File photo: A soldier inspects scene of suicide bomb

A suicide bomber detonated his explosive vest in a predominately Shi’ite Muslim district of Baghdad on Tuesday, killing at least nine people and wounding 30, police and medical sources said.

The blast targeted a commercial street in the eastern Baghdad al-Jadida area of the Iraqi capital, sources said, adding that the death toll could increase.

Islamic State has intensified bomb attacks in government-held areas of Iraq this year as it loses territory to U.S. backed Iraqi Government forces and Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias.

The ultra-hardline Sunni group claimed a truck bombing in July that killed at least 324 people in the Karrada shopping area of Baghdad.

The bombing was described as the deadliest single attack in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003.

The group continues to control vast areas in northern and western Iraq, including the city of Mosul, captured in 2014 (Reuters/NAN)