"On the metric of violence in Iraq, it appears that about 80% of Iraq has a murder rate no higher than in the roughest neighborhoods in Chicago, Los Angeles, or Miami. This is worthy of being classified as 'violent criminal activity' rather than 'civil war'. The remaining 20% of Iraq has a higher rate of violence, but no higher than it was two years ago. Note that life expectancy in Iraq has actually risen.

Lastly, it appears that 64% of Iraqis believe that Iraq is going in the right direction, and 77% are still glad that Saddam was removed. If one excludes Sunnis from the polls, the figures above rise to 83% and 96% respectively. Given that Shiites and Kurds are the ones Saddam had killed millions of, these high approval numbers are a surprise only to anti-American fanatics,"
http://futurist.typepad.com/my_weblog/2006/05/we_will_in_iraq.html

So, Iraq is a far distance from having an American violent crime or Murder rate. But wonder how close it is to say Mexico or Brazil? Brazil has 19.04 per 100K and Mexico has 17.58 per 100K
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcgvinco.html

And supposively in 1970's Iraq had 12 per 100K:
http://www.benbest.com/lifeext/murder.html

Of course, it is well know that Washington DC has a very high murder rate, around 50 per 100k, but the US as a whole is fairly low 5.70 per 100K [according to the http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcgvinco.html link. [which high compared to other industrial nations].

Anyhow, if you say Iraq has about 27 million population and take that 1970's rate of 12 per 100K it would be 3240 murders per year or 270 per month. During Saddam reign I seen numbers which are about twice this rate [roughly more than Brazil].