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US
Starts Sweeping Najaf Attack, 75 Iraqis Killed In Kut
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US tanks roll past a picture of leading Shiite figures in Baghdad's Sadr City (AFP)
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AN-NAJAF,
IRAQ, August 12 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – US forces,
backed by helicopter gunships, launched early on Thursday, August 12,
a major offensive on the Iraqi holy city of An-Najaf as grinding
battles between the occupation forces and Mahdi Army entered its
second week.
Meanwhile,
at least 75 Iraqis were killed and up to 150 others injured in a
deadly US raid overnight into the southern city of Kut.
Thousands
of An-Najaf residents were fleeing the area around Imam Ali Shrine in
the heart of the city, Reuters news agency reported.
A
message in Arabic read out from Humvees said: "To the residents
of Najaf: Coalition forces are purging the city of Mahdi Army."
US
tanks were blocking all roads leading to Imam Ali shrine, one of
Shiites’ holiest sites, as US aircraft and artillery pounded a
nearby cemetery, a stronghold for Mahdi Army loyal to anti-occupation
firebrand Moqtada Al-Sadr.
A
series of explosions rocked the city on Thursday as fighting between
US occupation forces and Mahdi Army entered a second week.
Witnesses
said the crackle of machinegun fire echoed from the southern parts of
the city as smoke rose from the area.
A
senior official of Mahdi Army warned Wednesday night, August 11, that
the Shiite fighters would blow up pipelines in the south if US forces
launched the assault.
“If
the US forces attacked An-Najaf, we will blow up the oil pipelines,”
Sheikh Asaad Al-Basri, the leader of the Mahdi Army told Reuters.
75
Iraqis Killed
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Iraqi Shiite fighters pray in An-Najaf
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Further
to the south, heavy US bombardment of Baghdad southern neighborhood
Kut killed overnight 75 people and wounded more than 150.
Iraqi
medics told Aljazeera satellite channel Thursday that the predawn US
raid into Kut killed at least 75 people and injured up to 150 others.
US
planes started bombing Al-Shakia district, in southern Kut, after 3:00
am.
Many
of the dead and wounded were women and children, they added.
The
office of Sadr in Kut was flattened in the bombing, Sheikh Mohammad
Yihyiah, a supporter of the Shiite leader.
"Our
office has been destroyed because it was in the same district,
fortunately there were was no one in the office that's why we have no
casualties. Perhaps they thought it would be full of militiamen,"
he told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Twenty
people were killed and 50 wounded overnight when British forces pounded
districts in the southern city of Amara, targeting
strongholds of supporters of Sadr, who urged Shiites to keep on
fighting even if he was captured or killed.
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