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Blasts Kill at Least 72 in Baghdad
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But in a sign of simmering tensions even in those parts of southern Iraq considered relatively calm, a substantial number of U.S. troops on Thursday reinforced the Polish forces that control Diwaniyah, the southern city where Iraqi troops battled Mahdi Army militiamen this week, the Reuters news agency reported.
In Baghdad, officials from Sadr's organization said Thursday that the Mahdi Army had clashed with U.S. forces in eastern Baghdad on Wednesday night. A U.S. military spokeswoman said she had no information about fighting in the area.
Sahib al-Amiri, a close aide to Sadr in Najaf, said the fighting began after U.S.-led forces tried to raid Sadr's offices in the Kamaliyah, Obaydi and Fedaliya areas of the capital.
The Mahdi Army members blocked roads with burning tires to prevent the forces from entering, he said. Then gunfire erupted.
Sheik Hassan al-Baghdadi, head of the Sadr office in Kamaliyah, said the mood in that neighborhood had been tense for two weeks, since U.S. forces began raiding Shiite mosques and harassing residents. He said the Americans had arrested 50 local leaders and members of the Mahdi Army.
Then, on Wednesday night, residents believed the U.S. military was about to seize a prominent local imam, Ahmed al-Aboudi of the Allawi Mosque in Obaydi. Aboudi said the Mahdi Army shot at U.S. troops to prevent his arrest and set an American vehicle on fire.
An Interior Ministry official said that dozens of Mahdi Army members were killed or wounded in the clashes and that five Iraqi army officers were killed and nine wounded. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the political sensitivity of the matter.
The American military on Thursday also announced the deaths of three service members on Wednesday. A Marine assigned to Regimental Combat Team 5 and a soldier assigned to the 1st Marine Logistics Group were killed in combat in Anbar province, and a soldier assigned to the 1st Brigade of the 34th Infantry Division was killed by a bomb in an unspecified location.
Correspondent Ellen Knickmeyer and special correspondents Naseer Nouri, Naseer Mehdawi and K.I. Ibrahim in Baghdad, special correspondent Saad Sarhan in Najaf and other Washington Post staff in Iraq contributed to this report.
