While aspects of last week's Black Wednesday bombings in Baghdad remain mysterious, their message was clear, writes Salah Hemeid On a scorching Wednesday morning last week, an enormous explosion ripped through an apartment block just outside the fortified Green Zone in Baghdad, sending huge columns of smoke billowing over a large area. The blast, caused by the explosion of a truck bomb outside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, blew through the front of the building, damaging several houses and sending cars flying into the sky and leaving others as mangled heaps of metal. Within a few minutes of the first explosion, five other attacks hit the Iraqi capital, including a truck bomb that went off outside the Ministry of Finance building some three kilometres away. Some 500 people were either killed or wounded in the attacks on what has been called Baghdad's Black Wednesday, the city's worst terrorist attacks since the pullout of the American troops from Iraqi cities in June under the Iraqi-US security agreement. The attacks also exposed deep failings on the part of the Iraqi security forces, which assumed responsibility from US troops. They stirred fears in the Iraqi population about the security forces' ability to confront a re-emerging insurgency that many had believed was on the road to defeat. They also triggered harsh criticism of the government of Shia Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki, even from members of his own cabinet. Foreign minister Hoshyar Zebary, an ethnic Kurd, summoned the media to his wrecked ministry on Saturday, where dozens of employees had been wounded by flying glass from the attacks, and said he suspected members of the Iraqi security forces had helped the perpetrators. "According to our information, there was collaboration between security officers and the murderers and killers," an angry Zebary said, calling for a thorough investigation. Zebary said checkpoints and blast walls near the ministry had earlier been removed due to a "false sense of security". "Things should be called what they are, and we should stop making unnecessarily optimistic statements. We should tell people the truth. There has been a deterioration in security... and the coming days may even be worse," Zebary warned. For his part, Al-Maliki, who had previously been trumpeting the successes of the country's security forces in the fight against the insurgents, appeared on state television later in the day to defend his government, announcing that the police had already found those behind the attacks. He said the government was doing everything in its power to combat terrorism. "I assure the Iraqi people that the security forces are capable of doing their job, and that they will achieve further victories despite occasional shortcomings," Al-Maliki said, ignoring the remarks from Zebary that the government had fallen into a false sense of security. Earlier, Major-General Qassim Atta, spokesman for the Baghdad Operations Command, a special security unit in charge of the capital, said that the force had arrested members of a cell believed to be responsible for Wednesday's bombings. To back up these claims, Atta on Sunday showed a video of someone he said was a supporter of the Baath Party of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein confessing to having organised one of the truck-bomb blasts last week. The man said he had orchestrated the bombing with a leader of a branch of the now outlawed Baath Party living in Syria. The man, identified as Wissam Ali Kadhim Ibrahim, a former police chief, said Syrian-based Baathist leader, Sattam Farhan, ordered his group to carry out the attacks, an allegation which prompted the Iraqi government Tuesday to recall its ambassador from Damascus. Syria later recalled its envoy in Baghdad dismissing the accusations as "mere fabrication". However, the release of Sunday's video and the reports of arrests in connection with the bombings also drew attention to the security forces' previous claims of having successfully detained suspected terrorists. Such claims have not been borne out in the past, and they have therefore not met concerns that the country's security forces are not able to carry out their duties. At a closed-door meeting last Friday, parliamentary leaders questioned the ministers of defence and the interior about the bombings, together with the head of the Baghdad Security Command, later criticising the security services for what was described as negligence and the overlapping of responsibilities. However, the only head to roll thus far has been that of Iraq's intelligence chief, General Mohamed Al-Shahwani, who was told that it was time for him to go even though he was not personally blamed for any wrongdoing. Beyond the search for someone to blame for the apparent lapses in security before the blasts, together with evidence of internal rivalry among the Iraqi military, intelligence and police forces, the explosions have also sparked a national debate about who might be the perpetrators. Politicians have traded accusations, implicating their enemies in the attacks even after the Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attacks. While Al-Maliki has accused extremists affiliated with the militant group Al-Qaeda in Iraq and the remnants of Saddam's Baath Party of being responsible for the attacks, others have blamed intra- Shia rivalry ahead of the forthcoming elections, or lingering disputes between majority Shias, Sunnis and minority Kurds. Some Iraqis have also accused Iran of being involved in the blasts, Iranian ambassador to Iraq Khazum Hassan Qumi responding by blaming the United States and Israel for the bombings. Yet, whoever was behind Wednesday's blasts, like other recent bombings in the country they seem to have been planned to exacerbate tensions among Iraq's feuding ethnic groups and to damage the country's Shia-led government by showing that it cannot provide security even to key government departments like the foreign and finance ministries. For these reasons, the government's claim that the Baathists were behind the attacks are not completely groundless, even if the evidence so far is lacking. There has been ample proof that the Baathists have resurfaced in Sunni-dominated provinces of the country not under government control, such as Al-Anbar, Mosul, Tikrit and Diyala, and in Sunni neighbourhoods in Baghdad, despite a government ban. Reports from these areas suggest that members of the former ruling party are regrouping and stepping up their activities in conjunction with other Sunni insurgent groups, sometimes with the local authorities turning a blind eye or even giving them essential support. This Baath resurrection also comes on the heels of recent US contacts with the insurgents and the pressure that the Obama administration has been putting on Al-Maliki to open talks with them. US officials reportedly met with insurgent representatives in Turkey in March to try to convince them to lay down their arms and join the political process. Sources also told Al-Ahram Weekly that European diplomats have been involved in the talks, and several meetings have been held in Baghdad with local insurgency leaders. The sources said that French diplomats had recently met with Baath Party leaders in Damascus to discuss their future strategy and the possibility of their participating in next year's elections. Yet, if true, the Baathists' attempt at a comeback is more open to question than it has been. It might not be as smart a strategy to support it as the Americans, Turks and even some Arabs might think. This is because the Baathists, who are operating at the heart of the Sunni insurgency, are not talking about joining the government or participating in the elections, but are instead bluntly declaring that they want to rule Iraq once again. Wednesday's bombings reinforced such fears among the Iraqi Shias, raising the stakes such that violence may well erupt again and split the country even deeper along confessional lines. On Monday, a group of Shia parties formed a new political coalition ahead of January's elections, ending weeks of bickering between the different Shia parties. The formation of the new coalition was largely prompted by last week's bombings. Al-Maliki did not join the new bloc, saying that he intended to form a coalition not based on religious or ethnic groupings instead. However, it is highly unlikely that Al-Maliki will stay the course if he thinks that the Baathists are gaining strength in the Sunni west and north of the country. If that happens, he may well rejoin the broad Shia alliance instead of risking his constituency's support and votes.
