Signs of Panic in Mixed Iraq Neighborhood

[leftchick]

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/world/3801560.html

Signs of Panic in Mixed Iraq Neighborhood


By ANTONIO CASTANEDA Associated Press Writer
© 2006 The Associated Press

BAGHDAD, Iraq — The man strapping the air conditioner to the top of a taxi paused to explain: His family was packing up and fleeing their Baghdad neighborhood because of threats against Shiites. "We are leaving because we are scared," he said, too afraid to give his name. "This is a dangerous area."

Full-scale civil war may not have broken out in Iraq, but startling signs of sectarian hatred are evident along several streets in the religiously mixed Dora neighborhood.

While Shiite families leave Dora, Sunni politician Adnan al-Dulaimi is accusing government forces and Shiite militias of "ethnic cleansing" against Sunni communities _ including in Azamiyah, where residents clashed Tuesday with Iraqi forces they feared were clearing the way for Shiite death squads.

In Dora these days, rows of homes sit empty and abandoned. The streets show signs of desperate attempts to craft barriers from palm tree trunks and rusty washing machines. And there are countless crude threats scrawled in black spray paint.

[Supersedeas]

1. Mission Accomplished?

[sabra]

2. Good news: Iraq ghost towns = less violence

:sarcasm:

[izzie]

3. Last week I read that some of this people were living in tent cities

First I have heard of all this since we got to that country. The news item said 65000 people had now moved into these places. Looks bad as that means we will have to re fill all those places with aid and I am sure we had done this when the war started. I am sure by now some one has walked off with the millions we put into that Iraq program. Like maybe some of those young republicans they moved into Iraq right after the war to run things.

[leftchick]

4. yes, I saw the photos on yahoo

al-Sadr is setting up refugee camps for his people.

[Cooley Hurd]

5. I was under the impression that Sadr City was a fortress unto itself...

...where even the US military feared to tread. I guess this speaks VOLUMES about the situation on the ground in Baghdad.:(

[madmark]

6. well we have transformed the middle east . . . into Bosnia