3 Sunni mosques bombed; U.S. forces intensify fighting

BAGHDAD — U.S. forces fighting al-Qaida and allied militants intensified operations Wednesday in Baghdad and on all four points of the compass around the capital. To the south, suspected Shiite militiamen bombed three Sunni houses of worship in what may presage a war of the mosques.

An Associated Press reporter in Baqouba, the capital of Diyala province to the north and east of Baghdad, reported intense gun battles in the streets and around the main market district as American and Iraqi forces sought to clear the city of al-Qaida fighters.

Gen. Abdul-Karim al-Rubaie, an Iraqi military commander in Diyala, told the AP that security forces had ringed the city and were not letting anyone come or go. He said many al-Qaida fighters had hidden their weapons and were trying to flee Baqouba.

"We fear that the insurgents want to mingle with civilians. ... Citizens have given us the names of hundreds of al-Qaida elements who have quit fighting and are hiding in their houses in Baqouba. These people are going to be arrested after the end of the battles," the general said.

The latest military report on the Diyala offensive, which began Monday night, said U.S.-led forces had killed 41 insurgents, discovered five weapons caches and destroyed 25 bombs and five booby-trapped houses.

Toward nightfall Wednesday, provincial police reported that a mortar round crashed into a village east of Baqouba and killed two women and two children. It was not known who fired the round.

The head of a Sunni insurgent group that has turned against al-Qaida in Diyala province and is cooperating with U.S. and Iraqi forces in the area said his fighters were participating in the operations and had succeeded in clearing several neighborhoods in eastern and western Baqouba.

The group leader, who declined to be identified for fear of retribution, spoke as his fighters linked arms, chanted and danced. Women ululated in celebration. An AP reporter also saw residents in the Mustafa area in western Baqouba serving food to the former insurgent fighters. Other residents began repairing their shops.

The U.S. military said it has 10,000 American soldiers in Diyala province, an al-Qaida bastion, a troop strength that matched in size the force that American generals sent against the insurgent-held city of Fallujah 2 1/2 years ago.

With all of the nearly 30,000 additional troops ordered to Iraq by President Bush now in place, the military said the massive operations on Baghdad's flanks were "a powerful crackdown to defeat extremists" and named the combined offensives "Operation Phantom Thunder."