Iraq was in mourning Tuesday for dozens of people killed when a bomb ripped through a crowded Baghdad market on the eve of a Muslim feast in what the Islamic State group claimed as a suicide attack.

The bloody carnage Monday evening, one of the deadliest attacks in years in the war-scarred country, reportedly cost at least 36 lives, mostly of women and children, hours before the start of Eid al-Adha, the Muslim festival of sacrifice.

It sparked revulsion and renewed fears about the reach of the IS, which lost its last territory in Iraq after a gruelling campaign that ended in late 2017, but retains sleeper cells in remote desert and mountain areas.

The Sunni Muslim jihadists claimed on the Telegram messenger service that an IS suicide bomber detonated an explosives belt in the Woheilat market of northeast Baghdad's Shiite district of Sadr City that was busy with Eid shoppers.

In the panic and chaos of the attack, screams of terror and anguish filled the air. When the smoke cleared, human remains lay strewn amid scattered sandals, market produce and the charred debris of stalls.

President Barham Salih condemned the "heinous crime of unprecedented cruelty on the eve of Eid", writing on Twitter that the perpetrators "do not allow people to rejoice, even for a moment".

No official death toll has yet been released by Iraqi authorities, but medical sources told AFP at least 36 people were killed and about 60 wounded.

- 'Cowardly attack' -

Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhemi said the "cowardly attack illustrates the failure of terrorists to regain a foothold after being defeated by our heroic security forces" and vowed that "terrorism will not go unpunished".

The attack came days before Kadhemi was to meet US President Joe Biden in Washington, and ahead of a scheduled parliamentary election in October.

At Sadr General Hospital, doctor-turned-parliamentarian Jawad al-Moussawi visited some of the survivors on Tuesday.

"Those innocent victims who perished yesterday were children and women, what is their sin? They had nothing to do with any political or sectarian goals," he told AFP from the grounds of the public hospital.

Osama al-Saidi, head of the Iraqi Political Science Association, said it was "a clear message that IS is still present and is able to strike targets in Baghdad".

"Whenever elections approach, terror attacks happen with the aim of sending a political message," he said.

Deadly attacks were common in Baghdad during the sectarian bloodletting that followed the US-led invasion of 2003, and later on as IS swept across much of Iraq.

Iraq declared IS defeated in late 2017 after a fierce three-year campaign and attacks became relatively rare in the capital -- until January this year when a twin IS-claimed suicide bombing killed 32 people in another Baghdad market.

The US-led coalition that supported Iraq's campaign against IS has significantly drawn down its troop levels over the past year, citing increased capabilities of Iraqi forces.

- 'Tired of everything' -

The latest attack sparked condolences from abroad, and recriminations among Iraqi political leaders.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said "the murder of dozens of civilians ... is shocking in its cruelty and cynicism" and called for the perpetrators to "receive the punishment they deserve".

The foreign ministries of Iraq's neighbours, Iran and Turkey, respectively, condemned the bombing as a "barbaric act" and "heinous terror attack".

Pointing to security failings, lawmaker Adnan al-Zurfi accused commanders of the Falcon Cell counter-terrorism unit of having turned from "intelligence gathering to politics".

Many ordinary Iraqis reacted with grief and a sense of helplessness in a country that has endured decades of war and insurgency, on top of ongoing economic woes and political crises.

On social media, popular comedian Ahmed al-Basheer recalled that only days ago at least 60 people died when a fire tore through a Covid hospital unit in the southern city of Nasiriyah.

"Every day there's a new calamity," he wrote. "We're tired of everything."

'I took them to the market': a Baghdad father's grief
Baghdad (AFP) July 20, 2021 - When Emad Jawad dropped his wife and son at a bustling Baghdad market on the eve of the Eid al-Adha festival, he couldn't know he would never see them alive again.

Within half an hour, an Islamic State group suicide bomber detonated an explosives vest there, killing at least 36 people in one of Iraq's deadliest such attacks in years.

The bloody carnage Monday evening claimed the lives of mostly women and children, including a four-month-old baby, maimed dozens more, and left the war-scarred nation revulsed and bewildered.

The day after, as Muslims marked the Festival of Sacrifice, the devastated father was mourning the violent loss of his loved ones.

"They were so pure, only God knows," said an inconsolable Jawad, dressed in a black tunic, of his wife Hoda, 25, and their eight-year-old son Kayan.

"They will never be replaced, neither him nor his mother."

Another 60 people were wounded at the Al-Woheilat market in the capital's sprawling and poor, mostly Shiite district of Sadr City.

Receiving mourners in a funeral tent, the distraught Jawad, a 41-year-old police officer, recounted the day that changed his life forever.

"I'm the one who dropped them off at around 5:30 pm, and the explosion happened at around 6:00 pm," he told AFP.

"I rushed to the market, searching for them. Then I headed to the hospital and shouted at the morgue workers if Kayan was there, but they didn't know his name. How could they?

"But because he was so strikingly beautiful, I asked if there was a blond boy inside. Sadly, they said yes."

Sitting silently nearby at the funeral was a boy wearing a black baseball cap, Kayan's brother Ali, fighting back tears.

He shot glances at his father as the bereaved man described washing Kayan's corpse, disfigured by shrapnel, and the bloodied remains of his wife, for the burial.

Kayan's grandfather showed photos of his beloved grandchild on his mobile phone.

"We bought him Eid clothes so he could be buried in them," the old man said.

- 'In a terrible state' -

Deadly attacks were common in Baghdad during the sectarian bloodletting that followed the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

Violence again flared years later as the Sunni extremist group IS swept across much of Iraq and neighbouring Syria.

Iraq declared IS defeated on its territory in late 2017 after a fierce three-year campaign, and attacks became relatively rare in the capital.

But the jihadists still have sleeper cells, and the comparative calm was shattered in January, when a twin suicide bombing claimed by IS killed 32 people in another crowded Baghdad market.

Then came Monday's even deadlier attack.

At the dilapidated Sadr General Hospital, where most victims were taken, Ali Faisal, a young doctor, said many were "dead on arrival", others suffered burns and fractures.

"I myself declared the time of death for two children, a six-year-old and an eight-year-old," he told AFP.

"A four-month-old baby was also killed."

Waiting in the corridor was Nowraz, a 25-year-old woman wearing a face mask against the coronavirus, and a flowing black abaya robe.

She said she was waiting to see her cousin Saberin who survived the blast but was wounded.

Saberin had gone to the market with her 16-year-old daughter Aya and her one-and-a-half-year-old son.

"We didn't know they were at the market," said Nowraz. "She went with Aya and her son to buy clothes for Eid."

The infant boy survived with serious burns, but the teenage girl died.

"She's in a terrible state," Nowraz said of her cousin. "We're afraid to tell her that her daughter is dead."

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