U.S. army soldiers patrol a highway in Fallujah

Additional Reporting By Subhy Haddad Hadad, IOL Correspondent

BAGHDAD, September 27 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Few hours after American occupation forces gunned down four Iraqis, a rocket-propelled grenade was fired early Saturday, September 27, at the landmark Rashid Hotel in central Baghdad, housing many U.S. occupation officials.

The four Iraqi civilians, including two women, were killed when U.S. troops opened fire on cars at the entrance to the hotspot town of Fallujah, 50 kilometers (30 miles) west of Baghdad, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

An AFP correspondent at Fallujah Hospital said eight other Iraqis were wounded, four seriously, after the incident at 10:45 pm (GMT 1845) outside the town.

Rafeh Issawi, a doctor at the hospital, said four people were pronounced dead from gunshot wounds and their bodies taken away by relatives.

The dead were identified as Biajia al-Jumaili, 65, her daughter Amal, 40, her son-in-law Zamel, 45, and Khalil Jadduh al-Jumaili, 40.

Witnesses said that local mosques broadcast a call for blood, drawing some 2,000 people to Fallujah Hospital, chanting : "America is the enemy of God."

But the U.S. army argued Saturday that its troops shot dead only two Iraqis and wounded four others.

"An Iraqi vehicle ran a checkpoint in Fallujah. Soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division opened fire. They killed two and wounded four," an American military spokesman told AFP. He gave no further details.

RPG Attack

"foreign terrorists who are infiltrating in largely through the Syrian border," said Bremer

Meanwhile, an RPG attack targeted early on Saturday Rashid Hotel in downtown Baghdad which is housing many U.S. occupation officials.

A U.S. military spokesman said the RPG was fired about 6:40 am (0240 GMT) in the first such coordinated attack on the facility since Baghdad fell to invading U.S.-led forces in April.

"There was an RPG attack against the Rashid Hotel," said a U.S. spokesman, who asked not to be named.

An occupation official said the rocket caused superficial damage to the 14-story building, which is under tight security and ringed with sand bags and barbed wire, adding that no casualties were reported.

"This is the first coordinated, intentional, targeted attack against the Rashid Hotel," said military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Kevin Gainer. Other minor incidents occurred there but no details were available.

The attack came two days after a small bomb at a hotel housing the Baghdad offices of the U.S. television network NBC killed a maintenance man in the first such attack on foreign journalists in the occupied country.

The Rashid Hotel, built in 1983, used to house most of the foreign press, diplomats and many visiting Western businessmen before U.S.-led forces invaded the country in March.

A mosaic of former U.S. president George Bush, who led the campaign that chased Iraqi troops out of Kuwait in 1991, used to adorn the floor at the entrance, bearing the legend "The Criminal."

But since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in April, the picture is gone and the hotel houses officials of the occupying forces.

It stands next to the Baghdad convention center, where the military press offices are located.  

On the other hand, the airport of Mosul some 420 kms to the north of Baghdad, came under mortar attack launched by the Iraqi resistance early on Saturday, eyewitnesses told IOL by telephone.

They said the 3-pronged mortar attack that took place at 05:15 am (01.15 GMT) caused serious damage to the airport premises and destroyed at least 7 vehicles belonging to the U.S. forces stationed in the airport.

The eyewitnesses said the mortar attack left an unspecified number of U.S. soldiers wounded, but gave no further details.

Also on Saturday, the Iraqi Al-Sabah newspaper revealed that 35 Iraqi civilians were killed last week when three ammunition depots had exploded at No’maniya town, some 130 km south of Baghdad.

It said that the explosion was caused by a spark ignited by torches used by Iraqis,  who were to steal the ammunition and a number of missiles stored in the said depots.

A number of ammunition depots at No’maniya were bombarded during the U.S.-British war against Iraq, but other depots remained intact and free-for-all on an area stretching to 2,000 hectares of land.

248 Foreign Fighters

On Friday, U.S. overseer in Iraq Paul Bremer said his forces were currently holding 248 foreign fighters, including 19 alleged members of Al-Qaeda, claiming that "about half of the foreigners in custody are Syrians."

"I think the next two countries are Iran and Yemen," he told a Pentagon press conference, adding he "may be wrong" on the figures.

But on the number of Al-Qaeda detainees, Bremer said "it's 19, to be precise," stopping short of specifying their nationalities.

Bremer said the foreign fighters who allegedly infiltrated Iraq since the end of the war fell into two broad categories.

One was Ansar-al-Islam, an "Al-Qaeda oriented group that has reconstituted and re-infiltrated after the war and has now got probably several hundred members in Iraq," he claimed.

The other, he argued, included "foreign terrorists who are infiltrating in largely through the Syrian border."

Some of them "may also be Al-Qaeda," while some "may just be terrorists for hire. We're not entirely sure," claimed Bremer.

More Troops

In another development, the Pentagon announced Friday that it mobilized two U.S. Army National Guard brigades for deployment to Iraq and put a third on standby as U.S. calls for international troop contributions go unheeded.

The 30th Infantry Brigade from North Carolina and the 39th Infantry Brigade from Arkansas -- 10,000 soldiers in total -- will mobilize October 1 and October 12, respectively, the Department of Defense said in a statement.

"These units can expect to be in the Iraqi theater for up to 12 months. The total length of mobilization is up to 18 months to allow time for equipping, training, mobilizing, leave and demobilizing activities," it added.

The two brigades were notified in July that they could be tapped for service as part of a major force rotation plan to ease pressure on U.S. soldiers already deployed in Iraq.

At the time the Pentagon said the rotation would not affect the total number of U.S. troops serving in Iraq.

Also on Friday, the Pentagon alerted another 5,000 soldiers -- the 81st Army National Guard Infantry Brigade from the western US state of Washington -- that they may be next.

U.S. defense officials had given numerous indications over the past few days that the U.S. could be forced to deploy additional troops of its own to Iraq if no other countries agreed to aid the U.S.-led occupation.

U.S. President George W. Bush and his Secretary of State Colin Powell held bilateral meetings with leaders of several countries on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly meeting in New York in the hopes of convincing them to contribute troops to Iraq.

Several countries -- in particular Turkey, South Korea, India and Pakistan -- have been asked to commit forces, but have so far not agreed to do so.

Nearly 160,000 foreign soldiers are present in Iraq, including 140,000 Americans and 10,600 British.

Britain controls the southern part of the country, while Poland directs a division of 9,000 soldiers in the center-south. The U.S. troops are deployed in the center and the north of Iraq.