An explosion ripped through a holy site in Samarra Wednesday, destroying the al Askariya "Golden Mosque," a U.S. military statement and a local security official said. A photograph provided by the U.S. Army showed the dome on the mosque had been destroyed, with debris littering the area. An official with the Salahuldin Joint Coordination Center said a group of men dressed as Iraqi Police commandos entered the shrine around 7 a.m. (11 p.m. ET Tuesday) and detonated explosives under the dome, collapsing it and damaging the entire mosque. The site is sacred to Shia, because they believe Imam al Mehdi will appear at the mosque, bringing them salvation, CNN reported. Samarra is located in southern Salah-ad-Din province, about 70 miles (110 km) northwest of Baghdad. On Tuesday, a car bomb detonated in a marketplace in the southern Baghdad suburb of Dora, killing 20 people and wounding another 25, police said. The Associated Press reported that the car appeared to be detonated by remote control and was aimed at a police patrol but missed its intended target. The car bomb was parked near a police checkpoint, and an Iraqi suspected of setting off the blast has been arrested, AP reported.
