Word: baghdad
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...blast, Baghdad...
...gunner in a scout unit, Aaron Genevie often rode through Baghdad popped up out of the top of his humvee, manning a belt-fed automatic machine gun. Gunners are the eyes and ears of the driver, constantly scanning the horizon for threats. In Baghdad's congested streets, they are also traffic cops--waving cars out of the way, shouting at drivers who get too close. That's what Genevie was doing the day he died, telling his driver to maneuver around an Iraqi national-police checkpoint when a roadside bomb went off and killed him instantly...
...reappearance of Moqtada al Sadr comes at an inconvenient time for an Iraqi government struggling to keep up the appearance of political stability - and for U.S. military commanders trying to impose a degree of peace in Baghdad...
...absence from view did not prevent Sadr from looming large over the political scene in Baghdad, where his loyalists make up the second-largest bloc in parliament and his militia, the Mahdi Army, control some of the largest neighborhoods. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki depends on Sadr's support to keep his job. Nearly two months ago, he ordered six of his followers to resign from Maliki's cabinet, to protest against the government's failure to secure a withdrawal timetable from the Americans. But his loyalists remain in parliament, giving him a big say in any legislation that comes...
...Sadr's comeback will also likely re-energize the Mahdi Army, which has kept a low profile in Baghdad since the start of the "surge" in U.S. troops. Sadr had initially ordered his militia not to engage the Americans; this lead to an immediate drop-off in the activities of Shi'ite death squads, lending credence to U.S. suspicions that many of these squads are from the Mahdi Army. But there have been indications recently that the death squads are being reactivated: the bodies of Sunnis have begun to turn up in Baghdad, bearing signs of gruesome torture and execution...