U.S. and Iraqi Troops Push Into Fallujah

Iraq's interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, urges Iraqi troops to free the people of Fallujah "taken hostage" by insurgents. (Pool Photo/Mehdi Fedouach Via Reuters)

Allawi imposed a 24-hour curfew on Fallujah and nearby Ramadi starting at 6 p.m. and banned weapons in the two cities. He also closed border crossings with Syria and Jordan and shuttered Baghdad's international airport for 48 hours.

The border closing, which does not apply to overland food shipments, was intended to prevent foreign guerrillas from moving into Iraq and joining the insurgency. U.S. and Iraqi officials have described the insurgent force in Fallujah as a mixture of Iraqi and foreign guerrillas numbering as many as 3,000.

The Association of Muslim Scholars, which represents Iraq's 3,000 Sunni Muslim clerics and supports the insurgency, warned Iraqi soldiers against taking part in the offensive. In a statement, the group urged Iraqis against "being deceived that you are fighting terrorists from outside the country, because by God you are fighting the townspeople and targeting its men, women and children, and history will record every drop of blood you spill in oppressing the people of your nation."

Recent visitors to Fallujah have said it is largely empty of women, children and the elderly, but that a large majority of the military-age men who remain are "sons of Fallujah." Allawi brushed aside the notion that most of the insurgents in the city are Iraqis.

"I think there is a misperception," Allawi told reporters. "There is a division between the Iraqi people and the terrorists. We are after the terrorists. We are not after anybody else."

Recalling the massacre of 49 Iraqi National Guard recruits over the Oct. 23-24 weekend by a group led by Zarqawi, Allawi declared: "They say they are targeting multinational forces. They are killing and massacring the Iraqi people!"

"They think that Iraq now is weak, but I warn them from this place that the time of action has begun, and I will never allow anyone to inflict harm on the Iraqi people, whether they are foreign terrorists or the mercenaries of Saddam Hussein."

The prime minister said emergency powers that his government invoked on Sunday would be used selectively to target other cities where insurgents hold sway. "We are going to confront all the hotbeds in Iraq and get rid of all the terrorists," he said.

In interviews Monday, several Iraqis said they welcomed the government's hard line, calling the imposition of emergency powers long overdue.

"This law should be implemented in a tough, firm way, because there is a certain softness in this government," said Wadhah Jarrah, 60, a lawyer. "Why aren't those who kill police and National Guardsmen in cold blood tried and hanged?"

Sundis Abdallah, 52, a government employee, said: "This law is our last hope to achieve security. . . . These are the forces that are supposed to protect us. If they are killed, then who will protect the people, the state, the children? Criminals should be dealt with firmly so that the rest of the state can go forward."

But at his cigarette stand in Baghdad's Karrada district, Munaf Jabbar wondered what all the fuss was about.

"We have been living in emergency since this government was formed," he said. "Let them not deceive themselves. Imposing a curfew? It is already imposed. If you go out at 8 or 9 at night, you won't find anybody in the street."

In the hours before troops advanced on Fallujah, U.S. warplanes and gunships dropped bombs and fired artillery rounds into the city, targeting insurgents' defensive positions and blowing up booby traps intended to stall the offensive. The air assault lit the city in a giant explosion of orange, followed by the white twinkle of falling embers.