Wednesday: 91 Iraqis, 3 GIs Killed; 42 Iraqis, 1 Marine Wounded

Updated at 11:45 a.m. EST, Nov. 2, 2006

Another 91 Iraqis were killed and 42 more wounded in violent acts today. November's first U.S. military fatality occurred today west of Baghdad; a soldier was killed when a roadside bomb blasted his vehicle. The U.S. military also reported that a soldier was killed by small arms fire and a Marine died in a non-hostile incident, both in Anbar Province yesterday. The family of a wounded Marine today reported that he had been injured in Anbar on Monday. Several assassination attempts occurred, some successful. Five high profile Iraqis were kidnapped.

In Baghdad, the leader of the Iraqi National Party, Hazim al-Hemedawi, was wounded along with two bodyguards, when gunmen attacked their convoy. The house of Abdel Aziz Al-Hakim, the head of the parliamentary majority, was the target of a mortar attack in the capital; three bodyguards were injured. In an unspecified location west of the capital, a former professor from an Anbar Province university was shot dead by gunmen. Also, two court officials were killed when a time bomb attached to their fuel tank exploded as their vehicle crossed a bridge in Baghdad. The convoy of the security advisor of the Governor of Sallaheddine Province was blasted by a roadside bomb in Baiji; two guards were wounded in the attack. Also, a U.S. airstrike killed an alleged al Qaeda leader and his driver in Ramadi; Rafa Abdul Salam Hamud Al Ithawi, also known as Abu Taha, was also the Emir of Shamiyyah. He was accussed of harboring foreign fighters.

A member of the Transportation Ministry protection force was kidnapped while visiting relatives in Rahsad, and a teacher was abducted from his classroom at a school in Amarah. The head of Iraq's basketball federation and coach to blind athletes is the lastest sports figure kidnapped, and another Sunni coach were abducted from a youth club. A police colonel was abducted in the al-Selekh district of the capital.

Thirty-five bodies were found scattered in the capital; they bore the usual gunshot wounds and signs of torture, which suggest sectarian violence. In the southern Bayaa district, a bomb exploded in a minibus, killing three and wounding seven. A roadside bomb killed two and wounded seven people at a market in central Baghdad’s Shoran neighborhood. In eastern Baghdad, a car bomb exploded, killing a police officer and four civilians; seven people were also wounded. Also, a mortar round landed in eastern Baghdad where the blast killed a police officer and wounded two others. In separate shooting incidents, a clerk with the Ministry of Industry and a policeman were killed on their way to and from work. Clashes in the Doura district left a policeman dead and three others wounded.

During clashes between police and smugglers in the border town of Safwan, Sunni cleric Sheikh Yasin al-Kubaisi and his son Ahmed were killed.

In Suwayra, ten bodies were discovered in the Tigris River; one was beheaded.

Nine bodies were found in Mosul; one was charred, but the rest bore gunshot wounds. Gunmen also killed a policewoman, and a roadside bomb wounded two other officers. Two policemen were killed, three others wounded when a bomb blew up in the al-Aden district.

Two suicide bomb attacks north of Ramadi took the lives of five policemen and wounded three others.

In Falluja, police found five bodies bearing gunshot and evidence of torture.

The body of a man was found in Numaniya.

Two people were killed in unspecified and separate incidents in Baquba and Muqdadiyah.

Compiled by Margaret Griffis