by: Liana DeMasi

Suicide bombers have ambushed Iraq’s capital, Baghdad, over the past few months. The most recent attack was a bomber that killed 18 funeral attendees at a Shia mosque. Iraqi officials are assuming that the attack is the work of the Islamic State extremist group because of their similar attacks over the past few months.

Previous to the mosque bombing, there were a series of car bombings that killed 48 people in Baghdad. The attack that preceded the car bombings had an even higher death toll, committed by three suicide bombers that detonated their bombs in close proximity to a government building, killing 58 people and injuring at least 107. The first bomber detonated his devices while at the gateway of the building, a main office of the Kurdish political party. The two remaining assailants drove cars into the compound that contained heavy explosives, which caused even more damage than the first.

Due to a public announcement via twitter made by ISIS, the Iraqi authorities are led to believe that ISIS was behind this attack as well. In their public claiming of the bombing, they also stated that the bombers were foreign followers of the extremist group as opposed to Iraqi natives. The extremist group is becoming known for recruiting more members from foreign countries such as Canada, Turkey and France. This makes the fear of imminent attack extremely real even for countries outside the Middle East seeing as many of the ISIS members may in fact live among us.