4 U.S. Marines Killed in Iraq Incidents

NAJAF, Iraq - U.S. warplanes bombed Najaf's Old City and troops clashed with Shiite militiamen Sunday amid fears a plan to end the standoff could collapse. An Iraqi mediator pleaded for radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to pull his fighters from the revered shrine at the center of the crisis.

Meanwhile, four U.S. Marines assigned to the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force have been killed in separate incidents in Iraq's volatile Anbar province, the military announced.

U.S. forces also appeared to have sealed off the Old City where al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia is holed up, restoring a cordon that had been loosened in recent days, when peace efforts were making progress.

A car bomb also detonated near a U.S. military convoy outside Mosul, the military said. Two children were injured in the blast.

The bomb exploded as the convoy passed a road west of the city, said Capt. Angela Bowman, a U.S. military spokeswoman.

Early Sunday, U.S. warplanes struck the Old City, scene of much of the fighting, and the sounds of shelling could be heard in the streets, witnesses said. Al-Sadr fighters mortared a police station, and U.S. troops and fighters clashed through the morning.

In the afternoon, militants atacked U.S. forces with mortars, prompting another round of clashes that lasted for around a half hour. At least three people were killed and 18 injured during fighting overnight, said Tawfiq Mohammed of Najaf General Hospital.

U.S. tanks were seen in the streets, though not near the Imam Ali Shrine, the holy site that the Mahdi Army has used as a stronghold and refuge since fighting erupted Aug. 5.

The Iraqi government, which had threatened an imminent raid on the shrine last week, took a more measured stand Sunday, saying it was willing to wait patiently as al-Sadr's aides worked out how to turn over the shrine to Shiite authorities here.

"The government will leave no stone unturned to reach a peaceful settlement," Iraqi National Security adviser Mouaffaq al-Rubaie told The Associated Press. "It has no intention or interest in killing more people or having even the most trivial damage to the shrine. We have a vested interest in a peaceful settlement."

An unofficial mediator and distant relative of the militant leader pleaded with al-Sadr to disarm his militants, pull them out of the shrine and disband his militia immediately.

"We are in a race with time," said Hussein al-Sadr, who earlier in the week presented a peace offer that the firebrand cleric accepted. Since then, however, efforts to end the crisis have begun to unravel as al-Sadr's followers bicker with Shiite religious authorities over how to hand over control of the shrine.

Fighting in the nearby city of Kufa on Saturday killed 40 of the militants, according to a source in the Interior Ministry. However, Mahmoud al-Soudani, head of al-Sadr's office in west Baghdad, called the claim "government propaganda" and said only one militant had died in Kufa Saturday.

In separate violence north of Baghdad on Sunday, a car bomb exploded in the town of Khalis, killing two people and injuring 14 others, including a deputy provincial governor, Bassam al-Khadran, who was lightly wounded, Iraqi officials said.

A suicide bomber detonated the car, laden with explosives, as al-Khadran was traveling to work in a small convoy, said Gen. Waleed al-Azawi, chief of police for Diyala province. Both fatalities and seven of the injured were al-Khadran's bodyguards, he said. One civilian was also wounded.

In Jur al-Nadaf, 12 miles south of Baghdad, attackers sprayed a police vehicle with machine-gun fire, killing two policemen before fleeing, said police Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman of the Interior Ministry.

In Baghdad, assailants fired two mortar shells into the city center on Sunday, wounding at least one civilian and damaging a shop and several houses, said Abdul-Rahman.

In the southern city of Basra, an Iraqi intelligence officer kidnapped nearly a week ago and threatened with death if U.S. and Iraqi forces did not end the violence in Najaf was found dead, his body riddled with bullets, police said Sunday.

In a video shown Tuesday on the pan-Arab Al-Jazeera television station, a group calling itself the Defense of the Holy Sites Brigades said they had snatched the man.

