U.S. Troops Push Deeper Into Fallujah By EDWARD HARRIS, Associated Press Writer
FALLUJAH, Iraq - American forces pushed deeper into the southern reaches of Fallujah, cornering militants backed into smaller pockets of the city. Hundreds of men trying to flee were turned back by U.S. troops.
In Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, guerrillas launched mass attacks against police stations and political party offices in what could be a bid to relieve pressure on their allies here.
On Friday, Army and Marine units moved to tighten their security cordon around the beseiged city, backed by FA-18s and AC-130 gunships.
Some three to four dozen militants tried to break out towards the south and east late Thursday but were repelled by U.S. troops, the military said.
U.S. forces were also positioned to the west near key bridges, blocking rebels from crossing the Euphrates River with patrol boats.
Troops have cut off all roads and bridges leading out of the city and have turned back hundreds of men who have tried to flee the city during the assault. Only women, children and the elderly are being allowed to leave.
The military says keeping men aged 15 to 55 from leaving is key to the mission's success.
"If they're not carrying a weapon, you can't tell who's who," said one officer with the 1st Cavalry Division.
A U.S. soldier was killed Thursday night when his tank rolled over near Fallujah, the military said.
Another American soldier was killed in northern Mosul during "combat operations" there Thursday, the military said.
In Iraq's third-largest city, guerrillas assaulted nine police stations on Thursday, overwhelming several, and battled U.S. and Iraqi troops around bridges across the Tigris River in the city, where a curfew had been imposed a day earlier.
In Baghdad Friday, Iraqi security forces, backed by U.S. troops, arrested a hardline Sunni cleric and about two dozen others after a raid of his Baghdad mosque uncovered weapons caches along with photographs of recent attacks on American troops, the U.S. military and the Iraqi National Guard said.
Sheik Mahdi al-Sumaidaei, the head of the Supreme Association for Guidance and Daawa, a conservative Sunni organization, was detained Thursday, along with 25 others, the U.S. military said.
A car bomb in the capital Thursday exploded Thursday moments after a U.S. patrol passed on Saadoun Street, killing 17 bystanders and wounding 30.
The four-day Fallujah offensive has killed some 600 insurgents, 18 U.S. troops and five Iraqi soldiers, the U.S. military said. An additional 178 Americans and 34 Iraqi soldiers have been injured, the military said.
Overnight, U.S. troops launched another mass offensvie south of the main east-west highway that bisects Fallujah, a Sunni Muslim insurgent stronghold 40 miles west of Baghdad.
An Iraqi journalist in the city reported seeing burned U.S. vehicles and bodies in the street, with more buried under the wreckage. He said two men trying to move a corpse were shot down by a sniper.
Two of the three small clinics in the city have been bombed, and in one case, medical staff and patients were killed, he said. A U.S. tank was positioned beside the third clinic, and residents were afraid to go there, he said.
"People are afraid of even looking out the window because of snipers," he said, asking that he not be named for his own safety. "The Americans are shooting anything that moves."
Many, if not most, of Fallujah's 200,000 to 300,000 residents fled the city before the assault. It is impossible to determine how many civilians who were not actively fighting the Americans or assisting the insurgents may have been killed.
Commanders said they believe 1,200 to 3,000 fighters were in Fallujah before the offensive.
Most of the insurgents still fighting in Fallujah are believed to have fallen back to southern districts ahead of the advancing U.S. and Iraqi forces, although fierce clashes were reported in the west of the city around the public market.
Meanwhile, two Marine Super Cobra attack helicopters were hit by ground fire and forced to land in separate incidents near Fallujah, the military said. The four pilots were rescued, though one suffered slight injuries.
At a U.S. camp outside Fallujah, Maj. Gen. Richard Natonski, commander of the 1st Marine Division, said the operation was running "ahead of schedule" but he would not predict how many days of fighting lay ahead.
He said militants have been using mosques as military strong-points.
"In almost ever single mosque in Fallujah, we have found an arms cache," he said. "We have found IED-making (bomb-making) factories. We have found fortifications. We've been shot at by snipers from minarets."
Natonski also said he had visited a "slaughterhouse" in the northern Jolan neighborhood where hostages were held and possibly killed by militants. He described a small room with no windows and just one door. He said he saw two thin mattresses, straw mats covered in blood and a wheelchair that apparently was used to transport captives.
Also, a Fox News reporter embedded with India Company of the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment said the unit found five bodies in a locked house in northwest Fallujah on Wednesday. All the victims were shot in the back of the head. Their identities were not known, although there were indications they were civilians, the report said.
Late Thursday, Marines found the Syrian driver captured with two French journalists in August inside an undisclosed location in Fallujah. Capt. Ed Bitanga said the man told military officials he had been separated from the journalists about a month ago.
On Aug. 20, Christian Chesnot, 37, with Radio France Internationle, and Georges Malbrunot, 41, with Le Figaro, disappeared along with their Syrian driver Mohammed al-Joundi on a trip to the holy city of Najaf. A militant group calling itself "the Islamic Army in Iraq" claimed responsiblity, demanding that France revoke a new law banning Islamic head scarves from state schools.
U.S. officials believe the al-Qaida-linked terror movement of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who claimed responsibility for many of the kidnappings and beheadings of foreign hostages, used Fallujah as a base. They said they believe al-Zarqawi may have slipped away before the offensive.
Last April, Fallujah militants fought Marines to a standstill during a three-week siege, which the Bush administration called off amid public criticism over civilian casualties.
The current offensive was begun so the government can hold national elections in January, although Sunni clerics have called a boycott to protest the Fallujah operation.
This offensive has gone swiftly, in part because of a larger ground force and massive use of air and artillery.
However, a steady stream of wounded being flown to the U.S. military's Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany suggests that fighting in some parts of Fallujah has been intense.
Hospital staff were expanding bed capacity as 102 wounded U.S. service members were flown in Thursday — up from the usual 30 to 50 a day the U.S. military hospital receives, officials said. A day earlier, 69 wounded were brought in.
Military officials cautioned that the figure of 600 insurgents killed in Fallujah was only a rough estimate and that many died in air and artillery bombardments ahead of the ground advance.
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Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Jim Krane near Fallujah; and Tini Tran, Sameer N. Yacoub, Mariam Fam, Sabah Jerges, Katarina Kratovac and Maggie Michael in Baghdad.
A Syrian driver Mohammed al-Joundi, shows how he was handcuffed after being freed by US Marines early morning in the center of Fallujah, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. The U.S. military confirmed Friday a hostage found in Fallujah is Mohammed al-Joundu the Syrian driver abducted with two French journalists in August. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)
US Marines lead away a captured Iraqi man in the center of Fallujah, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. Trooping past dead bodies and abandoned weapons, U.S. Marines fighting their way through Iraq's rebel-infested Fallujah are blasting their way through walls and hammering open doors seeking fighters and guns in the dayslong battle against Sunni Muslim insurgents. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)
US Marines try to push into the center of Fallujah, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. Trooping past dead bodies and abandoned weapons, U.S. Marines fighting their way through Iraq's rebel-infested Fallujah are blasting their way through walls and hammering open doors seeking fighters and guns in the dayslong battle against Sunni Muslim insurgents. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)
US Marines move toward the center of Fallujah, Iraq, Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. On Friday, Army and Marine units moved to tighten their security cordon around the beseiged city. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)
An Iraqi family who tried to flee fighting in the center of Fallujah, Iraq, shelter next to a wall, as U.S. Marines look on Friday, Nov. 12, 2004. Hundreds of men trying to flee the assault on Fallujah have been turned back by U.S. troops following orders to allow only women, children and the elderly to leave. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)
