By Ernesto Londoño and Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, March 7, 2007

BAGHDAD, March 6 -- At least 118 Shiite pilgrims were killed in a series of attacks across central Iraq on Tuesday, a wave of violence on the eve of one of Shiite Islam's most sacred holidays that appeared intended to widen Iraq's sectarian divide.

A Sunni insurgent group asserted responsibility for the carnage, which occurred three weeks into a U.S. and Iraqi effort to bring security to Baghdad and other parts of the country.

The attacks came a day after nine U.S. soldiers were killed in two roadside bombings, one of which was the deadliest single strike against U.S. ground troops this year. The U.S. military is deploying 21,500 additional troops, mainly in Baghdad, to enforce the security plan.

The roadside bombings, in Diyala and Salahuddin provinces, illustrated the continuing vulnerability of U.S. soldiers, who have been attacked in recent weeks by antiaircraft weapons, powerful armor-piercing roadside bombs and sniper fire.

In the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Tuesday, armed men broke into a prison and freed 140 inmates, many of whom were suspected Sunni insurgents, said Husham al-Hamdani, head of the security committee in Nineveh province.

The worst attack against Shiites happened shortly after 4 p.m. on a major road in the central city of Hilla when two male suicide bombers detonated vests packed with explosives near a tent set up for pilgrims. The pilgrims were headed to Karbala to mark Arbaeen, the end of the 40-day commemorative period of mourning for one of Shiite Islam's holiest figures.

"We ran away because suddenly dust went up in the air from the middle of the crowd, and there were people flying with it," said Muhammad Hassan, 29, a pilgrim who was wounded in the back. "We were seeing corpses, heads, limbs flying around, dead children and women. Women were screaming and weeping. Children were crying."

The bombings in Hilla killed at least 77 people and injured more than 125. Nine other attacks targeting pilgrims elsewhere in the country left at least 41 people dead, according to Lt. Col. Abdullah Salman, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry.

Thousands of Iraqis embark on a pilgrimage to Karbala this time of year to mourn Imam Hussein, the prophet Muhammad's grandson. Many travel dozens of miles on foot in an act of penitential homage to Hussein.

A spokesman for the Islamic State of Iraq, a Sunni insurgent group, called the attacks "more successful than we had expected." The spokesman, Abdul Rahman al-Ghrairy, said the attacks were part of a campaign to avenge the alleged rape of a Sunni woman by Shiite policemen in late February.

Ghrairy said in a telephone interview that two Saudi volunteers had carried out the Hilla bombings and that the target was a son of Shiite politician Abdul Aziz al-Hakim. Ghrairy's claim could not be independently confirmed, and there were no reports that Hakim's son was at the scene of the blasts.

Hakim is the leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the country's largest political party.

Anwar Shammary, a Supreme Council officer, blamed Sunni militants and former loyalists of Saddam Hussein for the attack, saying they wanted to "scuttle the political process and the Baghdad security operation."

Other Shiite leaders condemned the attacks, with some expressing concern that Shiites are increasingly vulnerable as Sunni insurgents step up attacks while Shiite militias keep a low profile.

"The blood of those who love the ancestors of the prophet was dropped today on the soil of Iraq," Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said in a statement. "This angry crime against unarmed citizens won't pass without punishment."

Hilla is the capital of Babil, one of the three provinces where U.S. officials last year handed over control of security operations to Iraqi officials.

"This certainly is not an indication that the province is not working under Iraqi control," said Lt. Col. Christopher C. Garver, a U.S. military spokesman. "We have a very determined enemy in this country. They're out to conduct spectacular attacks to restart the cycle of violence. We know they are going to be successful at times."

Most of the large-scale attacks against U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians since the Feb. 14 inception of the Baghdad security plan appear to have been committed by Sunni insurgents. Shiite militias, meanwhile, including the powerful Mahdi Army, led by anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, appear to have scaled down their violence.

Abdul Razak al-Nadawi, a spokesman for Sadr, denounced the attacks as "a criminal act" and blamed the government for not protecting the pilgrims. Sadr representatives, he added, had asked the government to allow the Mahdi Army to help provide security along the route from Baghdad to Karbala, but the government did not take them up on the offer.

"Last year, when the Mahdi army was involved in securing the road, no attacks occurred, but this year we have seen the breaches that happened," Nadawi said in a telephone interview from the southern city of Najaf. "The government should have been more alert and better prepared to deal with the situation."

Nadawi said that the Sadrists would not be pressured to retaliate against the Sunni insurgents. "We are still committed and comply with the words of our leader, Moqtada Sadr, which call for calm and self-restraint," he said.

Other Sadr officials said the attacks suggested that the Sunni insurgents were trying to capitalize on Sadr's orders to his men to lay down their arms. "I don't think there's a single Iraqi who doesn't want the Mahdi Army to get into the streets," said Ayad al-Khaby, a Sadr official in Baghdad's Kadhimiyah neighborhood.

A Mahdi Army commander in Baghdad, Mohammad Abu Haider, said he was upset that people he called Sunni criminals were not being brought to justice. But he said he and his fighters would obey Sadr's orders and refrain from seeking revenge. "We want to show we have a clean hand," he said. "The Sadrists have the ability to retaliate to avenge the innocent blood that was shed today."

In the Dora neighborhood of Baghdad, Mustafa Malik Thiyab, 22, was walking with his father and five brothers toward Karbala, a pilgrimage his father has vowed to make every year, when the group was caught in cross fire between insurgents and police. Thiyab and his relatives hid in a tent along with other pilgrims as the gunfight unfolded outside for more than half an hour. Then a bomb blew up next to the tent, he said.

"I lost track of my brothers," said Thiyab, who later found the body of his 15-year-old brother. "I then realized I was hit in the chest, abdomen and leg."

Another injured pilgrim interviewed at Yarmouk Hospital in Baghdad said he still intends to make it to Karbala.

"This explosion targets our will and determination to keep us from observing Arbaeen," said Jassem Hussein, 20. "We say to the terrorists, 'We shall continue, no matter what happens and regardless of whoever may push you to carry out such cowardly attacks.' "

The attacks on U.S. soldiers made Monday the third-deadliest day for American troops in Iraq this year, after incidents in January and February involving downed U.S. helicopters.

Six Task Force Lightning soldiers were killed in Salahuddin province when a large roadside bomb detonated near two of their vehicles, according to Garver, the U.S. military spokesman. Three Task Force Lightning soldiers were killed in Diyala province, in northeastern Iraq, in another roadside bombing, he said. The growing sophistication of weapons used against military aircraft and armored Humvees has made nearly all modes of transportation in Iraq treacherous for U.S. soldiers.

In Mosul, the Badoosh prison was attacked at approximately 5:30 p.m. by armed men who drove up to the building in pickup trucks, according to Hamdani, the provincial security official. U.S. helicopters were called in to help track down some of the inmates, and at least six were gunned down, Hamdani said.

Special correspondents Saad al-Izzi, Salih Dehema, Naseer Mehdawi, Waleed Saffar and K.I. Ibrahim in Baghdad, Saad Sarhan in Najaf, and staff researcher Robert E. Thomason in Washington contributed to this report.