BAGHDAD — Entire sections of Baghdad’s embattled Sadr City district have been left nearly abandoned by civilians fleeing a U.S.-led showdown with Shiite militias and seeking aid after facing shortages of food and medicine, humanitarian groups said Wednesday.
The reports by the agencies, including the United Nations children’s fund, add to the individual accounts by civilians pouring out of the Sadr City area as clashes intensify.
U.S. forces have increased airpower and armored patrols in the attempt to cripple Shiite militia influence in Sadr City, a slum of 2.5 million people that serves as the Baghdad base for the Mahdi Army, led by anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
The battles started in late March after the Iraqi government opened a crackdown on militias and armed gangs in the southern city of Basra, including some groups Washington says have links to Iran.
Claire Hajaj, a UNICEF spokeswoman based in Jordan, said that up to 150,000 people — including 75,000 children — were isolated in sections of Sadr City “cordoned off by military forces.” She said that about 6,000 people have been forced to flee their homes and that some areas of southeastern Sadr City were virtually abandoned.
The U.S. military is trying to weaken the militia’s grip in the slum and disrupt rocket and mortar strikes from Sadr City on the U.S.-protected Green Zone.
The fighting has prevented aid workers from reaching residents of the neighborhood, and in past weeks has led to shortages of water, food and medicine, Hajaj said.
She noted, however, that the water shortage seems to have abated in recent days, and the Iraqi government and U.S. forces have been able to restore some basic services to certain areas.
U.S. commanders have stressed that they are pushing to restore services — water, electricity, garbage collection — to areas once the security situation permits.
Meanwhile, al-Arabiya television identified the leader of an al-Qaeda in Iraq umbrella group as Hamid Dawoud al-Zawi, a former member of Saddam Hussein’s army who joined the Sunni-led insurgency after the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.
Previously, the leader of the group, known as the Islamic State of Iraq, was identified as Abu Omar al-Baghdadi.
The al-Arabiya report cited the source as an Iraqi police official, but gave no further details. The U.S. military would not comment on the authenticity of the report, citing security reasons.
In Kuwait, a Sunni fundamentalist linked to al-Qaeda, Mubarak al-Bathali, was quoted as saying Iran provides “weapons and money” to Sunni insurgents in Iraq.
Al-Bathali claimed Tehran is seeking to use all Iraqi groups to keep U.S. forces “too busy” to consider a military strike on Iran. Al-Bathali, in an interview with the al-Qabas daily, offered no firm evidence to back up the claim.
