GMT – 21.32: CNN reports that the death toll of these four attacks against Shiites increased to 36 and the total number of the wounded to 124. However. the fifth attack against a Sunni target took 6 lives and wounded 30. At the end of five attacks, 42 people were killed and 154 were wounded. 

GMT – 18.40: At least 26 people were killed and 94 wounded in four separate bombings in Iraq on Friday. A Shiite mosque in Mosul, a bus carrying pilgrims and a car in the Sadr City section of Baghdad, and another vehicle carrying pilgrims in Baghdad were the targets on a religious holiday for Shiites, the end of a celebration of the birth of Imam al-Mahdi,.

Last week, after the formal handover of sovereignty from US occupying forces to Iraqi authorities, we noted an Orwellian description in The New York Times that the country was now in a “violent semi-peace”.

Although attention has turned away from Baghdad, because of events in Gaza and also the (misguided) sense that the long aftermath to the 2003 war is ending, the tension in events keeps sneaking back. On the one hand, an interesting blog on the website Alive in Baghdad recounts last week’s Shi’a commemoration of Ashura: “This year many Iraqis have noted a dramatic decrease in violence. With the exception of a suicide attack on Iranian pilgrims in Kadhamiya, Shi’a in Iraq were able to celebrate 2009’s Ashura Festival in relative peace.”

On the other, this morning’s headlines highlight that violence: “A string of bombings around Iraq’s capital has killed eight people, including three Iraqi soldiers who died when their weapons truck was hit, and wounded at least 32.”

As the political complexities get even more tangled in advance of provincial elections — the latest is that Iraqi Sunni parties cannot agree on a replacement for the Speaker of the Parliament, who resigned in the midst of the debate over Muntazar al-Zaidi’s shoe-throwing — the half-full, half-empty state of “violent semi-peace” is likely to continue.