An Iraqi policeman guards the area after a bomb exploded outside Basra's Mirbad hotel

BASRA, Iraq, March 18 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – As U.S. occupation prepared to mark the first anniversary of their invasion of Iraq, at least two U.S. occupation soldiers and eight Iraqis were killed in separate bomb and gun attacks on Thursday, March 18, in the war-torn country doubling the death toll in a bloody 24 hours.

Just ahead of the March 20 one-year anniversary of an invasion U.S. President George W. Bush promised would make the world safer, one day witnessed 2 U.S. soldiers killed and six others wounded in a mortar attack in Baghdad, 4 Iraqis killed in a car bomb attack in Basra, one Iraqi killed and 9 U.S. soldiers injured in an attack in Fallujah, an Iraqi contractor working for the U.S. occupation found dead near Mosul and three Iraqi journalists shot dead in Baquba.

In Baghdad

Two U.S. soldiers were killed and six others wounded in a mortar attack northwest of Baghdad, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

"A 13th Corps Support Command Soldier was killed and seven were wounded in a mortar attack at approximately 12:45 p.m. March 17th at Logistics Base Seitz near Baghdad," the statement read.

"Three of the wounded were medically evacuated to the 31st Combat Support Hospital, where one died of wounds."

The attack was on a base just outside the city, close by the Baghdad airport.

Basra

Al least four people were killed in a car bomb attack while another man was beaten to death by a mob after the blast targeting a hotel in Iraq's main southern city of Basra, Iraqi police and medical sources told AFP.

"We have received two dead and one man who was beaten by the crowd who died on arrival at the hospital," said Manal Nassrah, an emergency doctor at Basra's Al-Sadr university hospital.

The wounded counted a nine-year-old boy and two middle-aged men who were lightly wounded, the doctor said.

Shortly after the explosion, a crowd seized a man and beat him up, witnesses told AFP. The apparent suspect, an unidentified man, was wounded and taken away by police in an ambulance, they said.

British occupation forces, which control the city, and Iraqi police cordoned off the area, preventing journalists from approaching the site.

Firefighters put out the fire in the car which exploded meters (yards) away from the newly-renovated three-floor hotel, which caters mainly to Iraqis.

The explosion came a day after a suicide car bombing targeted a small hotel in central Baghdad, killing at least seven people, according to the interior ministry, and wounding dozens of others. The U.S. occupation army said 17 people died.

U.S. Helicopter Comes Down

Meanwhile, a U.S. helicopter came down on Thursday south of the flashpoint Iraqi city of Falluja, west of Baghdad, witnesses told Reuters.

A U.S. military spokeswoman in Baghdad said she had no immediate information on the incident.

Resistance attacks have brought down several helicopters in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion a year ago.

In November 2003, two Black Hawk helicopters collided and crashed in the northern city of Mosul after coming under fire, killing 17 U.S. soldiers in the bloodiest single incident for American occupation forces since major combat was declared over on May 1.

Fallujah

In Fallujah, one Iraqi was killed Thursday, and another three were wounded, along with nine U.S. soldiers, in an attack on the mayor's office in this flashpoint city, police and U.S. military said.

Gunmen opened fire at the building as municipal council members were meeting with U.S. occupation forces and exchanges of fire broke out, the police said.

Police and hospital sources told AFP Omar Okaili, 18, was killed and that Waddah Jawad, 40, Aref Hadi, 60, and Rashid Hamid, 65, were hurt.

U.S. Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, deputy operations chief for the U.S.-led occupation in Iraq, confirmed in a press conference in Baghdad that "we had an incident in Fallujah where we had a military force that was working in one of the provincial buildings."

"There was a number of troops that were on rooftops nearby, watching security,' he explained.

"Apparently during the meeting a number of mortar rounds came in in that vicinity, probably to disrupt the meeting. One of the mortar rounds landed on one of the rooftops," he said.

