official.

Meanwhile, perhaps the biggest security threat in the heavily fortified capital has been assassinations of government officials and military officers, many dozens of whom have been killed this year by pistols with silencers....

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