U.S. Forces Attack Iraqi Holy City

Until Friday, U.S. forces had been content to chip away at Sadr's forces on the outskirts of Najaf, fearing that a frontal attack near the holy places would inflame Shiite opinion. Shiites, who account for 60 percent of Iraq's population, have largely accepted the U.S.-led occupation after years of repression under the former government of Saddam Hussein, which was dominated by Sunni Muslims.

U.S. military officials also have been reluctant to move against Sadr personally for fear of angering his followers. The operations on the outskirts of Najaf and other southern cities were meant to press him to accept a negotiated solution.

U.S. military officials said Sadr, whose fighters are mostly from outside Najaf, is widely unpopular inside the city. Najaf's primary industry is catering to Iranian Shiite pilgrims, a trade that blossomed after Hussein's ouster but has dwindled to nothing with the violence.

On Thursday, Sadr's militants broke up public demonstrations against him by firing rifles into the air. Shiite leaders called off an anti-Sadr rally scheduled in Najaf.

U.S. military officials said that while they believe Sadr must be defeated now to prevent his influence from spreading, they are still constrained by concerns about damaging the holy sites.

"We want to do everything we can to avoid widening this problem from Moqtada to something more," said Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, chief spokesman for the U.S. military in Iraq. "We certainly want to avoid being drawn into an attack that would create an incident that has strategic impact."

The images of U.S. tanks near the Shrine of Imam Ali, one of Shiite Islam's holiest mosques, brought calls for resistance during Friday prayer services at pro-Sadr mosques.

"Where are those people who said Najaf is a red line?" Abdul Hadi Daraji asked several thousand worshippers at the al-Hikma Mosque in Sadr City, an eastern Baghdad slum named for the young cleric's father, who was assassinated in 1999. "I'm asking all the people here, 'If anyone feels he is able to go to Najaf to support your brothers, go!' "

Witnesses said Najaf's Thulfiqar Hotel came under fire Friday morning as U.S. tanks rattled through the streets. Correspondents from the Reuters news agency, Agence France-Presse and the Associated Press, as well as The Washington Post and the U.S.-funded al-Hurra satellite channel, reside at the hotel.

As described by witnesses, tank rounds struck the roof, the lobby and a courtyard behind the building, sending cameras toppling and reporters ducking for cover. Some suffered minor injuries.

"They first made warning shots," said Farhan, the owner. "When the reporters wouldn't move [from the roof] they shot."

In sporadic clashes throughout the day, U.S. forces killed at least four Iraqis, including two Mahdi Army fighters, and wounded 25 others, according to hospital reports. And Ahmed Ali, assistant director of Najaf's Hakim Hospital, said that "the number of killed could increase because we have some critically wounded people." Not all the dead reach hospitals, Najaf residents said; some are immediately buried by their comrades.

Despite the intense fighting, Sadr delivered a scheduled sermon at Friday prayers in the main mosque in Kufa, roughly six miles east of Najaf. He warned that others were trying to divide the Shiite community and advised a rival Shiite militia attached to a political party not to fall for the ploy.

Over the past three days, U.S. forces have also fought pitched gun battles with insurgents near the shrines of Hussein and Abbas in Karbala -- mosques that the insurgents have sought to use as fortresses. U.S. officials estimated that more than two dozen insurgents have been killed in Karbala in recent days.

Combat continued there Friday, and persistent firefights made gathering the dead and wounded Iraqis impossible, witnesses said. Those who fell near houses were quickly pulled inside and later returned to their families.

For the first time, fighting spread to Nasiriyah, a Shiite city southeast of Najaf. Insurgents overran the governor's office, a police station and a hotel. At the police station, the militants briefly held 16 U.S.-trained Iraqi policemen and seized four patrol cars, witnesses there said.

The action followed a call by the Mahdi Army commander in Nasiriyah, which has been largely calm in recent weeks, to rise up. Kimmitt said during his regular afternoon news conference that the situation there was under control. A few hours later, however, Sadr's militiamen attacked the occupation authority offices. One Philippine contractor was wounded.

Special correspondents Omar Fekeiki and Naseer Nouri in Baghdad, and Saad Sarhan in Najaf contributed to this story.