Suicide Bombing Kills 12 in Baghdad

An injured Iraqi man lies at a hospital after a suicide car bomber crashed into an Iraqi police checkpoint, killing 33 and injuring 75 at an entrance to Sadr City, the capital's biggest Shiite Muslim neighborhood, in Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday, April 18, 2007. Four large bombs exploded in mostly Shiite areas of Baghdad on Wednesday, killing at least 164 people and wounding scores _ the deadliest day in the city since the start of the U.S.-Iraqi campaign to pacify the capital. (AP Photo/Ali Abed) (Ali Abed - AP)

Insurgents were equally defiant.

A Sunni insurgent coalition posted Web videos on Thursday naming the head of al-Qaida in Iraq as "minister of war" and showing the executions of 20 men it said were members of the Iraqi military and security forces.

The announcement unveiling an "Islamic Cabinet" for Iraq appeared to have multiple aims. One was to present the Islamic State of Iraq coalition as a "legitimate" alternative to the U.S.-backed, Shiite-led government _ and to demonstrate that it was growing in power despite the U.S. military push against insurgents. It also likely sought to establish the coalition's dominance among insurgents after an embarrassing public dispute with other Iraqi Sunni militants.

At least 46 Iraqis were killed or found dead nationwide Thursday.

The U.S. announced three more troop deaths _ two soldiers killed Wednesday by a roadside bomb north of the capital, and another soldier killed the same day in a small arms fire attack in southwest Baghdad.

Two British soldiers were killed and three others wounded Thursday by an explosion in southeastern Iraq. The attack occurred in Maysan province, a day after British troops transferred control of the area to Iraqi forces.

Many of the more than 230 Iraqis killed or found dead a day earlier were buried in quiet ceremonies before Thursday's noon prayer, according to Muslim tradition. Other bodies were in refrigeration containers, still unidentified, at morgues across Baghdad.

In Baghdad's Sadr City district, relatives flocked to Imam Ali Hospital to claim the bodies of loved ones. A man held his shirt over his mouth and nose as he moved past decaying bodies. Nearby, four men loaded a casket onto a minibus.

Collective wakes were held for multiple victims in huge tents erected in narrow alleys and at mosques close to the blast sites. Onlookers gathered around a crater about three yards wide, left by the force of one explosion.

One of them, 38-year-old Akram Abdullah, who owns a clothing shop about 200 yards away, fell to his knees in tears.

"It's a tragedy _ devastation covers the whole area. It's as if a volcano erupted here," said Abdullah, the father of three boys.

"Charred dead bodies are still inside the twisted cars, some cars are still covered with ashes," he said, describing the scene before him in a phone interview.

Abdullah, whose shop was damaged by flying shrapnel, said he took part in 18 funerals Thursday morning. "I cried a lot," he said.

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AP writers Lolita C. Baldor in Fallujah, Iraq, Pauline Jelinek in Washington and Sarah DiLorenzo in New York contributed to this report.