6 U.S. Soldiers Killed in Iraq Attacks

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A suicide attack and roadside bombings killed six American soldiers, and Iraq's prime minister warned residents of insurgent bastion Fallujah on Wednesday to hand over terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi or face military action.

Al-Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad group has claimed responsibility for beheading several foreign hostages and for car bombings throughout the country, and a videotape posted Wednesday on an Islamic Web site showed militants linked to al-Zarqawi beheading two Iraqis they accused of being intelligence officers.

The attacks, at a time when U.S. forces are putting pressure on insurgent strongholds in the Sunni heartland, occurred in the run-up to the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which Iraqi television said would begin here Friday. Some extremists believe they earn a special place in paradise if they die in a jihad, or holy war, during Ramadan, when Muslims believe God revealed their holy book the Quran to the Prophet Muhammad.

Iraq's deteriorating security, including bombings, mortar and rocket attacks, kidnappings and shootings, has slowed reconstruction efforts and forced the United States to divert funds from rebuilding to security.

Assistant Secretary of State Richard Armitage acknowledged that the United States was initially too slow in channeling money to Iraq, telling a donors' conference in Tokyo that "it took longer than necessary to get our act together prior to turning over sovereignty" to Iraqis on June 28.

Wednesday's suicide attack came when a driver plowed into a U.S. convoy and blew up his car in the northern city of Mosul, killing two American soldiers and wounding five, according to the military. Four other soldiers were killed in roadside bombings in the Baghdad area — three late Tuesday and one early Wednesday, the command said.

Last year, the advent of Ramadan was marked by a surge in insurgent attacks. To prevent a repeat, U.S. troops have stepped up offensive operations in Sunni Muslim strongholds to the north and west of Baghdad.

More than 1,000 U.S. and Iraqi troops launched two simultaneous raids Wednesday around Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, to clear the area of insurgents.

"Basically, it's a pre-Ramadan operation just to clear up some of the area around Baqouba," said Capt. Marshall Jackson, spokesman for the 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division.

There were no reports of major clashes, but several people were detained. In an unrelated attack, a police captain was killed Wednesday in a drive-by shooting near Baqouba, officials said. Insurgents regularly target Iraq's security forces, who are seen as collaborators with the United States and its allies.

Elsewhere, U.S. troops sealed off key streets and searched buildings in the insurgent stronghold of Ramadi, 70 miles west of Baghdad, after days of clashes, residents reported. The U.S. command had no comment.

On Tuesday, Iraqi government soldiers backed by U.S. Marine and Army units raided seven mosques in Ramadi, detaining four people and seizing bomb-making materials and pro-insurgent literature, the military said.

U.S. and Iraqi authorities have used a mix of diplomacy and force to try to regain control of insurgent enclaves in time to hold nationwide elections in January. Troops swept into the militant stronghold of Samarra, north of Baghdad, this month and have been carrying out smaller-scale raids in recent days in other areas.

But the major insurgent stronghold is Fallujah, a city of 300,000 that has become the symbol of Sunni resistance. U.S. forces have staged weeks of "precision strikes" aimed at buildings believed to be safehouses of al-Zarqawi's network and its associates.

At the same time, Iraqi officials have been negotiating with representatives of Fallujah to restore government control of the city, which fell under the rule of extremist religious leaders and their armed fighters after the Marines lifted their three-week siege last April.

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi warned that Fallujah must surrender terrorist leaders, chief among them the Jordanian-born al-Zarqawi, if they want to avoid attack. The Americans have insisted for months that Fallujah must hand over foreign fighters and those responsible for the brutal slaying last March of four U.S. contractors, which triggered the siege.

"If they do not turn in al-Zarqawi and his group, we will carry out operations in Fallujah," Allawi told a meeting of the 100-member interim National Council. "Fallujah of course is an honest city but it has been manipulated by a deviant bunch that wants to harm Iraq."

But a Fallujah negotiator, Hatem Karim, challenged claims that al-Zarqawi is in the city and said the elusive terror mastermind had become similar to the weapons of mass destruction which Washington had insisted were in Iraq but have never been found.

"We want to know what evidence there is of al-Zarqawi's presence in Fallujah," Karim said in an interview with Al-Jazeera television. "Al-Zarqawi has become like Iraqi WMD ... . We hear this name, but it doesn't exist. More than 15 to 20 houses were destroyed in Fallujah because they were accused of harboring al-Zarqawi or al-Zarqawi's followers."

He said Iraqi government officials never raised the issue of al-Zarqawi during closed-door talks with the Fallujah delegates.

Earlier Wednesday, Fallujah's chief negotiator with the government, Sheik Khaled al-Jumeili, told The Associated Press that many issues were resolved but both sides had yet to agree on what happens to specific individuals wanted by U.S. or Iraqi officials.

