Bush predicts bloody summer in Iraq

By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush on Thursday predicted a bloody summer in Iraq for U.S. troops and Iraqi civilians, saying he expected insurgents and al Qaeda to step up attacks to try to influence the U.S. debate over how long to stay in Iraq.

The U.S. House of Representatives broke a four-month deadlock with Bush on Thursday night and approved $100 billion (50 billion pounds) in new funds for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan without a timetable for withdrawing combat troops. The bill now goes to the Senate for expected approval this week.

Despite the deployment of tens of thousands of U.S. and Iraqi troops in a major U.S.-led security crackdown, attacks have continued unabated.

On Thursday, a suicide car bomber killed 27 mourners at a funeral in Falluja, west of Baghdad. And, in Baghdad, gunmen shot dead all 11 passengers in a minibus in the mainly Shi'ite Husseiniya district.

Bush said he expected "heavy fighting in the weeks and months" ahead. "What they're going to try to do is kill as many innocent people as they can to try to influence the debate here at home," he said.

Asked at a Rose Garden news conference on Thursday how long he believed he could sustain his strategy without significant progress, Bush noted the U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, was to report back on the effects of the new strategy at the end of the summer.

Defence Secretary Robert Gates later said he also anticipated more violence this summer from what he called "a smart, agile, thinking enemy."

"They know what's going on in this country and I think we should be prepared for them to make a very strong effort to increase the level of violence in July and August. My hope is that anticipating it will allow us to thwart it."