THE US military was last night investigating television footage that appeared to show a marine in Fallujah shoot dead an injured and apparently unarmed man inside a mosque.
The images were set to inflame critics of the handling of the war in Iraq and the behaviour of US units engaged in the fighting.
Pictures aired on TV networks showed a man slumped on the floor of a mosque, where rebels had earlier been shooting at US troops.
When the troops realised the man was not dead, one opened fire, hitting him in the head at close range. The wounded man was half-sitting against the wall, wearing an orange headscarf.
Before the troops entered the mosque, one is heard saying: "We have got two in there."
Another asks: "Did you shoot them? Did they have any weapons on them?"
As the cameraman follows the marines inside, one is heard to say: "These are the two wounded that they never picked up."
There is shouting among the marines and then one opens fire. At that point news channels, including CNN, blacked out the image.
The marines shown in the footage, which was filmed on Saturday, were from the Third Battalion of the First Marine Regiment. According to reports in the US, the marines had come under fire last Thursday from the mosque shown in the footage.
Marines returned fire with tanks and machine guns. When they went into the mosque on the same day they found 10 fighters dead and five wounded.
They pulled out of the mosque, but saw activity in the building the following day.
When they went in for a second time they saw the man slumped against the wall.
One marine is heard shouting: "Hes faking hes dead."
There was another shout: "Hes breathing."
Gunfire rang out, and one marine said: "Hes dead now."
Pentagon officials said the marine who fired had been taken off the battlefield.
It also emerged that the marine in question had been shot and wounded the day before the incident in the mosque.
Military officials said a rebel tactic was to draw US soldiers in by pretending to be dead and then opening fire.
"The US occupation troops are gassing resistance fighters and confronting them with internationally-banned chemical weapons, resistance sources told Al-Quds Press Wednesday, November 10."
These people need to just get over it! They lost! And they need to understand that they dont share the same views as the majority of the american people.
lets just hope it dont come up with sooo many liberal sites when you do a search for something conservative. HA! has anyone else noticed this on google?