Mortar barrage on Mosque kills 27...
now we have wholesale killing...Iraqi on Iraqi with our blessing....you are about to see full scale CIVIL WAR with all of the Arab countries involved...we will be the target....
Bush and his cronies .....they were warned repeatedly about this....
Iraq's Top Shiite Cleric Arrives in Najaf
By ABDUL HUSSEIN AL-OBEIDI, Associated Press Writer
NAJAF, Iraq - Iraq (news - web sites)'s top Shiite cleric made a dramatic return to Najaf at the head of a massive convoy Thursday hoping to end three weeks of fighting in the holy city. But hours earlier, a mortar barrage hit a mosque filled with Iraqis preparing to join his march, killing 27 people and wounding 63.
Along with the mortar attack, another group of thousands of marchers heading into Najaf from its sister-city Kufa came under fire from an Iraqi National Guard base. At least three people were killed and 46 wounded.
The violence could undermine the peace effort by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani -- the most widely respected cleric among Iraq's Shiite majority. His intervention could be the best hope so far to end the fighting between U.S.-Iraqi forces and the Mahdi Army militia of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
Upon al-Sistani's arrival, the heavy clashes in Najaf appeared to ease, though gunfire still echoed sporadically across the city. Several hundred yards away from the house where al-Sistani was staying, al-Sadr fighters and Iraqi security forces exchanged fire, and at least three people were wounded.
After al-Sistani's arrival, the U.S. military announced it would hold its fire for 24 hours "to see if this agreement will be adhered to by al-Sadr," said U.S. Rear Adm. Gregory J. Slavonic, a military spokesman. "Coalition forces will support Sistani's effort to return the city to the citizens of Najaf."
With all sides -- the Americans, the Iraqi government and al-Sadr -- giving at least nominal support to al-Sistani's efforts, it was not known who fired the mortars that struck the mosque in Kufa or whether it was an attempt to sabotage the peace effort. Iraqi police have shot at peaceful marchers several times in the past few days.
The 75-year-old ayatollah is seeking to bring his enormous popularity to bear, encouraging Shiites to march on Najaf and get all sides to stop fighting.
Thousands of people heeded the call, marching from their hometowns to Najaf and gathering on the outskirts of the holy city Thursday, but witnesses said police barred them from entering the city.
The fighting here has killed scores of civilians and nearly paralyzed the city since it began Aug. 5. In the last 24 hours, 55 people were killed and 376 injured during clashes in Najaf, Sa'ad al-Amili of the Health Ministry said Thursday. At least 40 people have been killed in Kufa over the same period, including the victims in the mosque.
The military said Thursday that a U.S. soldier in Baghdad was killed by a mortar attack the night before. As of Wednesday, 964 U.S. service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq in March 2003, according to the U.S. Defense Department.
Al-Sistani -- who had been in London undergoing medical treatment -- has refused to get involved in previous crises and has stayed above the fray, supporting neither al-Sadr nor the U.S. troops and the pro-U.S. government.
He holds the loyalty of a far broader swath of Iraq's Shiite majority than al-Sadr. Al-Sadr's fiery anti-U.S. message has drawn many poorer, disillusioned Shiites but is seen by other Shiites as too radical. Al-Sadr's followers have set up their own religious courts and arrested hundreds of people on charges including selling alcohol and music deemed immoral.
Al-Sistani is calling for Najaf and Kufa to be declared weapons-free cities, for all foreign forces to withdraw from Najaf and leave security to the police and for the Iraqi government to compensate those harmed by the fighting here.
Al-Sistani's 30-vehicle convoy drove 220 miles from the southern city of Basra to Najaf, joined by at least a thousand cars from towns along the way, where supporters on the street cheered al-Sistani.
He arrived in Najaf just before 3 p.m. and went directly to one of his houses in the al-Sa'ad neighborhood, about a mile from the revered Imam Ali Shrine, where the militants were holed up.
Interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi declared a 24-hour cease-fire in Najaf from the time of al-Sistani's arrival "to reinforce our commitment to peace."
Allawi expressed hope al-Sistani's peace initiative would succeed so the government would not have to resort to a long-threatened raid on the Imam Ali Shrine -- an action that would likely outrage Iraq's Shiite majority.
"I stress that this is the last call for peace and that this is the last chance to put an end to the spilling of innocent blood," Allawi said in a statement. "God willing, our prayers for Iraq's peace and stable security will be met."
Al-Sadr's aides had backed al-Sistani's call for a march on Najaf and urged their followers to join in.
Thousands of Shiites had gathered at the mosque in Kufa, an al-Sadr stronghold, to march to Najaf when the mortar rounds hit -- one inside the mosque compound and around two others at the main gate, according to witnesses.
"This is a criminal act. We just wanted to launch a peaceful demonstration," said Hani Hashem, bringing an injured friend to the hospital.
The blasts killed 27 people and wounded 63, according to Mohammed Abdul Kadhim, an official at Furat al-Awsat hospital in Kufa.
Blood was splattered on the pavement in a courtyard beside the mosque and a pair of sandals was left nearby, according to Associated Press Television News footage. Shrapnel from the explosions tore small chunks out of walls and the pavement, but the compound did not appear to have suffered serious structural damage.
Outside the hospital's gate, crowds of angry people gathered, shouting "God is great!"
After the attack, thousands of demonstrators loyal to al-Sadr marched on nearby Najaf but came under fire from a base between the two cities housing Iraqi national guardsmen and U.S. troops, witnesses said.
The marchers scattered when the gunfire broke out. The day before, gunfire from the same base killed eight people and wounded 56 others who were taking part in what appeared to be a peaceful demonstration supporting al-Sadr.
Another mortar attack in Kufa on Wednesday, apparently targeting a police checkpoint, killed two civilians, including an 8-year-old boy.
Al-Sadr aide Hussam al-Husseini blamed the mortar attack on American forces backing Iraqi troops in the city. "We held the interim government responsible for this bombing," he said.
A U.S. military spokesman denied firing the barrage, saying troops were still avoiding targeting holy sites in Kufa and Najaf.
"We did not have any weapons systems, to include mortars, in range of the Kufa Mosque last night or today, nor have we conducted any military operations in the city for the last 48 hours," Marine Capt. Carrie Batson said in an e-mail to The Associated Press on Thursday.
Batson said that militants have been responsible for "wild, undisciplined fire" in the past.
Any damage inflicted by U.S. forces on holy sites would anger Iraq's Shiite majority and could spark a greater uprising against the fledgling interim government, which is also battling a persistent and bloody Sunni insurgency.
In other violence, saboteurs attacked about 20 oil pipelines in southern Iraq late Wednesday, reducing exports from the key oil producing region by at least one third, an official with the state-run South Oil Co. said Thursday on condition of anonymity.
AI
