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Sunnis begin a religious holiday in Iraq
(AP)
Updated: 2005-11-03 20:48
A three-day holiday began for Sunni Arabs in Iraq on Thursday, ending a month
of fasting during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, and unusual signs of
celebration emerged in war-torn cities.
In Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's hometown, children appeared on the streets in new
clothes, and the amusement park was crowded with families for the start of the
Eid al-Fitr holiday.
But long-standing animosity to U.S. forces also was apparent in the mostly
Sunni city 80 miles north of Baghdad.
"The real Eid for Iraqis will be the day that occupation forces get out of
our country," said Aqel Omar, 48, a retired government employee, as he gathered
with about 30 relatives at the home of their local tribesman.
"I hope that next year our country is liberated and stable and that we can
rebuild it again," he said in an interview.
Several attacks by Sunni-led insurgents had made Wednesday a deadly day in
Iraq, and on Thursday the country's most feared militant group, al-Qaida in
Iraq, said it has sentenced to death two Moroccan embassy employees kidnapped
last month in Iraq.
On Wednesday, 20 people were killed when a suicide bomber detonated a minibus
packed with explosives in an outdoor market crowded with holiday shoppers on
Wednesday. Another 60 people were wounded in the attack in Musayyib, a Shiite
Muslim town on the Euphrates River, about 40 miles south of Baghdad. A local
doctor, Ali Abbas, said the wounded included nine children and four women.
On July 16, nearly 100 people died in a suicide bombing in front of a Shiite
mosque near the same site in Musayyib.
Six U.S. troops also were killed Wednesday, four of them
during fighting in and around Ramadi that involved a roadside bomb and a
helicopter crash. The city is 70 miles west of Baghdad.
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