War on Shiites

last updated 8 January 2015

Baghdad

Insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi this week declared a “full-scale war on Shiites all over Iraq, wherever and whenever they are found.” His call to arms appears to have already been in effect. Recent insurgent attacks have shifted their focus from U.S. troops and Iraqi police recruits to Shiite civilians, and they’ve grown deadlier. A single suicide bomber killed 114 Shiite laborers last week. Credit for the success of the insurgency goes at least partly to Saddam Hussein, Time magazine reported. Shortly after he was driven from Baghdad, the magazine said, Saddam ordered his henchmen to build insurgent networks across the country. While the U.S. focused on searching for weapons of mass destruction, Baathist loyalists were looting arms caches, wooing tribal leaders, and plotting civil war.