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An Iraqi doctor treats a young wounded girl in a hospital following a US raid on Fallujah (AFP)
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FALLUJAH,
Iraq, September 25 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – At least
seven Iraqis were killed and up to 11 others wounded, including
children and women, Saturday overnight, when US forces again used
excessive artillery and planes to pound the city of Fallujah in cold
blood.
“We
have received seven dead, including a woman and three children, and 11
wounded,” Doctor Suheib Mahmmoud, from Fallujah's general hospital,
told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
TV
footages showed a four-year-old boy and an elderly woman being freed
from the debris of a destroyed home.
US
occupation forces pounded the restive city with artillery fire late
Friday and through the night and carried out an air strike on a house
in the Dhubat neighborhood at 4:00 am (0000 GMT), witnesses and an AFP
correspondent said.
The
US military confirmed in a statement that it had carried out operations
overnight in the restive city and said the air strike targeted a
hideout for “insurgents” loyal to suspected Al-Qaeda operative Abu
Mussab Al-Zarqawi.
However,
Iraqi medical sources and independent journalists in Fallujah say that
most of those wheeled into local hospitals are civilians, including
numbers of women and children.
Iraqi
fighters in Fallujah denied
in June the presence of Zarqawi in their town, adding they were simply
defending their homeland against occupation forces.
At
least 56 Iraqis, including women and children, were
killed when
US occupation forces launched an overnight aerial onslaught on Fallujah,
according to Iraqi hospital sources Friday, September 17.
In
April, at least 700 Iraqis, mostly
women and children, were killed and 1,500 others injured when
the
US occupation forces imposed a tight siege on the town and intensified
air strikes on its densely-populated areas.
On
September 18, Amnesty International blasted the
US for its barbaric
raids on Fallujah.
Mosque
Stormed
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A US Humvee leaves the Ibn Taymia mosque in Baghdad (AFP) |
Meanwhile,US
occupation on Saturday raided a Sunni mosque in
Baghdad following a tip-off but found nothing and withdrew.
“We
received reports weapons were being stored in the mosque... We came at
10:00 am (0600 GMT) and, with the full cooperation of the mosque's
imam, we searched the mosque and found nothing,” Captain Tom Burrell
told AFP on the scene.
A
contingent of up to 100 national guards backed by
US
amour sealed off the area but the
US
officer stressed that only Iraqis entered the Ibn Taymia mosque, which
lies beside the main highway leading to the airport.
Also
on Saturday, seven Iraqis were killed when attackers sprayed gunfire
on a group of Iraqi national guard recruits west of
Baghdad, hospital sources said.
“Seven
bodies were brought here as well as one wounded person,” said Doctor
Mohammad Salaheddin from
Baghdad's Yarmuk hospital.
The
ambush took place on the
Rabih Boulevard where another attack on a group of Iraqis queuing up to join the
national guard left seven dead on Wednesday, September 22.
