Fierce Fighting In Fallujah
Multiple explosions shook Fallujah after dark Tuesday and plumes of smoke rose into the air as fighting erupted for a second straight night. A U.S. AC-130 gunship hammered targets in the city.
Blasts and gunfire went on steadily for more than half an hour in sustained fighting, apparently in the northern Jolan district, a poor neighborhood where Sunni insurgents are concentrated.
Flames could be seen rising from buildings, and mosque loudspeakers in other parts of the city called on firefighters to mobilize.
The fighting broke out as a two-day extension to a cease-fire came to end.
It wasn't clear if the fighting was a final American push for the city, or a focused attack on known guerilla bases, CBS News Correspondent Kimberly Dozier reports.
Earlier in the day, U.S. aircraft dropped white leaflets over the city west of Baghdad, calling on insurgents to surrender.
"Surrender, you are surrounded," the leaflets said. "If you are a terrorist, beware, because your last day was yesterday. In order to spare your life end your actions and surrender to coalition forces now. We are coming to arrest you."
In other developments:
If the government can't make laws or provide security "it will not be real sovereignty," said Mahmoud Othman, a member of the Governing Council. "The less sovereignty there is, the less the possibility that the government will be able to work and achieve its tasks."
U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who has proposed a caretaker government to take over on June 30, was to brief the Security Council on Tuesday.
"Brahimi remains the sole negotiator with credibility to devise a possible path through dangerous terrain," said CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pamela Falk, "and both U.N. and U.S. negotiators are relying on his outline for a caretaker government."
The U.S. military on Sunday announced the two-day extension to the fragile cease-fire to give political efforts a chance — backing down from threats to launch an all-out assault on Fallujah to root our insurgents.
Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said Monday and Tuesday there was no ultimatum for a launch of an assault if political efforts did not show results. "We don't think deadlines are helpful," Kimmitt said Tuesday.
Earlier Tuesday, Marines were pushing ahead with a key part of the political track, the introduction of U.S.-Iraqi patrols into Fallujah. Those patrols were scheduled to begin Thursday.
Heavy fighting erupted Monday night in the Jolan neighborhood, where one Marine and eight insurgents were killed, and tank fire destroyed a mosque minaret that U.S. commanders said insurgents were using as sniper's nest.
Heavy fighting erupted Monday night in the Jolan neighborhood, where one Marine and eight insurgents were killed, and tank fire destroyed a mosque minaret that U.S. commanders said insurgents were using to snipe.
The Najaf fighting included one of the heaviest battles with the militia as U.S. troops try to increase the pressure on gunmen loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. U.S. troops moved into a base that Spanish troops are abandoning, but promised to stay away from the sensitive Shiite shrines at the heart of the southern city.
The first skirmish came in the afternoon, when Shiite militiamen opened fire on a U.S. patrol, and seven insurgents were killed. Hours later, a M1 tank was attacked with rocket-propelled grenades, triggering a heavy battle in which warplanes destroyed an anti-aircraft gun belonging to the militia, and 57 gunmen were killed, Kimmitt said.
U.S. authorities have vowed to capture al-Sadr and uproot his militia, the al-Mahdi Army, which launched a bloody uprising at the beginning of April. Al-Mahdi gunmen still dominate the streets of Najaf, Kufa and Karbala.
About 2,000 troops are deployed outside Najaf, but the military is having to tread carefully. Any action that even brings the possibility of harm to the sacred Imam Ali Shrine at its heart could turn the limited al-Sadr revolt into a widespread uprising by Iraq's Shiite majority.