Free Republic

Part three: The Fedayeen have vowed to step up their suicide bombings. Neil Mackay reports that they are just one string of militias ready to fight to the death for Saddam YOU'LL have seen one of their number already -- a middle-aged man in a blue serge suit with a keffiyeh scarf wrapped around his head. As the TV cameras rolled, he triumphantly waved his Czech-made assault rifle in the air while Iraqi villagers in the distance behind him stripped down the US Apache helicopter he'd just shot down. This avuncular-looking farmer, Ali Obeid, now praised as a national hero...

Scuds hidden at site in Al Qa'im? By Douglas Jehl The New York Times WASHINGTON -- Out of sight of television cameras, some of the heaviest and most prolonged fighting in Iraq has been raging for nearly three weeks near the town of Al Qa'im on the Syrian border. There, British commandos and U.S. special forces have been attacking units of Iraq's Special Republican Guards and Special Security Services, according to senior military and defense officials. The Iraqi forces in the area, along the Euphrates River, have been defending a large compound that includes phosphate fertilizer and water treatment plants....