2006 al-Askari Shrine bombing | |
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Part of the Iraqi Civil War | |
Location | Samarra, Saladin Governorate, Iraq |
Coordinates | 34°11′56″N 43°52′25″E / 34.1990°N 43.8736°E |
Date | 22 February 2006 6:44 a.m. (UTC+03:00) |
Target | Al-Askari Shrine |
Attack type | Bombing |
Deaths | None |
Injured | None |
Perpetrators | Unknown |
The 2006 al-Askari Shrine bombing occurred on 22 February 2006 at approximately 6:44 a.m. local Iraqi time, and targeted the al-Askari Shrine in the city of Samarra, Iraq. The attack on the mosque, one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam, has not been claimed by any group; the then President of the United States, George W. Bush, claimed that the bombing was an al-Qaeda plot. Although the mosque was severely damaged from the blast, there were no casualties.
The attack was followed by retaliatory violence, with over a hundred dead bodies being found the next day[1] and well over 1,000 deaths in the days following the bombing; some counts place the death toll at over 1,000 on the first day alone.[2] Already-prevalent communal violence between Iraqi Sunnis and Shia armed groups eventually escalated into a full-scale civil war.