Iraqi Officers Behind $4.8M Bank Heist

The Iraqi robbers who killed eight security guards and stole $4.8 million from a Baghdad bank this week were army officers, not insurgents, the Los Angeles Times reports. Iraqi police revealed today the arrest of four elite officers assigned to guard Shiite Vice President Adel Abdul-Mahdi. "It was a genuine test" of Prime Minister Nouri Maliki, a lawmaker said. "It is clear that everyone is subject to the law."

The arrests further fueled the notion that political factions can be as deadly as militants in today's Iraq. With elections set for January, even Friday's bombings, which killed 29, may not be the work of extremists: "You can't say every attack is Al Qaeda or the Baathists," one analyst said. "There is quite a connection between these attacks and political reasons. Some people inside the system don't want stability in the Iraqi state." (More Iraq stories.)