Five more US soldiers killed in Iraq
Tuesday, 3 July 2007
BAGHDAD, July 2 (AFP): Five more US soldiers have been killed in fighting in Baghdad and the western Iraqi province of Anbar in a single day, the military said Monday.
Two soldiers and one marine were killed in Anbar Sunday "while conducting combat operations," a statement said.
Another soldier was killed while on patrol on Sunday with Iraqi national police in western Baghdad, when insurgents detonated a roadside bomb and then opened fire on them. Two Iraqi policemen were also wounded in the attack.
Insurgents ambushed another US military patrol in southern Baghdad, killing one soldier.
The latest fatalities took the military's losses in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion to 3,575, according to an AFP count based on Pentagon figures.
Meanwhile: Iran is using the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah as a "proxy" to arm Shiite militants in Iraq and Tehran's elite Quds force helped militants carry out a January attack in Karbala in which five Americans were killed, a US general said Monday. A senior Lebanese Hezbollah operative, Ali Mussa Dakdouk, was captured March 20 in southern Iraq, US military spokesman Brig. Gen. Kevin J. Bergner said. Dakdouk served for 24 years in Hezbollah and was "working in Iraq as a surrogate for the Iranian Quds Force," Bergner said.
The general also said that Dakdouk was a liaison between the Iranians and a breakaway Shiite group led by Qais al-Kazaali, a former spokesman for cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Bergner said al-Kazaali's group carried out the January attack against a provincial government
building in Karbala and that the Iranians assisted in preparations. Al-Khazaali and his brother Ali al-Khazaali were captured with Dakdouk.
Dakdouk told US interrogators that the Karbala attackers "could not have conducted this complex operation without the support and direction of the Quds force," Bergner said.
Documents captured with al-Khazaali showed that the Quds Force had developed detailed information on the US position at the government building, "regarding our soldiers' activities, shift changes and defenses, and this information was shared with the attackers," Bergner said.
The Karbala attack was one of the boldest and most sophisticated against US forces in four years of fighting in Iraq, and US officials at the time suggested Iran may have had a role in it. In the assault, up to a dozen gunmen posed as an American security team, with US military combat fatigues, allowing them to pass checkpoints into the government compound, where they launched the attack. One US soldier was killed in the initial assault, and the militants abducted four others who were later found shot to death.
Two soldiers and one marine were killed in Anbar Sunday "while conducting combat operations," a statement said.
Another soldier was killed while on patrol on Sunday with Iraqi national police in western Baghdad, when insurgents detonated a roadside bomb and then opened fire on them. Two Iraqi policemen were also wounded in the attack.
Insurgents ambushed another US military patrol in southern Baghdad, killing one soldier.
The latest fatalities took the military's losses in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion to 3,575, according to an AFP count based on Pentagon figures.
Meanwhile: Iran is using the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah as a "proxy" to arm Shiite militants in Iraq and Tehran's elite Quds force helped militants carry out a January attack in Karbala in which five Americans were killed, a US general said Monday. A senior Lebanese Hezbollah operative, Ali Mussa Dakdouk, was captured March 20 in southern Iraq, US military spokesman Brig. Gen. Kevin J. Bergner said. Dakdouk served for 24 years in Hezbollah and was "working in Iraq as a surrogate for the Iranian Quds Force," Bergner said.
The general also said that Dakdouk was a liaison between the Iranians and a breakaway Shiite group led by Qais al-Kazaali, a former spokesman for cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Bergner said al-Kazaali's group carried out the January attack against a provincial government
building in Karbala and that the Iranians assisted in preparations. Al-Khazaali and his brother Ali al-Khazaali were captured with Dakdouk.
Dakdouk told US interrogators that the Karbala attackers "could not have conducted this complex operation without the support and direction of the Quds force," Bergner said.
Documents captured with al-Khazaali showed that the Quds Force had developed detailed information on the US position at the government building, "regarding our soldiers' activities, shift changes and defenses, and this information was shared with the attackers," Bergner said.
The Karbala attack was one of the boldest and most sophisticated against US forces in four years of fighting in Iraq, and US officials at the time suggested Iran may have had a role in it. In the assault, up to a dozen gunmen posed as an American security team, with US military combat fatigues, allowing them to pass checkpoints into the government compound, where they launched the attack. One US soldier was killed in the initial assault, and the militants abducted four others who were later found shot to death.