Al-Jumeili insisted there were "only a handful" of non-Iraqi Arab fighters in the city — a claim the Americans dismiss — and that they would leave if a deal were struck with the government.

"They are outlaws to them but they are mujahedeen to us," he said of the fighters.

Al-Jumeili said both sides agreed that Fallujah natives be included in the Iraqi National Guard unit which would assume security responsibility in the city. He said there was also agreement to compensate residents whose relatives have been killed or injured or whose property has been damaged. There was no immediate government or U.S. comment.

A U.S. Humvee vehicle burns following a suicide attack in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, October 13, 2004. A suicide car bomber blew up his vehicle next to a U.S. military convoy, damaging at least one Humvee and wounding three soldiers, a military spokesman said. Photo by Namir Noor-Eldeen/Reuters

An unidentified armed man rushes to the scene after a huge explosion caused by a car bomb rocked central Baghdad, Iraq, in this Oct 12, 2003 file photo. The U.S. command reports that 59 car bombs were detonated or discovered before going off in september 2004, the highest total since the war began. They killed 29 Iraqi and multinational troops, along with scores of civilians. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)

Land mines are laid out after being handed in at the Al-Jazayer police station in the poor neighborhood of Sadr City in Baghdad.(AFP/Ahmad al-Rubaye)

A video grab image taken from the Web site of militant Iraqi group the Army of Ansar al-Sunna, Oct. 13, 2004, shows masked gunmen and a man it claims to be Luqman Hussein Mohammed, a member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party. The group said it had beheaded a member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party who it described as a 'spy' working as a translator for the U.S. army, according to an Internet statement. Photo by Reuters (Handout) The Army of Ansar al-Sunna said in a statement dated October 11 on its Web site that it had 'enforced God's law by slaughtering the apostate' Luqman Hussein Mohammed whom the group earlier said it abducted on October 5 in the western city of Ramadi. REUTERS/HO/Via Reuters TV

This image grab taken off the website of the Army of Ansar al-Sunna shows one of two men the group claimed were working for the Iraqi intelligence service, before he was beheaded. The extremist group, loyal to Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi, posted a video on the internet showing the beheading of the two men.(AFP/Ansar Al-Sunna)

Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi demanded that the Sunni Muslim rebel bastion of Fallujah turn over foreign fighter Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi or face a military invasion.(AFP/File/Don Emmert)

U.S. Army soldiers line up to pay their final respects to Army PFC Aaron James Rusin, 19, of the 44th Engineer Battalion, 2nd Infantry Division during a memorial service at Camp Ramadi, on the outskirts of Ramadi, Iraq, Wednesday, Oct. 13, 2004. Rusin, of western Pennsylvania, was killed during an ambush in Ramadi on Oct. 11, and was among two U.S. Army soldiers and two U.S. Marines from the 2nd Brigade Combat Team killed in action in during a five-day period ending Tuesday. (AP Photo/Jim MacMillan)

US soldier on patrol in the restive Iraqi town of Ramadi. Fresh clashes between armed rebels and US soldiers left six Iraqis dead and 33 others wounded, hospital sources told AFP.(AFP/USMC/File)

Six Iraqis killed, 33 wounded in Ramadi clashes: Iraqi medical sources,/font>

Wed Oct 13, 1:12 PM ET

RAMADI, Iraq (AFP) - Fresh clashes between armed rebels and US soldiers left six Iraqis dead and 33 others wounded, hospital sources told AFP.

"There are six dead and 33 wounded," said Dr Hamamad Dulaimi of Ramadi's general hospital, adding that seven children and five women were among those hurt.

He did not clarify whether the casualties included insurgents or were just civilians.

The fighting followed Tuesday's pre-dawn sweep by US marines and Iraqi forces of at least seven mosques in the rebel bastion of Ramadi, sparking firefights in which two Iraqis were killed.

A senior Sunni cleric for restive Al-Anbar province, Sheikh Abdul al-Aleem al-Sadi, and one of his sons were jailed in the raids, prompting criticism from the preacher's organisation, the Committee of Muslim Scholars.

The Sunni association also announced Wednesday the Americans had arrested a tribal leader, Sheikh Abdul Karim al-Uda, a chief of the Zuba tribe and two of his sons, one of whom likewise belongs to the Committee of Muslim Scholars.

The committee, which groups 3,000 mosques across Iraq, has become the premier voice among Sunni Muslims since the downfall of Saddam Hussein's regime, which was dominated by their religious group.

Ramadi is the capital of the western province of Al-Anbar, home to the city of Fallujah where the Sunni rebellion against the US deployment in Iraq is at its most intense.

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