Baghdad, Iraq – U.S. and Iraqi forces blocked access to a town on the northeast outskirts of Baghdad where Shiite gunmen were dug in for a third day Monday behind earthen barriers. Police issued calls for residents to leave the town, and some said they were running out of food and fuel.
The blockade of Husseiniyah came as at least 16 people died when four car bombs rocked the center of the capital. Three of the blasts took place in one 30-minute span, as the relentless Baghdad summer sun pushed temperatures to 115 degrees.
Police, morgue and hospital officials reported at least 59 people killed or found dead nationwide, and the American military announced the deaths of three soldiers and a Marine. At least 3,636 members of the U.S. military have died since the Iraq war began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
The Shiite-dominated parliament said Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki should intervene to end the crackdown by U.S. and Iraqi forces on Husseiniyah. The town is a stronghold of the Mahdi Army, the militia loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, and straddles the highway to Baqubah, where American forces are in the second month of a drive to cleanse that region of al-Qaeda in Iraq.
A 51-year-old resident, who would give her name only as Um Bassem, said police, apparently expecting a major outbreak of fighting, had issued calls for residents to leave Husseiniyah if they could. She said food stocks were becoming low.
Lt. Col. Michael Donnelly, spokesman for U.S. forces north of Baghdad, said American and Iraqi forces were now allowing residents to walk or ride donkey carts to food vendors outside the city. Other vehicle movement was banned.
Trouble broke out in Husseiniyah when U.S. forces took small-arms fire late Friday and ordered an airstrike on the building from which the gunmen were shooting. The military said helicopters fired missiles at the building and three gunmen fled to a second building.
U.S. aircraft then bombed the second structure, setting off at least seven secondary blasts believed to have been caused by explosives and munitions stored inside the building, the military said. It added that Iraqi police told American forces six militants were killed and five wounded.
Iraqi police and hospital officials said 18 civilians had been killed and 21 wounded in the attacks.
Donnelly said militant gunmen “are using civilians as protection and have no regard for the innocent.”
Iran’s ambassador to Baghdad, meanwhile, confirmed that the United States and Iran will discuss the security situation in Iraq today in Baghdad, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported.
