An observation from someone one who watches Iraq

I go through the wire photos from Iraq every few days, and in my last search I noticed that there were very few photos from on the ground and in the streets at least since the massive market bombing last week.

Almost all of the "field photos" coming out of Iraq right now are from photographers with US troops.

There aren't even independent photographs from the hospitals and morgues which are usually fairly safe shots for Iraqis working within their sect's hospitals.

This is definitely not an exact indicator, but on the back of the giant bombings over the last few weeks, the reports of a collapse of support for Maliki, and the withdrawal of Sadr from the government, this makes me think that the feeling in the Iraqi streets is becoming very tense.

This may not mean anything, but those Iraqi photographers who work independently and alone have about the best "sense of the streets" as anyone.

My gut tells me that the sectarian tensions are growing again.

Just an observation.