Powerful blast shatters Baghdad hotel
At least 29 dead, 50 wounded
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Watch CNN for ongoing live reports and frequent updates from our team in Baghdad -- led by Baghdad Bureau Chief Jane Arraf and correspondent Walter Rodgers -- on the Mount Lebanon Hotel attack.
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 CNN Baghdad Bureau Chief Jane Arraf reports from the scene of the blast.
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 CNN's Walter Rodgers reports on the inferno at a Baghdad hotel.
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 U.S. Army spokesman Col. Ralph Baker at the site of the Baghdad hotel bombing.
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 CNN security analyst discusses how the Baghdad bombing may affect the transition of power.
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 Interactive: Blast site in the Karrada district of Baghdad
 Audio Slide Show: Baghdad blast
 Gallery: Scenes from the blast
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BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Insurgents chose a "soft target" impossible to defend against when they bombed a Baghdad hotel, one Iraqi leader said.
The powerful car bomb went off Wednesday in central Baghdad, killing 29 people and wounding at least 50 others, senior U.S. military officials said.
Iraqi Governing Council member Adnan Pachachi said, "There is no absolute defense" against this kind of bombing.
"Whenever they find a soft target with a lot of people they want to maximize the losses, especially fatalities," Pachachi said.
Another council member, Mowaffak al Rubaie, said he was "appalled and disgusted" by the "cowardly action."
Rubaie said "the aim" is to stop the political process and promote instability.
"The target is democracy in Iraq," he said.
CNN security analyst Kelly McCann said there was virtually no security at the Mount Lebanon Hotel.
"There were armed guards that were contracted by the security manager, but there were no T-barriers, no blocks, no vehicle access control," McCann said. "It's not a great wonder that it was targeted."
Inside the so-called high security Green Zone, which houses coalition troops, such defensive measures exist as do 24-hour patrols.
U.S. officials believe the explosion was a suicide attack. It virtually destroyed the hotel and damaged a number of nearby houses and offices.
The blast left a 20-foot crater as the hotel erupted into flames.
Col. Ralph Baker, a U.S. Army spokesman, said officials believe the car bomb was at least 1,000 pounds.
The bomb used in Oklahoma City in 1995 was 2,000 pounds, according to CNN analyst Mike Brooks. He said the bomb used in the Khobar Towers attack in Saudi Arabia in 1996 was 5,000 pounds.
"It looks like the bomb was 1,000 pounds of plastic explosives and artillery shells mixed in with explosives to create more injuries on the scene," Baker said. "It fits the profile of the terrorist organizations we have been combating in the last year -- either Ansar al-Islam or the Zarqawi people."
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is a wanted insurgent figure whom the U.S.-led coalition suspects has al Qaeda links and is behind recent deadly strikes. Ansar al-Islam is a northern Iraq group with suspected ties to al Qaeda.
U.S. Army Lt. Col. Peter Jones said emergency workers are no longer looking for survivors.
"It's now simply an effort to recover the dead," he told CNN.
Most of the dead were in houses and shops that surrounded the residential hotel in the narrow street, Baker said. (Map of blast site)
The blast rocked the Karrada neighborhood in central Baghdad at 8:10 p.m. (12:10 p.m. ET).
U.S. electronics giant Motorola said "a handful" of its employees was staying in the Mount Lebanon Hotel and at least one employee was injured. All Motorola employees have been accounted for.
Another American company, CSC DynCorp., said that one of its employees sustained minor glass injuries from the blast but was not lodged at the hotel.
Ambulances transported wounded people, screaming for aid, away from the scene. Bystanders dug with their bare hands in the rubble, attempting to unearth victims. (On the Scene: Jane Arraf)
Dr. Mazin Issa said people brought to the Baghdad hospital have head and abdomen injuries, broken limbs and severe burns.
"Many hysterical patients are coming to the hospital," he told CNN. "Complete families are coming from one building."
The rescuers searched amid burning timbers and crumpled brick for survivors.
The death toll is expected to rise as crews continue to search.
"It was huge boom followed by complete darkness and then the red glow of a fire," 16-year-old Walid Mohammed Abdel-Maguid, who lives near the hotel, told The Associated Press.
The explosion was captured on tape during an Al Hurriya TV interview. A bright fireball flash is followed by a delayed, but loud, concussion.
A U.S. soldier a mile away told the AP the blast felt as though it were next door.
Iraqi police and coalition soldiers cordoned off the area. U.S. soldiers attempted to help rescue victims but were driven back by angry Iraqis.
The soldiers shouted at them to get back because of their concerns of additional explosives.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the United States is undeterred in its mission.
"This remains a time of testing in Iraq," McClellan said. "The stakes are high, the terrorists know the stakes are high. But they will not prevail. We will meet this test with strength and with resolve. Democracy is taking root in Iraq and there is no turning back."
FBI agents arrived at the bombing site early Thursday morning, Baker said. Senior U.S. officials in Washington said the FBI will participate in the investigation into the attack. A team of about 50 FBI agents was already stationed in Baghdad.
The explosion occurred near Firdos Square, where the large statue of Saddam Hussein was pulled down in April. This busy area of the city has been the scene of previous attacks.
The unfortified, unprotected Mount Lebanon Hotel often houses business people.
At least nine guests, including two Britons, were in the hotel when the bomb exploded, the hotel's managing director said. The guests' fate is unknown.
Also in the hotel were two Jordanians, two Egyptians, 20 Iraqi employees and the owner, who is Lebanese, the manager said.
The blast scene is close to the Palestine Hotel, where many foreign journalists stay.
Members of Iraq's Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish communities also live in the area.
The attack comes as coalition forces began Operation Iron Promise, a citywide sweep for insurgents, almost a year after the war started.
Other developments
Two U.S. service members died in separate mortar attacks that also wounded 10 of their colleagues, military sources said Thursday. One of the attacks occurred near Baghdad International Airport, and the other took place in the western Iraqi city of Qusaybah. (Full story)In other violence Wednesday, three U.S. soldiers and two Iraqi children were wounded by a bomb in south-central Baghdad, a military source said. The children and a soldier were evacuated to a combat hospital, where they were treated for shrapnel injuries. The other soldiers returned to duty.Iraqi leaders have reached an understanding with the United Nations, asking for advisers to help them put together an interim government before the June 30 political handover, a British diplomat said Wednesday. Emyr Jones Parry, British ambassador to the United Nations, said the Iraqi Governing Council is planning to bring back U.N. experts to help advise the government that will assume power.CNN's Jane Arraf and Walter Rodgers contributed to this report.
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Associated Press contributed to this report.
