Bombs fuel Baghdad anger

Bombs fuel Baghdad anger

By Paul Wood BBC correspondent in Baghdad

People believe the shopping area was hit by US missiles

One day on from the explosions which killed 17 people in the al-Shaab suburb of northern Baghdad the anger is, if anything, growing.

Despite what the Pentagon says, people are in no doubt that their friends and neighbours were killed by an American missile.

As usual, a government official is present but, as they push and jostle to speak, it's clear that what they say comes from the heart.

"Bush, he said I am a man of peace. He attacked innocent people here. You see that, so he was not a man of peace, he was a man of terror," said one Iraqi.

'Futile firing'

In Baghdad, anti-aircraft fire could be heard futilely trying to keep the bombers and missiles at bay.

The daytime sky was black once again with the smoke from fires lit in oil-filled trenches, a rudimentary defence against marauding war planes.

Iraqi officials say some 350 civilians have died in coalition bombing and other military action.

True, the bombing is carefully targeted.

But the longer it goes on and the greater the casualties, the more Iraqis will turn against the American and British forces who want to persuade them they come as liberators.

The movements of those reporting from Baghdad are restricted and their reports are monitored by the Iraqi authorities.