While Iraq has been holding steady and Afghanistan has become the focus point for major military troop movements, there’s another country in the Middle East that is under turmoil.

The Pakistani Prime Minister was the target of an assassination attempt Wednesday afternoon.

The attack took place in Rawalpindi, the garrison city near the capital. However, Sherry Rehman, the Pakistani information minister, said Mr. Gilani was not traveling in any of the cars in the motorcade. “This motorcade had left Islamabad to pick him up from the airport,” she said. “But the prime minister used a different route.”

He’s the latest in a series of politically based attacks in the past year.  Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated this past December while aiming for the Presidential seat recently vacated by Pervez Musharraf (who himself was victim of multiple assassination attempts during his time in office).

Last month suicide bombers were responsible for the deaths of 80-some people outside a weapons factory. Just before that, bombers caused massive injuries and deaths when they targeted an emergency room in Dera Ismail Khan.

In addition to all the bombings and assassination attempts and successes, NATO is finding strife in Afghanistan after a helicopter transporting international forces opened fire on a Pakistan village near the border of Afghanistan killing 7 people, according to a Pakistan Army spokesman.

Pakistan and America have been at odds over how to handle the issue of insurgent forces utilizing the mountainous region on the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.  America asserts that Pakistan has not been active enough and Pakistan holds the opinion that America has been reaching too far into Pakistani territory with their rocket attacks and other maneuvers.