- BAGHDAD -- U.S. military
officials said Monday that at least 200 Iraqi troops had deserted their
posts in the American-led offensive on Fallujah.
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- The troops supporting the nation's interim government
are facing pressure from some Iraqi religious groups and threats from insurgents.
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- Prominent Iraqi Muslim clerics, including influential
Sunnis and top aides to rebel Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr, condemned the
Iraqi troops serving alongside Americans in Fallujah. The insurgent council
that has controlled Fallujah for the past six months threatened to behead
Iraqi troops who entered the city to "fight their own people."
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- The U.S. military and Iraqi commanders estimated that
up to 200 Iraqi troops had resigned, with another 200 "on leave."
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- "Some people were afraid because they received threats,"
said Sgt. Abdul Raheem, an Iraqi soldier. "They were afraid of death."
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- Clerics in Fallujah blasted the Iraqi troops, saying
in a statement that such troops were "the occupiers' lash on their
fellow countrymen."
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- "We swear by God that we will stand against you
in the streets, we will enter your houses and we will slaughter you just
like sheep," the statement said.
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- Prime Minister Ayad Allawi made a surprise visit Monday
to bolster the morale of Iraqi troops at the Camp Fallujah base.
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- "Your job is to arrest the killers, but if you kill
them, let it be," Allawi told them.
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- The Association of Muslim Scholars, a Sunni umbrella
group said to represent 3,000 mosques, issued a religious edict calling
for all Iraqi soldiers, National Guardsmen and police officers to quit
immediately or become legitimate targets for the rebels. The fatwa included
a warning to the forces not to repeat the experience of Najaf, where Iraqis
joined an American-led effort to crush Sadr's uprising in the southern
Shiite holy city in August.
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- Hundreds of Iraqi troops are playing a support role in
Fallujah, mainly providing security for areas that American forces have
cleared.
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- Fallujah isn't the first battle to elicit mass desertions
by Iraqi troops. Hundreds were reported in the August standoff over Najaf,
and many troops refused to fight the last time U.S. troops entered Fallujah,
in April.
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- "Those who kill Iraqis are not Iraqis," said
Sheik Mohammed Bashar al Faidhi of the scholars' association. "We
told them: You made a terrible mistake in Najaf. Be careful not to repeat
this experience because the occupier will leave one day, but the people
will stay."
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- Despite the desertions, Iraq's security forces celebrated
two apparent victories this week.
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- In the flash-point town of Iskandariyah, south of Baghdad,
Iraqi police disguised as civilians ambushed a rebel checkpoint and killed
25 insurgents, according to Iraqi government officials.
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- A Babylon province intelligence officer who wouldn't
give his name for security reasons said 60 officers stormed the checkpoints
and sustained no casualties. The all-Iraqi operation came after a string
of large-scale attacks on Iraqi security personnel throughout the country.
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- "They were criminal, armed terrorists and we destroyed
them all," the officer said.
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- The other success came Sunday night when Iraqi commandos
took over Fallujah's main hospital with U.S. backing.
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- Four suspected foreign fighters, including two Moroccans,
were seized in the operation on the western bank of the Euphrates River.
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- The Iraqi forces blasted open doors and handcuffed patients
as they searched the building for gunmen, American military spokesmen said.
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- Medical staff at the scene offered a different version:
An overzealous, thuggish band of Iraqi troops stormed a place where there
were no rebels and terrified ill and injured patients.
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- "They looted from us, they hurt us and they didn't
respect the jobs we were trying to do," said Khaled Hindi, 38, an
ambulance driver, who said Iraqi forces stole his cell phone and money.
"There were fighters outside the hospital, but there were none inside."
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- Copyright © 2004, Chicago Tribune
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