BAGHDAD – A booby-trapped bicycle exploded near a cafe serving tea and food during Ramadan fasting hours today, killing at least five people in a religiously mixed area in northern Iraq, police said.
MOThe blast occurred about 11:30 a.m., hours after the dawn-to-dusk fast began. Witnesses said a boy left the bicycle bomb near the cafe, which was located in a popular market and was one of the few open during daylight hours despite Ramadan. Tradition requires faithful to abstain from eating and drinking from sunrise to sunset during the monthlong observance.

Two of the slain victims were in the cafe, while three were in the market, police chief Captain Abbas Mohammed said. He also said 19 people were wounded.

Nobody claimed responsibility for the attack. But the Sunni insurgent umbrella group the Islamic State of Iraq said Saturday that it was launching a Ramadan offensive in honor of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the founder of Al Qaeda in Iraq who was killed by an American airstrike in June 2006.

A parked car also exploded late yesterday in a mostly Shiite area of southwest Baghdad, killing at least 11 people lined up to buy bread at a bakery at the start of iftar, the evening meal at which Muslims break their Ramadan fast.

Another car bomb exploded Sunday in the western Baghdad of Mansour, killing at least one civilian and wounding five, police said.

The bloodshed was a blow to government hopes that a peaceful Ramadan would demonstrate the success of the seven-month operation in the capital.

The government, meanwhile, faced a deepening political crisis with yesterday’s announcement that anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s followers were withdrawing from the Shiite alliance in parliament. Al-Sadr’s followers hold 30 of the 275 parliament seats.

The announcement, made to reporters in Najaf, means the Shiite-led government can count on the support of only 108 parliament members — 30 short of a majority. However, it could probably win the backing of the 30 independent Shiite parliamentarians, as well as some minor parties.

Still, the decision by Mr. al-Sadr’s followers will complicate further American-backed efforts to win parliamentary approval of power-sharing legislation, including the oil bill and an easing of curbs that prevent former Saddam Hussein supporters from holding government jobs.

Mr. al-Sadr’s decision will also sharpen the power struggle among armed Shiite groups in the south, which includes major Shiite religious shrines and much of the country’s vast oil resources.

The Sadrists had been threatening to bolt the Shiite alliance for several days. But tensions rose after arrest warrants were issued against Sadrist officials in the holy city of Karbala in connection with last month’s Shiite factional fighting there.

The warrants, which were made public Saturday, angered the Sadrists, who said the government was provoking them despite recent gestures by al-Sadr, including a six-month halt to military operations by his Mahdi Army militia.

Shiites have shown signs of increasing frustration with militia violence, much of it blamed on breakaway Mahdi Army factions and criminal gangs and extortion rings.

Internal Shiite clashes broke out at a market in the Hamzah al-Gharbi area near Hillah, about 60 miles south of Baghdad, when shop owners from the Albu Jassim tribe fought back against militia fighters, leaving one civilian dead, a provincial police official said. The bullet-riddled bodies of a traffic police chief and his 11-year-old son also were found after they were kidnapped during the fighting, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information.

American commanders in southern Iraq have said Shiite sheiks are showing interest in joining forces with the American military against extremists, in much the same way that Sunni clansmen in the western part of the country have worked with American forces against Al Qaeda n Iraq.
In other violence reported by police on today:

— A mortar shell landed near the Shaab stadium in eastern Baghdad, killing one person and wounding three.

— Attackers blew up a school in Qarah Tappa, 70 miles north of Baqouba, days before final exams were to be held.

— Gunmen killed a police officer near his home near Diwaniyah, 80 miles south of Baghdad, late yesterday.

Iraqis in the predominantly Shiite area of Shaab in eastern Baghdad also rallied to demand that the government intervene to stop American-led raids in the area. Demonstrators burned the American flag and changed anti-American slogans, but no violence was reported.