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[Congressional Bills 109th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 984 Introduced in House (IH)]

109th CONGRESS
  2d Session
H. RES. 984

 Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that Iraq is in 
 the midst of a civil war since the February 22, 2006, bombing of the 
 Golden Mosque in Samarra, Iraq, one of the holiest places for Shiite 
                                Muslims.

_______________________________________________________________________

                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           September 6, 2006

 Ms. Waters submitted the following resolution; which was referred to 
                the Committee on International Relations

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION

 
 Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that Iraq is in 
 the midst of a civil war since the February 22, 2006, bombing of the 
 Golden Mosque in Samarra, Iraq, one of the holiest places for Shiite 
                                Muslims.

Whereas the United States went to war with Iraq on March 19, 2003;
Whereas the government of Saddam Hussein fell in April 2003 as a result of the 
        military action taken by the United States;
Whereas since the fall of the Hussein government there has been a struggle to 
        gain political power by numerous Iraqi political and religious factions;
Whereas a majority of political scientists define a civil war as a war between 
        different sections or parties of the same country or nation in which 
        casualties are in excess of 1,000;
Whereas the death toll in Iraq has far exceeded this level, with a conservative 
        estimate of 30,000 and may be in excess of 100,000 Iraqis killed since 
        the war began on March 19, 2003;
Whereas violence in Iraq has claimed the lives of approximately 100 Iraqis each 
        day in May and June of 2006;
Whereas Baghdad's central morgue reported that it received the bodies of 1,855 
        people in July of 2006, an average of nearly 60 a day, representing a 16 
        percent increase compared to June and a 71 percent increase compared to 
        January;
Whereas the United Nations estimates that more than 14,000 civilians have been 
        killed in Iraq in the first half of 2006;
Whereas on February 22, 2006, Sunni Muslims bombed and partially destroyed the 
        Golden Mosque in Samarra, one of Shiite Muslims holiest sites, 
        unleashing a nationwide wave of sectarian violence between Iraq's Shiite 
        and Sunni Muslims which has yet to subside;
Whereas Iraq's former interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, a Shiite, declared in 
        March 2006 that Iraq was in a civil war;
Whereas Adnan Dulaimi, a Sunni Arab leader, said of the violence in Iraq, ``It's 
        bloodshed and killing of the innocents, killing the elderly and women 
        and children. It's mass killings. It's nothing less than an undeclared 
        civil war'';
Whereas Ayad Samaraie, a leader of the Iraqi Islamic Party, said of the violence 
        in Iraq, ``It is actually a civil war'';
Whereas Fadhil Sharih, a leader of the Sadr movement, said of the violence in 
        Iraq, ``It seems clear that it's been moving toward the direction of 
        civil war''; and
Whereas a senior Iraqi government official was quoted by Reuters on July 23, 
        2006, saying of the violence in Iraq, ``If this is not civil war ... 
        then I don't know what is'': Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved,  That it is the sense of the House of Representatives 
that Iraq has been in the midst of a civil war since the February 22, 
2006, bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samarra, Iraq, one of the holiest 
places for Shiite Muslims.
                                 <all>
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