Posted on 04/07/2004 6:16:41 AM PDT by veronica
US marines pressing an offensive in this Iraqi town west of Baghdad bombed a mosque in the center of the town Wednesday and killed up to 40 insurgents inside, a marine officer said.
The attack came from a jet aircraft at a high angle to minimize the impact, the officer said.
"We wanted to kill the people inside," said Lieutenant Colonel Brennan Byrne.
Nevermore
true - 'tis now the house of the conqueror worm.
Here you go.
Female followers of Shiite radical cleric Moqtada Sadr. At least three people were killed as Spanish-led troops clashed with supporters of Sadr outside Najaf, in the most dangerous confrontation between the US-led coalition and Iraq's majority community.(AFP)
Palestinian women step on the US flag during an all women's protest in suport of Iraq in Gaza City. Some 150 women, representatives of women's organisations, took to the street to protest the US presence in Iraq.(AFP/Mohammed Abed)
Iraqi women at Baghdad's Sunni Muslim Abu Khanifa mosque donate their blood for wounded people in the embattled town of Falluja April 7, 2004. The bloody clashes with Shi'ites that have raged since Sunday in other areas are a new front for U.S.-led forces already fighting an insurgency in Sunni towns and trying to pacify Iraq before a June 30 handover of sovereignty to an Iraqi government. REUTERS/Ali Jasim
Iraqi Christian women attend Sunday Mass at the Syrian Orthodox Church in Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday, March 28, 2004. About 3.6 percent of the country's 22 million people are Christians, with the vast majority of the population Shiite or Sunni Muslim. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)
US civilian Administrator in Iraq Paul Bremer gestures during his breakfast meeting with a group of Iraqi women at the opening of the new Mansour Women's Center on International Women's Day in Baghdad, Iraq.(AFP/Pool/Bullit Marquez)
An Iraqi security guard monitors a queue of women at the Imam al-Kazem shrine in Baghdad. Two US government employees and their Iraqi interpreter were shot dead in central Iraq, while an errant US mortar round killed one Iraqi civilian.(AFP/Sabah Arar)
Kipling would call you "brother" for that one!
LOL !
By ALI AHMED, Associated Press Writer
RAMADI, Iraq - Men, children and a barefoot Iraqi woman scattered for cover as gunfire sprayed across the street, and moments later the body of a U.S. Marine lay spread-eagled on the ground. A teenage boy carried away his bloodstained flak jacket.
The spray of gunfire on Marines was the start a deadly battle Tuesday in which 12 Americans were killed, and opened another front in violence that has raged across Iraq this week.
On Wednesday, fighting persisted in the city of Ramadi, and Iraqis buried their dead. Mourners were seen bringing the bodies of 15 people killed in the battles to one cemetery, and 25 more were taken elsewhere for burial, police Col. Khalid al-Rawi said.
Ramadi is just 18 miles down the road from Fallujah, where hundreds of Marines have been battling guerrillas in the fiercest military operation in months. Both cities are strongholds for the Sunni Muslim insurgency that has killed hundreds of U.S. troops across Iraq.
But Tuesday's ambush and the three-hour gunbattle that followed was unusually deadly.
It began when Marines stopped to investigate a white civilian pickup left next to a wall on a footpath on a dusty street, its doors open as if its occupants had fled in a hurry.
Suddenly a burst of gunfire rang out, as gunmen hiding nearby in Ramadi's main cemetery opened fire. Children and adults ducked and dashed for cover.
Footage from Associated Press Television News showed one of the gunmen, a man in jeans and a T-shirt, walking down the street, an assault rifle in his hand.
On a nearby street corner, a boy walks away, a bloodied flak jacket cradled in his arms. Behind him lay its owner, a dead Marine, his shirt hiked up and blood covering his face.
More U.S. troops moved in, engaging in a battle that began in alleyways near the governor's palace, then spread over a mile-long area, U.S. commanders said.
U.S. Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said "an extensive number" of insurgents were killed.
"The enemy paid a price ... we have the bodies," said Maj. Gen. James Mattis, commander of the 1st Marine Division, which controls Anbar province, where Ramadi is the capital.
In Wednesday's fighting, dozens of gunmen battled U.S. troops, and 18 guerrillas were killed, a Marines statement said. Marines captured eight suspected insurgents, it said.
The Marines have vowed to pacify the violent towns of Ramadi and Fallujah, which have been a center of the guerrilla insurgency seeking to oust the U.S.-led occupation force.
Signs were emerging of growing sympathy between Sunni Muslim insurgents in the region and radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose militia has waged fierce battles with coalition and Iraqi forces in parts of Iraq this week.
In Ramadi, portraits of al-Sadr were posted on government buildings, schools and mosques, along with graffiti praising him for his "heroic deeds" and "valiant uprising against the occupier."
Believe me, I'll be more than happy to know you are having a drink or two at my expense!
Well, normally I would not engage in any type of dicsussion like this, particularly on a thread that is dedicated to a wholly different matter.
But your statement comparing and grouping the Mormon Church with the KKK is beyond the pale.
Jesus Christ is my personal Savior. I have accepted Him as my Redeemer and taken His name upon me. I trust Him and know that salvation only comes through His name. My sincere witness to you of this should (most probably by your own definition) indicate that I am saved.
...I am also a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, what you would call a Mormon.
I will not disparage your belief in our Master and Redeemer...I would appreciate it if you would have the respect to not disparage the faith of millions of others who also believe in Him and seek to follow Him.
As to the insurgents who took up residence in their Mosque so they could fire on and attack our troops...we did the right thing in bringing the roof down upon their heads and killing them there. They disparaged and desecrated their own house in so doing...not our Marines.
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