Twin Iraq bombings kill 12, injure 31

Hassan Obeidi

July 29, 2011 - 1:39AM

The Sydney Morning Herald - AFP

Twins blasts involving a car bomb and a suicide attack in Saddam Hussein's hometown in central Iraq killed 12 people near a bank and a market, as shoppers stocked up for Ramadan.

Another 31 people were injured in the blasts in Tikrit, officials said, ahead of the holy Muslim fasting period and with just months to go before US forces must withdraw completely from Iraq. [...]

Violence has steadily been rising in the past few months as the 47,000 US troops still stationed in Iraq begin packing up to leave by the end of the year from the country they invaded in 2003 to topple Hussein.

June was the deadliest month so far this year for the number of Iraqis killed, and the bloodiest in three years for US forces, who lost 14 soldiers in attacks.

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If the cities of Iraq burn before the U.S. pullout, inciting a withdrawal based on frustration and resignation that reconstruction has failed, then two more judgments of those prophesied by Jeremiah on the "land of Chaldea" will have come to pass, in sequential order, bringing the number to five out of nine -- 1) invasion by a coalition of many led by "a great nation", 2) capture, 3) punishment of "the arrogant one", 4) burning of the cities and 5) abandonment, followed by 6) war with and defeat by "the Medes", 7) plundering by the victors, 8) flood, and 9) drought, leading to a complete desolation.