Abdul Jawad's body was found in a deserted area Saturday, said Basra police commander Brig. Gen. Mohammed Kadhim al-Ali. It wasn't clear if the group was behind Abdul Jawad's slaying.

On Saturday in Najaf, U.S. troops and al-Sadr's fighters fought brief but heavy clashes, punctuated by gunfire and explosions, with one blast hitting the street 50 yards from the Imam Ali Shrine.

Interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi threatened last week to wrest the shrine from the Mahdi Army by force, an operation that risked risked turning the nation's majority Shiites against the government.

Allawi backed off that threat when the crisis appeared on the verge of resolution Friday. Insurgents removed their weapons from the shrine — though they retained control of it and armed fighters remained around it. Al-Sadr said he was prepared to turn the holy site over to representatives of Iraq's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani.

But the transfer bogged down Saturday amid arguments over its implementation; al-Sadr aides said they tried to give the shrine's keys to al-Sistani's representatives, who refused to accept them.

In a hastily called news conference in Baghdad on Saturday evening, Hussein al-Sadr, who had headed a peace delegation to Najaf earlier in the week, appealed to the militants to end the standoff "to keep the sanctity of our holy sites, to ease the suffering of Najaf and to quiet the situation."

Muqtada al-Sadr himself has not been seen in days, but al-Soudani said Sunday that the cleric was in good health and remained in Najaf.

The standoff has frustrated many in Najaf, who have suffered cuts in their water and electricity, had their streets rocked by explosions and seen scores of their innocent neighbors killed since the fighting started Aug. 5.

"All parties are stalling," said Saeed Mohammed, 41. "There has been no change, only more shelling and clashes that have hurt the city even more."

Meanwhile, guards at a prison in the southern city of Amarah helped 82 prisoners — all common criminals — escape early Sunday, a prison official said.

Fifty-seven of the escapees were recaptured, and the remainder were being sought, said Lt. Col. Nadhim Zayer Hattab, the director of Amarah's Central Prison.

"There was a deal between some prison guards and prisoners," he said. "There was no attack on the prison."

A U.S. Army soldier lifts up rocket launcher while guarding a cordon of the southern Iraq city of Najaf's old town, August 22, 2004. U.S. helicopter gunships pounded Shi'ite militias in the holy Iraqi city of Najaf on Sunday as tanks rumbled to within 800 meters (yards) of a holy shrine at the center of a near three-week insurgency. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani

U.S. Army soldiers search a building after moving forward into a position closer to the Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf, Iraq, Sunday, Aug. 22, 2004. (AP Photo/Jim MacMillan)

A militiaman loyal to Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr stands in front of a picture of his leader at the Iman Ali shrine in Najaf. The militiaman is holding a US military drone.(AFP/Ahmad Al-Rubaye)

A U.S. Army soldier breaks a window with his rifle during a gun battle with insurgents after moving forward into a position closer to the Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf, Iraq, Sunday, Aug. 22, 2004. (AP Photo/Jim MacMillan)

A U.S. Army tank commander patrols in Najaf, Iraq, as troops moved forward into a position closer to the Imam Ali Shrine Sunday, Aug. 22, 2004. (AP Photo/Jim MacMillan)

A U.S. Army Bradley armored vehicle maneuvers during a firefight with Iraqi Shi'ite militia near the edge of Najaf's old town August 22, 2004. U.S. tanks advanced to within 800 yards of the Imam Ali mosque in the Iraqi city of Najaf on Sunday after talks on surrendering control of the shrine at the center of an 18-day siege ran into trouble. REUTERS/Chris Helgren

U.S. Army soldiers search a building after moving forward into a position closer to the Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf, Iraq, Sunday, Aug. 22, 2004. (AP Photo/Jim MacMillan)

A U.S. Army soldier fires a machine gun during a gun battle with insurgents after moving forward into a position closer to the Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf, Iraq, Sunday, Aug. 22, 2004. (AP Photo/Jim MacMillan)

