Wave of violence in Iraq claims 22 lives

Iraq: three car bombs and two roadside bombs exploded in three separate locations, killing seven people.NEW: Along with the deaths, scores were woundedAl Qaeda in Iraq has targeted Shiites during RamadanJuly was the single deadliest month since August 2010Analyst cites "risk of acute instability"

Baghdad (CNN) -- At least 22 people died on Thursday in a wave of attacks across Iraq, police officials said.

Insurgents carried out attacks in Baghdad and Kirkuk, Salaheddin, Anbar and Diyala provinces, police said. The assaults included shootings, car bombs and roadside bombs.

The current Muslim holy month of Ramadan was bloody for Iraqis as al Qaeda in Iraq carried out a number of deadly attacks across the country, targeting mainly Shiite areas.

In the latest violence, three car bombs and two roadside bombs exploded in three separate locations, killing seven people. Gunmen attacked a police checkpoint and a police station in and near the Anbar city of Falluja, killing seven people, including six police officers. Two car bombs in two Baghdad neighborhoods killed six people. Bombs killed one person each east of Tikrit in Salaheddin and in Diyala.

At least 101 people were wounded, including 49 in Kirkuk and 41 in Baghdad.

Violence in Iraq has dropped significantly -- from the middle of the last decade when Sunni-Shiite violence raged during the height of the Iraq war -- to December, when the U.S. military withdrew from the country.

But the violence hit a nearly two-year peak in July, with 325 deaths reported, the Interior Ministry said. That's the deadliest single month since August 2010, when the toll was 426, the ministry said.

The Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella group that includes a number of Sunni extremist organizations and has ties to al Qaeda in Iraq, claimed responsibility for July 31 attacks that targeted the Emergency Police Headquarters and the Major Crimes Directorate. Those attacks left 27 people dead.

Douglas A. Ollivant, an Iraq expert, said Iraq is "a fragile state deeply traumatized and riven by 30 years of war, sanctions, occupation and civil strife."

In an August essay on the Council on Foreign Relations website, he said that since the U.S. withdrawal, Iraq has been engulfed in a "fierce political stuggle" between Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and Sunni rivals and tension between the prime minister and some Kurds.

"Although there are numerous positive signs of progress in Iraq -- violence has fallen to its lowest level since 2003, its economy is growing modestly, oil production recently surpassed that of Iran, and foreign investment is beginning to restore infrastructure decayed by years of war and sanctions -- the risk of acute instability and renewed conflict remains," he said.

"For the positive trends to continue, Iraq will need to contain various threats to internal stability and weather regional turmoil that could worsen significantly in the coming months."

CNN's Joe Sterling contributed to this report

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