Gunmen wearing military uniforms stormed a Sunni Muslim village near Baghdad and killed 24 people, some of them former insurgents who turned against Al-Qaeda, Iraqi authorities said Saturday. The attackers may have been pretending to be US soldiers because they wore US-style uniforms, sunglasses, and spoke some English, according to an Iraqi military source at the scene. The attack occurred Friday in a Sunni enclave called Albusaifi in the southern part of Baghdad province, a former stronghold of Al-Qaeda militants. A police source said the gunmen handcuffed the victims and shot them in the head. At least seven people were left alive, their hands tied behind their backs, Baghdad security spokesman Maj. Gen. Qassim Al-Moussawi said. “The terrorist group drove cars and killed 24 people, including five women,” Moussawi said. Iraqi authorities had warned of a possible escalation of violence due to rising tensions surrounding a March 7 parliamentary election that produced no clear winner. Iraqi and US troops sealed off the area. Moussawi said 25 people were arrested and security forces were searching for more. Moussawi said some of the victims were members of the Iraqi security forces and others of the Sahwa movement, or the “Sons of Iraq.” The group comprises Sunni former insurgents who joined the Iraqi government and US forces to fight Al-Qaeda militants and are credited with helping turn the tide of the Iraq war. “This is Al-Qaeda's doing,” said a Sahwa leader who asked not to be named. Another Sahwa official in southern Baghdad said the area was once an Al-Qaeda stronghold freed from “terrorists” by the Sons of Iraq. “The security situation is getting worse in the country because of the struggle for power,” he said. “If they (Al-Qaeda) succeed in destabilizing this area and other areas, there will be a security vacuum which will result in a chaos.” The attack was the largest of its kind in Baghdad in recent months, although the capital has been the target of large-scale bombings. Violence has fallen sharply in Iraq in the last two years following the sectarian slaughter of 2006-07, but assassinations, bombings and mortar attacks still occur daily. A source in the Iraqi security forces' intelligence service said 10 to 15 gunmen in pickup trucks were involved in the attack. He said Sons of Iraq members were targeted because they were loyal to the government. “We have intelligence information that says Al-Qaeda is trying to re-organize itself,” he said. The victims were members of three different families and included women and children, another source said. The attackers looked like US soldiers and spoke in English, using a translator to communicate with locals, the Iraqi military source said, but the villagers did not believe they were Americans.