Masked Iraqi police officers drive on patrol in Najaf August 22, 2004. U.S. tanks advanced to within 800 yards of the Imam Ali mosque in the Iraqi city after talks on surrendering control of the shrine at the center of an 18-day siege ran into trouble. (Ali Jasim/Reuters)

Iraqi Shi'ite militiamen, loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, deploy during clashes with coalition and Iraqi forces in the southern city of Basra, August 22, 2004. U.S. tanks advanced to within 800 yards of the Imam Ali mosque in the Iraqi city of Najaf on Sunday after talks on surrendering control of the shrine at the center of an 18-day siege ran into trouble. REUTERS/Atef Hassan

An Iraqi militiaman, loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, looks through the scope of his sniper rifle during clashes with coalition and Iraqi forces in the southern city of Basra August 22, 2004. U.S. tanks advanced to within 800 yards of the Imam Ali mosque in the Iraqi city of Najaf on Sunday after talks on surrendering control of the shrine at the center of an 18-day siege ran into trouble. REUTERS/Atef Hassan

Soldier Killed in Convoy Blast in Iraq

MOSUL, Iraq - A roadside bomb detonated near a U.S. military convoy on Sunday outside the northern city of Mosul, killing one U.S. soldier and wounding another, the military said. Two Iraqi children were injured in the blast, said Dr. Mohammed Ahmed of al-Jumhuri hospital.

The bomb exploded as the convoy passed a road west of Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad, said Capt. Angela Bowman, a U.S. military spokeswoman in Mosul.

The soldiers that were killed and wounded were assigned to Task Force Olympia. The wounded soldier was in stable condition, the military said. The names of the soldiers were being withheld pending the notification of next of kin.

In a separate attack, gunmen opened fire on a car, killing an Indonesian citizen and injuring a Filipino, hospital officials said. Two Iraqis, the car's driver and a bodyguard, were also killed in the attack, Dr. Dhia Taha said.

Insurgents have routinely attacked U.S. troops and foreigners involved in reconstruction projects.

" Filthy Islamofascists.

"Tell me why 1000 Americans died for them?"

1) Those Americans did not die for Islamofascists but because of them. 2)You would prefer that, if unchecked, they kill millions of Americans and others?

Hitler and Imperial Japan went unchecked until very nearly too late. An estimated 50 million persons - that is correct - were killed, as a direct result, in the resulting World War II.

You might visit the just-completed World War II Veterans' Memorial in D.C. and ponder on these circumstances - and the actions and sacrifices that have been made, and continue to be made, for our nation and for freedom and liberty.

Those who knew these men and women love them. They are perpetually young in our hearts. And those who later come to learn of them, even decades later, will also love them.

It is the very same for the fine men and women now serving our nation in Iraq. All they want is our support and love. And they are going to keep receiving it.

Freedom and national security does not come cheap. There will always be some who do not want to, and will not, hear this.

To state it again for those affected by reality deafness: freedom and national security DOES NOT COME CHEAP.

If we would have fought the Nazis like we are fighting the Islamic Terrorist, we would have lost.

The government will leave no stone unturned to reach a peaceful settlement," Iraqi National Security adviser Mouaffaq al-Rubaie told The Associated Press. "It has no intention or interest in killing more people or having even the most trivial damage to the shrine. We have a vested interest in a peaceful settlement."

Notice they make no mention of worrying about American Casualties. Pullback from Fallujah, Najaf and on and on.

Time is on the side of Islamists, who as we speak are getting closer to nukes. And when they do we will be offering a ripe target of 120,000 troops next door.

If we want to win like we did in WW2 we need to fight and govern like we did in WW2.

Right now we are acting like we are afraid of winning because we might piss off the muslims. Heck, they've been pissed at US since 1948, winning can only either keep them pissed or convince them NOT TO PISS US OFF!

imho

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