"Eight soldiers and one Marine were injured. We assessed those injuries not to be life threatening," he added.

Witnesses said two U.S. helicopters and several warplanes then flew over the city, located about 50 kilometers (30 miles) west of Baghdad in the so-called Sunni Triangle where U.S. forces regularly come under fire.

In the same area, gunmen forced three trucks carrying equipment for the U.S. Army to stop on the road linking Fallujah with nearby Habaniyah, an AFP journalist said.

They forced the drivers out of their trucks before setting the vehicles on fire, he said.

Mosul

In Mosul, an Iraqi contractor working for the U.S. army was found dead near the northern city of Mosul, police said Thursday.

"The body of Hadi Fadi, a 23-year-old who disappeared three days ago, was found with his throat slit and his body mutilated," officer Mohammad Thanun told AFP.

Police have launched an investigation into the incident, he said, adding that all of the victims' belongings were found with his body.

Mosul has recently witnessed daily acts of violence against Iraqi police forces, foreigners and US coalition forces.

Baquba 

In Baquba, three people were killed and 10 others wounded when gunmen opened fire on a bus transporting the crew of an Iraqi television station funded by the U.S.-occupation.

Gunmen opened fire on the bus carrying a crew from Diyala Television on a road near the village of Kanaan, outside the flashpoint town of Baquba, 60 kilometres (40 miles) north of Baghdad.

"Three people were killed and 10 others wounded," a doctor at a hospital in Baquba where casualties were transported for treatment told AFP on Thursday.

"I saw two men standing next to a car parked on the side of the road and when our bus arrived next to them, they started to shoot," one of the wounded, Saad Sadek, told AFP.

On Wednesday, three U.S. soldiers were killed and six others wounded in a mortar attack northwest of Baghdad.  

“A 13th Corps Support Command Soldier was killed and seven were wounded in a mortar attack at approximately 12:45 p.m. March 17th at Logistics Base Seitz near Baghdad ,” a U.S. military statement read.

Toll For Baghdad Hotel Bombing Downward

British Army troops investigate the site of a bomb blast outside Mirbad hotel

Meanwhile, U.S. and Iraqi officials said Thursday that six Iraqis and one Briton were killed and 35 other people wounded in the suicide car bombing outside a central Baghdad hotel.

"Seven people, including one British national, were killed and 35 others were wounded, and this is a final toll established by hospitals in Baghdad," Health Minister Khodr Abbas told AFP of the Wednesday night attack.

"According to the Iraqi police, seven civilians were killed and 35 were wounded," confirmed U.S. Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, deputy operations chief for the U.S.-led occupation.

Earlier reports from the U.S. military said up to 27 people were killed and 45 others wounded in the suicide car bombing outside the Jabal Lubnan (Mount Lebanon) hotel in central Baghdad.

Kimmitt told a Baghdad press conference that "the longer you wait after the incident the more precise you can get at your numbers."

Asked about the reasons the military considered the incident a suicide bombing, Kimmitt said: "remnants of the suicide bomber were found connected to pieces of the vehicle all around the area."

May Not Be the Target

But he said the U.S. military was not certain the hotel had been the target of the devastating bombing.

"We are not certain the hotel was the target. The hole was in the middle of the street, it is not definitive that the hotel was the target," he said.

"It is unclear why the bomber would not have driven the car closer to the hotel and exploded the bomb right next to the hotel for more damage. Given that it is in the middle of the street there is a chance that the hotel may not have been the target," he said.

He said the attacker "could have gotten much closer to the hotel, or right into the side of the hotel."

Kimmitt explained that "the vehicle may have prematurely detonated or was hit by another vehicle causing the detonation."

"Investigation is ongoing. We are unsure of either the motivation or the target of this attack and that is why we are not being definitive for the time being," he said

Kimmitt said nobody had been "detained in connection with this incident."

Iraqi contractor working for US army found dead: police.