2 March 2004 Iraq Ashura bombings

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Karbala Ashura massacre
Location	Karbala and Baghdad, Iraq
Date	March 2, 2004
Attack type	bombing (including car bombs and suicide bombers); mortar, grenade and rocket attacks
Deaths	at least 178
Injured	at least 500
Perpetrator(s)	Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad; attacks directed by Abu Abdallah al Hassan Ben Mahmoud

Major terrorist attacks of the Iraq War

Attacks with 100+ fatalities in bold:
1st Baghdad – 2nd Baghdad – Najaf – 3rd Baghdad – Nasiriyah – 1st Karbala – Irbil – Ashoura – Basra – Mosul – 4th Baghdad – Karbala-Najaf – Baqubah – Kufa – FOB Marez – 1st Al Hillah – Musayyib – 5th Baghdad – 6th Baghdad – 1st Balad – Khanaqin – Karbala-Ramadi – 1st Samarra – 7th Baghdad – 8th Baghdad – 9th Baghdad – 10th Baghdad – 11th Baghdad – 12th Baghdad – 13th Baghdad – 14th Baghdad – 2nd Al Hillah – Tal Afar – 15th Baghdad – 16th Baghdad – 2nd Karbala – 17th Baghdad – 3rd Karbala – Makhmour – Abu Sayda – 2nd Samarra – 18th Baghdad – Amirli – Kirkuk – 19th Baghdad – 20th Baghdad – Qahtaniya – 21st Baghdad – 2nd Balad – 4th Karbala

The Ashura massacre of March 2, 2004 in Iraq was a series of planned terrorist explosions that killed at least 178 and injured at least 500 Iraqi Shi'a Muslims commemorating the Day of Ashura. The bombings brought one of the deadliest days in the Iraq occupation after the Iraq War to topple Saddam Hussein.

[edit] The attacks

Nine explosions were detonated in Karbala, accompanied by mortar, grenade, and rocket fire, killing over 100 people, while three explosions near the Kazimiya shrine in Baghdad killed 58 more. Though the attack involved armed squads, car bombs, and up to a dozen suicide bombers, there was also an explosive-laden vehicle which was intercepted while trying to enter Basra, as were two suicide bombers in Karbala and others in Baghdad who had entered via Syria. The squads armed with rockets and small arms were meant to kill those wounded by the blasts as well as to trap those trying to flee the carnage.

Al-Qaeda was immediately held responsible for the attack, and it was believed their intent was to cause much more destruction than actually occurred.

Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, the American commander in Baghdad, initially blamed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi for the attacks, but it was subsequently revealed that his field commander in Iraq, Abu Abdallah al Hassan Ben Mahmoud^{[citation needed]}, directed the attacks. Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a highly influential Shiite in Iraq, blamed the U.S. for allowing the attacks to occur.