BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqi politicians tried again today to end a nearly three-month deadlock over forming a new transitional government, and the death toll from well-coordinated car bombings targeting police and civilians in Saddam Hussein's hometown and Baghdad rose to 29.

Insurgents, meanwhile, launched two separate attacks aimed at Iraq's oil industry in the north, setting fire to pumps near Kirkuk and opening fire on police guarding a convoy of tanker trucks, officials said. Two policemen were wounded and three insurgents arrested in a one-hour gunbattle over the convoy, police said.

On Sunday, lawmakers loyal to Prime Minister-designate Ibrahim al-Jaafari said he was ready to announce a Cabinet that would exclude his interim predecessor, Ayad Allawi.

Al-Jaafari had decided, some members of his political bloc said, to shun further attempts to include members of the party headed by Allawi, the secular Shiite politician who was prime minister as the country prepared for elections Jan. 30.

Members of Allawi's Iraqi List, which controls 40 seats in the National Assembly, said his party had not been officially informed of the development. Allawi loyalists were bidding for at least four ministries, including a senior government post and a deputy premiership.

"Whoever says the Iraqi List has withdrawn from the negotiations about the Cabinet is not right. We haven't done that," Iraqi List legislator Hussein al-Fadr said today.

Al-Jaafari's list could be submitted to parliament today, some officials said, but others indicated Tuesday was more likely. Many such forecasts have proven wrong earlier.

Many Shiites have long resented the secular Allawi, accusing his outgoing administration of having included former members of Saddam's Baath Party, which brutally repressed the majority Shiites and Kurds.

There had been intense pressure to end the political bickering after a recent increase in insurgent violence that many blamed on the continuing political turmoil nearly three months after the elections.

The New York Times reported today that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Vice President Dick Cheney, frustrated by the political deadlock, were pushing top Kurdish and Shiite politicians to come together and form a new government.

On Sunday, an emboldened Iraqi insurgency staged carefully coordinated dual bombings in Saddam's hometown of Tikrit and a Shiite neighborhood in western Baghdad, killing and wounding dozens of Iraqi police and civilians.

Also, the U.S. military said it had detained four more suspects in the downing of a civilian Mi-8 helicopter Thursday. All 11 passengers and crew were killed, including a survivor gunned down by insurgents. Ten suspects have been apprehended in all, the military said.

A vehicle packed with explosives was driven into a crowd gathered in front of a popular ice cream shop in Baghdad's western al-Shoulah neighborhood Sunday, police Maj. Mousa Abdul Karim said. Minutes later, as police and residents rushed to help the victims, a second suicide car bomber plowed into the crowd. At least 23 people were killed and 41 wounded, officials at two hospitals said today.

In Tikrit, two remotely detonated car bombs exploded in quick succession outside a police academy, killing at least six Iraqis and wounding 33, police and a hospital official said. The blasts occurred as recruits were about to travel to Jordan for training, said police Lt. Shalan Allawi.

Insurgents also attacked U.S. forces. A roadside bomb hit a convoy in eastern Baghdad, killing one American soldier and wounding two, the U.S. military said. Iraqi police said two civilians also were wounded in the attack.

At least 1,568 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

Al-Qaida in Iraq, the country's most feared militant group, claimed responsibility for the Tikrit and eastern Baghdad attacks in statements posted on militant Web sites. The group also claimed responsibility for a roadside bomb targeting a U.S. patrol near the Abu Ghraib prison, west of Baghdad. The U.S. military said no one was hurt in that attack.

The authenticity of those claims could not be verified.