'Baghdad is now a battlefield, and we are in the middle' [View All]

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http://www.suntimes.com/output/iraq/cst-nws-iside22.html

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- The Iraqi capital, on edge for months because of unrelenting violence, has shed its business-as-usual veneer and become a city at war.

Last week's U.S.-Iraqi raid on the Abu Hanifa mosque -- one of the most revered shrines for Sunni Muslims -- sparked street battles, assassinations and a rash of bombings.

The chaos has fanned sectarian tension and deepened Sunni distrust of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a Shiite installed by the Americans five months ago. It has also heightened the anxiety of the city's 6 million people -- already worn down by years of sanctions and tyranny, then war, military occupation, crime and deprivation.

''Baghdad is now a battlefield, and we are in the middle of it,'' said Qasim al-Sabti, an artist who kept his children home from school Saturday, which is a work day in Iraq. When he sent his children back to school Sunday, the teachers didn't show up.

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