war is hell

When I first started tinkering with the idea of graduate school, part of what drove me was the realization that a master's degree is essential to doing international work. I'd always been interested in conflict zones (like last spring's travel itinerary), partly as a result of my parents own flight from civil war in Lebanon, which was fed by their constant addiction to news, whether it was NPR, NBC Nightly News, or the LA Times. With the war in Iraq settling down a couple years ago, I thought it would be great to be able to work in a post-conflict zone and help establish a functioning participatory democracy, one in which a newly independent media can thrive.

But some scary news at work today really drove home the dangers of Iraq. Not that we weren't already cognizant of the Wild West-like atmosphere of kindappings and ambushes, but it had almost become routine. A dozen Iraqis killed in a suicide bombing here, four more Marines killed in an IED explosion. Sadly, it was no longer shocking. Just another bloody number to add to the ever-growing toll.

Then came this:

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- A suicide car bomber killed 17 Shiites at a teeming Sadr City market Wednesday, while gunmen in a predominantly Sunni neighborhood of Baghdad shot up a convoy of democracy workers in an ambush that took the lives of an American woman and three bodyguards.

The attack on the marketplace came one day after car bombings killed scores of university students just two miles away, indicating that al-Qaida-linked fighters are bent on a surge of bloodshed as U.S. and Iraqi forces gear up for a fresh neighborhood-by-neighborhood security sweep through the capital.

Although nobody claimed responsibility for either day's car bombings, such attacks are the hallmark of Sunni militants, who appear to be taking advantage of a waiting period before the security crackdown to step up attacks on Shiites. There had been a relative lull in Baghdad violence since the first of the year.

An Iraqi army officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of security concerns, said the attack on the Western convoy took place in Yarmouk, a predominantly Sunni neighborhood in western Baghdad.

The three-car convoy belonged to the Washington-based National Democratic Institute, according to Les Campbell, the not-for-profit group's Middle East director. He said the four dead included an American woman along with three security contractors -- a Hungarian, a Croatian and an Iraqi. Two others were wounded, one seriously, Campbell said by telephone from Washington. Their names were withheld until their families could be notified.

''It appeared to be an attack with fairly heavy weapons, we don't know what kind,'' Campbell said. ''We have some information that a firefight ensued. Our security company responded to the attack.''

Campbell said the ambush took place at midday as the group returned from a program elsewhere in Baghdad.