Bombings in Baghdad area kill 38 people

BAGHDAD — A bombing by the Islamic State militant group outside a popular ice cream parlor in central Baghdad and a rush-hour car bombing in another downtown area killed at least 31 people Tuesday, Iraqi officials said.

Later in the day, bombings in and around the Iraqi capital killed seven more people.

The attacks come as Islamic State militants are steadily losing more territory to U.S.backed Iraqi forces in the battle for Mosul, the country’s second-largest city. The Sunni extremists are increasingly turning to insurgency-style terror attacks to distract from their losses.

The nighttime early-morning attack outside the ice cream parlor in the bustling Karrada neighborhood killed 17 people and wounded 32, police and health officials said.

A closed-circuit camera captured the moment of the explosion, the video showing a busy downtown avenue with cars heading down the street when the blast struck. It then showed a fireball engulfing a building. Other videos of the attack, posted on social media, show wounded and bloodied people crying for help on the sidewalk outside the ice cream parlor.

In the second attack, an explosives- laden car went off during rush hour near the state-run Public Pension Office in Baghdad’s busy Shawaka area, killing 14 people, a police officer said. At least 37 people were wounded in that attack, he added.

In separate online statements, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the two attacks, saying its suicide bombers targeted gatherings of Shiites. The Associated Press could not verify the authenticity of the statements, but they were posted on a website commonly used by extremists.

Later Tuesday, seven people died and 19 were wounded in four separate bombings in and around Baghdad, officials said. The attacks targeted commercial areas and a patrol of Sunni anti-Islamic State tribal fighters, they said. No group immediately claimed those attacks.

All officials spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.

The attacks came days into the holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims fast during daylight hours. After sundown, families break their fast and Baghdad’s restaurants and cafes quickly fill up with people staying up long into the night.

During Ramadan last year, another section of Karrada was hit by a suicide bombing that killed almost 300 people, the deadliest single attack in the Iraqi capital in 13 years of conflict. The attack was claimed by the Islamic State.

Details of how the militants managed to stage Tuesday’s attacks were not immediately clear. After last year’s attack, Iraqi authorities stepped up security in Karrada, especially in the area of the bombing.

In the northern city of Mosul, Iraqi troops are pushing Islamic State fighters out of their last strongholds. Iraqi commanders said the offensive, which recently entered its eighth month, will mark the end of the Islamic State caliphate in Iraq, but they concede the group will likely increase insurgent attacks in the wake of military defeats.