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US
Air Raid on Fallujah Kills Dozens, Including Children
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The
attack on the 300,000-populated area killed three children
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BAGHDAD,
September 2 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Twenty Iraqis,
including three children were killed and six others injured Wednesday,
September 1, in a US air strike on two buildings in the restive Iraqi
city of Fallujah.
Two
buildings were destroyed when a US fighter fired a pair of missiles in
the residential neighborhood of Jebel in Fallujah.
"We
now have 17 dead people and six wounded," Doctor Seifeddin Taha
of the Fallujah general hospital told Agence France Presse (AFP).
Other
three bodies were recovered from under the rubbles of the destroyed
buildings.
The
deaths also include one woman and one elderly man after the raid on
the city, populated by 300,000.
Dismissed
The
US occupation forces confirmed the attack, claiming it was on safe
houses and meeting locations of followers of the Jordanian-born Abu
Musab Al-Zarqawi, who the US blames for several attacks against US
forces in the war-torn country.
The
US military added the attack was carried out upon intelligence
information from US and Iraqi sources.
But
Taha's statements carried a dismissal of the allegation.
"All
the wounded are families. Among the dead, there could be two or three
children but the bodies are torn to pieces and it's difficult to
tell," Taha added.
The
air raid comes as a star reminder of earlier attacks by US warplanes,
that ravaged Fallujah and left a high number of civilian casualties.
In
April, at least 700 Iraqis, mostly
women and children,
were killed and 1500 others injured when the US occupation forces
imposed a tight siege on the city and intensified air strikes on its
densely-populated areas.
In
May, US helicopters killed
more than 40 people,
including several children, during a wedding party in western Iraq.
Although
the occupation forces claimed the attack was on a safe house used by
foreign fighters entering Iraq from Syria , the Associated Press aired
a video
tape showing
a decorated wedding vehicle and guests arriving for the celebrations
followed by scenes of death and destruction.
Hostages
Freed
Meanwhile,
seven truckers, who were held hostage for more than a month in Iraq,
were released Wednesday reportedly after the Kuwaiti firm they work
for has paid a $500,000 ransom for the kidnappers.
The
seven truckers, three Indians, three Kenyans and an Egyptian arrived
in Kuwait from where they were due to return to their homelands.
The
release of the seven truckers were received with extreme welcome.
The
feed Egyptian hostage, Mohammed Ali Sanad, told the Arabic-language
al-Arabiya television they had been told about their release two days
ago.
"We
felt very happy and we did not sleep out of our joy," he said.
Relatives
of the Indian hostages, for their part, expressed joy over the news of
the hostages' release.
"We
thank the captors for sparing our boys," BBC News Online quoted
Harvinder Singh, elder brother of Sukhdev Singh as saying.
And
in Kenya, government spokesman Alfred Mutua said the country was
"ecstatic" at news of the release.
An
Iraqi group calling itself the Black Banners Bridges had kidnapped the
seven truckers, threatening to kill them if the Kuwaiti firm they work
for did not pull out of Iraq.
French
Anguish
France,
meanwhile, faces another day of anguish after the deadline set by the
kidnappers of the two French journalists taken hostage in Iraq expired
without news about their fate.
"The
situation remains worrying," Jean-Paul Cluzel, the head of Radio
France which employs Chesnot, said.
He
urged to go on with efforts to bring the two French reporters back
home.
"The
mobilization of everybody, in particular of French Muslims, must
continue," he told LCI television.
Le
Figaro editor-in-chief Jean de Belot said the two journalists were
still alive till Wednesday, urging to exert utmost efforts to secure
their release.
"French
officials were "nearly certain" late Wednesday the two
journalists were still alive."
"There
is indirect contact" with the hostage-takers, de Belot said
following a meeting at Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin's offices
with other top editors.
The
uncertain fate of the French journalists comes as a delegation of
Muslim scholars arrived
in Baghdad, in a bid to secure the release of the two French hostages.
"It
is very symbolic that a Muslim delegation goes over there to demand,
in the name of Islam, of God and the Muslims of France, that what is
being done be stopped because it doesn't help the Muslim cause,"
said Fouad Alaoui, secretary general of the Union of French Islamic
Organizations.
Chesnot
of Radio France and Malbrunot of Le Figaro newspaper disappeared in
Iraq on August 20, the day they were to have left Baghdad for the
Shiite holy city of Najaf, then the scene of fierce fighting between
US occupation forces and Shiite militia loyal to Shiite leader Moqtada
Sadr.
A
group calling itself Tawhid and Jihad said on Thursday it had slain
three Turkish hostages in Iraq.
No
immediate reports were available on the new beheadings.
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