BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - U.S. forces hunting down followers of Iraq's most wanted terrorist pushed into a lawless region near the Syrian border Tuesday after meeting unexpected resistance from insurgents hidden in remote desert outposts along the southern banks of the Euphrates River.
Marines fought house-to-house Monday against dozens of well-armed insurgents firing at them from balconies, rooftops and sandbagged bunkers in the border town of Obeidi and surrounding villages, the Los Angeles Times reported.
As many as 100 militants have been killed since Operation Matador, one of the largest American offensives in Iraq in six months, began Saturday night in Qaim, 200 miles west of Baghdad, the military said.
At least three U.S. Marines have been killed in the offensive, which involves more than 1,000 Marines, sailors and soldiers backed by helicopter gunships and fighter jets.
A Los Angeles Times reporter embedded with U.S. forces said 20 American troops were wounded, but the U.S. military could not immediately confirm that.
Gunmen, meanwhile, kidnapped the governor of Iraq's western Anbar province Tuesday and told his family he would be released when U.S. forces withdraw from Qaim, relatives said. Gov. Raja Nawaf Farhan al-Mahalawi was seized as he drove from Qaim to the provincial capital of Ramadi, his brother, Hammad, told The Associated Press.
The offensive comes amid a surge of militant attacks across Iraq, often targeting security forces and civilians, since the new government was announced April 28.
Two car bombs exploded in Baghdad, killing at least seven people and wounding 19, police said. Three American soldiers were among the injured, the U.S. military said.
It also said three U.S. Marines were killed in central Iraq on Monday, one by a homemade bomb in Nasser Wa Salaam, 25 miles west of Baghdad, and two others by indirect fire in Karmah, 50 miles west of the capital.
Marine Capt. Jeffrey Pool said troops built a pontoon bridge across the Euphrates on Monday and pushed into the northern Jazirah Desert, a largely unpatrolled area near the Syrian border.
"This is an area which we believe has been pretty heavy with foreign insurgents from many different areas _ Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Palestine," Lt. Col. Steven Boylan, a spokesman for U.S. forces in Iraq, told The Associated Press late Monday. "That's a fairly porous area of the border because of the terrain. It is very difficult."
Residents reported fighting Tuesday in Obeidi, 185 miles west of Baghdad, and the two nearby towns of Rommana and Karabilah. Speaking by telephone, they said frightened residents were fleeing the Qaim area.
"It's truly horrific, there are snipers everywhere, rockets, no food, no electricity," Abu Omar al-Ani, a father of three, said from Qaim on Monday night. "Today five rockets fell in front of my house. ... We are mentally exhausted."
Pool said insurgents had tried to launch a counterattack Monday night 4 1/2 miles from U.S. Camp Gannon in Qaim. They attacked a Marine convoy with small arms fire, rocket-propelled grenades, roadside bombs and two suicide car bombers, Pool said.
One bomb damaged an armored Humvee, and a suicide car bomber was destroyed by a U.S. Marine tank, but no Marines were killed and 10 insurgents surrendered, Pool said.
Marine commanders expressed surprise at the extent of resistance Monday in Obeidi and surrounding villages on the southern side of the Euphrates, telling the Chicago Tribune their intelligence had indicated the insurgency had massed on the other side of the waterway.
In the towns of Sabah, Obeidi and Karabilah, insurgents fired mortar rounds at U.S. Marine convoys along the Euphrates' southern edge, the Los Angeles Times said.
An embedded Chicago Tribune reporter wrote that in one house, militants in the basement fired rifles and machine guns upward through holes in the walls at ankle height, aiming at spots the Marines' body armor did not cover.
At one point, the Times said, a Marine walked into a house and an insurgent hiding in the basement fired through a floor grate, killing him. Another Marine who was retrieving a wounded comrade suffered shrapnel wounds from a militant's grenade, the Times said.
Marine commanders expressed surprise at the extent of resistance Monday in Obeidi and villages on the southern side of the Euphrates, telling the Chicago Tribune their intelligence had indicated the insurgency had massed on the other side of the river.
In Sabah, Obeidi and Karabilah, the Times reporter said, insurgents fired mortar rounds at U.S. Marine convoys along the southern edge of the Euphrates.
The report said one Marine suffered a broken back and at least two were wounded Sunday when a land mine hit their tank.
The New York Times reported that Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle fighters dropped two 500-pound laser-guided bombs and fired 510 20-millimeter cannon rounds Sunday against insurgents around Qaim and that Marine F/A-18 fighters fired 319 20-millimeter cannon rounds.
"The enemy honestly felt that they had a sense of security up there," U.S. Col. Bob Chase, chief of operations for the 2nd Marine Division, told the newspaper. "Now it is no longer a safe haven, and it will never be a safe haven again."
He was quoted as saying insurgents have had a network of illegal "rat lines" of men and materials moving from Syria into Iraq that had to be stopped.
Meanwhile, Italian Foreign Minister Gianfranco Fini suggested that Italian troops could stay in Iraq into early 2006, after Iraqi elections are held _ longer than the Italian premier had previously indicated.
He said the withdrawal of the 3,000-member contingent could coincide with "the final act of the U.N. path" setting elections in December. He said, though, that the elections themselves could be delayed another month or two, pushing back any pullout.
Premier Silvio Berlusconi has said Italy planned to begin reducing its contingent by about 300 troops in September, although he said any decision would be made with the U.S.-led coalition and Iraqi officials, and would depend on security.
Japan's defense chief Yoshinori Ono said the apparent kidnapping of one of its citizens would not affect the country's deployment of 550 troops in southern Iraq.
The Sunni militant Ansar al-Sunnah Army claimed on its Web site it had kidnapped Akihiko Saito, 44, after ambushing a group of five foreign contractors protected by Iraqi forces. It said Saito was "seriously injured" in the fighting and that the others had died.
A spokesman for Saito's employer, Cyprus-based security firm Hart GMSSCO, confirmed he was missing after an ambush Sunday night involving Hart personnel.
Saito's brother, Hironobu, urged Tokyo to stay the course.
"If the Japanese government decides it's best to stay in Iraq, I will support (that). ... I do not expect the Japanese government to waver for the sake of my brother," he said.
Tuesday's worst car bomb attack in Baghdad occurred near a movie theater in al-Nasr Square. The Interior Ministry said at least seven people were killed and 16 wounded by a suicide car bomb that exploded as a U.S. military convoy was passing.
A U.S. military spokeswoman, Capt. Kelly Lewis, confirmed the attack, but said it apparently targeted an Iraqi army patrol, wounding at least 10 Iraqis, including security forces and civilians. Three American soldiers were also wounded, Lewis said, but she could not confirm whether they were part of a convoy.
Three policemen were wounded when a car bomb exploded several miles to the south of al-Nasr Square in Abu Nawas, an area of the capital once famous for riverside restaurants and nightclubs.
Also Tuesday, parliament appointed a 55-member committee of legislators from Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish groups to draw up a new constitution. Political leaders spent the first three months since the Jan. 30 elections trying to form a government and now have until Aug. 15 to draft a constitution that must then be approved in a national referendum.
Copyright 2004 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Market Data 
Markets 
AI
