Two Americans Die In Iraq Violence
Insurgent attacks killed an American soldier near Baghdad and a British trooper in the south Sunday, as U.S. forces sealed off a house in the northern city of Mosul where eight suspected al Qaeda members died in a gunfight — some by their hand to avoid capture.
In Washington, a U.S. counterterrorism official said the identities of the suspected al Qaeda members was unknown. Asked if they could include terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the official replied: "There are efforts under way to determine if he was killed.
The official said spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information.
The U.S. soldier killed near the capital was assigned to the Army's Task Force Baghdad and was hit by small arms fire, the military said. The Marine, assigned to Regimental Combat Team 8, 2nd Marine Division, died of wounds suffered the day before in Karmah, a village outside Fallujah to the west of the capital.
Their deaths brought to at least 2,093 the number of U.S. service members who have died since the war began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
In the southern city of Basra, a roadside bomb killed a British soldier and wounded four others, the British Ministry of Defense said. The ministry said 98 British soldiers have died in the Iraq conflict.
The U.S. military also said Sunday that 24 people — including one American Marine — were killed the day before in an ambush on a joint U.S. Iraqi patrol in Haditha, 140 miles northwest of Baghdad in the volatile Euphrates River valley. The dead included 15 civilians caught in the crossfire.
According to the U.S. statement, the attack began Saturday with a roadside bomb detonating next to the Marine's vehicle, followed by a heavy volley of fire from insurgents.
"Iraqi army soldiers and Marines returned fire, killing eight insurgents and wounding another," the statement said.
In other developments:
The "special voting" will take place on Dec. 12, Farid Ayar said. The rest of the country will vote on Dec. 15 for legislators who will serve for four years, he said.
Almost immediately, a fierce firefight broke out, and three insurgents detonated explosives and killed themselves. Five more died fighting, while four police officers also were killed, he said.
The Pentagon has said it plans to scale back troop strength to its pre-election baseline of 138,000, depending on conditions. Rumsfeld said the U.S.-led coalition continues to make progress in training Iraqi security forces, which he placed at 212,000.
Rumsfeld also said talk in the United States of a quick withdrawal from Iraq plays into the hands of the insurgents.
"The enemy hears a big debate in the United States, and they have to wonder maybe all we have to do is wait and we'll win. We can't win militarily. They know that. The battle is here in the United States," he told "Fox News Sunday."
Anger over detainee abuse has increased sharply since U.S. troops found 173 detainees at an Interior Ministry prison in Baghdad's Jadriyah neighborhood. The detainees, mainly Sunnis, were found malnourished and some had torture marks on their bodies. Sunni Arabs dominate the insurgent ranks.
The 400 protesters carried posters of tortured detainees, disfigured dead bodies and U.S. troops detaining Iraqis as they marched for a few hundred yards through western Baghdad.
Iraq's Shiite-led government has promised an investigation and punishment for anyone guilty of torture. Attacks against Shiite civilians by Sunni religious extremists have occurred throughout the Iraq conflict but spiked since the detainees were found last weekend.
CBS News correspondent Kimberly Dozier reports that the pattern of tit-for-tat bombings –
– is getting worse.In Mosul, extraordinary security measures were underway Sunday around the house where the insurgents died, Iraqi officials said. American soldiers maintained control of the site a day after a fierce gunbattle which broke out when Iraqi police and U.S. soldiers surrounded a house after reports that al Qaeda in Iraq members were inside.
Three insurgents detonated explosives and killed themselves to avoid capture, Iraqi officials said. Eleven Americans were wounded.
Meanwhile, four Christian women were killed Sunday night when gunmen stormed their home in a Christian district of eastern Baghdad, police said. The gunmen stole valuables and the motive for the attack appeared to have been robbery, police added.
The latest deaths occurred at the end of a violent three-day period in which at least 140 Iraqi civilians died in a series of bombings and suicide attacks — most of them targeting Shiite Muslims.
They included 76 people who died Friday in near-simultaneous suicide bombings at two Shiite mosques in Khanaqin and 36 more killed the next day by a suicide car bomber who detonated his vehicle amid mourners at a Shiite funeral north of the capital.