Fallujah, Iraq — U.S. troops battled insurgents in two central Iraqi towns Wednesday, with 40 Iraqis reportedly being killed in a single air strike on a mosque in Fallujah, a stronghold of Sunni resistance near Baghdad.
Witnesses said that a U.S. helicopter gunship hit the mosque with three missiles. U.S. officials were unavailable for comment.
Part of the wall surrounding the Abdul-Aziz al-Samarrai mosque was demolished, said an AP reporter, Abdul-Qader Saadi, at the scene, although the mosque building itself was not damaged.
The strike came as worshippers were gathering for afternoon prayers, witnesses said. The bodies of dead and wounded were rushed away in cars to private homes in the area where temporary hospitals have been set up.
Angry residents gathered around the mosque after the strike. The offices of an organization of Sunni clerics next door were also lightly damaged.
U.S. marines have besieged Fallujah, west of Baghdad, for the past three days in a major operation aimed at uprooting insurgents.
Earlier, hospital officials in Fallujah said at least 60 Iraqis had been killed and more than 120 wounded in overnight fighting in Fallujah.
In another development, a U.S. military helicopter made an emergency landing in the city of Baqouba, 50 kilometres east of Baghdad, on Wednesday after it was hit by small arms fire, the U.S. military said.
No one was wounded in the incident and the military planned to transport the OH-58 Kiowa helicopter to a nearby base by truck.
Meanwhile, a top U.S. general in Iraq vowed to "destroy" a Shia militia known as the Mahdi Army that, along with Sunni Muslim guerrillas, is waging the most extensive fighting in Iraq since U.S. President George W. Bush declared an end to major conflict last May. A dozen U.S. marines, two other coalition soldiers and scores of Iraqis were killed in battles Tuesday.
"The coalition and Iraqi security forces will continue deliberate, precise and powerful offensive operations to destroy the al-Mahdi Army throughout Iraq," Brigadier-General Mark Kimmitt, the U.S. military's deputy head of operations, told reporters in Baghdad.
He said U.S. forces were trying to hunt down members of the Mahdi Army in the mainly Shia neighbourhood of Sadr City in Baghdad, while U.S. and coalition forces were working to prevent militiamen from seizing government buildings and police stations in southern cities.
He called on the militia's leader — Muqtada al-Sadr — to surrender. "If he wants to calm the situation … he can turn himself in to a local Iraqi police station and he can face justice," Gen. Kimmitt said.
So far the fighting appears to be mainly by Mr. al-Sadr's militia. He is trying to persuade Shiites outside militia ranks to join the fight.
While Mr. al-Sadr's supporters attacked coalition forces in the south, U.S. marines have been besieging Fallujah, west of Baghdad, to uproot Sunni Muslim guerrillas.
Marines and gunmen were engaged in heavy battles in the Dubat neighbourhood on the eastern side of Fallujah and elsewhere in the city, witnesses said.
U.S. warplanes opened fire on groups of Iraqis in the street. Rocket-propelled grenade fire set a U.S. Humvee ablaze, injuring soldiers inside, witnesses said.
Mosques in the city called for a jihad (holy war) against Americans.
Among the 60 dead in the city reported earlier, 26 people — including 16 children and up to eight women — were killed when warplanes struck four houses late Tuesday, said Hatem Samir at Fallujah Hospital. Others were killed in ongoing street battles.
Marines this week launched a major operation to root out Sunni Muslim guerrillas from Fallujah, 55 kilometres west of Baghdad, one of the strongest bastions of Iraqi resistance. On Tuesday, the insurgents opened a new front with a bloody attack on marines in the nearby town of Ramadi.
Gunmen hiding in Ramadi's main cemetery opened fire on U.S. patrols, sparking a gunbattle in alleys and near the governor's palace, witnesses said.
Major-General James Mattis, marine commander in Anbar province, of which Ramadi is the capital, confirmed Wednesday that 12 marines had been killed in two battles in the city that raged for three hours Tuesday.
He said one of the fights spread along a front stretching for 1½ kilometres. He would not speculate on how many insurgents were killed but said "the enemy paid a price. … we have the bodies."
Gen. Mattis also said troops captured an unspecified number of combatants from Syria.
New fighting erupted in the same Ramadi neighbourhood on Wednesday, witnesses said.
In the south, Shia militiamen attacked coalition troops in five cities Tuesday in battles in a revolt sparked by a U.S. crackdown on Mr. al-Sadr.
He urged Iraqis to rise against the U.S. occupation and vowed to die rather than be captured by U.S. forces.
Clashes continued overnight between militiamen from Mr. al-Sadr's Mahdi Army and coalition troops in Kut, Karbala and the mainly Shia Baghdad neighbourhood of Sadr City. At least 12 Iraqis were killed in Kut and four in Baghdad, along with two Iranians caught in the crossfire in Karbala, according to doctors.
The Mahdi Army appeared to be in control of Kut and Kufa, occupying government buildings and roaming the streets, as Iraqi police stood aside. Witnesses reported that a British civilian working for a private security company was killed when militiamen took over the company's office in Kut.
Signs were emerging of growing sympathy between Sunni Muslim insurgents and Mr. al-Sadr's Shia movement. In mainly Sunni Ramadi, portraits of Mr. al-Sadr were posted on government buildings, schools and mosques, along with graffiti praising him for his "heroic deeds" and "valiant uprising against the occupier."
Iraq's Shia majority has largely avoided anti-U.S. violence, shunning Mr. al-Sadr's virulent anti-U.S. rhetoric as well as the insurgency led by Sunnis in central Iraq. U.S. officials have expressed concern that Mr. al-Sadr could start co-operating with the Sunni guerrillas.
