http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/22/news/iraq.php
Sunnis fight Sunnis, and Americans, southeast of Baghdad By Cara Buckley Thursday, November 22, 2007 BAGHDAD: Sunni insurgents dressed as Iraqi Army troops stormed a Sunni village southeast of Baghdad at dawn on Thursday, witnesses said, killing at least 11 people during a three hour firefight before U.S. and Iraqi soldiers drove them off. More may have been killed. A hospital worker counted 11 dead, including three Iraqi soldiers, but a local sheik said 20 corpses remained scattered throughout the village. The village, Howr Rajab, has been the site of fierce struggles between two rival Sunni groups, the homegrown Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, which the U.S. authorities say is foreign-led, and members of Sunni Awakening, who are allied with the American forces here. The head of Howr Rajab's Awakening Council, Sheik Maher al-Maenee, said 50 attackers burst into the village from three entry points at 6:30 a.m. One local said the insurgents overran an Iraqi Army checkpoint and commandeered two tanks. The attackers wore Iraqi Army fatigues, Maenee said, and Awakening Council uniforms stolen during previous raids. Iraqi troops fought back, killing at least three insurgents, and the fighting continued until 9:30 a.m., when U.S. soldiers arrived by air and in Humvees. The attackers fled south toward Busaifi, an area considered an Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia stronghold. Howr Rajab has been contested ground for much of the last six months. With its unpaved roads and lush palm groves where fighters can easily hide, it was prime territory for extremist Sunni groups who wanted a staging ground for attacks into Baghdad. The insurgents took over the rural area about a year ago and co-opted many local residents, marrying their daughters, using their homes and terrorizing Shiites who lived nearby. But last summer, locals banded together to form an Awakening Council to fight them. The two groups have had several pitched battles since late August and many local residents sent their women and children away for safety. But about four weeks ago they had begun to return to their homes because they thought they had stopped Al Qaeda's advance for good. Now, that looks far from certain. Meanwhile, reported cases of cholera have soared in recent weeks in especially impoverished parts of Iraq, said May Yassem, a spokeswoman for the Ministry of Health. Seventy-nine new cases have been reported, she said, most in the slums of eastern Baghdad, where sanitary conditions are poor. The water-borne disease, which causes diarrhea and dehydration, has killed 23 people in Iraq so far this year, Yassem said. Countrywide, 4,626 cases have been reported, she said, most near the northern city of Kirkuk. Also Thursday, 10 mortars were fired on the Green Zone The American military would not comment on whether there were casualties. And in Razkari, a town in Kurdistan, 1,500 demonstrators filled the streets, calling for the execution of three of Saddam Hussein's former henchmen, including Ali Hassan al-Majid, who is known as Chemical Ali. The three were sentenced to die this summer for using poisonous gas in a 1980s campaign that killed an estimated 180,000 Kurds. But one key Iraqi government official has refused to sign the execution order, to the fury of the Kurds. "I lost two of my sons," said one demonstrator, Amina Hammed Ibrahim, 70. "All I ask of the authorities is to treat these convicted men the same way they treated us." Separately Thursday, Abdul Zahra al-Talaqani, a spokesman for the Ministry of Tourism, said Iraq would allow nearly twice as many Iranian pilgrims to visit holy Shiite cities under a new agreement between the historic rivals. The plan, which Iran has yet to sign off on, would allow 2,500 Iranian pilgrims visit the holy cities of Karbala and Najaf each day, up from 1,500, Talaqani said. Baghdad and Samarra would remain off-limits, he said, because of security concerns. Reporting was contributed from Baghdad by Alissa J. Rubin, Anwar J. Ali, Khalid al-Ansary, Abeer Mohammed and Qais Mizher.
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