AP: Major Battle in Iraq's Baqouba Kills 18

[Eugene]

Major Battle in Iraq's Baqouba Kills 18

By THOMAS WAGNER

BAGHDAD, Iraq Nov 18, 2006 (AP)— Iraqi and American forces fought Sunni insurgents
in an hours-long street battle Saturday in the increasingly violent city of Baqouba,
as residents fled indoors under the rattle of automatic weapons fire and the blasts
of rocket-propelled grenades.

City police said at least 18 people were killed and 19 wounded.

Nationwide, police and morgue officials said the death toll was 53, including those
killed in Baqouba.

The city was chaotic following the fighting, and Baqouba's police media office said
it was not known how many of the dead were Sunni insurgent fighters. The Americans
reported no dead or wounded among U.S. forces.

-snip-

Full article: http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2664382

Report continues with the raid in Sadr City.

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. Suicide Bomber Kills 22 People in Iraq

A suicide bomber in a minivan lured day laborers to his vehicle with promises of a job Sunday morning then blew it up, killing 22 people and wounding 44 in the mainly Shiite southern city of Hillah, police said.
...
The minivan approached the men in central Hillah, a mostly Shiite city 60 miles south of Baghdad, and exploded as they gathered around it, said police Capt. Muthanna Khalid Ali.

Unemployment is high across Iraq, and men often struggle to feed their families by working jobs such as the construction work the Hillah residents were seeking. Sunday is a working day in mostly Muslim Iraq.

``The sudden explosion shook the whole area and shattered the windows of a store I was standing outside of nearby,'' said Muhsin Hadi Alwan, 33, one of the wounded day laborers. ``The ground was covered with the remains of people and blood, and survivors ran in all directions.''

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6225795,00.html

They are killing people just on the assumption of their religious sect because of the town they live in. How can it not be a civil war?

[Kagemusha]

2. Only if you call it by some other name due to issues of scale

Civil war generally implies it's political groups battling for territory. I believe the term adopted in the 90's for this sort of thing was "ethnic cleansing". It was only civil war when it involved the taking or clearing of entire towns. Smaller scale actions would be termed ethnic cleansing, which sounds like a deliberate use of a clunky translation to make it sound more sinister but hey, it is sinister, so not worth nitpicking...

[SpiralHawk]

3. Meanwhile, Commander AWOL arrives on the battlefront in Vietnam

40 years too late, and surrounded by bodyguards.