RAWALPINDI, Pakistan - :
Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Thursday by an attacker who shot her after a campaign rally and then blew himself up. Her death stoked chaos across the nuclear-armed nation, an important U.S. ally in the war on terrorism.
At least 20 others were killed in the attack on the election rally where the 54-year-old former prime minister had just spoken.
The assassination threw the campaign for the Jan. 8 election into disarray and sparked a wave of violence that left at least nine people dead Thursday. Angry supporters rioted in the southern port city of
Karachi after her killing, firing shots at police, setting tires and cars on fire and burning a gas station.

At the hospital where Bhutto died, supporters smashed glass and wailed, chanting slogans against President Pervez Musharraf. Musharraf blamed Islamic extremists for her death and said he would redouble his efforts to fight them.
"This is the work of those terrorists with whom we are engaged in war," he said in a nationally televised speech. "I have been saying that the nation faces the greatest threats from these terrorists. ... We will not rest until we eliminate these terrorists and root them out."


'She has been martyred'
The attacker struck just minutes after Bhutto addressed thousands of supporters in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, 8 miles south of Islamabad. She was shot in the neck and chest by the attacker, who then blew himself up, said Rehman Malik, Bhutto's security adviser.
Sardar Qamar Hayyat, a leader from Bhutto's party, said that at the time of the attack he was standing
about 10 yards away from her a white, bulletproof SUV with a sunroof
"She was inside the vehicle and was coming out from the gate after addressing the rally when some of the youths started chanting slogans in her favor. Then I saw a smiling Bhutto emerging from the vehicle's roof and responding to their slogans," he said.
"Then I saw a thin, young man jumping toward her vehicle from the back and opening fire. Moments later, I saw her speeding vehicle going away," he added.
Bhutto was rushed to the hospital and taken into emergency surgery. She died about an hour after the attack.
A doctor on the team that treated her said she had a bullet in the back of the neck that damaged her spinal cord before exiting from the side of her head. Another bullet pierced the back of her shoulder and came out through her chest.
"At 6:16 p.m., she expired," said Wasif Ali Khan, a member of Bhutto's party who was at Rawalpindi General Hospital.
"The surgeons confirmed that she has been martyred," Bhutto's lawyer Babar Awan said.
Bhutto's body was flown to her home province of Sindh shortly after the arrival Friday from Dubai of her
....husband, Asif Ali Zardari, and their three children.

المقال بعدو طويل ... بس هي أهمّ المقتطفات عن الخبر ..
بالمناسبة ، اليوم وقت اللي قريت الخبر ، كانو كاتبين فيه انو كل مناصرينها صرخو بفورة غضبون " dog Musharraf dog " ... بس هلأ وقت اللي اجيت لارجع للينك ما عاد طلع معي ...
المهم ، من شوي كان نازل موضوع تاني عن الخبر ، وكان ناقل الخبر متــّهم القاعدة بالفعل ، ما بعرف شو دخل القاعدة بالموضوع !! بس بظنّ مشرّف في الو علاقة ..
انا فعلاً مانـّـي مصدقة انها ماتت !!
الله يرحمها يا رب ..


وعالهامش .. يا ريت .. يا ريت بلا مزح وتنكيت بلا طعمة بكل المواضيع ..