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At Least 97 Iraqis Killed In Fallujah, 40 In Ramadi
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The
incursion reduced at least five houses to rubble
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BAGHDAD,
April 7 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – At least 97 Iraqi
civilians were killed and 165 were injured in continued U.S. bombardment
of the besieged town of Fallujah, while at least 40 others were slain in
similar raids on Ramadi.
"F16
helicopters shelled the densely-populated areas of the city, leaving 45
inhabitants dead and 65 others injured for the day," Aljazeera
correspondent reported Wednesday, April 7, citing official medical
counts.
The
correspondent said that American warplanes attacked a mosque, causing
the immediate death of civilians in a car barking outside.
He
said the mosque compound hosts the Fallujah branch of the Islamic
Scholars Association.
The
U.S. army admitted that a Cobra helicopter fighter slammed a Hell Fire
missile and a laser-guided precision bomb into Abdulaziz Al-Samarai
mosque in Fallujah Wednesday, killing up to 40 people, reported Agence
France-Presse (AFP).
"We
want to kill the people inside," said Lieutenant Colonel Brennan
Byrne, claiming as many as 40 fighters were holding up inside.
It
was not immediately clear if the 40 killed inside the mosque fall within
the 45 death toll documented by hospitals.
At
least 52 Iraqi civilians, including women and children, were killed and
some 100 others injured overnight in U.S. bombing of the city.
Iraqi
fighters reportedly shot down three U.S. helicopters and destroyed two
jeeps and two armored vehicles.
Heavy
rocket and machine-gun fire could be heard while black smoke billowed
into the air as marines took cover behind abandoned metal shops and
debris in the streets.
"I
think this is worst than the first one (the war last year),"
Richard Savick, a veteran of the Gulf War, told AFP.
Baby
injured
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A
baby injured by the raid
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Marines
were using aggressive tactics to draw out the fighters and then chase
them.
"We
chased them; we keep it as aggressive as possible," Corporal Jay
Picard.
Marines
battled Iraqis wearing black fatigues or civilian clothes, with their
faces shrouded by headscarves, after tanks, amphibious assault vehicles
and Humvees rolled into the town late Monday, April 5.
All
day Tuesday, the sounds of exploding mortar rounds and of machine-gun
fire shook the city as fighters ran in packs of four or five, appearing
out of alleys and on roof tops, spraying bullets and shooting off
rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs).
Iraqi
fighters put up Tuesday tough resistance to the occupation troops,
forcing them to pull back to the outskirts of the conflictive city.
TV
footage showed the havoc wrecked by the grisly U.S. incursion, which
reduced several houses to rubble and destroyed scores of shops, the main
source of livelihood for many residents in the town, 50km west of
Baghdad.
The
only hospital in the city was shelled Monday, April 5, by U.S.
helicopters.
Doctors
said the situation is extremely serious as some of the injured have bled
to death, the Doha-based newscaster added.
Fallujah
residents appealed to United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan and
the international community to intervene and end the crippling U.S.
blockade.
The
town had been sealed off at dawn Monday and U.S. troops were only
letting cars with Fallujah license plates enter or leave the town.
The
offensive, dubbed "Vigilant Resolve", involves two marine
battalions, or more than 2,000 troops, based near Fallujah, a bastion of
anti-occupation resistance.
It
coincides with deadly clashes between Shiites and U.S.-led occupation
troops across the country, which killed at least 100 people and injured
some 400 others.
Eight
Demonstrators killed
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Iraqi
fighters sniff through the rubble
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Eight
Iraqis were killed and 12 others injured Wednesday by the U.S. forces
during a demonstration west of the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk to
protest the crackdown on Fallujah, police and medics said.
Awad
Khalaf al-Juburi, police chief in Hawija, 50 kilometers (30 miles) west
of Kirkuk, said there had been a demonstration by some 1,500 people to
denounce the massacres committed by the American army in Fallujah.
At
the end of it, "some of them started firing at the American
soldiers, who fired back, killing eight people, including a child, and
wounded 12 others."
Ramadi
Victims
The
ghastly raids on Fallujah came as at least 40 Iraqis were killed and
dozens others injured in a separate U.S. military attacks on Ramadi,
110km west of Baghdad, Aljazeera said.
"The
U.S. forces barred ambulance vehicles from having access to the wounded,
as grinding battles are raging in areas of the town," its
correspondent said on air.
At
least 12 U.S. Marines were killed and 24 others wounded Tuesday night in
fierce battles with Iraqi fighters in Ramadi.
It
was the highest single-day casualty toll suffered by U.S. forces since
the beginning of the year, reported AFP.
Between
60 and 70 Iraqi fighters armed with rocket-propelled grenades and
automatic weapons engaged with the U.S. occupation troops.
"We
had about 12 dead and a couple dozen wounded," said a Pentagon
official, who requested anonymity.
"We're
pretty sure we got most of them in much greater numbers than us,"
he argued.
Eight
U.S. soldiers were killed and eight wounded in separate attacks around
chaos-mired Baghdad over the past 48 hours.
The
deaths raised to at least 628 the number of U.S. soldiers killed in
resistance operations in Iraq since last year's U.S.-led invasion,
according to an AFP tally.
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