Update for Saturday, April 30, 2016

Iraq’s political crisis deepens as Sadrist protesters enter the Green Zone and storm the parliament chamber over failure to make political reforms. Many members of parliament fled, others are hiding in fear of the mob, although only fairly minor violence has been reported. All roads into the capital are closed. [I should note that although Muqtada al-Sadr leads a sectarian militia that was accused of atrocities against Sunnis during the civil war, he claims to be an Iraqi nationalist and that his current protest is a condemnation of the sectarianism of the Shiite-dominated government. What his long-term intentions may be is unclear.]

Suicide truck bomb attack on a market in Nahrawan, southeast Baghdad, kills 19 and injures 48. Although this attack caused many more casualties than the recent attack in Brussels, it will of course be largely ignored in the U.S. and Europe. [Some reports say the target was a nearby Shiite pilgrimage procession, but recent reports say the marketplace was the target.]