8 U.S. Soldiers Killed in 2 Iraq Attacks

By ERICA GOODE and RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.

BAGHDAD — A man walked up to a group of American soldiers on foot patrol in an upscale shopping district in central Baghdad on Monday and detonated the explosives-filled vest he was wearing, killing five soldiers and wounding three others and an Iraqi interpreter who accompanied them.

In eastern Diyala Province, north of the capital, three more American soldiers and an interpreter were also killed Monday when they were attacked with an improvised bomb, according to the military, which did not release any more details.

Another soldier was wounded in the blast.

The suicide bombing in Baghdad was the deadliest single attack on American soldiers in the capital since the height of the troop buildup here last summer. Nine Iraqi civilians were also wounded in the blast, according to officials at Yarmuk Hospital, where the victims were taken.

Reports from Iraqi witnesses suggest that the soldiers may have let down their guard because of the relative quiet of the last few months, leaving the safety of their Humvees and chatting with residents and shopkeepers.

Hours later, a car bomb exploded outside a hotel in the northern Kurdish city of Sulaimaniya, killing two people and wounding 30 in the first significant attack in that city in several years.

The attacks underscored how fragile security in Iraq remains despite a recent drop in violence and statements by American military officials that Sunni insurgents were on the run.

In Baghdad, the suicide bombing, in the Mansour neighborhood, shattered a perfect springlike afternoon, with shoppers out sampling hamburgers and sausage from street vendors and browsing through boutiques for the latest fashions.

The owner of a clothing store on Mansour Street said five soldiers and an interpreter entered his shop about 3 p.m.

“The soldiers were asking about the security situation and also making jokes and laughing,” said the store owner, who refused to give his real name for fear of reprisals from local militias. “Some of them said, ‘Be sure that we’ll come back again in order to buy clothes from you before we leave on vacation.’ ”

After the soldiers left the store, he said, he climbed up a ladder to a storeroom to retrieve his lunch and then heard a large explosion. He scrambled back down, he said, to find the bodies of two of the soldiers he had just been chatting with lying in the doorway of the store. Four of the soldiers died at the scene, and a fifth died later of his wounds.

Muhammad, a hamburger vendor whose stand is about 175 feet from the site of the bombing, said the same group of eight or nine American soldiers had been coming to the street for the last three days, getting out of their Humvees and walking around the shopping area, called the Rawad intersection after a popular ice cream parlor there.

“Usually, we see the Americans come in Humvees and they don’t stop, they just keep driving,” said Muhammad, who was afraid to give his last name. On Monday, he said, a soldier carrying a notebook walked into a currency exchange called The Ship. The other soldiers gathered in a small group.

“When the explosion happened we panicked and started running, and the gunner on one of the Humvees started shooting,” he said. “Even the Iraqi soldiers and police started firing in the air, so we jumped into one of the narrow alleys and remained there hiding until the Iraqi soldiers ordered us to walk at least two blocks away from the spot.”

He said that before the bombing, he had been surprised that the soldiers had allowed pedestrians to come up and talk to them, instead of keeping them at a distance as they normally do.

Military officials did not release details of the attack or explain how the suicide bomber was able to approach the soldiers so easily. But an Iraqi Army officer at a checkpoint near the site of the bombing said the suicide bomber was a young man who had walked up to the soldiers and engaged them in conversation. “He came and stood beside them and started talking to them and then detonated himself,” the officer said.

The attack in Baghdad was the worst of a string of attacks throughout the country that appeared to be directed at Iraqis sympathetic to American forces.

In Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, a suicide bomber killed a tribal leader in charge of local forces known as Awakening Councils, groups of American-backed former insurgents who have risen up against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a largely homegrown group that intelligence officials say is led by foreigners.

The bomber, a woman, went to the door of Sheik Thaer Ghadhban al-Karkhi’s house in Kanaan, about 12 miles east of Baquba, shortly before 8 a.m., while the sheik was sitting in the garden with his 9-year-old nephew, one of his guards said.

When Sheik Karkhi, accompanied by his nephew, went outside to see who it was, the woman blew herself up, killing the sheik, his nephew and two of his bodyguards. Six other bodyguards were wounded.

In Basra, Dr. Khalid Nasir al-Mayah, one of only two psychiatrists left in the region, was shot and killed by gunmen at Basra al-Sadr Hospital. Since 2003, Basra’s medical professionals have been in peril: 5 doctors have been assassinated, 12 have been kidnapped, 16 have left the area and 23 have fled Iraq.

The attack in Sulaimaniya occurred about 7 p.m., striking a hotel favored by Western investors who have been racing into eastern Kurdistan to exploit new opportunities to drill for oil.

Witnesses said the blast sent a shock wave through the center of the city. “There was a big noise from the blast and a wave of hot air,” said Shamal Ahmed, 35, who was driving by the hotel. “I got shrapnel in my face and arms because the front windshield of my car was completely destroyed.”

Mudhafer al-Husaini and Ahmed Fadam contributed reporting from Baghdad, and employees of The New York Times from Sulaimaniya, Basra and Diyala.