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US strikes hideouts in Fallujah { July 1 2004 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19691-2004Jul1.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19691-2004Jul1.html
U.S. Strikes Suspected Iraq Terror Hideout
By TODD PITMAN
The Associated Press
Thursday, July 1, 2004; 4:12 AM
BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. jets pounded a suspected safe house of terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in Fallujah on Thursday, the latest in a series of strikes against the man suspected of masterminding deadly attacks and beheadings in Iraq.
The missile strike, which a doctor in the insurgent-controlled city said killed four people, came shortly before former-dictator Saddam Hussein was to appear in an Iraqi court.
Later Thursday, a roadside bomb went off in Baghdad's Amiriya district after a U.S. patrol passed through. Several Iraqi bystanders were killed and injured, said Col. Adnan Hussein, head of the Interior Ministry's information office.
Separately, a bomb exploded near the car of a senior Iraqi Finance Ministry official, slightly wounding him but killing his guard and driver, Hussein said. The bomb exploded near Yarmouk Hospital in central Baghdad.
Ehsan Karim, the head of the ministry's audit board, was driving by. Karim's guard and driver were killed, said Karima Ali Salam, a nurse at the hospital. Four bystanders were also injured.
The attack on the safe house was launched after "multiple confirmations of Iraqi and multinational intelligence," said Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, deputy operations director for the multinational force.
"This operation employed precision weapons to attack the safe house and underscores the resolve of multinational and Iraqi security forces to jointly destroy terrorist networks within Iraq," Kimmitt said.
Kimmitt did not mention casualties in his statement, but Dr. Loai Ali of the Fallujah General Hospital said four people were killed and 10 injured. There was no word on whether al-Zarqawi was in the house.
Fallujah residents contacted by telephone said U.S. jets fired missiles at a house on the eastern side of the city.
The raid came hours after rebels fired mortar rounds at a U.S. base on the outskirts of Baghdad's airport, wounding 11 soldiers and starting a fire that burned for more than an hour.
U.S. forces have mounted three previous airstrikes against suspected terrorist hideouts in recent days. On Friday, U.S. jets pounded a suspected al-Zarqawi hideout, killing up to 25 people, U.S. officials said.
Al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian militant said to be connected to al-Qaida, is believed to be behind a series of coordinated attacks on police and security forces last week that killed 100 people. He is also believed to be behind the beheading of two hostages, an American and a South Korean.
U.S. authorities Wednesday increased to $25 million the reward for information leading to the arrest of al-Zarqawi, more than doubling the previous offering of $10 million. Osama bin Laden has a $50 million bounty on his head.
Fallujah is believed to have become a stronghold of the al-Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad movement since Marines lifted their three-week siege in April and handed security over to a locally raised force commanded by officers from Saddam Hussein's army.
The Tawhid and Jihad movement claimed responsibility for the beheading of American Nicholas Berg and South Korean Kim Sun-il.
Meanwhile, police slapped a 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew on the Shiite holy city of Najaf on Wednesday, a day after discovering about 150 pounds of explosives in a white BMW, police Brig. Ghalib al-Jazaari said.
One Libyan man who allegedly entered Iraq from neighboring Syria to fight U.S. forces was detained over the incident, al-Jazaari said.
The police chief also said militiamen loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr kidnapped 25 policemen Tuesday in Najaf, 100 miles south of Baghdad, in response to the arrest of two of their colleagues but released 16 of them on Wednesday.
Ahmad al-Shibani, an al-Sadr spokesman, confirmed the kidnappings, but said all 25 had been freed. "We just wanted to teach them a lesson," he said.
With the end of the occupation, about 160,000 foreign troops, mostly American, remain in Iraq to provide security and train Iraq's new security services. U.S. officials have warned that the transfer of sovereignty would not stop assaults.
The United States was still looking for U.S. Marine Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun. On Tuesday, his status was changed from "missing" to "captured."
An insurgent group has claimed the kidnapping of Hassoun and has threatened to behead him unless Iraqi prisoners are released. Hassoun was shown blindfolded with a sword brandished over his head in a video aired on Al-Jazeera television.
Hassoun, of Lebanese descent, was last seen about a week before the videotape was broadcast Sunday, the military said.
"The circumstances surrounding the Marine's absence initially indicated that he was missing," a statement by the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force said. "However, in light of what we have observed on the terrorists' video, we have classified him as captured."
© 2004 The Associated Press
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