Large numbers of US forces supported by helicopters gathered outside this Euphrates River village yesterday as a region-wide operation to wipe out supporters of Iraq's most wanted militant continued into its seventh day.
An AP reporter saw a large convoy of mainly US Marines, backed by tanks, redeploy several kilometers from Rommana to Obeidi, on the river's northern bank, in a massive troop buildup that forced scared residents indoors.
The Obeidi operation appeared to signal a continuation of the high-profile Operation Matador, launched last Saturday in several villages close to the Syrian border known as major routes for foreign fighters entering Iraq to battle coalition forces.
PHOTO: AP
Residents said US troops blocked the main road linking Obeidi with safer areas to the east outside the field of operations.
``There is fear among the residents of Obeidi, but we don't think it [the village] has any military importance. There are no fighters in the village,'' said Obeidi resident Khalaf Ali, 35.
The campaign, the largest since insurgents were forced from Fallujah six months ago, has killed more than 100 suspected foreign fighters allied with Jordanian-born militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the military has said. Scores have also been captured.
Al-Zarqawi, a Sunni Muslim terror mastermind, has claimed responsibility for scores of bombings, assassinations and kidnappings in a bid to derail the US-backed, Shiite-led government.
Operation Matador came amid a surge of militant attacks that have killed at least 430 people across Iraq since the government was announced April 28.
Violence continued yesterday with three Iraqi street cleaners being killed and four injured when a roadside bomb exploded apparently prematurely in Dora, a southern Baghdad neighborhood, said Dr. Zaid Adil of Yarmouk Hospital.
A suicide car bomber detonated his vehicle near an Iraqi police patrol in central Baqouba, north of the capital, wounding three policemen and a civilian, said police colonel Mudhafar Muhammed.
Seven mortar rounds slammed into Baghdad's international airport at 9am, but no casualties or damages were reported, police Captain Talib Thamir said.
At least nine more Iraqis were killed and 19 wounded Friday in a series of bombings, ambushes and other attacks.
Also Friday, a gunfire exchange with US forces in Mosul, 362km northwest of Baghdad killed five Iraqi civilians and three suspected insurgents, the American military said.
US Marines on Friday characterized the violence in Iraq's vast Anbar region, which includes Obeidi and Qaim, as intertribal fighting, adding Marines have not conducted operations inside Qaim, a town of 50,000 people, since the campaign's opening days.
During the past few days in Qaim and nearby smaller villages, Iraqi fighters have been brazenly swaggering through rubble-strewn streets, toting machine guns and grenade launchers and setting up checkpoints in preparation to do battle.
But in Obeidi, the streets were virtually empty yesterday as residents bolted doors, remained inside and waited for a possible US offensive.
Overnight, US warplanes streaked noisily overhead and several loud explosions were heard in various locations throughout the region, but the source of the blasts nor details on possible casualties were not immediately clear.
This remote desert region is a haven for foreign combatants who slip across the border along ancient smuggling routes and collect weapons to use in some of Iraq's deadliest attacks, according to the US military. But fighters in the Sunni town of Qaim, some 200km west of Baghdad, insist there are no foreigners among them.
The US military has confirmed five Marine deaths so far and says about 100 insurgents have been killed in the Qaim operation. But a Washington Post reporter embedded with US forces put the American death toll Thursday at seven -- six of them from one squad.
On Friday, an American soldier was killed and four others wounded when a car bomb exploded in Beiji, 250km north of Baghdad, the military said in a statement.
At least 1,613 members of the US military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
New interim prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, extended Iraq's state of emergency for another 30 days Friday throughout Iraq, except the northern Kurdish-run areas.
The state of emergency, renewed monthly since being first imposed Nov. 7 -- hours before the Fallujah offensive, includes a nighttime curfew and gives security forces powers of arrest without warrants.
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and