Gunmen at a makeshift checkpoint south of Baghdad murdered 47 people who had been demonstrating against the destruction of the Shia shrine at Samarra, bringing Iraq close to a sectarian bloodbath.

The victims were Shia and Sunni returning from a demonstration in the town of Kenaan, when they were dragged from their cars and killed. Their bodies were left in a ditch by the side of the road. The scale and intensity of the violence increasingly resembles Lebanon at the start of its bloody civil war 30 years ago. WSWS: Sectarian violence engulfs Iraq following mosque bombing. URUKNET.INFO: Whose Bombs were They? BAGHDAD DWELLER: The night before the bombing: Two eyewitnesses. --This runs smoothly and in complete accord with the ZIONIST plan for the region. Check Oded Yinon: The Zionist Plan for the Middle East.