November 21, 2012

A bomb explosion aboard a crowded bus left 21 people injured in Tel Aviv, Israel’s commercial capital, and 11 people were killed by Israeli missiles in Gaza City today in the continuing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian territory of the Gaza Strip. At least 150 Palestinians and 5 Israelis have died so far in the latest flare-up between the Israelis and Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, which began eight days ago. On November 14, Israel responded to rocket fire from Gaza with an air strike that killed the head of the military wing of Hamas.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived in Cairo, Egypt, today to discuss a possible peace plan with Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, the only world leader with effective lines of communication to both Israel and Hamas. Earlier in the day, Clinton and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon were in the West Bank meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. The secretary of state met yesterday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem.

Gaza Strip is a piece of land administered by Palestinians. It lies on the Mediterranean coast, where Egypt and Israel meet. (World Book map)

In Iran’s capital, Tehran, the speaker of the Iranian parliament announced today that his country was “proud” to be providing assistance “both financial and military” to Hamas-controlled Gaza. Iran is known to supply Hamas with the rockets that the Islamist militant organization regularly lobs into Israel.

Additional World Book articles:

• Egypt 2011 (a Back in Time article)
• The Middle East: From Fall to Spring (a special report)
• A Special Day in Israel (a special report)

Feb. 23, 2012

A coordinated wave of car bombings and shootings in Baghdad and across Iraq leave more than 50 people dead and some 200 others wounded. There were nine bombings in Baghdad alone. At one point, multiple gunmen appeared and mowed down commuters at the height of the morning rush hour. Outside the capital, terrorists carried out deadly bombings in the cities of Mosul and Kirkuk and in Salah ad Din province, northwest of Baghdad.

According to Iraqi police, the attacks represent the most widespread operation yet mounted by suspected Sunni insurgents in what officials describe as a “frantic race” to undermine people’s faith in the government. They suggest that al-Qa’ida in Iraq is most likely responsible. The resurgent terrorist organization has in the past carried out similar complex, coordinated operations.

The latest wave of violence in Iraq began after Shi’ite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki issued a warrant for the arrest of Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, the most senior Sunni politician in the Iraqi government. The warrant, on charges that he was financing death squads, was issued the day after the last U.S. troops withdrew in late December 2011. Hashemi, who denies the charges, has avoided arrest by staying in Iraq’s semiautonomous (partially self-governing) Kurdish region in the north.

Additional World Book articles

• Iraq War
• The War in Iraq: the Military Campaign and Aftermath
• The War in Iraq: Shifting Alliances on the World Stage
• Iraq: a Quest for Political Identity in a Second Year of War
• Iraq 2009 (Back in Time article)

Jan. 6, 2012

A series of bomb attacks in Iraq on January 5 left at least 72 people dead. A suicide bombing targeting Shi’ite pilgrims near the city of Nasiriyah killed 48 people. Nasiriyah is about 200 miles (320 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad. The pilgrims were on their way to the Shi’ite holy city of Karbala. Another 24 people were killed in multiple bombings in Shi’ite neighborhoods in Baghdad.

Sectarian tensions between Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims have worsened in recent weeks. After the last U.S. combat troops left Iraq in mid-December, the Shi’ite dominated government of Nouri al-Maliki issued an arrest warrant for Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, the highest Sunni official in Iraq. The government alleged that Hashemi had ordered the assassinations of rival Shi’ite bureaucrats. Hashemi, who fled to the semi-autonomous northern region of Kurdistan, characterized the charges as “political slander.”  His entire political bloc subsquently boycotted the Iraqi parliament and Maliki’s Cabinet.

A new government of Iraq took power in May 2006. This photograph shows Prime Minister Nouri Kamel al-Maliki, center, being congratulated by former Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jafari. AP/Wide World

Sectarian violence, often carried out by a militant group that calls itself Al-Qa’ida in Mesopotamia, left thousands of innocent Iraqis dead in 2006 and 2007. (Mesopotamia was an ancient region in which the world’s earliest civilization developed. It included the area that is now Iraq, eastern Syria, and southeastern Turkey.)

Additional World Book articles

• Al-Qa`ida
• Ashura
• Iraq War
• War in Iraq: A Special Report
• Iraq 2006 (Back in Time)
• Iraq 2007 (Back in Time)